2013 PCA: Dibella Takes Down Event #3; Jetten Wins First-Ever Open-Face Chinese Major

January 08, 2013

The 2013 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure, which is celebrating its 10th anniversary, is in full swing at the Atlantis Resort on Paradise Island in the Bahamas. The $100,000 Super High Roller already saw Scott Seiver lay claim to the $2,003,480 first-place prize, while the Main Event is playing through its early stages.

Although the big buy-in events garner the most attention at the PCA, several preliminary events take place every day. An astounding 41 tournaments are on the 2013 PCA schedule. The PokerNews Live Reporting Team is only live blogging the $100,000 Super High Roller, $10,000 Main Event, and $25,000 High Roller, so we thought it would be helpful to provide you with a brief look at some of the more interesting preliminary events.

Defending Champ John Dibella Finds More PCA Success By Winning $2K NLHE Turbo

Many people thought it was a fluke when John Dibella, 44, defeated a final table that included Xuan Liu, Kyle Julius and Faraz Jaka to at last year’s PCA Main Event for $1,775,000. The amateur silenced his critics on Sunday when he returned to the PCA and won another tournament—Event #3 $2,000 No-Limit Hold’em Turbo.

The New Yorker and married father of two defeated a field of 109 to capture a $69,780 first-place prize, emerging victorious over a final table that included Joe Elpayaa, who finished in fourth place for $17,980. With his victory, Dibella moved over $2 million in live tournament winnings.

2013 PCA Event #3 No-Limit Hold’em Turbo

Afanasyev Takes Down Event #4 for $13,400

2013 PCA Event #4 No-Limit Hold’em Turbo

Telker Defeats A Team PokerStars Pro To Win First Major Of His Career

Turbo tournaments don’t take long, as evidenced by Event #7 No-Limit Hold’em Turbo 8-Handed at the 2013 PCA on Monday night. The $5,000 buy-in attracted 57 players and created a $276,450 prize pool, which was distributed among the top eight finishers.

After an afternoon and evening of action, 24-year-old Michael Telker, who finished seventh in last year’s PCA High Roller, made it all the way to heads-up play alongside Team PokerStars Pro Johnny Lodden. The American was able to best his Norwegian foe for $96,750 and the first major win of his career. It’s also worth noting that Igor Kurganov, who won the PokerStars and Monte-Carlo®Casino EPT Grand Final High Roller last April and just took third in the PokerStars $109 Sunday Rebuy for $31,780, finished fourth for $26,260.

2013 PCA Event #7 No-Limit Hold’em Turbo 8-Handed

Peter Jetten Wins First-Ever Major Open Face Chinese Poker Tournament

It’s hard to recall a game that has grown as fast and been as popular as Open Face Chinese. The game garnered mainstream attention during the World Series of Poker Europe as players like Phil Hellmuth, Brandon Cantu, Jeff Lisandro, Joe Hachem and Jason Mercier spent their evenings playing long sessions of the game.

The player enthusiasm for the game inspired PokerStars to host the first-ever Open Face Chinese tournament at this year’s PCA, and while there were a few wrinkles that will need to be ironed out, the event proved a tremendous success as 59 players accounted for 18 re-entries, creating a prize pool of $149,380.

Along with many of the aforementioned players, the tournament also attracted Chinese Poker aficionados Daniel Negreanu and Shaun Deeb. Neither of those players, nor any of those listed above, had much success. Instead, the title went to well-known Canadian pro Peter Jetten, who has the distinction of being the first major live Open Face Chinese champion.

2013 PCA Event #41 Open Face Chinese

Noseworthy Wins The Canada Cup

While Day 1a of the Main Event was taking place on one half of the room on Monday, the Canada Cup Championship was playing out on the other. You could say the event was designed to determine Canada’s best, and in that case it would be Danny Noseworthy, who defeated Joseph Stiers in heads-up play. With that said, a deal was struck during three-handed play alongside Kyle Myers, who took the biggest payday, based on the stacks at the time.

After the deal was in place, the three proceeded to enjoy drinks while battling for the $5,400 left up top for the win. Myers’ big stack didn’t help as he was the next to go, and then Noseworthy, who began the final table as chip leader, and Stiers clashed for over an hour. The latter was ahead for the majority of the match, but a fortunate double by Noseworthy helped him pull out in front. In what became the last hand, Noseworthy flopped two pair holding Ax7x, which shot down Stiers’ Kx9x. Noseworthy earned $40,417 for his victory.

The 2013 PCA Main Event is happening now. Follow along as the PokerNews Live Reporting Team brings you all the live updates from that event by clicking here.

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PR & Media Manager for PokerNews, Podcast host & 2013 WSOP Bracelet Winner.

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