button in Safari
Hard Work and Passion Pay Off For Carlos Chadha at the Borgata Summer Poker Open $2,700 Championship
Over a 20-year career, Carlos Chadha has experienced every poker player's dream and also worst nightmare. He’s sat with the game’s best and beaten them for big scores. He’s also gone years without winning anything, wondering if all the work and studying he was doing was worth it. He’s won millions in live tournaments, and had long stretches where the money disappeared. It’s a dichotomy that a poker pro who stays around long enough is well familiar with.
Through it all, Chadha has never lost the one thing he started with: his love of the game. The passion that keeps him coming back, the determination to put in long hours of study in an attempt to get better, paid off in a big way today at the final table of the 2026 Borgata Summer Poker Open $2,700 Championship.
Chadha came into the final table as a massive chip leader and, after just over three hours, took care of the rest of the field on his way to emerging on top of the 565-player field and capturing the $242,385 first prize after making a big river call against Maxwell Young on the final hand.
Borgata Summer Poker Open $2,700 Championship Final Table Results
| Place | Player | Country | Prize |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Carlos Chadha Villamarin | United States | $242,385 |
| 2 | Maxwell Young | United States | $167,985 |
| 3 | Nicholas Verderamo | United States | $116,525 |
| 4 | James Tedrow | United States | $77,345 |
| 5 | Michael Renna | United States | $54,100 |
| 6 | Russ Dunlevy | United States | $42,975 |
| 7 | Andrew Porter | United States | $34,620 |
| 8 | Ricky Guan | United States | $28,160 |
| 9 | Mike Dentale | United States | $22,945 |
“It’s amazing. It’s a culmination of, like, four years of really hard tournament work. Sixteen months of exploit, deep-stack, multi-way pot work playing cash games. So both of them came together in this tournament. I used everything I had,” Chadha said.
The Washington, D.C. resident moved up past $3.5 million in career earnings with this score, and if there is one thing that separates this title from all the ones he’s earned before, it’s that this one seemed almost too easy. “Just surprisingly smooth. I think I played really well. I think everyone else played well. Yeah, it was just very surprisingly smooth. Normally, there’s more roller coasters than this. I mean, I only lost the chip lead for like half an hour or an hour. So, yeah, just smooth and pleasant and enjoyable. And I felt like I basically knew what I was doing in every spot,” he said.
“It makes the 1000s of hours of studying pay off. So finally worth it. You know, a lot of times you study and you don’t get results, especially in multi-table, live tournaments. So it’s just nice to have an actual result to go with hard work.”
Title Gives Chadha Optimism That Hard Work Was Worth It
Chadha’s career resume includes multiple final tables in big buy-in events. From the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas, to the Bahamas and over to EPTs across the Atlantic, he’s competed in super high rollers across the globe and made deep runs against some of the toughest fields in the game. He admits that this event doesn’t quite match the experience he had in those ones, but one thing he did get from this victory is validation.
“It’s not as high as, like, any of the high rollers where I’ve done well. So those, you know, when you’re playing against the best in the world, even though I didn’t win any of those, I am kind of more proud of those, I would say,” he said.
“This one is just more, like, hard work pays off. Like, I mean, I’m proud of myself more for this one. This is not as impressive. It’s not going to look as impressive on my Hendon Mob. It’s not my biggest cash. I have several bigger cashes than this. But, like, it verifies that I’m actually good at poker. Even though I know I’m super good at poker, every now and then you lose for a long time, especially live MTTs. I’ve had multi-year bad runs. I’ve had multi years when I’ve lost. I’ve played for 1,000 hours a year and just lose $100,000. It’s nice to just verify that, yes, the studying, the hard work, the experience pays off. It’s just a relief that hard work does pay off at some point in my life.”
Chadha, Young Make Quick Work of the Rest of the Final Table
The final seven players returned to the Borgata poker room at noon to battle for the trophy, with Chadha holding nearly three times the stack of Young in second place. His strategy was to apply constant pressure and use ICM to his advantage. He felt he had played more, had more experience, and studied more than all of his opponents. But even with his big lead and ability to run over the table, he still considered himself an underdog coming into the day.
“I was opening—they’re probably keeping track of my VPIP or whatever—it was probably 50 percent or more, I’m sure. I think I had a pretty big study advantage, I assume. I don’t know the other players that well, but I assume I’ve studied more than all these guys. I’ve probably played more hands than all these guys. So, yeah, pretty confident, but then again, you know, I’ve been in this spot before and I’ve come in fourth place and been devastated. I know I had, like, maybe 35 percent of the chips coming in, so maybe there was a 42 percent chance that I win. I still thought I was a dog to win the tournament,” he said.
WSOP bracelet winner Andrew Porter was the first casualty after Young flopped a pair of eights and Porter couldn’t connect with a straight draw. Chadha then flopped top two pair to win a race against Russ Dunlevy and bust Dunlevy in sixth place.
Michael Renna shoved for his last 1,165,000 on an ace-high flop with a pair of nines, but Young called him with ace-seven and improved to trips on the turn to score the knockout. Young overtook Chadha for the chip lead for the first time today when he flopped two pair against Chadha’s top pair of kings. He then extended his lead by rivering a straight to bust James Tedrow, who earned his seat online in a $25 BetMGM qualifier, in fourth place.
Chadha Makes a Big Call on the River on the Final Hand
Nicholas Verderamo doubled up twice on consecutive hands to pull close to the two big stacks, but he then shoved for the third hand in a row and ran right into Chadha’s kings to fall in third place. Chadha took a 15,525,000 to 7,000,000 lead over Young into heads-up, and they played only eight hands before Young limped in on the button and Chadha raised to 675,000. Young called to see a five-high flop as Chadha slowed down and checked. Young then bet 600,000, and Chadha called.
Young bet another 1,100,000 on the turn, and Chadha again called. The river brought an eight, and Young moved all in for 2,450,000. Chadha tanked for a few minutes before calling with eight-four for a rivered two pair, and Young mucked fives and threes. “I got screwed on the river,” he called out to his rail after having to settle for second place.
Chadha then went through an exhaustive, stream-of-consciousness explanation of what he was thinking on that last hand. The summary: he felt he had more experience playing heads-up than Young did, and was ready to exploit that advantage.
“He could just be barrelling with just the naked ace of spades, naked king of spades. He could have, like, king-two offsuit with the king of spades, ace-two offsuit with the ace of spades, queen-two offsuit with the queen of spades, maybe. He could just have any two. Any two is an open-ended draw. So, like, tons of draws missed, basically…So I really just thought he had a six or ace-deuce. Maybe a set. It looks like I have an overpair and I’m just pot-controlling. Like, he probably just pigeonholed me into having top pair, an overpair, and just thought he had the best hand. He didn’t,” Chadha said.
“You know, I’m guessing he’s somewhat inexperienced with heads-up play, just from the fact he was not limping at all. That was his first limp. There’s a lot of limping in heads-up. The ranges are really weird. I was a heads-up pro for three years. So I have tons of experience heads-up. I assume he probably didn’t understand how many weak hands, how many 4-8 offsuits I’d have. Like, he probably just put me on overpairs, and he probably just thought he’s beating an overpair and was betting for value. So it’s fine. I mean, if you don’t have experience—and it’s a very esoteric game—it’s fine. So, yeah, it was a tough spot.”
Highs and Lows of Tournament Poker Worth the Pain For Chadha
Chadha came to Atlantic City on a high note after navigating through a massive field in the WSOP Main Event a few weeks ago to finish in 51st place. He recognizes that results like that come along very rarely in the career of a professional poker player. The dizzying highs and terrifying lows of tournament poker can overcome a player and throw them out of the game. What keeps players like Chadha coming back is simply pure passion.
“I’ve had two good scores in a row. I came in 51st out of 9,200 in the World Series just now. That was literally my last bullet that I played. I played one bullet in this and won it for an even better score than I made at the World Series. I love tournament poker. I love to play high rollers against people who are better than me. It’s a bad way to make money. A friend of mine told me live tournaments are a luxury. So I’m going to keep that in mind going forward. I do love live tournaments, but they really are a luxury, and they’re super high-variance. You’re never going to get to the endgame in your lifetime, especially if you’re playing Main Events with 100-plus people,” he said.
“I’m a super nit. I sell tons of action to everyone, all the time. And yet, still, I have gut-wrenching variance, literal years where I just lose money, and it’s super depressing. I’ve been pretty depressed when I have losing years. I’m going to try and avoid that again. I’ve said that before. Honestly, it’s worth the pain. It’s like having a child. You’re gonna experience bigger highs and bigger lows in tournament poker than you will in cash. Like, cash is consistent, easy money, and that’s the smart thing to do. And I wish sometimes I had no ambition, and I just was happy playing cash and just making a good living playing cash, but this is my passion. So, you know, I’ll keep on throwing money at it until I don’t love it anymore. I love it, so I just keep on doing it.”
That concludes PokerNews' coverage of the Borgata Summer Poker Open $2,700 Championship. Stay tuned for more updates as the final events of the festival conclude here in Atlantic City.
