The Sunday Briefing: PokerStars Breaks New World Record

December 28 2009, Mickey Doft

It was anything but a typical Sunday on the virtual felt as the last weekend of 2009 came to a close in unusual fashion. PokerStars broke the Guinness Book of World Records for holding the biggest online poker tournament in history. To be exact, 149,196 players ponied up one dollar to take a shot at the $300,000 guaranteed prize pool. When all was said and done 30,000 people cashed in the tournament, and "oskar69" won it and took home $50,000.

The bigger buy-in tournaments on PokerStars went smoothly also as seven players emerged with six-figure scores in the Sunday Majors. The Sunday Million was won by "coach6999", who pocketed $143,444.13 after a deal had been agreed upon between the final five players. Larry “BBOY3110” Sharp claimed the day’s biggest prize, $213,443.78 for his second-place finish.

There were no big scores on Full Tilt because it suffered a network outage just before 8 p.m. on the East Coast. When the site was back up and running over two hours later, all running tournaments had been voided.

PokerStars Sunday Million
Buy-in: $200+15
Prize Pool: $1,868,800
Entrants: 9,344

*1. coach6999 - $143,444.13
*2. Larry “BBOY3110” Sharp - $213,443.78
*3. tsakalias - $190,767.65
*4. schnaggels19 - $122,287.23
*5. mystinen60 - $100,474.88
6. OBVAMENTS - $56,064
7. robvleugel - $37,376
8. plusmillion - $20,556.80
9. Mr Puckey - $13,081.60

*denotes five-way deal leaving $30,000 to the eventual winner

Notable Finishes: Sadan “the_snail03” Turker (12th - $9,717.76), Simon “pokerbrat13” Charette (16th - $4,672), tomgus456 (21st - $4,017.92), Andy “BKiCe” Seth (28th - $3,644.16).

PokerStars Sunday Warm-Up
Buy-in: $200+15
Prize Pool: $921,000
Entrants: 4,605

*1. NinjasTyle87 - $129,846.18
*2. dmmarquez - $121,918.80
3. Joseph “JBlaze20” Chaplin - $75,982.50
4. montjeu8 - $52,036.50
5. Comeback2008 - $39,142.50
6. Steinapride - $29,932.50
7. haneferd - $20,722.50
8. ReadOnYou - $11,512.50
9. pokerwille - $7,368

* denotes heads-up deal leaving $10,000 to the eventual winner

Notable Finishes: Joel “SpadeSkillz” Dickerson (13th - $4,144.50), Theo “pittrounder” Tran (16th - $2,763).

PokerStars Sunday 500
Buy-in: $500+30
Prize Pool: $513,000
Entrants: 1,026

*1. Zackattak13 - $79,000
*2. pleasepick - $73,668.80
3. Jamie “B_Davis5” McCarrel - $48,735
4. Tony “DrunkPPlaya” Gargano - $35,704.80
5. sethsethseth - $25,393.50
6. bballin04 - $20,263.50
7. Mike “Pipedream17” Dietrich - $15,133.50
8. nikov - $10,003.50
9. majskolv - $5,643

* denotes heads-up deal

Notable Finishes: Nicolas “PKaiser” Fierro (10th - $4,565.70), Hiren “hustla16” Patel (12th - $4,565.70), Joao Mathias “joaoMathias” Baumgarten (13th - $3,539.70), Steve “stevejpa” Paul-Ambrose (17th - $2,513.70)

PokerStars $215 Rebuy
Buy-in: $200+15
Prize Pool: $214,400
Entrants: 307

1. Dave “SexSeen” Sands - $43,952
2. 1$ickDisea$E - $32,160
3. Mike “Pot Odds 3” McNeil - $24,227.20
4. bad_beat_bud - $18,224
5. Tommie “Godfatti” Janssen - $12,649.60
6. Matt “cwp394” Ross - $9,648
7. Sorel “zangbezan24” Mizzi - $7,504
8. Ryan “mossified84” Skomac - $5,360
9. David “vui-qua-di” Pham - $3,752

Notable Finishes: Adam “Roothlus” Levy (12th - $3,430.40), Alvaro “VARICO” Ballesteros (16th - $2,358.40), Christian “charder30” Harder (18th - $2,358.40), Chris “Moorman1” Moorman (19th - $1,929.60).

Ultimate Bet $200K GTD
Buy-in: $200+15
Prize Pool: $200,000
Entrants: 966

1. BEARBEER - $44,920
2. SEXYGOOD - $26,900
3. Jason “ICU_FISH” Smith - $18,300
4. LOLPWNU - $12,900
5. KCREACTION23 - $10,900
6. VEGASVILLA8 - $8,900
7. 1SEXYDANCER - $6,900
8. E STUDENT - $4,900
9. JOE ROSS - $3,400

Notable Finishes: Simon “TEDL0GAN” Charette (13th - $1,720).

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Comments

donpeters
12-28-2009 07:52

Did you happen to find out why FTP was down? And what happened with the void, did players just finish in their current chip position and get paid out that way?