The nineteenth Full Tilt Online Poker game289 Series finally came to an end early this week, after an impressive 45 tournaments were played out. The series has been great for players and railbirds alike, with the giant guaranteed prize pools drawing huge crowds of players and making for weeks of fun, excitement and action. The Main Event wrapped up to conclude the series and was won by GIAMPP.
In case you’re new to the online poker world or play predominantly cash games, the Full Tilt Online Poker Series, more commonly known as FTOPS, is one of the biggest tournament series on the internet, and takes place roughly every three months. There are a huge range of events, which vary in terms of games, buy-in, format and much more – basically the only thing these events have in common is the generous guaranteed prize pool associated with them. This series alone had a combined guaranteed prize pool of $22 Million, not a bad amount of cash to be spread around the 45 tournaments it consisted of.
The Main Event is, of course, the one that everybody awaits most eagerly, and an impressive 14,479 entries were purchased. The Main Event had a guaranteed prize pool of $3,000,000 but, as has become the theme for Multi-Entry tournaments this series, this number was vastly exceeded, with the total prize pool coming in at a staggering $8,687,400. Multi-Entry tournaments is the latest innovation at Full Tilt Poker, and allows you to buy into a tournament multiple times, giving you a new and separate stack on a different table with each entry you buy, thus greatly improving your chances of winning and also increasing the prize pool significantly.
All FTOPS events are hosted by a well-known member of the Full Tilt Poker community, and the Main Event host was famous poker pro Erick Lindgren. For those of you haven’t seen this pro on High Stakes Poker or the numerous other TV poker shows where he has made appearances, the American pro is a WSOP Bracelet holder, has won two WPT Championships and has career tournament winnings in excess of $7.3 Million. Lindgren purchased six entries to the Main Event but luck was not on his side and his final entry was eliminated in 2377th place.
As the final table reached its final three players, a break was held to discuss a chop. According to Full Tilt rules players can agree to split the prize money, but there must be an amount left aside for first place, as a single winner must be found. At the time of the chop the chip leader was blur5f6, who went on to finish in second place and receive a modest pay-day of $1,162,949.74. SirMad was third in chips and was the first to be eliminated after the chop, taking home $805,440.26 for his troubles. It was GIAMPP who came out on top of Heads Up play, and in addition to the FTOPS Main Event Jersey he collected $877,949.74.
With the end of the Main Event the nineteenth Full Tilt Online Poker Series came to a very successful end, and one thing is certain: Except to see more Multi-Entry events in the future, as these have proven to be very successful. If you feel like you’ve missed out, Mini FTOPS XIX is just around the corner, and it’s always only another three months until a new FTOPS kicks off!
