The 55th Annual World Series of Poker concluded last night in Las Vegas with five bracelets being won, Jonathan Tamayo’s $10million Main Event scoop being the cream of the crop.
Tamayo’s incredible run to WSOP glory was covered extensively by us here but what of the other four winners? Let’s start by looking at…
Event #93: $777 Lucky 7’s No-Limit Hold’em (7-Handed)
Michael Liang emerged victorious from a monster field of 6,292 runners to bag the $777,777 top prize and his maiden WSOP gold bracelet.
Of the final five who returned for day 3 and the bracelet hunt Duc Nguyen held a huge overnight lead with 99 bigs and Rajesh Mehta held only 17 bigs.
Nguyen did his job by disposing of Garshovsky, Batavia and Mehta, but despite a 9:1 chip lead over Liang he couldn’t finish things off, Liang quickly doubling twice and eventually pulling away.
The final hand turn card saw all the chips go in and ended his hopes of a comeback of his own…
Duc Nguyen: J♣ J♠
Michael Liang: K♠ 4♠
Flop: 10♥ 4♣ 6♥
Turn: K♦
River: 2♣
Final Table Results
| Place | Player | Country | Prize |
| 1 | Michael Liang | USA | $777,777 |
| 2 | Duc Nguyen | USA | $300,777 |
| 3 | Rajesh Mehta | USA | $190,777 |
| 4 | Manoj Batavia | USA | $141,777 |
| 5 | Mitch Garshofsky | USA | $105,777 |
| 6 | Jorge Postigo | Peru | $80,777 |
| 7 | Lukas Hafner | Austria | $60,777 |
Event #97: $3,000 Pot-Limit Omaha 6-Handed
Alex Livingston “saved his summer” by taking down the $390,621 top prize, picking up his second bracelet along the way.
Seventeen players, including Alex Foxen, Shaun Deeb, Dylan Weisman, and Ari Engel, returned for the final day’s action, but none would make the final table.
Martin Zamani did rather better, the whistleblower in the infamous Bryn Kenney ‘cheating’ case bagging a podium spot before bowing out to Livingston when his turned straight was felled by rivered quads…
Martin Zamani: Q♠ 9♠ 8♦ 7♦
Alex Livingston: K♦ 10♦ 6♣ 6♠
Flop: 6♦ 7♠ 3♣
Turn: 5♣
River: 6♥
That mean 3rd place and $177,114 for Zamani and left Livingston heads-up against Uruguay’s Francisco Benitez.
A four-hour battle ensued but eventually Livingston closed out the win when Benitez couldn’t fill his house on the river.
Francisco Benitez: K♥ Q♣ J♥ 3♣
Alex Livingston: 10♠ 10♦ 7♦ 5♠
Flop: 3♦ 4♠ 6♦
Turn: Q♦
River: 7♥
“This truly was a summer saver,” Livingston told reporters after his win.
Final Table Results
| Place | Player | Country | Prize |
| 1 | Alex Livingston | Canada | $390,621 |
| 2 | Francisco Benitez | Uruguay | $260,403 |
| 3 | Martin Zamani | USA | $177,114 |
| 4 | Andrew Watson | USA | $122,746 |
| 5 | Hokyiu Lee | Honk Kong | $86,709 |
| 6 | Christopher Roth | USA | $62,457 |
Event $98: $1,500 The Closer
Taiwan’s Ching Da Wu topped a field of 3215 entries to take down the $525,500 top prize and WSOP gold, with Mike Matusow bagging a top 10 finish.
Unlike Livingston’s win, there was to be no marathon heads-up battle, a three-way all-in ending things in Wu’s favour after Bigdan Munteanu squeezed from the big blind and Colavita shoved the button. Wu, however, had the goods…
Mario Colavita: A♠ 10♠
Bogdan Munteanu: K♦ Q♣
Ching Da Wu: A♦ A♥
Flop: 2♥ 8♣ 4♦
Turn: 6♣
River: 4♠
Wu, a California-based software engineer currently seeking his green card, had just won his first WSOP gold bracelet and the biggest score of his life.
Final Table Results
| Place | Player | County | Prize |
| 1 | Ching Da Wu | Taiwan | $525,500 |
| 2 | Mario Colavita | Italy | $350,370 |
| 3 | Bogdan Munteanu | Romania | $261,170 |
| 4 | John Racener | USA | $196,170 |
| 5 | Stanislav Zegal | Germany | $148,480 |
| 6 | Michael Baltierra | USA | $113,270 |
| 7 | David Cabrera Polop | Andorra | $87,080 |
| 8 | Chad Lipton | USA | $67,480 |
| 9 | Luis Yepez | Venezuela | $52,705 |
| 10 | Mike Matusow | USA | $41,500 |
Event #99: $1,000 Super Turbo No-Limit Hold’em
Lithuania’s Aneris Adomkevicius had the distinction of winning the final bracelet event of the entire 55th Annual World Series of Poker, scooping $201,355 to go with the coveted jewellery.
Short stacks and short levels were the order of the day as 1544 were whittled down to a heads-up fight between Adomkevicius and Mark Newhouse.
Newhouse, famous/infamous for his back-to-back WSOP Main Event 9th place finishes in 2013 and 2014, was still searching for his maiden WSOP bracelet but it wasn’t to be as he shoved his short stack and received a call…
Mark Newhouse: J♦ 8♥
Aneris Adomkevicius: 6♠ 6♦
Flop: 5♥ 10♦ A♥
Turn: 9♠
River: K♣
Final Table Results
| Place | Player | Country | Prize (USD) |
| 1 | Aneris Adomkevicius | Lithuania | $201,355 |
| 2 | Mark Newhouse | USA | $134,228 |
| 3 | Theo Tran | USA | $96,633 |
| 4 | Peter Bigelow | USA | $70,409 |
| 5 | Kenneth Kim | USA | $51,930 |
| 6 | John Holley | USA | $38,776 |
| 7 | Jakob Miegel | Germany | $29,317 |
| 8 | Dong Chen | China | $22,448 |
| 9 | Edward Small | UK | $17,409 |
| 10 | Octaviano Duran | USA | $13,678 |
And with that, the 2024 World Series of Poker was at an end, an incredible summer of action over until it all begins again next year!
We hope you have enjoyed our coverage here at VIP Grinders and we’ll have one or two exciting and interesting WSOP roundups over the next week or so to ease you gently back to reality!
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