Tureniec wins EPT Copenhagen

In 2008, Michael Tureniec announced his arrival on the poker scene with a second place finish at EPT London. Onlookers predicted good things for the Swedish Full Tilt pro, but it took until February 2011 for him to bag his first major title.

Tureniec arrived in Copenhagen last week as one of the outsiders in pro riddern 449-strong field, which included a rejuvenated Peter Eastgate after his retirement in 2010. And as the final table began to take shape, all eyes were on Per Linde looking to add to his deep run at last year’s EPT San Remo with a first EPT win.

Linde took his seat among the final eight with a whopping 3.1 million chip lead on his nearest rival, but his stack was soon overshadowed by up-and-coming Brit John Eames. Eames turned over pocket Kings no fewer than four times in the first 60 hands to level the playing field and from then on in it was anyone’s title.

But Tureniec, one of the shorter stacks early on, bullied his way into heads-up against Linde after eliminating Eames in third-place. Three hours into their titanic bout, Linde shoved with pocket sevens before Tureniec insta-called with A-J, spiking a J on the turn to pocket the €496,271 first prize.

‘It’s such a tough field here with a lot of Scandinavian players,’ said Tureniec. ‘My plan now is to first get a driver’s license, then get a nice car.’

The final table payouts were as follows.

1 Michael Tureniec 3,700,000 DKK
2 Per Linde 2,450,000 DKK
3 John Eames 1,400,000 DKK
4 Kevin Iacofono 1,000,000 DKK
5 Nikolas Liakos 750,000 DKK
6 Mudassar Khan 600,000 DKK
7 Andrea Dalla Molle 450,000 DKK
8 Juha Helppi 296,400 DKK