John “The Razor” Pham has broken his World Series of Poker bracelet drought in style in Las Vegas this year, winning not one but two of the coveted wrist jewelry. The Stockton, California player’s latest win was in Event 40, the $2 500 buy-in 2-7 Triple Draw, which drew an entry field of 238 players with a liberal sprinkling of big names.
Among the more recognisible hopefuls taking the field for this event were Robert Mizrachi, Terrence Chan, John Juanda, Mike Caro, Doyle and Todd Brunson, WSOP veteran Billy Baxter, Gavin Smith, Carlos Mortensen, Tom Schneider, Andy Block, Daniel Negreanu and David Sklansky.
Starting play in the final table round, Pham enjoyed a comfortable 230 000 chip lead over closest rivals Gioi Luong and Shun Uchida, who both made him work hard for his win. The threesome went through the other survivors to end up in a three handed contest that took several tension filled hours of play to resolve, with some tough and aggressive talk between Phan and Luong in a tense game.
Finally, it was Uchida who was eliminated, setting up a heads up between the combative Luong and Pham, with the latter exploiting his slight chip lead at that point to take the game in less than an hour, adding a second bracelet to his win in Event 29 last week and collecting the main $151 896 cash prize. It was the first double bracelet achieved so far this (2008) year.
731 players registered for Event 41, the $1 500 buy-in Mixed Hold’em competition, among them respected pros like Mats Gavatin, Jonathan Tamayo, Jan Von Halle, Nick Binger, Ricky Sanders, Fabrice Soulier and Lou Esposito. By day’s end, he field was down to 98 players which eventually salted down to a final table of nine, with Swedish professional Gavatin holding the chip lead on 405 000, closely pursued by Las Vegas pro Nick Binger on 339 000 and Florida amateur Frank Gary on 332 000.
Other final tablers were Chris Rentes, Michael Chu, Alex Jilali, David Machowsky, Jonathan Tamayo and David Sorger.
It looked as if it Binger all the way in the first few hours of final table play, as the Las Vegas pro eliminated six of his opponents, one of whom was the initial chip leader Gavatin. But it was not to be and Binger’s third place removal after almost five hours of action in the three handed stage cleared the way for a heads up between amateur player Frank Gary and pro Jonathan Tamayo, who had dominated the tournament in the earlier days of play and held a 600 000 chip lead.
Given the vagaries of fortune and poker, it wasn’t enough to hold the Florida amateur, who eventually emerged from the heads up victorious with his first WSOP jewelry and the main prize of $219 508. Tamayo pocketed the second place check of $140 093.