Brits go Back to Back in San Remo

May 4, 2011, Posted by Pokerfarm

There was a familiar flag cast next to the winner's name last night at EPT San Remo. British pro Rupert Elder came into the final table as the chipleader along with the likes of EPT Kiev winner Max Lykov and EPT Berlin runner up just a week ago, Max Heinzelmann. It was a fast and furious final table and chips were splashed around liberally right from the get-go.

Elder struggled for a short while 4 handed, when the impressive Xuan Liu took over the chiplead. Shortly after, Max Lykov fell in 4th place in a fairly sick fashion when his KK failed to hold against Liu’s 1010. The curse remains - there has still been no repeat EPT winner.

Liu was looking to make it back to back female winners at San Remo but ultimately came unstuck, losing a huge pot to the classy Heinzelmann. His feat was possibly was of the most impressive in EPT history; it was the second consecutive EPT that Heinzelmann had made to the heads up stage, both within huge fields. Heinzelmann came within a whisper of going one better; it seemed the writing was on the wall during the heads up stage where Elder admitted that he had been outclassed. However the dealer had other ideas and Max Heinzelmann will have nightmares about his brutal demise. He raised on the button with 10 8 and Elder defended with 6 6. The flop was good for TV – 6,7,9. All the chips flew in on the A turn and it looked like Elder was done for. It wasn’t to be though, as the dealer flipped the ace from space on the river. Soon after winning this enormous pot Elder’s A5 managed to hold against Heinzelmann’s Q5 and we had ourselves another British winner of an EPT.

This season’s EPT has been nothing short of remarkable for British players – Elder became the 4th Brit to win one after David Vamplew (London) Toby Lewis (Villamoura) and Roberto Romanello (Prague). It’s testament to the state of UK poker that our boys have been so successful this year. What’s more the WSOP is around the corner, and the Brits are looking odds on to have their best ever year at the series.

EPT SAN REMO 

1 Rupert Elder €930,000

2 Max Heinzelmann €600,000

3 Xuan Liu €360,000

4 Max Lykov €290,000

5 Francesco De Vivo €220,000

6 Massimiliano Manigrasso €170,000

7 Costantino Russo €125,000

8 Roberto Spada €81,950