Sam Trickett among partypoker LIVE MILLIONS SHR Sochi Champions

March 10, 2020

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The partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Super High Roller Series (SHRS) Sochi festival has crowned four of its five champions and it’s been a great couple of days for members of the Team partypoker stable.

Sam Trickett took down the $25,000 No-Limit Hold’em event while Mikita Badziakouski triumphed in the $50,000 No-Limit Hold’em tournament. Xia He Jiang and Wai Leong Chan also got their hands on a winner’s trophy.

Event 1: $25,000 Short Deck

Entries: 42
Prize pool: $1,050,000

Xia He Jiang of Spain was the unlikely champion of the $25,000 Short Deck event, a tournament that drew in a field of 42 entrants.

Little was known of Jiang before June 2019 that was when he won the $1,100 Wynn Summer Classic Main Event for $332,037. A couple more cashes followed, but nothing compared to the $378,000 he collected for this impressive victory.

Jiang defeated the 2018 World Series of Poker Main Event champion John Cynn heads-up for the title. That is after coming out on top of a final table housing such luminaries as Stephen Chidwick, Wai Leong Chan, Cary Katz, and the hot-running Aaron Van Blarcum.

The Spaniard has an obvious talent and now he has a bankroll allowing him to showcase that talent.

Read about Marty Mathis' awesome story

Event 2: $25,000 NL Hold’em

Entries: 58
Prize pool: $1,450,000

Sam Trickett won his first tournament in almost seven years when he topped a field of 58-players in the $25,000 No-Limit Hold’em event.

Trickett made a rare appearance in the live poker tournament world at the 2019 WSOP Europe festival. That resulted in a €368,899 prize for finishing second in the €25,000 High Roller event.

It must have whet Trickett’s appetite for big live events because he flew out to Sochi, a decision that turned out perfectly. Victory was far from assured when Trickett reached the final table because he was surrounded by stars of the game.

Chin Wei Lim and Paul Phua were the first casualties of the day. The legendary Phil Ivey soon followed. Ivey came unstuck when his pocket queens lost to Matthias Ebinger’s king-ten thanks to a ten on the flop and king on the turn.

Russia’s Artur Martirosyan crashed out in sixth-place and would later reach another final table.

Timothy Adams, the recently $250,000 Super High Roller Bowl Australia champion, busted in fifth before Adrian Mateos ran out of steam in fourth.

Eibinger’s king-four then lost to Trickett’s jack-ten courtesy of a runner-runner straight.

Trickett locked horns with Ivan Leow for the title and emerged from the battle victoriously. His ace-four came from behind to beat the dominating ace-queen and the $435,000 top prize was Trickett’s.

Event 3: $25,000 Short Deck

Entries: 61
Prize pool: $1,525,000

Wai Leong Chan won his second Short Deck title of his career in the $25,000 buy-in event. Chan has been in remarkable form of late, finishing ninth in both the Triton London Million for Charity and Main Events, being the runner-up in the $250,000 Super High Roller Bowl Bahamas, and winning the $25,000 Short Deck at the partypoker LIVE Caribbean Poker Party.

Now he has another major Short Deck title after sending Paul Phua home in second-place. This latest victory netted Chan $435,000, remarkably, it’s only his eighth-largest prize.

Others who reached the final nine included Sam Greenwood, Sergey Lebedev, Dmitriy Kuzmin, Aaron Van Blarcum, Danny Tang, Ivan Leow, and Thai Ha.

$1M in cash game leaderboards!

Event 4: $50,000 NL Hold’em

Entries: 45
Prize pool: $2,250,000

Event #4 was the $50,000 No-Limit Hold’em tournament and another Team partypoker Pro took it down. Mikita Badziakouski, the man currently 16th in the all-time money listings, won the $765,000 top prize after outlasting 44 opponents.

Poland’s Wiktor "limitless" Malinowski was the first to collect some of the $2,250,000 prize money when he fell in seventh-place. Cary Katz and Sam Greenwood joined him before Aaron Van Blarcum busted in fourth-place.

Van Blarcum was an unknown force until he won the WPT Legends of Poker in Los Angeles for $474,390 in August 2019. Now he’s mixing it up with the game’s elite and showing he can mix it up with them.

Luc Greenwood ran out of luck to bust in third to leave Badziakouski and Artur Martirosyan heads-up for the title.

Martirosyan looked set for a double when his turn shove with trip sixes was called by Badziakouski who held a flush draw and gutshot combo. However, the Belarusian spiked one of his 11 outs on the river to win yet another major live poker tournament.

_{All images courtesy of PokerCM}

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