The poker world’s biggest tournament, the World Series of Poker is already well underway at the Rio Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas.  It comprises of a massive total of 55 poker events, with the main event, the World Championship No Limit Texas Hold’Em beginning next month.  It will be concluded with the final table being decided in November. 

In addition, a Player of the Year Award will be given to the player gaining the most points throughout the events of the World Series. 

This year’s World Series of Poker got off to a start with the World Championship Pot-Limit Hold’em being decided.  The event had a buy-in of $10,000 and had a field of 352 players. 

The honour of receiving the first WSOP bracelet of 2008 went to Canada’s Nenad Medic.  The man originally from Serbia also earned £404,362 to go with his gold-encrusted bracelet. 

He faced an extremely tough field with some top professional players making the final table.  The line-up included previous WSOP bracelet winners Mike Sexton and Kathy Liebert.  Also making it through was Patrik Antonius seen by many as the best poker player in the world.  Other top players, Andy Bloch and Phil Laak also made their way through to the final table.  Mike Sowers, Chris Bell and Amit Makhija completed the final table line-up.

Bloch had the chip lead, with Medic in second place at the beginning of the final table action.  Bloch held on to this lead for most of the duration of the final table.  However, Medic eventually overtook Bloch’s lead in a three-way battle that eliminated Kathy Liebert and after hours of final table play, it was Medic and Bloch who progressed to the heads-up final.  At this point, Medic had a chip advantage of more than two to one over Bloch.

It was Andy Bloch’s birthday, but it wasn’t to be his lucky day as Medic was in no mood to lose his significant chip advantage.  After an hour of the heads-up Medic became the first bracelet winner of this year’s World Series of Poker.   

Bloch received a runners-up prize of £248,270 which should ease his birthday blues somewhat.

After his victory Medic said, “It was a tough field, the whole tournament, all the way to the final table. . .I always had a decent stack.  The ace – king versus kings – I didn’t feel too good about that, but it worked out.”

This was Medic’s first WSOP bracelet which adds to the WPT title he already has.

The final table standings were as follows:

Nenad Medic $794,112 (£404,362)
Andy Bloch $488,048 (£248,270)
Kathy Liebert $306,064 (£155,603)
Mike Sexton $248,160 (£126,189)
Amit Makhija $198,528 (£100,951)

Chris Bell $157,168 (£79,920)
Patrik Antonius $124,080 (£63,107)
Mike Sowers $99,264 (£50,486)
Phil Laak $74,448 (£37,872)

Print version