Tomas Fara Goes From One Blind to Win his First Gold Bracelet in Event #7: €1,100 Turbo Bounty Hunter NLHE
Thirteen full hours were needed for Event #7: €1,100 Turbo Bounty Hunter No-Limit Hold'em to finish here at King's Resort for the 2019 World Series of Poker Europe. Czech Republic's Tomas Fara managed to complete a stunning comeback from just one big blind to win his first gold bracelet along with €59,904 in prize money plus the bounties.
To achieve this, Fara had to overcome a couple of big names in the final table such as German high roller Manig Loeser and bracelet winners Anson Tsang and Phil Hui. Shaun Deeb finished in 13th place, enough to take over the top spot from Robert Campbell in the hotly-contested 2019 WSOP Player of the Year race.
Event #7: €1,100 Turbo Bounty Hunter No-Limit Hold'em Final Table Results
| Place | Player | Country | Prize (EUR) | Prize (USD) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tomas Fara | Czech Republic | €59,904 | $66,918 |
| 2 | Nisad Muratovic | Bosnia and Herzegovina | €37,004 | $41,337 |
| 3 | Manig Loeser | Germany | €24,949 | $27,870 |
| 4 | David Elyashar | Israel | €17,172 | $19,183 |
| 5 | Anson Tsang | Hong Kong | €12,071 | $13,484 |
| 6 | Arturs Scerbaks | Latvia | €8,670 | $9,685 |
| 7 | Phil Hui | United States | €6,366 | $7,111 |
| 8 | Julian Selinger | Germany | €4,781 | $5,341 |
| 9 | Giorgiy Skhulukhiya | Russia | €3,674 | $4,104 |
At 4 p.m. it was time for the seventh bracelet event of the festival to start. All the big names that are here at King's Resort took their seats in this event sooner or later, hunting their chances to win a turbo bracelet. Notables such as Martin Kabrhel, Joao Vieira, Ryan Riess, Chris Ferguson, Viktor Blom, Rainer Kempe, Daniel Negreanu, Alex Foxen, and Ismael Bojang all registered but didn't cash.
After 12 levels of late registrations, a total of 377 entries were made, only ten shy of last year's 387 entries. Pawel Zawadowicz was the bubble, leaving 58 players to cash at least €1,099. Among the players that headed to the cashier after their elimination were Eyal Bensimhon (53rd - €1,163), Denis Drobina (50th - €1,163), Phil Hellmuth (40th - €1,267), Sam Grafton (36th - €1,418) recent two-time bracelet winner Dash Dudley (30th - €1,418) and Pierre Neuville (24th - €1,631).
Deeb Takes Over POY Lead
Shaun Deeb managed to rack up yet another cash at the 2019 WSOPE and ended up in 13th place for €2,329. The tiny score brought enough points to surpass Robert Campbell in the 2019 WSOP Player of the Year race, which is still hotly contested with several hopefuls, including Negreanu, jockeying for the top spot.
Another big name that fell just short of the final table was Dzmitry Urbanovich. As was one of the shortest stacks of the field, he shoved all in under the gun with ace-jack offsuit, only to get called by Manig Loeser with ace-king. Loeser started the final table as one of the top stacks and saw Giorgiy Skhulukhiya and Julian Selinger quickly fall by the wayside to leave the field with seven.
Phil Hui, an outsider in the WSOP POY race, was gunning for his third WSOP bracelet but his run stopped in seventh place. He shoved from early position with king-nine, only for David Elyashar to wake up with kings and leave the field six-handed. Bosnian Nisan Muratovic, one of the big stacks, then eliminated Arturs Scerbaks in sixth.
Fara Spins it Up From One Big Blind
For Fara, his bracelet dream seemed all but over after taking a big hit to his stack by losing ace-king versus Loeser's ace-queen when a queen hit the flop, and the Czech was left with just one big blind. However, he still had a chip and a chair, and after escaping with pocket fours against pocket tens, as well as hitting with ten-six against pocket eights, Fara was right back in it. Those eights belonged to bracelet winner Anson Tsang, who was left with five bigs after that hand and shortly busted after.
Fara then sent Elyashar to the rail by winning fives against king-ten to complete the comeback. Three-handed, it was Loeser who took the lead after holding with queens in a big pot, possessing over 50% of the chips in play at one point. But with the rapidly escalating blinds, Loeser dropped back after losing several all ins and ultimately ended up in third after shoving queen-jack in Fara's ace-deuce and not improving.
Heads-up, Fara started with a commanding lead of over 3:1 and ended it in five hands. In the final hand, Fara shoved with king-queen and Muratovic called with ten-eight. The board drew blanks for the Bosnian and Fara comeback his miracle comeback from one big blind to with the WSOP bracelet.