Top News – Seidel Tops All-Time Money List, Full Tilt Poker Goes Live

So the past few weeks in poker saw some big live tournament action with as many as three big events crowning their winners, rewarding trophies and huge cash prizes. Erik Seidel broke the record after winning the NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship, adding $750,000 to his lifetime tournament winnings and climbing to the #1 spot in poker's all-time money list with a total of $14.7 million in his account. Another big winner was Victor Ramdin who won the The Big Event at the Bicycle Casino in Los Angeles (an event which was formerly known as NAPT LA) and collected the first-place cash $500,000. In non-tournament news we've got the story on Full Tilt Poker launching their own series of live events called the ONYX Cup and as it's hosted by Tilt, one thing's for sure – there's gonna be some high-stakes action.

Seidel Scores the NHPC Title, Tops All-Time Money List

Last week Erik Seidel became the first man to overcome the $14.5 million mark in live poker tournament winnings. So far it's been a fantastic half a year for Seidel as he increased his winnings by more than $4 million in the past few months which finally led him to leading the all-time list.

The final drop to the big pot was scoring the NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship title just two weeks ago as he not only took his vengeance for the runner-up position in last years' event, but also won the $750,000 first-place cash prize as well as the shiny trophy. In 2010 he was very close to winning the tournament, but lost the final battle to Annie Duke and had to settle for the second place. However, this year Seidel was ready to go all the way which he did by outplaying the 2003 WSOP champion Chris Moneymaker in the final play. Moneymaker on his part receiver $300,000 for the second place and will now have to wait for the next year's event to make his own comeback.

Here's what Seidel had to say after his victory: “I have competed in the NHPC since 2005 and lost to Annie Duke in the finals at last year’s tournament, so my win today is truly special. It is always exciting to compete against my fellow poker players who showcased great skill on the tables this year.”

Seidel's success story of conquering the All-Time list began in January when he finished 4th in the $25,000 High Roller Event at the PCA for $296,000 in cash. He then collected $618,000 (USD) for the 3rd place in a A$ 100,000 No-limit Hold'em event and another $2.5 million (USD) for winning the A$250,000 Super High Roller Event both at the 2011 Aussie Millions. He was also introduced into the Poker Hall of Fame last November.

Ramdin Wins The Big Event

If you're not familiar with the name “The Big Event” you may wonder what's all this about and whether it's worth your time. Well, it is because The Big Event is not some minor poker tournament with the players you never heard of. No. What it is is the former NAPT LA event which had to change its name at the very last minute as the owners of the NAPT brand, PokerStars and the Bicycle Casino have decided to rename the tournament after discussions with California gaming regulators. However, the name did not change anything and the tournament went on as planned.

Many pros have attended The Big Event which followed the same structure as the NAPT event. However, none of them were as good as the team PokerStars pro Victor Ramdin, who managed to keep the chip lead for most of the event and finally win it by outplaying the 2005 WSOP Main Event champion Joe Hachem.

The Big Event at The Bicycle Casino gathered a total of 417 players over two starting days, creating a prize pool of almost $2 million. Victor Ramdin collected $500,000 for the first-place finish whereas Joe Hachem had to settle for $300,000.

These are the final standings of the 2011 The Big Event:

1. Victor Ramdin $500,000
2. Joe Hachem $300,000
3. Jeremy Ausmas $190,000
4. Taylor von Kriegenbergh $140,000
5. Bryan Leskowitz $100,000
6. Govert Metaal $75,000
7. Jose De Noronha $55,000
8. Santiago Nadal $35,327

Full Tilt Goes Live

Big news came from the online high-stakes mecca – Full Tilt Poker. Last Friday WickedChopsPoker leaked info about Full Tilt planning to strike the live poker arena with a huge tournament series with the official announcement coming out on Monday. And on Monday it did come out – an 8 minute-long video presentation announced that Full Tilt Poker will be hosting a live tournament series of 6 events called the ONYX Cup and taking place in the United States, Asia and Europe.

The video was hosted by Ali Nejad and featured some of the Full Tilt pros including Phil Ivey, Patrik Antonius, Gus Hansen, Erik Seidel, and Tom Dwan all of whom discussed the launch of the new tournament. The first thing to draw our attention were the buy-ins ranging from $100,000 to $300,000 (for instance the biggest WSOP event buy-in is $50,000) which means no amateurs at the tables. The series will start on May 11 in Las Vegas and finish with a $250,000 Grand Finale event with $1 million added to the prize pool. The ONYX Cup will have it's own player ranking system which will reward the Top 3 finishers of each event with tournament points. The player with the most points at the end of the series will be crowned the champion.

Want to play high-stakes at the ONYX cup with the pros? Head to Full Tilt Poker now and start playing the Onyx cup qualifiers to win your seat at the live tables!

Underage Kid Wins $500,000 on PokerStars?

And to finish this week's edition of Top News is a story which should be especially relevant to all of you underage online poker maniacs. A few weeks ago we told you about the special PokerStars Sunday Million 5 year anniversary event taking place March 6th and rewarding $5 million instead of the regular $1.5 mil, plus a brand new Lamborghini Gallardo. The event had past, the winners rewarded, but..

After the tournament was over and the final positions and cash prizes were determined, the Dutch newspaper “Algemeen Dagblad” attempted to interview the Dutch player under the screen name “zeurr” who finished in sixth place and was rewarded with a $500,000 cash prize. However, when the journalist attempted to contact the guy named Jimmy Jonker aka zeurr by phone, his father Jos Jonker answered and claimed he was the account holder and the one who played the tournament. It then turned out that Jimmy was only 17 years-old which meant that him playing online at PokerStars would violate the T&Cs.

Still, the question of who – the father or the underage son – had actually played the tournament and won the money remains unanswered. Should it turn out that the account holder was under 18 at the time of taking part in the tournament, his account would be ceased and half a million bucks that he won would go back to PokerStars. Now that would be a shame, wouldn't it?

And that's all we had for now, join us next week for more live and online poker news here at OnlinePoker10.

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