On the third hand of the final table, Marc Wright opened to 85,000 with the 
to mix things up. César García reraised to 215,000 from the button with the 
and action folded back to Wright. He quickly gave it up and García won the pot.
"Just let me have some big hands early on and get some chips together. That'll help me relax and play my game," could've been the thoughts of some of our players coming in to today. Then [Removed:284] looked down and saw....
[Removed:287] opened from under the gun with 
and one-by-one each of his opponents folded.
The cards are in the air for the EPT Berlin Main Event final table.
Level: 26
Blinds: 20,000/40,000
Ante: 5,000
The players are being introduced one-by-one, so play should be underway very shortly.
This final is also being broadcast on PokerStars.TV (EPTLive.com) with hole cards face-up.
The PokerNews live reporting team were tucked up in bed last night preparing for today's final, rather than attending the players party. Neil Stoddart went for us and this what he saw.
Another stop along the European Poker Tour, another final table and another champion to be crowned. That's what's on the docket today here at EPT Berlin.
The Main Event is down to its final eight players, led by Belgian World Series of Poker gold bracelet winner Davidi Kitai. He's joined by notables Andrew Chen, Mario Puccini and César García.
Yesterday's action saw the field get cut from three tables down to just one. Everyone left has locked up a minimum payday of €72,000, but they're all licking their chips at the €825,000 that rests up top for the eventual winner. We don't know who's going to claim the top prize just yet, but we can tell you that whoever it is will be earning their first EPT title.
Coming into Day 4, there were still three former EPT champions in the mix, but none of them have made it to the final day. Vladimir Geshkenbein (10th - €51,000), Anton Wigg (14th - €30,000) and Kevin MacPhee (19th - €20,000) were the three former champions in the final 24.
Seating Assignments and Chip Counts
| Seat | Player | Chips |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | César García | 1,485,000 |
| 2 | Pratyush Buddiga | 1,280,000 |
| 3 | Mario Puccini | 2,065,000 |
| 4 | [Removed:284] | 1,940,000 |
| 5 | Andrew Chen | 3,600,000 |
| 6 | Davidi Kitai | 5,695,000 |
| 7 | Bahadir Kilickeser | 4,640,000 |
| 8 | Marc Wright | 1,540,000 |
The final table will be broadcast live, albeit on a one-hour delay, and you can read the player bios below. The live stream can be found over at PokerStars.tv while all your normal live updates will be feeding through right here on PokerNews. Coverage will begin at 1:00 PM local time.
Law student César García is currently ranked the number one online tournament player in Spain and has a string of great online results. He was runner-up in the Sunday Million in August 2009 for over $200,000 and has also finished fourth in a Spring Championship of Online Poker rebuy event, fourth in the Sunday Warm-Up and won a $200 rebuy. What's more is that García also has a title from the World Championship of Online Poker in 2009.
García first took up poker after watching the EPT on TV. He and fellow students started playing home games in their university dormitory. In his first live tournament at the university in 2008, García came second. The following year, he played the same tournament again and won it for €6,000. This gave him a big enough bankroll to start playing online and also competing in live events, mainly at Casino Gran Madrid.
This is García's sixth EPT, but best live result to date. Previously, he came 39th in the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure Main Event in 2010 for $59,000 and fifth in the EPT Deauville €2,000 side event for €30,500.
García’s parents César and Carmen have been here in Berlin all week, but he hasn’t let them watch him play in case it made him nervous. However, they will happily be on hand for today's final table rooting hard.
García enters the final table seventh in chips with 1.485 million.
Bio courtesy of PokerStars.
Pratyush Buddiga is fast making a name for himself in the poker world after already becoming a star in another world. In 2002, Buddiga won the prestigious Scripps National Spelling Bee contest — two years before his younger brother took down the same title. He bested 249 other contestants to win the title and $12,000.
Buddiga has made this European Poker Tour Berlin final table less than two years after taking up the game. He turned pro a year later after graduating from Duke University where he studied Economics. He regularly plays multi-table tournaments online and has benefited from the coaching he receives from poker superstar Mike "Timex" McDonald, who’s also been railing him here all this week.
Last summer, Buddiga racked up four World Series of Poker cashes in his first visit to the Series. His best score there was an in-the-money finish in the WSOP Main Event for $21,295. This is his biggest live result to date.
Buddiga travelled to Berlin with four friends. They'll all be on the rail supporting him tomorrow, along with many others he knows from the poker scene. He wasn’t planning on playing the PokerStars and Monte-Carlo® Casino EPT Grand Final next week, but that will certainly be under deep consideration given his result here in Berlin.
Our very own Lynn Gilmartin caught up with Buddiga on Day 4.
Buddiga will be looking to spell "double up" shortly after the cards are in the air — coming into the final table with 1.28 million in chips, Buddiga is the shortest stack of the bunch.
Bio courtesy of PokerStars.
Economics student Mario Puccini has been playing poker since 2007. He’s well known in the German poker community for winning nearly a hundred tournaments on PokerStars in the last four years, including the Super Tuesday in 2009 for over $60,000. His last major win was taking down the PokerStars $55 rebuy for $12,500.
This is his fourth EPT Main Event cash. His best result so far was eighth place at EPT Loutraki in November for €27,000. He also finished 51st at EPT Budapest in 2008 and 32nd at EPT San Remo in 2010. He’s also had three final tables in EPT side events with his best being a third-place finish in a Dortmund €2,000 event for €42,000.
Puccini enters the final table with just over two million in chips and sits fourth overall.
Bio courtesy of PokerStars.
