This week we returned to the normal sized $500,000 Sunday Warm-up after kojocki took down eamsie last week in a special $1 million guaranteed edition of the Sunday Warm-up celebrating the earlier start times to accommodate people who like to play poker but would rather not have to call into work the next morning with over $100,000 on the line. While it is still going to take a marathon ten plus hours to award this $101,611.21 sitting at the final table for our champion, our victor will get a little more shut-eye and down a few less Red Bulls at the office after taking down the 3,236 players that punched their ticket for this $215 buy-in event.

Team Online Martin AABenjaminAA Hruby was able to find the right cards while cashing in 324th place ($362.43). Team PokerStars pro Jan Heitmann was found a little higher up the pay ladder but after losing a pair of flips bowed out in 154th place ($679.56). Sebastian Ruthenberg also enjoyed a long run tonight but was stopped by iberbiber as pocket sevens for the UK pro was not able to dodge A♣8♣ on a K♦ K♣ 9♦ A♦ 4♦ as Ruthenberg collected $776.64 in 131st place. That left Spanish Team PokerStars pro Juan Maceiras looking to add to his bankroll from the huge €315,000 cash for 5th place at the EPT Madrid Grand Final. With the blinds sitting at 6K/12K ante 1.2K Maceiras would open shove from early position for 218,711 as it folded to BetrThanPhil (who almost snagged a SCOOP watch a few weeks ago in Event #35-L) in the cutoff holding A♣Q♥ and covering Juan's stack. BetrThanPhil would make the call as Maceiras turned over K♥T♦. Despite flopping an open ended straight draw, Macerias would watch the 6♦ Q♣ J♦ 2♥ 4♠ board end his tournament night in 94th place ($906.08).

Juan Maceiras - 94th place

Just after the nine and half hour mark only ten players and two tables remained as hand for hand play trickled into the 80K/160K ante 16K level. migsgreen was hanging on with just 1.1 million facing a raise to 480,000 chips from Ab4r4 in the cutoff. Holding T♥J♥ in the big blind migsgreen fired the rest of his missiles into the middle and got a call from ab4r4 who showed A♠4♦. The jack in the door was good for migsgreen but the second card paired up Ab4r4's ace J♣ A♦ 4♣ 8♣ 2♥ and held for the 2.3 million chip pot shipping $3,883.20 to migsgreen for tenth place and starting our final table below:

Seat 1: juancito10 (2896654 in chips)
Seat 2: Grizzlypower (8047090 in chips)
Seat 3: iberbiber (1938681 in chips)
Seat 4: mister MH (2964530 in chips)
Seat 5: circuslover (1663584 in chips)
Seat 6: kronkol (3432072 in chips)
Seat 7: BetrThanPhil (6139493 in chips)
Seat 8: Ab4r4 (3613674 in chips)
Seat 9: pastika (1664222 in chips)

It pays to knock out the Team PokerStars players

Two of our final nine got the distinction of knocking out the resident pros. BetrThanPhil was better than Juan Maceiras and iberbiber took down Sebastian Ruthenberg before both players assured themselves $5,177.60 for making tonight's final table.

Ok, maybe it doesn't pay that well to knock out the Team Pros

With the blinds at 80K/160K ante 16K only Grizzlypower and BetrThanPhil held more than 20 big blinds as the rest of the pack would need to pick a spot soon. Iberbiber's spot was holding J♦A♦ in the small blind calling the chip leader's shove from the button with 1.6 million chips. Grizzlypower would need some help to add to the chip lead flipping up the dominated A♥3♣, and that help wasted no time showing up as the first card on the board paired up the trey, holding on the 3♠ 4♥ A♠ Q♣ 8♠ board to bump iberbiber out in ninth place ($5,177.60).

1-2-3 DODGEBALL!

The time comes in every tournament where you are sitting with a pocket pair hoping it finds a way to dodge a bunch of outs. Ab4r4's turn to start bobbing and weaving came in the hand below:

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All-in preflop for 1.2 million holding pocket sixes 6♦6♣ Ab4r4 was looking to parry his way through the board cards as kronkol held A♣Q♦. The flop J♣ 8♣ T♣ added more balls being thrown at the Switzerland player as kronkol picked up straight and flush draws to his overcards. The scoring hit came on the turned 9♥ as the 3♥ on the river did not salvage a chopped straight and Ab4r4 claimed eight place cash ($8,090.00).

Exiting from the big top

Just two hands later BetrThanPhil was already enjoying a decent stack of chips and facing the short stack 1.1 million chip shove by circuslover in the big blind. BetrThanPhil would make the call as well as the chip leader Grizzlypower for a potentially messy pot. The two chip leaders decided not to prod each other and checked down the 3♥6♠ A♦ 8♦ 6♥ board. BetrThanPhil was first to show, turning up two pair J♥A♥ as Grizzlypower and circuslover could only muck their hands while watching another 3.6 million chips slid over to BetrThanPhil. circuslover ride at the carnival came to end in seventh place ($14,562.00).

Two aggressive big stacks enter only one leaves

As mentioned with circuslover's elimination, Grizzlypower and BetrThanPhil held the chip lead with aggression and both of them got their chips in the middle preflop with the blinds at 125K/250K ante 25K for a whopping 12.8 million chip pot. Watch the results below:

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The big hand showed to be a big cooler for Grizzlypower holding big slick A♠K♥ to BetrThanPhil's aces A♦A♣. No miracles 6♣ 4♦ 6♥ 9♦ 4♣ and no chips for Grizzlypower as the former chip leader's growl became a soft as a whisper exiting the final table cave in sixth place ($21,034.00).

BetrThanAces? Didn't think so

With the blinds holding at 125K/250K ante 25K for a few more hands, BetrThanPhil took a little hit to his massive stack while doubling up pastika but still held an eight figure pile of chips. After kronkol raised it up to 750K from the small blind, BetrThanPhil slyly gave the raise a little bump to 1.25 million. Holding just 219,844 more behind, kronkol called showing a suited ace A♦9♦. kronkol would need some diamonds to overcome the pocket aces A♣A♥ that seemed to have reappeared in BetrThanPhil's hand. Drawing dead by the turn T♠ 4♣ K♠ 7♦ Q♠ kronkol watched another tournament life fall to BetrThanPhil's aces, finishing in fifth place ($27,506.00). This would be kronkol's second fifth place finish in the Sunday Warm-up equaling his February 2010 feat.

Fans love quick deals (and so do bloggers)

Team Online's Andre Coimbra heeded the call of our remaining four to hash out a deal, and in less time than it took to type this sentence the players took home the below amounts with $10,000.00 set aside for the winner.

pastika: $76,627.71
BetrThanPhil :$74,609.26
mister MH: $55,550.51
juancito10: $51,154.13

Take it on the run baby

Just one hand after splitting up the cash, pastika put the two smaller stacks on the defensive with a shove from the button. juancito10 looked down at a decent J♠K♥ and made the call for his remaining 3.6 million chips as mister MH folded the big blind. pastika's J♣Q♥ went searching for a lady and found her quickly on the flop 3♥ Q♣ 4♠. Kings managed to stay off the turn 6♥ and river 8♠ as juancito10 profited almost $14K more from making the deal one hand earlier, taking home $51,154.13 in fourth place.

Too much pastika in the pie

Taking down five of six hands in a row, pastika (which sounds like a rare spice but actually is a tackle and bait shop in Wisconsin) continued to increase the chip lead going into the 150K/300K ante 30K blind level. After min-raising from the button, pastika would call mister MH's 4.5 million chip shove from the small blind. mister MH showed pocket eights 8♥8♠ and pastika would need to shake and bake a bit for the win again, as his pocket fives 5♣5♠ were dominated. 9.4 million in the middle and all of it would slide to pastika after another two outer spiked, this time with a dramatic five on the river Q♣ 2♦ T♥ T♠ 5♥ ending mister MH's night in third place ($55,550.51). The win set up the potential long heads-up battle below.

Potential not reached, winner found quickly

Two aggressive players but both had plenty of chips to fight it out for the extra $10K and title of Sunday Warm-up champion. pastika's 20.6 million to BetrThanPhil's 11.6 would find all of their chips in the middle preflop after just six minutes of heads-up play. BetrThanPhil was ground down to 8.6 million and blinds sitting at 200K/400K ante 40K when the decisive hands played out below:

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BetrThanPhil 4♦4♥
pastika A♣7♥

A race for the win as pastika would need to catch something one last time to deny BetrThanPhil the title. It would wait for the turn but sure enough a seven managed to appear on the K♣ K♠ 5♣ 7♦ 8♣ board ending BetrThanPhil's night as the runner-up ($74,609.26) shipping the extra $10K to our champion pastika!

$500,000 guaranteed Sunday Warm-up results (06-12-11)
(* denotes part of four-way deal)
1. pastika (Czech Republic) *$86,627.71
2. BetrThanPhil (Canada) *$74,609.26
3. mister MH (Netherlands) *$55,550.51
4. juancito10 (Spain) *$51,154.13
5. kronkol (Netherlands) $27,506.00
6. Grizzlypower (Germany) $21,034.00
7. circuslover (United Kingdom) $14,562.00
8. Ab4r4 (Switzerland) $8,090.00
9. iberbiber (Canada) $5,177.60

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