Julian Thomas Wins WPT Prague Main Event

Julian Thomas Wins WPT Prague Main Event

Monday, 23 December 2013

Prague has been a great place to be these past few days if you're called Julian and you come from Germany. After Julian Track took down the EPT Main Eventin the Czech capital, compatriot Julian Thomas repeated the trick in the World Poker Tour's 2013 finale.

Thomas pocketed a first prize of €283,827 after outlasting a 306-runner field at the city's Card Casino.

The German went into the six-man final table second in chips but kept a low profile during the early stages when two of his rivals for a pre-Christmas bonus hit the rail. Valeri Savov was the first to go, unluckily running his pocket kings into the pocket aces of Gintaras Simaitis.

Long-time leader Ognjen Sekularac was followed. The Serb struggled to get anything going and busted when a river shove with air was picked off by Vasili Firsau's trips. Lithuanian Simaitis departed in fourth when his As8s ran into Thomas's pocket queens. A 10h-9s-7s flop game Thomas a severe sweat but the board bricked out to send Simaitis away €86,723.

It didn't take long for the tournament to reach an explosive conclusion courtesy of a massive three-way all in. Thomas got the action going with a button raise which was greeted with a shove from small blind Andrey Shatilov who was holding QhJh. Firsau in the big blind came over the top with JJ which put Thomas to a decision. In reality it was no decsion at all as the German had two lovely aces in hand. They held to make it a German double in Prague and give Thomas his biggest ever live score.

After a near miss in Paris, Vasili Firsau will be disappointed at a second runner up finish in a World Poker Tour Main Event in the past two months. Combined prizes of over €415,000 should offer some consolation.

The final table positions and payouts were as follows:

1st Julian Thomas GER $283,827
2nd Vasili Firsau BEL $185,796
3rd Andrey Shatilov RUS $116,982
4th Gintaras Simaitis LTH $86,703
5th Ognjen Sekularac SER $64,683
6th Valeri Savov BUL $52,297



Tags: WPT Prague, Julian Thomas