A Look at the Season 9 PokerStars.net European Poker Tour Prague Side Events

December 18, 2012

For the past week, the PokerNews Live Reporting Team has been bringing you live updates from the Season 9 PokerStars.com European Poker Tour Prague Main Event. While that tournament was the cornerstone of the stop, it was just one of a whole festival that’s been being held in the Czech Republic.

As such, we thought it’d be a good idea to take a look at some of the preliminary events, starting with Guillaume Rivet’s win in the Eureka High Roller. Interestingly, the French Canadian runs in the same circle as Team PokerStars Pro and 2010 World Series of Poker Main Event champion Jonathan Duhamel; IPT High Roller at EPT Sanremo winner Marc-Andre Ladouceur; and recent World Poker Tour Montreal winner Jonathan Roy, just to name a few. All of these players have a title to their name, and now Rivet does too.

The 22-year-old managed to defeat Germany’s Robert Haigh, who has $138,113 in live lifetime winnings, to capture the Eureka High Roller title at the EPT9 Prague for €89,200. In one of the determing hands, Rivet, who began Day 2 as the chip leader, min-raised to 40,000 on the button, Haigh called, and then both players checked the 5♣J♥2♦ flop. Haigh proceeded to check-call a bet of 32,000 on the Q♦ turn, and then checked the 9♠ river. Rivet took the opportunity to bet nearly 25% of his stack, which Haigh called. Rivet tabled Q♠7♠, and it was good as Haigh simply mucked. Not long after, Rivet picked up 10♣10♠ to finish his opponent.

Not surprisingly, many of Rivet’s friends were in attendance including Duhamel, Ladouceur and Roy (see lead picture). "To be honest, there's so much luck in tournaments. Even if we were - and I don't think that we are - the best in the world we still wouldn't win that often," Rivet told the PokerStars Blog when asked about the Québécois’ recent results.

EPT9 Prague Eureka High Roller

Notable finishes: Jacob Toole (USA; 10th - €7,300); Philippe Ktorza (France; 12th - €6,100); Kyle Frey (USA; 14th - €5,200); Martin Jacobson (Sweden; 22nd - €3,850); Martin Staszko (Czech Republic; 24th - €3,850)

For more on the Eureka High Roller, visit the PokerStars Blog.

Telezhkin Takes Down Event #1 €1,100 No-Limit Hold’em

Two years ago, Kirill Telezhkin won the PokerStars Russian Poker Series Main Event in Kiev for $171,350, and now he’s back in the winner’s circle after taking down the first preliminary event of the EPT9 Prague—Event #1 €1,100 No-Limit Hold’em.

Telezhkin defeated a tough final table that included EPT7 Prague Main Event champ Roberto Romanello (9th - €2,830) and the United State’s Kyle Frey (2nd – €28,900), with whom he made a heads-up deal. Other notables finishes in the event included Robert Haigh (Germany; 14th - €1,140) and Martin Staszko (Czech Republic; 10th - €2,800).

EPT9 Prague Event #1 No-Limit Hold’em

*Denotes heads-up deal

Nanev Wins Eureka PLO championship; Martin Gets More Money

Rumen “ali_baba_ang” Nanev, a 42-year-old from Varna, Bulgaria, took down the €330 Mixed Hold’em/PLO event at the EPT Sanremo a couple of months back, and he’s followed that up by winning the Eureka Pot-Limit Omaha Championship, which ran alongside the EPT Prague

"I actually won (the last tournameny) in the PLO so it feels like this is the second one on the bounce," Nanev told the PokerStars Blog. "PLO is my game of preference at the moment but I play both Hold'em and PLO. I prefer playing cash but I've found that I have a lot of edge in the PLO tournaments so I try to play most of them. People make a lot of key mistakes. People's strategy is, a lot of the time, wrong. I feel that my understanding of the game helps me during the different stages of the tournament. I've been short, been middle stacked and big stacked. I have a different strategy for every stage of the tournament."

Nanev may have earned the title, but it was actually Ben Martin who took down the biggest prize after a heads-up deal.

Eureka Pot-Limit Omaha Championship

*Denotes heads-up deal

For more information on Nanev’s win, click here.

Lozovaya Takes Down The Women’s Event

While EPT Main Event and High Rollers tend to garner the most attention, the Women’s Event at each stop always proves to be one of the more enjoyable tournaments. That was certainly the case at the Prague Hilton Hotel on Sunday when 41 ladies from around the world gather for a friendly competition.

The tournament only lasted a day and saw six different women from five different countries make the money. Interestingly, it was two Russians who squared off in heads-up play with Evgenia Lozovaya besting Anna Yamshchikova to take down the title and €4,410 first-place prize.

EPT Prague NLHE Women’s Event

Bilokur Captures Another High Roller Title

Back in January, Russian Alex Bilokur captured the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure High Roller event for $1.1 million. Nearly a year later, Bilokur has won another High Roller title by winning the EPT Prague €2,100 High Roller Turbo for €72,000.

Bilokur, who was declared the winner, actually chopped the prize money with Spain’s Dragan Kostic, who finished runner up to Martin Schleich in the EPT8 Barcelona Main Event for €532,000.

EPT9 Prague High Roller

*Denotes heads-up deal

Here's a look at some of the other preliminary event results:

EPT9 Prague Event #5 Pot-Limit Omaha 8-Handed

*Denotes heads-up deal.

EPT9 Prague Event #9 No-Limit Omaha Eight or Better*

*This was the first time this game was offered on the EPT.
**Denotes heads-up deal.

EPT9 Prague Event #12 NLHE “Win The Button”

*Denotes fourhanded deal.

The EPT9 Prague Main Event recently concluded. Learn more in our Live Reporting Section.

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