Season 12 of the World Series of Poker Circuit has started in fine fettle after Firas Haddad won a first event that attracted over 1,400 entrants at the Foxwoods Casino, Mashantucket, Connecticut.
The World Series of Poker Circuit (WSOPC) is like a carousel standing in the middle of an illuminated square – you can’t keep your eyes of it, and it keeps moving around and around.
It was only a fortnight ago that Loni Harwood applied a wet towel on the inflammation caused by the poker community’s misogynists, by winning the Season 11 WSOPC National Championships in North Carolina. A few days ago it started all over again.
The organizers were confident that the boys and girls would come out to play. A $500,000 guarantee was slapped on the tin. 1,457 entrants – spread over four starting flights, including 507 unique entries on Flight D – meant the guarantee was smashed. $734,910 would be divided between 153 players, $126,760 would go to the winner.
That honor fell to Firas Haddad. The New Yorker has been recording live scores for the past decade. Of the eight of them, seven have come in this very casino, but he has never experienced anything like this before. His previous best score was $36,369 after coming third in the 2006 Foxwoods Poker Classic.
Bradley St. Vincent continued his sweet run of form finishing in 15th place. He finished 58th at the WSOP Main Event before making the final table of the WSOPC National Championships finishing in fourth a fortnight ago.
The final table of nine was shrouded in mystery. Rami Jradeh was the only previous WSOPC gold ring winner in action. You have to go back to 2008 to cast your eyes on that statistic. The only non-American at the final table also had previous form. Mexican David Cossio took second in the huge WSOPC Main Event held in Harrah’s Horseshoe in Hammond in 2013 for $260,100. Other than that, the field was an inexperienced one in term of live scores.
Ultimately, Haddad would defeat Joseph Umdenstock in heads-up action. It was the latter’s first live tournament cash, Haddad was cashing in a WSOP event for the first time.
The final hand of play saw Umdenstock limp from the button before calling a Haddad raise. The flop was [6x] [5x] [3x] and Haddad open jammed for several times the size of the pot; Umdenstock called. It was pocket kings for Haddad, and ace-five for Umdenstock. The turn and the river changed nothing and Haddad was having a new ring slipped onto his finger.
Final Table Results
1st. Firas Haddad – $126,760
2nd. Joseph Umdenstock – $78,635
3rd. Rami Jradeh – $57,624
4th. Donald Lohr – $43,808
5th. Daniel McCoy – $33,350
6th. David Cossio – $25,685
7th. Eric Kitain – $20,012
8th. Irfan Karajic – $15,771
9th. Jovy Ounthongdy – $12,574
The WSOPC stop at Foxwoods has 11-more gold ring events waiting to play out including the Main Event.
