Post by Ryan Knuppel on -

The World Series of Poker Europe is in full swing and the first winner has already emerged. An Israeli man named Tamir Segal managed to win the first gold bracelet in Europe in less than four hours. There were a total of 2,991 entrants to this event, and Segal managed to beat them all in an event called Event #1: €550 COLOSSUS No-Limit Hold’em. The amount of money he won is €203,820.The tournament had a guaranteed prize pool of €1 million. However, this was surpassed due to the high number of applicants and it turned out to be exactly €1,435,412. The event took place in a Czech town called Rozvadov, at the King’s Casino.

Tamir Segal has never won such a big cash prize before and was excited after he managed to beat Wojciech Wyrebski during the heads-up play. Wyrebski came in second and won a nice sum of €125,966, which is also the highest he has been paid for playing poker professionally. Wyrebski also gave us a lot of compelling poker plays and was a real threat to Segal. There were a total of eight starting flights, Day 2 being particularly chaotic. Only ten players made it to the unofficial final table. Some of the names that you might recognize who made it to the final table are Bjorn Bouwmans, Krasimir Yankov, and Hannes Neurauter.

The first one to leave the final table was Italian poker player Nelio Gatta, who was paid €13,410. Bouwmans and Yankov followed Gatta to the rail, managing to win €17,209 and €22,281, respectively. The seventh and the sixth place were occupied by Italian players Flavio Decetaldo and Francesco Delfoco. They won €29,104 and €38,349, respectively. Neurater managed to get fifth place, while Dariusz Glinski emerged in fourth place. Neurater won €51,854, and Glinski had to be satisfied with €68,331. The battle between the final three had some interesting plays. Ayguen was losing his chips at a slow and steady pace. However, all of that sped up when he went all in with his pocket jacks, only to face Segal’s king-seven that made a straight with the river. The number of chips was going back and forth in the heads-up play. This lasted for almost twenty minutes before Wyrebski decided to raise his bet with ace-queen in his hand. He faced a hand containing king-ten, but Segal was once again lucky as another king came on the turn and decided in Segal’s favor. Tamir Segal showed some great moves and played well. We can probably expect more from him in the near future – maybe even during the upcoming WSOPE events. Until then, Tamir will enjoy his title and first bracelet ever.