The amateur player Leigh Wiltshire has defeated all of the pros to take home the sumptuous first prize at the 2014 Sky Poker UK 6-Max Poker Championship Main Event at Dusk till Dawn.
When you have been involved with the biggest overlay in the history of poker, then the word ‘Guarantee’ should strike more fear into your nerve endings that a ghoul-faced little boy, scratching your window, and murmuring the words, “Let Me In.”
So Rob Yong is either a glutton for punishment, a thrill seeker, or has absolute faith in the ability and hard work of his team at Dusk till Dawn (DTD).
I think it’s the latter.
There is a word that the Japanese use that is called ‘Gemba’. Translated it means ‘the real place’, or in business terms, ‘where the work works.’ In DTD this will be the card room floor. If you want to run a successful card room then you need to understand Gemba. You need to understand your players and how they tick.
Yong is an expert at this.
This is why he slapped a £500,000 guarantee on the £1,000 Sky Poker UK 6-Max Poker Championship Main Event. They said they would come and they did.
It was close though.
They needed 500 players to ensure the guarantee was met and with 499 on a clock that was about to run down, in sauntered Sam Trickett to take his place in the field and bring a smile on the chops of Yong.
With the guarantee met the governor could relax, and the players could get on with their pursuit of glory. Trickett wouldn’t cash in the event, but there were plenty of recognizable faces that did: Neil Channing (14th), Jonathan Kalmar (17th), Tom Middleton (20th), Tom Hall (23rd) and Mathew Frankland (32nd) the absolute best of British.
The £110,000 first prize would end up in very unlikely hands. Now that’s not a sleight on the talents of Leigh Wiltshire, but it was a bloody tough field and format, and he had qualified for the event for just 1p. Now that’s what you call a great ROI.
Wiltshire is well known within the UK circles for his work with the Amateur Poker Association & Tour (APAT), and PokerNews UK Editor Matthew Pitt also advised us that he also gives his time to the Labrador Rescue Trust.
It seems Mr. Wiltshire’s life is all about giving to others, with the exception of when he is sat at the poker table.
Final Table Standings
1st. Leigh Wiltshire – £110,000
2nd. Abhishek Khaitan – £70,000
3rd. Stephen Devlin – £40,000
4th. Andy Young – £27,500
5th. Neil Strike – £20,000
6th. Paul Haycock – £16,000
In other Sky Poker 6-Max news, Elior Sion overcame a scintillating final table in the £3,000 High Roller to win £55,000; Mike Cummings took £20,000 in the £200 buy-in 6-Max Mini, and Ben Vinson topped a final table that included Mickey Petersen and Simon Trumper to win the £14,000 first prize in the £500 Pot-Limit Omaha (PLO).
