Daniel Habib Wins WPT DeepStacks South Africa For $113,445

Johannesburg pro Daniel Habib walked off with his first WPT title yesterday after taking down the WPT DeepStacks for a cool R1million, almost doubling his lifetime tournament earnings in one fell swoop.

Habib, who hasn’t cashed in tournament play since late 2014 and has since preferred cash game play, took the $73,000 top prize and the title after 3 days of tough poker at the Emperor’s Palace Hotel and Casino in South Africa’s biggest city.

A record-breaking field of 456 entries had paid R13,500 ($985) apiece to battle it out for deep-stack supremacy and a share of the $366,088 prizefund on offer, 35 players finally making the money – with Habib surging to the top of the chip counts after the bubble burst on day 3, from where he ‘cruised along until the final table, where a key double in five-handed play propelled him back to the top’, according to the WPT updates.

Unusually, the final table started 10-handed, and despite a couple of short-stacks falling quickly it took several hours for the players to sort the contenders from the - admittedly relative - also-rans, leading to a 4-way deal, after ‘a 15-minute discussion about how best to divide the remaining prize pool’ which left Habib with ‘the most money and the official title along with the WPTDeepStacks trophy.’

The deal amounts were also quite unusual, a full third of the original 1st prize being divvied up by the 2nd-4th spots, Habib obviously intent on the trophy and the kudos which go with it.

*The payouts along with the original prize amounts as reported by WPT.com

The WPT Deepstacks tour has a worldwide appeal, with stops in the likes of Brazil, Morocco, South Korea and throughout Europe and the USA, which they describe as ‘combining the WPT’s industry-leading brand with DeepStack cutting–edge approach to mid-major poker’.

Full Final Table results