Lindgren tops Seidel for $1 million in Australia

It's an aptly named tournament, the Aussie Millions. Particularly for Full Tilt Poker pro Erick Lindgren, who walked in with the $100,000 buy-in for a preliminary tournament and walked out twelve hours later with $1 million.

The $100,000 buy-in event at the Crown Casino in Melbourne is always a well-attended precursor to the main event down under, and this year was no exception.

Eighteen of the toughest, richest poker heavyweights handed over the steep entry fee, and in the end it was two from Team Full Tilt - Lindgren and Erik Seidel - who proved toughest, making it to heads-up play, with the former eventually outlasting the latter for the $1 million.

Seidel took home $550,000.

The unusual format - a Pot-Limit pre-flop/No-Limit post-flop betting structure and speed poker rules (30 seconds to make a decision) - may have thrown some off their game, but the final tally of defeated pros was still an impressive list.

Some of the players sent to the rail early: Gus Hansen, Phil Ivey, Daniel Negreanu, John Juanda, Tony Guoga and David Benyamine.

The bulk of the players went on to participate in the even bigger main event, with Day 1A going yesterday and Day 1B today.

For up-to-the-minute accounts of the Aussie Millions main event, visit PokerListings.com's Live Tournament Section.

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