Thomas Santerne Wins Second High Roller Title at 2024 European Poker Tour Prague Festival

France’s Thomas Santerne has captured two excessive curler titles inside a four-day span on the 2024 European Poker Tour Prague collection. Santerne got here out on high within the €20,000 buy-in on Dec. 6, incomes $185,500. Then on Dec. 10 he emerged victorious within the €50,000 buy-in occasion, the highest-stakes occasion on supply on the pageant. The latter triumph added one other $408,869 to Santerne’s profession earnings, sufficient to see him surpass the $5.1 million mark.

Along with the 2 PokerStars spade trophies and the cash, Santerne additionally secured 450 Card Participant Participant of the Yr factors with this pair of wins on the Hilton Lodge Prague. Previous to this collection, he had recorded 4 final-table finishes and one win, taking down the €50,000 buy-in at EPT Paris in February for $960,638. He now has 2,702 whole factors, sufficient to maneuver him into one hundred and fifteenth place within the 2024 POY standings offered by International Poker.

This occasion took two days to play right down to a champion. Solely the highest 5 contenders would make the cash to say a chunk of the $1,258,750 prize pool. Teun Mulder was knocked out on the bubble, operating aces up into the broadway straight of Nikita Kuznetsov. The Dutch professional left empty-handed, whereas Kuznetsov locked up his fourth high-stakes money of the collection, having already positioned third in each the €10,200 thriller bounty and €20,000 excessive curler occasions and fifth within the €25,000 buy-in.

Current €25,000 buy-in occasion winner Espen Jorstad was the primary to be eradicated inside the cash. The 2022 World Sequence of Poker fundamental occasion champion earned $119,780 for his fifth-place displaying, surpassing $18.7 million within the course of.

Kuznetsov misplaced an enormous preflop showdown with A-Ok in opposition to the pocket aces of 2024 WSOP fundamental occasion third-place finisher Niklas Astedt throughout five-handed play. Kuznetsov hung round for some time, however was finally knocked out in fourth place ($148,400). His pocket eights misplaced a race in opposition to the A-Q suited of Santerne, which made high pair, high kicker. Kuznetsov now has practically $5.4 million in lifetime cashes to his title.

Sergey Lebedev was additionally despatched packing by A-Q, together with his A-9 arising brief in opposition to the superior ace held by Astedt. Lebedev earned $204,580 for his third-place displaying.

Santerne held roughly a 2:1 chip result in begin, however a double up for Astedt left the stacks roughly balanced. This parity prompted the ultimate two to hash out a deal to redistribute the remaining prize cash. Astedt locked up $377,122, whereas Santerne was assured of at the least $382,369. They left the trophy and $26,500 to play for.

Within the remaining hand, all the chips obtained in with the board displaying 93110. Santerne held Ok10 for high pair, whereas Astedt had A4 for the nut flush draw with one out to the ‘metal wheel’. The river was the 6, locking up the pot and title for Santerne. Astedt headed to the payout line to gather his newest huge payday. The Swedish on-line poker legend now has greater than $8.8 million in recorded match earnings.