Highly successful Miami businessman, broker and realtor William Kakon (38) loves competing and poker, and makes Las Vegas and the World Series of Poker a regular annual holiday stop to get a little of both every year.
This year he achieved a major ambition to secure his first WSOP winner’s bracelet, at the same time picking up the $196,055 main prize in Event 11.
The $1,500 buy-in Limit Hold’em competition attracted a field of 660 players, many of them well respected names, generating a prize pool worth $891,000.
Seen taking their seats in the event were Matt Glantz , Jeff Shulman, David Chiu, Alexander Kostritsyn, Brandon Cantu and Shannon Shorr.
Moroccan-born Kakon lived and worked in capitals around the world before settling in Miami, where his business talents are widely recognised; for the past six years he has been listed in the top 1 percent of US brokers, having generated wealth in excess of $3 billion.
His competitive streak was evident in an aggressive but astute playing style that saw him survive the crowded field to carve up the final table and finally face 45-year-old New York poker pro Daniel Needleman in the heads up.
Ruthlessly but with good humour deploying his chip advantage, Kakon ground his last opponent into the runner up position, sending Needleman home with $121,051.
Other final table finishers were paid:
Mike Lancaster $78,693
Bryan Pimlott $57,799
Shannon Shorr $43,053
Kevin Song $32,485
Brandon Cantu $24,796
Hector Contreras $19,138
Alexander Kostritsyn $14,924