Byron Kaverman Wins £25,000 Single-Day High Roller I for £273,710
After an extended 13-hour day at the felt, Byron Kaverman conquered the PokerStars European Poker Tour London £25,000 Single-Day High Roller I at the Hilton Park Lane. Kaverman defeated a field of 30 entries to record a six-figure score of £273,710 after defeating Orpen Kisacikoglu in a grinding heads-up match.
"How long did that heads-up match go for?" Kaverman inquired afterward, noting that it was late into the night. "Good thing for those 15-minute levels." Indeed the fact that the blind levels were shortened to 15 minutes once they got heads-up helped speed things along a little quicker.
Kaverman will add another big score and a trophy to his already illustrious resume, totaling over $17,000,000 at the live felt. The American poker pro has become a regular on the European circuit, mainly focusing on the high-rollers. "See you guys tomorrow," Kaverman touted, indicating that he'll be back for the £50,000 Super High Roller that kicks off at 12:30 pm local time.
Final Payouts
| Place | Player | Country | Prize (GBP) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1st | Byron Kaverman | United States | £273,710 |
| 2nd | Orpen Kisacikoglu | Turkey | £176,470 |
| 3rd | Steve O’Dwyer | Ireland | £117,050 |
| 4th | Espen Jorstad | Norway | £84,640 |
| 5th | Ben Heath | United Kingdom | £68,430 |
Summary of the Day
The action got started early in the day with 12 players initially taking their seats in order to receive half of the tournament rake returned. It was the regular high-stakes tournament players that travel around to many of the EPT stops throughout the year, many of that are accustomed household names by now.
Late registration remained open for the first 10 levels of the day, and when the dust settled a total of 30 entries were recorded to create a prize pool of over £720,000. With only five places paid, it was a mad dash to reach the final table of eight players.
However, once they closed in on the money bubble, the action started to grind to a halt. Kisacikoglu held a clear chip lead over his fellow opponents who were all battling it out in order to stay alive. Unable to get anything going in the latter stages, it was Sam Greenwood who unfortunately became the bubble boy.
Five-handed play lasted surprisingly longer than most expected with a few players hovering around the 10 big blind mark. After many blind vs blind encounters, Ben Heath finally succumbed to the pressure from Kaverman. Heath's king-high was no good when Kaverman flopped a pair of jacks, bringing the field down to just four.
The reigning WSOP Main Event champion Espen Jorstad had a healthy chip stack for the majority of the day but was unlucky in a couple of late flips that left him on crumbs after the final break of the day. Jorstad was forced to go with queen-high in the big blind but ran into Kisacikoglu's king-high. No help on the runout for Jorstad meant he would be eliminated in fourth place.
Not far behind the exit line was Steve O'Dwyer who saw his ten big blinds go up in flames against a red-hot Kisacikoglu. In another blind vs blind confrontation, Kisacikoglu managed to spike a pair of nines on the flop and O'Dwyer was unable to recover.
That left Kisacikoglu with a two-to-one lead over Kaverman going into heads-up action but that lead was short-lived. In one of the first pots of the duel, Kisacikoglu opted to run a triple-barrel bluff but ran right into Kaverman's top pair, sending the chip lead to the American. From there, Kaverman slowly chipped away at Kisacikoglu over the next hour until it finally came to a head when Kisacikoglu was down to just seven big blinds.
The two players finally got all of the chips in the middle and Kaverman managed to spike a pair on the flop to take the lead. Kisacikoglu had a single over card and a flush draw as outs but was unable to come from behind, ending the tournament in the wee hours of the morning.
The PokerNews live reporting team will be back tomorrow to bring you more live coverage of high-stakes tournaments as the Super High Roller gets underway.