Stephen Chidwick Wins €25,500 Single-Day High Roller For €690,400

(Photo: Pokerstarslive.com)

Following Igor Kurganov’s €million scoop of the big €50K buy-in super high roller event a few days ago it was the turn of the €25K boys and girls to pony up the readies, and with 112 entries it meant a €2,744,000 up for grabs – with England’s Stephen Chidwick wrestling the lion’s share of that, some €690,400, ahead of a final table full of big names.

Although hardly a new name to the world of high-stakes tournaments, his online winnings and live cashes combined taking him well over the $10million mark, Chidwick’s victory in Barcelona was by far the biggest single cash of his career – not bad for someone who started his poker career with a bankroll of… freerolls! And according to his RunItOnce bio, ‘He famously won 101 seats to the Main Event before he was old enough to play in the tournament.’

In the first of two €25K high roller events scheduled for the PokerStars Championships, Barcelona, Chidwick found himself facing the likes of Erik Seidel, Mustapha Kanit, Isaac Haxton and the newly-crowned €50K champ Igor Kurganov, but only Haxton among those could make it to the final table, the others falling by the wayside in the tough and quick one-day event.

Seventeen players would make the money, guaranteed a minimum €43,080 for their efforts, and it was Spain’s Sergei Reixach who would bubble the final table proper, out in 9th for €68,600 and leaving 8 player representing 7 different nationalities in the mix.

Of the two Americans at the table, Haxton was the first to fall in 4th spot – and when Ukrainian Igor Yaroshevskyy hit the rails with over 300,000 in his pocket it left Chidwick to play high-stakes regular Bryn Kenney for the title, and it was a short, sharp affair.

Kenney’s shove with pocket threes ran into the Englishman’s eights – and that’s all she wrote of the heads-up fight, a delighted Chidwick lifting the trophy and his biggest-ever payday.

With over $2.5million in winnings since the start of the year, Chidwick is this year’s ‘high-roller heater’ player and the one they’ll all be looking to beat when the second Barcelona €25K comes around next week.

Final Table results