Vladimir Korzinin has won Triton Monte Carlo Event 12: $150,000 No Limit Hold’em – 8-Handed for $4,350,000 only days after finishing runner-up in the $200K Triton Invitational.
The Estonian is a newcomer to the game, racking up his first cash only last month, and now he has an incredible $7,896,800 in live tournament earnings already.
He also now sits on the brink of making the top 200 players of all time with only four cashes to his name. Just incredible.
To achieve this maiden win, Korzinin had to survive a final table that included four of the top 15 live tournament winners of all time.
Action Recap
The field was made up of 121 entries, including 55 re-entries to build a prize pool of $18,150,000 in the final NL hold’em event of Triton Monte Carlo.
The top 20 finishers would get paid and it was Chris Brewer who was the unfortunate soul who missed out on a $236,000 min-cash.
Brewer called off his stack with A♠ K♠ against the K♦ Q♦ of Tom Fuchs which hit a decisive queen on the flop.
Patrik Antonius hit the rail in 17th place, unable to reach the heights of his career best cash a few days ago.
Triton co-founder Paul Phua was the final table bubble boy after running K♥ Q♦ into Tom fuch’s A♦ 9♠
Now, let’s look at the final table line-up to see just what Vladimir Korzinin was up against:
| Player | Big Blinds (BBs) |
| Sam Greenwood | 85 |
| Tom Fuchs | 74 |
| Stephen Chidwick | 48 |
| Bryn Kenney | 48 |
| Vladimir Korzinin | 46 |
| Thomas Boivin | 38 |
| Ossi Ketola | 28 |
| Dan Smith | 21 |
| Fedor Holz | 17 |
Not exactly a cakewalk, and with that in mind, Korzinin set off with a bang.
Opening Q♠ 10♠ from mid position, Korzinin got a call from Thomas Boivin in the big blind with J♣ 5♥
The flop came down 5♣ 9♦ A♠ and both players checked.
The 5♠ turn was a great action card — trips versus a flush draw.
Boivin led out for ⅔ pot and Korzinin jammed his remaining 35 big blinds. Boivin called but the 7♠ was enough for Korzinin to knock his opponent out with a $435,000 prize.
Korzinin then sent overnight chip leader Sam Greenwood to the rail when the Canadian’s flush failed to arrive, leaving seven left.
Tom Fuchs ran out of luck after he doubled up Ossi Ketola and then found himself at risk against Fedor Holz and Korzinin. Holz doubled up and Fuchs was on his way home.
Stephen Chidwick and Dan Smith were the next two to leave, having little options with 10 big blind stacks.
Korzinin dealt with Smith and then Chidwick soon regretted his decision to go with second pair while Ketola snapped him off with top pair.
Ketola and Korzinin were now leading the way but with Holz and Bryn Kenney chasing them down, nothing was certain.
Holz was the first to gather momentum, doubling through Ketola, losing a chunk to Kenney, but then doubling through the Finn once again.
Kenney then had a chance to build his stack but Korzinin worked his magic again when his K♣ Q♣ hit a flush to beat the pocket sixes of his rival, who banked a nice $1,616,000.
It was now time for Ketola to wreak some revenge on Holz. Back-to-back wins saw Holz out for a $1,962,000 prize and the two amateurs would fight it out for the trophy.
Ketola had 49 blinds to Korzinin’s 32, giving hope that this would be a close fight. That said, both players loved to gamble it up so maybe it wouldn’t take long, after all.
The final hand was an all-in on the turn with the board showing Q♠ J♣ 10♥ 7♣
Ketola turned over Q♣ 6♥ for top pair while Korzinin’s 10♣ 6♣ gave him second pair and a flush draw.
The 9♣ river handed the win to the Estonian newcomer but unbelievably, he didn’t realise he’d won and thought he was accepting applause for his runner-up performance.
Triton Monte Carlo Event 12: $150,000 No Limit Hold’em – 8-Handed
| Rank | Name | Country | Prize (USD) |
| 1 | Vladimir Korzinin | Estonia | $4,350,000 |
| 2 | Ossi Ketola | Finland | $2,970,000 |
| 3 | Fedor Holz | Germany | $1,962,000 |
| 4 | Bryn Kenney | USA | $1,616,000 |
| 5 | Stephen Chidwick | UK | $1,300,000 |
| 6 | Dan Smith | USA | $1,016,000 |
| 7 | Tom Fuchs | Austria | $762,000 |
| 8 | Sam Greenwood | Canada | $562,000 |
| 9 | Thomas Boivin | Belgium | $435,000 |
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