Jonathan Van Fleet Wins the partypoker MILLIONS Online for $1,027,000

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Jonathan "sordykrd" Van Fleet

Jonathan "sordykrd" Van Fleet has added to his impressive online tournament poker resume of now almost $9.5 million in cashes as tracked on PocketFives after winning the partypoker MILLIONS Online for $1,027,000.

The event was the largest in partypoker's history with a $5,300 buy-in, a mammoth $5 million guaranteed prize pool and a mouth-watering $1 million guaranteed payout to first place. The tournament guarantee was smashed after attracting 1,047 entrants to generate a $5,135,000 prize pool.

The tournament featured a deep structure with four opening flights followed by two more days of play. Players began with 1 million in chips with blinds increasing every 30 minutes throughout the tournament outside of final two faster-paced opening flights.

PlacePlayerPrize
1Jonathan "sordykrd" Van Fleet$1,027,000
2N0-IPTRI4I2I$651,118
3SandwichBacon$435,448
4LendaMerienda$294,749
5karamazovbros$207,968
6BOOMALOOM_$148,915
7Ludovic "FilthyTrousers" Geilich$104,754
8IN INFINITY$75,485

Day 1 Highlights

Day 1 featured two slow-paced opening flights on Dec. 3-4 followed by two turbo flights on Dec. 5. "McDisilDrOon" was the Day 1 chip leader after accumulating 22.4 million in chips. partypoker Ambassador Joao "joaosimaobh" Simao also amassed a healthy stack of 15.3 million in chips, good for third place overall.

But the first flight of the event ended with some confusion, and ultimately controversy. Each opening flight was scheduled to play through 16 levels. However, the Day 1a flight continued through Level 16, leaving players wondering what was happening. Instead of the tournament pausing with all surviving players progressing to Day 2 as expected, it went on for more than half an hour.

partypoker's tournament organizers to were left with a decision to make regarding how to address the situation. They opted to rewind the tournament back to the end of Level 16, as was originally scheduled.

Day 2 Highlights

The field was trimmed down to 227 players to start Day 2 on Dec. 5 with 104 of the players guaranteed to walk away with at least the minimum payout of $10,270. The day featured 14 blinds levels of 30-minutes each and the money bubble broke after "Roger_Sterling" was eliminated in 105th place.

All of the remaining Team partypoker players were eliminated before reaching the money including Sam "SamTrickett" Trickett (132nd place), Joao "joaosimaobh" Simao (142nd place), Anatoly "NL_Profit" Filatov (150th place), Rob "WelshWizard" Romanello (160th place), Johnny "JLoHarada" Lodden (180th place) and Natalia "N4talB" Breviglieri (224th place).

Final Day Highlights

Day 3 kicked off on Dec. 6 with 25 players each guaranteed a $29,783 payday. Jesse May and partypoker Ambassador Padraig Parkinson commentated the entire final day on the partypokertv Twitch channel.

Ludovic "FilthyTrousers" Geilich began the day with 120.4 million in chips while Van Fleet was short on chips with a stack of just 24.1 million and blinds beginning at 600,000/1,200,000 with an ante of 150,000.

At the first break the field was down to 17 players. Day 1 chip leader "McDisilDrOon" was among the early eliminations in 21st place for $34,918.

The final table was reached about two hours into play after Viktor "Isildur1" Blom (tenth place) and James "ballcupper" Lee (ninth place) were eliminated from the tournament to collect $59,053.

The final table began with blinds at 1,250,000/2,500,000 with an ante of 312,500. "N0-IPTRI4I2I" kicked off the action in the chip lead with 265 million in chips and four players including Van Fleet were all grouped together at the bottom of the pack with chip stacks between 71 to 76 million.

A few hands into the final table, "IN INFINITY" became the first final table casualty. He four-bet jammed with pocket kings and was called by "karamazovbros" with pocket queens. A queen spiked the flop and "IN INFINITY" collected the eighth place prize of $75,485 after he was unable to catch up on the turn or river.

Shortly afterwards, Van Fleet with pocket aces doubled off Geilich with ace-jack to give him his first nine-digit stack of the tournament. About half an hour later Geilich was eliminated in seventh place for $104,754 when he jammed seven-four suited from the small blind and was unable to get there after Van Fleet called with queen-jack suited from the big blind.

"BOOMALOOM_" hit the rails in sixth place for $148,915 after he three-bet jammed with ace-jack. He was called by "N0-IPTRI4I2I" with king-jack suited and his tournament life ended after a king spiked the flop and he was unable to improve on the turn or river.

Next to go was "karamazovbros" in fifth place for $207,968 after he four-bet jammed from the button with king-queen offsuit and was unable to outflip the pocket tens held by "N0-IPTRI4I2I" in the big blind.

"LendaMerienda" hit the showers in fourth place for $294,749 after he open-jammed for 20 big blinds with ace-four offsuit from the small blind and was unable to get there after he was called by "N0-IPTRI4I2I" with pocket queens from the big blind.

At this point, "N0-IPTRI4I2I" had more than triple the chips of both of his opponents. However, the chip lead he held throughout the final table was short-lived and by the end of the blind level Van Fleet was able to more than double up to become the new chip leader.

"SandwichBacon" was low on chips and three-bet jammed with king-three suited and was eliminated in third place for $435,448 after he was called by Van Fleet's pocket tens.

Heads-up play began with Van Fleet holding a 3:2 chip advantage. Van Fleet chipped away at his opponent and held an almost 12:1 chip advantage when the final hand took place.

"N0-IPTRI4I2I" opened from the button and Van Fleet called. Van Fleet won the tournament less than six hours after Day 3 began after his ace-queen held against his opponent's king-jack. "N0-IPTRI4I2I" didn't walk away empty handed as he collected a huge runner-up prize of $651,118 while Van Fleet collected his first seven-figure tournament cash of his poker career.

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Jason Glatzer

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