The $65 million guaranteed Blowout Series is under way at PokerStars, with all the stars coming out on the opening Sunday. We saw familiar names flock to the tables as prize pools already begin to swell. Here’s the first daily bulletin, with all the news and results from the tables.
BLOWOUT BULLETIN
Perrymejsen detects top spot: The first event to wrap from Blowout Series — the appropriately named Event #1 — brought out the very best PLO sharks from across the world. While both the low and high buy-in titles went to Brazilians — “rkmertens” bagged the low for $5,089, and “FábioC.p.br” took the high for $32,123 — the medium event became the latest triumph for the much-decorated Swede Jerry “Perrymejsen” Ödeen. Ödeen has close to $5 million in documented cashes on PokerStars alone (it’s more than $8 million across all sites) and he has high-placing finishes in WCOOP, SCOOP and through the High Roller Club. His $20,106 haul for winning the Blowout Series event, beating a field of 2,765 entries, is not even in the top 30 of his largest online cashes. It’s the mark of a serious pro when that is the case.
Super nine for high roller final: It would be difficult to hand-pick a more formidable line-up for the final table of the Blowout Series’ first high roller tournament, which will play out tonight. All of Tino “tinnoemulder” Muelder, Yuri “theNERDguy” Martins, Laszlo “omaha4rollz” Bujitens, Niklas “Lena900” Astedt and Conor “1_conor_b_1” Beresford are seated, which means the dominant force from WCOOP, Stadium Series and the global rankings are all involved. There’s $1.085 million in the prize pool and $211K up top. The UK’s “DuTTiFruTTi9” is the chip leader. The only shame is that two top streamers, Jon “apestyles” Van Fleet and Lex Veldhuis perished in 10th and 12th respectively, denying us the chance to watch it from their perspectives. It restarts at 1.05pm ET today.
Big Blowout! puts $5m in the pool: The first Big Blowout! tournament of this series attracted 37,673 entries (including 12,168 re-entries) of $109 apiece. If you do the math, that doesn’t quite reach $5 million, but it doesn’t matter: that huge sum is in the prize pool regardless. It means that when the tournament wraps up over the coming two days, the winner is in line for a prize of $485,826.50 — an absolutely enormous ROI on the $109 buy-in. There are 588 players still in with a shout, with Russia’s “ZERGA_77” leading at this stage.
THE SERIES EXPLAINED | SCHEDULE & RESULTS | ALL BLOG REPORTS
European representation: Most people in Europe will be celebrating Christmas about now, while also preparing for New Year, but that hasn’t stopped tens of thousands playing poker too. The three biggest prizes of the first night of Blowout Series all went to Europe-based players with “Elmagico19A1” of the Netherlands winning $70,164 alongside the title in the $530 NLHE 8-Max, “Stiffler8818” of Germany picking up $58,536 (including $22,071 in bounties) in the Sunday Cooldown Special Edition, and “sweetmike79” of the Czech Republic banking $46,316 in the $55 buy-in NLHE. That latter result came after a four-way deal, with everyone guaranteeing themselves more than $33,000 — not a bad return from that fifty bucks.
LATEST RESULTS
Event | Entries | Prize pool | Winner | Country | Total prize |
Event #01-L: $5.50 PLO, 6-Max | 7,304 | $35,790 | rkmertens | Brazil | $5,089 |
Event #01-M: $55 PLO, 6-Max | 2,765 | $138,250 | Perrymejsen | Sweden | $20,106 |
Event #01-H: $530 PLO, 6-Max | 350 | $175,000 | FábioC.p.br | Brazil | $32,123 |
Event #02-L: $55 NLHE, 8-Max | 8,616 | $430,800 | sweetmike79 | Czech Republic | $46,316* |
Event #02-M: $530 NLHE, 8-Max | 835 | $417,500 | Elmagico19A1 | Netherlands | $70,164 |
Event #03-L: $2.20 NLHE, 8-Max, Turbo, PKO | 13,206 | $40,000 | Alexrobert92 | Romania | $3,379†|
Event #03-M: $22 NLHE, 8-Max, Turbo, PKO, Mini Sunday Cooldown | 11,614 | $232,280 | TheLipoFund | Mexico | $15,844†|
Event #03-H: $215 NLHE, 8-Max, Turbo, PKO, Sunday Cooldown | 2,949 | $589,800 | Stiffler8818 | Germany | $58,536†|
†inc. bounties
*denotes deal
STAT TRACKER
Events completed: 8
Total entries: 47,639 (inc. 6,817 re-entries)
Total prize pools: $2,059,420
First-place prizes: $251,558
Events ongoing: 2
Note: Stats refer to completed tournaments only
TWITCH WATCH
It’s great to see Lex Veldhuis streaming a full schedule again, and running deep in major series. However, that always brings with it the fear of situations like this, deep in the $5K High Roller. “Not in this one,” laments Lex. Yes, in this one:
COUNTRIES LEADER BOARD
Eight tournaments wrapped on the opening night of Blowout Series, and winners came from seven different countries. No prizes for guessing which nation had two champs: yep, Brazil takes an early lead in the standings and it’s now everyone else’s job to try and rein them in.
2 titles – Brazil
1 – Czech Republic, Germany, Mexico, Netherlands, Romania, Sweden
STARTING TODAY
1.05pm ET: Event #04: NLHE, 8-Max
Buy-ins: $5.50, $55, $530
Guaranteed: $80,000, $300,000, $200,000
3.05pm ET: Event #05: NLHE, 6-Max, Progressive KO
Buy-ins: $11, $109, $1,050
Guaranteed: $100,000, $250,000, $200,000
5.05pm ET: Event #06-L: $2.20 NLHE, Turbo
Buy-ins: $2.20, $22, $215
Guaranteed: $10,000, $80,000, $200,000