Jamie Nixon raked in the largest live tournament score of his career when he took down the £1,250 Grosvenor UK Poker Tour GUKPT London Main Event title. As part of the 2022 GUKPT Grand Final festival, the tourney drew in 347 entrants and found a champion in the Grosvenor Poker-sponsored Nixon who earned an impressive £93,970 and crossed $500,000 in live tournament earnings.
The top 34 places were paid out, with the likes of Kevin Allen, Lee French, Timothy Chung, Yiannis Liperis, James Rann, and Chris Johnson cashing in but failing to make it to the event’s final table.
Johnson ended up as the final table bubble, with Yucel Eminoglu busting in ninth place in a cruel fashion. Eminoglu committed his last seven big blinds with ace-queen of hearts and found himself up against the ace-queen of diamonds in the hand of Justin Tsui. A chopped pot looked most likely but the board ran out with three diamonds, giving Tsui a flush, and sending Mad Turk to the rail.
Down to ten big blinds, Mamut open-shoved with ace-king, and Nixon called with pocket sevens. A queen-high board did not help Mamut, and his run ended in eighth place. He was then followed by Ryan Mandara in seventh place and Justin Tsui in sixth place. Tsui fell after a move against Phil Clarke who opened from the hijack and Tsui called in the big blind. A jack-nine-four flop with two hearts saw Tsui check-shove with nine-seven offsuit. Clarke snapped with the queen-jack of hearts.
The final five became four when Antoine Labat lost it to Clarke. Labat was all-in for ten big blinds with ace-eight against the dominating ace-queen of Clarke. Clarke spiked a flush on the river to send out Labat in fifth. Mitch Hynam was the shortest stack, so it was unsurprising to see him bust in fourth. He was followed by Clarke who crashed out at the hands of Nixon, setting up the heads-up.
Sidhu held a 3,700,000 to 3,300,000 chip lead over Nixon going into heads-up. After losing a big chunk of his chips, Sidhu was all-in with his five-deuce needing to hit against Nixon’s suited ace-king. The five community cards fell queen-high, busting Sidhu in second place, and giving Nixon the title.
Final Table Payouts
1. Jamie Nixon – £93,970
2.Kully Sidhu – £64,980
3. Phil Clarke – £39,630
4. Mitch Hynam – £24,995
5.Antoine Labat – £16,780
6. Justin Tsui – £12,140
7.Ryan Mandara – £9,285
8.Nikolai Mamut – £7,855
9.Yucel Eminoglu – £6,425