/ Matthew Pitt / 04 May 2011 / Leave a Comment 
British poker pro Rupert Elder woke up this morning with an extra €930,000 in his back pocket after winning the penultimate European Poker Tour event of Season 7 in San Remo, Italy. He defeated Max Heinzelmann heads up to resign the German to his second consecutive runner-up finish in EPT Main Events, having come second at EPT Berlin just a few weeks ago.
The final table of eight were all guaranteed to walk away with no less than €81,950 but one man who would have never thought he would be the one to pick up this amount was Roberto Spada who started the day third in chips behind Elder and Heinzelmann. But he had a disastrous start and doubled up Xuan Liu not once but twice and was left with just 480,000 chips with blinds at 40,000/80,000/5,000a. These found there way into the middle with the Italian holding just Kd3c and fell foul to Max Lykov's Ah9d when the board ran out Td-4s-7s-Js-8s.
Another hour passed before a flurry of eliminations so the play go from seven-handed to just four remaining players! First Costantino Russo three-bet shoved with 9h9s over the top of a Liu opening raise and lost the race against her AdQc, then less than five minutes later Massimiliano Manigrasso found himself all in with pocket queens only to be more than an 80% underdog to Elder's black kings. And the bust outs did not stop there, just ten minutes later and Francesco de Vivo, the last Italian in the field, found himself down to less than eight big blinds and he called them off with Qs9h when Liu shoved into him with Jh4d in a blind-versus-blind battle. A four on the flop was enough to send him to the rail, albeit with €220,000 to console himself with.
The surviving four players were all respected professional poker players and any one of them would have been deserving of the title. Lykov of Russia had the chance to become the first-ever double EPT winner but the poke3r gods were not shining down on him and sent him packing in very unfortunate circumstances. After seeing Heinzelmann open to 200,000 from the button and Liu three-bet to 490,000 in the small blind, Lykov must have thought he was in heaven as he had been dealt pocket kings in the big blind. He made it 925,000 to play and then called Liu's shove after Heinzelmann had folded. Liu was in a lot of trouble, her pair of tens a massive underdog and they fell further behind after the 2s-3s-2c flop. However, the dealer put out the Th on the turn to put the ball firmly back into her court and when the river was the 9c it was gave over for Lykov and he will have to wait to add to his 2009 EPT Kiev title.
Liu was next to go, ironically after getting her money in good against Elder. With blinds now at 60,000/120,000/15,000a, Elder opened with a 250,000 raise only to see Liu, the last-woman in the tournament, move all in for 2,480,000 chips. Elder reluctantly made the call with Ac7h and looked disgusted when Liu revealed AhJh. Any negative thoughts were soon banished though as Elder spiked a seven on a board reading 4h-5h-7d-Ts-6s to send the diminutive Liu to the rail.
Despite starting the heads up battle with a substantial 20,290,000 to 9,245,000 chip lead over Heinzelmann, Elder actually found himself down by a similar margin after just 45 minutes of one-on-one action and was actually a single card away from finishing second, but Lady Luck was certainly shining down on him to keep him in the game. Heinzelmann min-raised to 320,000 and Elder made the call, meaning both players saw a 7h-6c-9h flop. Heinzelmann lead out with a 300,000 bet, a bet that was raised to 825,000 by Elder then to 1,700,000 by Heinzelmann. Elder smooth-called the four-bet allowing the dealer to put out the As on the turn. Heinzelmann now checked then raised all in when Elder bet 2,410,000, Elder snap-called and turned over 6h6s for a set, but was being crushed by the Tc8s of Heinzelmann that had made a straight. Elder needed the river to pair or he would be eliminated and it did indeed pair as the Ac arrived to double him him and give him the advantage once again.
Elder won another massive pot 15 minutes later that saw him lead by almost 3-to-1 chips and then the final hand took place. Heinzelmann open-shoved from the button with Qd5s and after a brief pause Elder made the call with Ad5c. The board ran out 3s-2c-7c-Th-Ks and with that Heinzelmann was eliminated in second place, again, and Elder had become the EPT San Remo Champion.
The last stop on the EPT circuit is in a couple of days time, between May 7-12, in Madrid for the Grand Final. It would be quite amazing if Heinzelmann could make it to his third consecutive EPT final table, tune in to find out if he can indeed do just that.
Final table payouts
1st: Rupert Elder - €930,000
2nd: Max Heinzelmann - €600,000
3rd: Xuan Liu - €360,000
4th: Max Lykov - €290,000
5th: Francesco de Vivo - €220,000
6th: Massimiliano Manigrasso - €170,000
7th: Costantino Russo - €125,000
8th: Roberto Spada - €81,950
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