In the seven years of its existence, only five players have won multiple GUKPT titles. It’s an illustrious bunch including WSOP bracelet winner Praz Bansi, Sunny Chattha, Priyan de Mel, Paul Foltyn and former international footballer Tony Cascarino all with two victories. Julian Thew currently stands alone as the only player with three titles.
After the latest leg of the UK’s longest running poker tour you can add another name to that coveted list – Andrew Teng. The British pro initially won GUKPT Thanet back in 2008 for £68k and can now add another £26,000 to his bank account for his GUKPT Edinburgh victory. The £500+£50 event drew 150 unique players to the Grosvenor Maybury casino on the edge of the city. Add 42 re-entries to that and there were 192 entries in total, leaving an £8,000 overlay for Grosvenor to make up after guaranteeing a £100,000 prizepool for the event.
The final table was full of established pros, including six native Scots. It was the outsiders however, who were looked at as the most dangerous threats, especially German Dominik Nitsche. A regular on the EPT, Nitsche has over $3m in tournament winnings but, despite coming into the final with one of the biggest stacks, was the first player eliminated. The end came when Nitsche ran A-K into the pocket Aces of Jeff Kimber in the biggest pot of the tournament so far. The Aces held up and Nitsche had to settle for a meagre £2,300 payday.
Kimber, who is in a great run of form after winning PKR Live earlier in the month, rode that stack all the way to fourth place before a brutal loss with Q-Q to the 9-9 of Jonny Gray left him short stacked. It was a beat that Kimber couldn’t recover from, eventually shoving with Ad-7d only to be called by Teng’s dominating As-Ts, which held up. Kimber collected £7,800 to add to the $18k he won at PKR Live.
Scott Brown was the next to go, losing with Qd-Jd to Gray’s Ad-Th, leaving Gray and Teng to battle it out heads-up. Gray was the local favourite with the rail and also carried in the chip lead to heads-up. After over two hours of play though, the two could not be separated. With stacks now equal they greed to a deal, each securing £22k and leaving £4k, the GUKPT trophy and a seat at the GUKPT Grand Final to play on for. It didn’t last long after that point – the final hand coming when Gray open shoved A-9 and Teng woke up with pocket Kings. The board was safe for Teng to win the hand, the tournament and create some GUKPT history by winning his second title.
The GUKPT will now move on to the seaside with the next leg coming from Brighton on May 1. It’s another £500+£50 buy-in with a £100k guaranteed prizepool. Satellites are running right now on GrosvenorPoker.com where you can win your seat for just a small outlay.
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