Arthur Conan Makes Big Comeback, Wins Seminole Hard Rock $50K

April 24, 2021

Arthur Conan gave life to the old "chip and a chair" cliche as he authored a stellar and improbable comeback to win the $50,000 Super High Roller at Seminole Hard Rock Poker Showdown. Down to just one blind four-handed, Conan managed to run it back up and eventually capture the $733,320 first-place prize in a field of 42 entries.

That number represented a venue-record for the buy-in level, a continuation of a theme throughout the series thus far as huge numbers have turned out for all of the events, breaking multiple house records. Admittedly, this one just inched by as the old record was 41 from 2019.

As for Conan, the score roughly doubles his career live cashes, according to The Hendon Mob. He told local media he was as surprised as anyone.

“I’m very shocked with that comeback,” he said. “Very happy, of course.”

Official Final Table Results

Going into the final day — already in the money — Conan had the shortest stack with just nine big blinds while there were a couple of clear leaders in Chris Brewer and Seth Davies around 80.

Conan managed to hang around as Jeremy Ausmus busted then he doubled with a turned flush all in versus the set of sixes shown down by fellow short stack Sean Winter. Winter was unable to recover fully from that and busted in fifth.

Conan Saves a Chip

With four players left, the big hand came up. According to the live updates, Davies made a small raise to 60,000 from the small blind at 25,000/50,000/25,000. Conan called and they saw a Q♦10♥6♥ flop. Davies bet 90,000 and Conan called. On the J♦ turn, Davies again bet 90,000. This time, Conan made it 250,000 and Davies peeled, bringing the 4♥ on the river.

Davies checked, Conan bet 265,000 and Davies called. Conan could only muster 9♠7♥ for a bluff and Davies took it with queens and tens.

Conan had left himself with a T25,000 chip, one big blind, with most of that committed in the small blind next hand. Conan won with 4♦2♠ against K♦Q♥ to get up to 100,000. He shoved the next hand with A♥7♥ and managed to have his kicker play versus A♣6♦. Then, deuces held against ace-nine and Conan suddenly had a playable stack of 505K at 30K big blind.

Parlaying into a Win

Another key pot versus Davies went the other way, and this one vaulted Conan into an improbable lead. Davies raised preflop and then barreled off against Conan, on the button, on 9♠8♣6♥4♥7♣. Conan had Q♥10♥ and had an easy river call, seeing he'd gotten there against flopped top set.

Now with the chip lead, it was all Conan from there. He busted Davies with aces full in a bit of a cooler against trip aces then won a huge flip when sevens beat ace-ten suited of Brewer blind on blind.

All that remained was a severely outchipped Sam Soverel and he was collecting a second-place payout mere minutes later when his king-nine couldn't topple Conan's pocket fives after the Frenchman flopped a set and faded a flush draw.

Poker Showdown Continues With Main Event Looking Huge

With the weekend arriving, the marquee World Poker Tour $3,500 Main Event has gotten underway.

After another strong turnout on Day 1a — 1,047 entries — the $2 million guarantee was an afterthought. At the time of writing, another four-figure turnout for Day 1b had pushed the number past 2,000, meaning the prize pool was pushing toward $7 million. As registration remains open for still another level-plus, that number isn't final yet, but the WPT has already tweeted that they've hit a tour record.

A truly staggering prize pool will be up for grabs, and PokerNews will bring a recap of the Main Event and other action in the coming days.

_{Photo courtesy of Seminole Hard Rock}

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