Tom Middleton Wins WCOOP Challenge Main Event

Wednesday April 2,2014 :  U.K. PLAYER SCORES HALF-A-MILLION IN ONLINE POKER CHALLENGE
 
"Middy" takes home $500,000 after besting 1,623 entrants.
 
Tom "hitthehole" Middleton from Leeds in England has been enjoying a strong winning streak recently in both live and online poker tournaments, with his latest victory online in the $2,100 buy-in WCOOP Challenge Series main event adding half a million dollars to his growing bank balance.
 
He was the 2013 EPT Barcelona champion, where he claimed Euro 942,000 in the Euro 5,300 buy-in main event, and he followed that up a week later with an $89,000 online win in the Sunday 500, and a $72,000 final table finish in WCOOP Event #64 – the $215 buy-in NLHE 8-Max competition – barely two weeks after that.
 
His latest score came from the WCOOP online series main event which ended this week. The $2,100 buy-in competition attracted 1,624 registrants, generating a prize pool of $3,248,000.
 
Two days in, and after holding the chip lead and losing it several times, the final table saw Middleton comfortably in the lead on 4.7 million chips as the final table formed, chased by player ‘ventox' on 4.6 million with BrynKenney at third on 3,3 million.
 
A ruthless Middleton hacked his way through the final table, eliminating four of the survivors in a row at one point. When Aussie player ‘Stella948' fell at third for $292,320, it was Middleton and an Israeli player using the handle ‘bboooommmmmm' who faced each other in the heads up, with Middleton holding a 4 million chip lead.
 
Several hands later the duo started negotiating a chop which would leave $40,000 on the table for the winner, along with a $5,200 entry to the 2014 WCOOP main event.
 
After some haggling the deal was agreed and play resumed, with the Israeli enjoying initial success, but Middleton fighting back into contention and then drawing level, and both players holding around 12 million chips apiece.
 
The deciding hand went to Middleton, who must have been relieved to see his dangerous Israeli opponent eliminated as the runner up for the agreed chop prize of $422,594.
 
216 players in all cashed in the event, with other final table payments as follows:
 
somnium89 (Ukraine) $217,616
ventox (Norway) $154,280
David "WhooooKidd" Baker (Mexico) $121,800
Ben "ShankingYou" Palmer (Costa Rica) $89,320
jbrown8777 (Canada) $56,840
Bryn "BrynKenney" Kenney (Canada) $32,480