Spencer Champlin Bounces Back From Heads-Up Loss With PokerGO Tour Kickoff Win

Spencer Champlin got here into heads-up play for the 2025 Fortunate Hearts Poker Open $3,500 most important occasion title on Jan. 21 with a slight lead over Martins Adeniya. The previous accountant turned poker professional was unable to shut out the win in that match, although. He tried an enormous multi-street bluff try within the occasion’s ultimate hand, solely to run right into a backdoor flush for his opponent. Champlin fell simply wanting his first title of 2025, however walked away with a career-best payday of $425,000.

It didn’t take very lengthy for the Scarborough, Maine resident to get one other shot at a trophy. Simply three days faraway from that second-place exhibiting, Champlin navigated his manner all the way down to the ultimate two in occasion no. 4 of this yr’s PokerGO Tour Kickoff sequence. This time round, Champlin overcame a heads-up chip deficit to seize the title and the highest prize of $157,500.

Champlin now has greater than $3.9 million in recorded match earnings, with $582,500 earned already in 2025. This newest win got here with 528 Card Participant Participant of the 12 months factors. With the 1,200 he earned because the runner-up within the LHPO most important occasion in Florida earlier this week, he has surged into first place within the POY race standings offered by International Poker. His 1,728 whole factors give him a 178-point lead over second-ranked Brandon Wilson.

A complete of 126 entries have been made on this $5,000 buy-in no-limit maintain’em match that ran from Jan. 23-24 contained in the PokerGO Studio at ARIA Resort & On line casino Las Vegas, leading to a $630,000 prize pool break up amongst the highest 18 finishers. Solely seven contenders bagged up chips on the finish of day 1.

The ultimate day started with two-time bracelet winner Martin Zamani within the lead and Champlin in sixth chip place. Mike Vanier quickly overtook the chip lead because of a wild hand that noticed him river tens full towards Zamani’s jack-high straight, which additionally got here in on the tip.

Devastating River for Martin Zamani! : https://t.co/U87HtUAbSf pic.twitter.com/xkCtQ2SSsI

— PokerGO (@PokerGO) January 24, 2025

Occasion no. 2 winner Patrick Leonard was the primary to hit the rail on day 2. The British poker professional was at his third ultimate desk of the sequence, having additionally positioned sixth in occasion no. 1. He earned $25,500 for this seventh-place end, bringing his haul for the sequence to $171,000. Joey Weissman (sixth – $31,500) quickly joined Leonard on the rail. The bracelet winner’s A-8 was unable to carry up towards the Okay-Q of Eric Blair, who made two pair to win the pot and slim the sphere to 5.

Vanier added to his already sizable lead when his A-4 outran the A-10 of two-time bracelet winner Sam Soverel. Vanier spiked a 4 on the flop and held from there to ship Soverel residence with $37,800. He then scored one other elimination, shoving with Q-2 from the small blind and besting the A-9 of Blair out of the large blind. Vanier flopped a queen to take the lead and prevented Blair’s backdoor straight draw to win the hand. Blair earned $53,550 because the fourth-place finisher.

Champlin’s first knockout of the day noticed his AJ maintain up towards the A5 of Zamani. The flip gave Zamani an open-ended straight draw to go together with his reside card, however a brick on the tip ended his run in third place ($69,300). The current PGT Final Likelihood occasion winner now has greater than $7 million in recorded earnings to his title.

Vanier held greater than a 2:1 chip lead when heads-up play bought underway, however Champlin narrowed the hole a bit within the early going earlier than the pivotal conflict of the match performed out. Champlin limped in from the button for 150,000 with OkayOkay and Vanier raised to 550,000. Champlin three-bet to 1,200,000 and Vanier four-bet shoved. Champlin shortly referred to as together with his massive pocket pair and held by means of a Q8434 runout to double into the chip lead.

The 2 quickly performed one other massive all-in pot, with A9 for Champlin besting Vanier’s OkayQ. Vanier was left with only a handful of huge blinds after that loss, and was quickly despatched to the rail in second place when his Okay-10 was unable to tug off the large upset towards pocket kings but once more for Champlin. Vanier earned $97,650 because the runner-up.

Here’s a have a look at the payouts and rankings factors awarded on the ultimate desk:

Place
Participant
Earnings
POY Factors
PGT Factors

1
Spencer Champlin
$157,500
528
315

2
Mike Vanier
$97,650
440
195

3
Martin Zamani
$69,300
352
139

4
Eric Blair
$53,550
264
107

5
Sam Soverel
$37,800
220
76

6
Joey Weissman
$31,500
176
63

7
Patrick Leonard
$25,200
132
50

Picture credit: PokerGO / Antonio Abrego.