Many poker diehards anticipated 888poker's The Festival Online Series. The poker operator promised to offer more than $1 million in prize money in its three opening tournaments. This is likely to happen since each of the events exceeded their initial guarantees.
The $109 buy-in $100,000 guaranteed Mystery Bounty Opening Event attracted 1,072 players and had a $107,200 prize pool. emperor_H won the tournament but didn't make its largest cash as "Trendki11" bagged its $10,000 mystery bounty despite exiting it in the 21st position. But each final table qualifier won over $1,000.
Who Reached the Tournament's Final Table?
- emperor_H from Morocco- a $9,423 total prize; $568 bounties and a $8,854 prize
- katekajie from Montenegro- a $8,092 total prize; $1,634 bounties and a $6,457 prize
- CurrD from the United Kingdom- a $4,831 total prize; $84 bounties and a $4,747 prize
- AvadoKedavra from Costa Rica- a $5,810 total prize; $2,292 bounties and a $3,517 prize
- YamaaKK from Brazil- a $2,644 total prize; $42 bounties and a $2,602 prize
- Fumapalheiro from Brazil- a $2,753 total prize; $808 bounties and a $1,944 prize
- kaua. From Brazil-a $2,126 total prize; $662 bounties and a $1,464 prize
- Andrew_flash from Germany-a $3,008 total prize; $1,898 bounties and a $1,109 prize
- Tom "sheeeeeeeet" Hall from the United Kingdom- a $1,057 total prize; $210 bounties and a $846 prize
How Things Unfolded at the Table
Tom Hall had 35 big blinds when he reached the final table. But he was the first finalist to leave the tournament within 30 minutes. "katekajie" used ten-eight of diamonds to make an under-the-gun min-raise.
"kaua." Used pocket tens to make a 12.3 big blind all-in three-bet after two finalists folded. Hall used an ace-queen to call off 10.3 big blinds. Unfortunately, queen and ace didn't land on the board hence ending his run in ninth place.
Andrew_flash followed Hall in the eighth position after making an under-the-gun min-raise and using pocket aces to look down. emperor_H used a pair of eights in the hole to three-bet six big blinds while Andrew_flashjammed more than 29.5 big blinds.
emperor_H called and got a set of eights from an eight on the flop that busted Andew_flash. kaua. used jack-ten to make a button open-shove with only 4.4 big blinds left and AvadoKedavra used ace-nine to call. None of them paired the hole cards but an ace-high ended kaua.'s run in seventh place.
Fumapalheiro followed kaua. in sixth place after using ace-five to commit the last two big blinds, but CurrD's red kings beat him. YamaaKK exited the event in fifth place after using ace-trey of spades to make an 18 big blind three-bet all-in and emperor_H using pocket rockets to call.
The board didn't help YamaaKK and busted him. CurrD collected a large portion of AvadoKedvara's stack after his short-stack shove with queens beat their opponent's sevens and reduced their stack to 11 big blinds.
AvadoKedvara used pocket sevens to jam 5.8 big blinds on the button before katekajie used queen-ten to call in the big blind. Unfortunately, a queen on the flop ended AvadoKedvara's run in fourth place.
katekajie busted CurrD in third place after using jack-four of spades to make a big blind call when their opponent used eight-seven of spades to make a button min-raise. emperor_H had a 55.9: 44.6 big blind lead over katekajie when their heads-up match began.
The former used ace-seven to make a min-raise and the latter used pocket nines to three-bet 8.2 big blinds. emperor_H made an all-in shove prompting katekajie to call off 21.4 big blinds. Tens and kings double-paired the board and sent katekajie packing in second place with $8,092.
