Madsen the boss in Borgata Winter Open

02/08/2010

It was a good week and a good live tournament for poker pro Jeff Madsen at the Borgata last week; on Friday the young twenty-something gun walked away with the respect and the $625 000 main prize in the $3 500 buy-in Borgata Winter Open, besting a field of 765 other hopefuls.

The Atlantic City event mustered a guaranteed prize pool of $2 million (it eventually topped out at $2.5 million, enabling 72 players to cash) and attracted a slew of highly experienced and talented live tournament players.

Taking their seats at the final table on the last day were Madsen, Sirous Jamshidi, David Marchese, Barkley Hamilton, Nick Kamen, Al Grimes, David Fox, Ross Mallor, Chan Pelton and Matt Matros.

In the end it came down to a heads between Madsen and Sirous Jamshidi, with Madsen holding a chip lead that he never really relinquished, deploying a small ball strategy to continually grind his opponent down. Jamshidi took home $367 794 for his second placing.

Although a significant win, this one is by no means the biggest in Madsen's highly successful online and live poker career. The young player already holds two coveted 2006 World Series of Poker bracelets and won $660 000 in a NLHE tournament at the Rio in Las Vegas recently, following this with a $643 000 NLHE win only a week later. Last year he made two final tables in the L.A. Poker Classic scoring a total of nearly $230 000, and he recently finished third in the Doyle Brunson Five Diamond World Poker Classic for $69 000.

In January this year Madsen placed 19th in the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure main event for $87 000.