In rather stunning fashion, Hong Kong commodities trader David Steicke took on 22 of the best players in the world to win the 2009 Aussie Millions $100k No-Limit Hold'em Challenge and its $1.2 million first-place prize Sunday night.
The final table began in Melbourne just after 4 p.m. with six players remaining. After a rather long feeling-out process, Team Full Tilt pro John Juanda was actually the first player knocked out.
Juanda lost half his stack to 2004 Aussie Millions Champ Tony Bloom in what looked like an ill-advised bluff, then shoved with jacks into J.C. Tran after he'd flopped trip queens.
Fifth place went to Aussie Bill Jordanou, who doubled his short stack twice before running pocket queens into Steicke's kings, bursting the money bubble.
Four-handed, Dan Shak found himself rather short and went with threes. Again it was Steicke who did the deed, calling with sevens, then flopping quads to render the turn and river moot.
Shak took $200k for fourth, and Steicke took charge of the tournament three-handed. Tony Bloom made a bit of a comeback, but a huge bluff by Steicke sent him reeling, and when the 13th and last level of play of the tournament started, Steicke had $1.9 million of the $2.3 million chips in play.
J.C. Tran took third when he ran a weak king into Steicke's much stronger one, cashing $300k. Then it was Bloom's turn to say goodbye; he bowed out after just a few hands of heads-up play when Steicke hit the river against his unconnected ace-rag.
A few minutes after Bloom headed to the cage to grab the $600k second-place prize and Steicke had finished counting his $1.2 million in Crown plaques, he sat down for a little chat with PL.com.
Wow David! What an amazing win - you must be elated.
Yeah, I'm definitely on top of the moon. This is just the 64th tournament I've ever played in today. I haven't won anything, but I've had a third, fourth, fifth and sixth. I had a second in a sit-and-go high roller one time, but I hadn't actually won anything.
I've had a few final tables. I've been playing for one and a half years and I knew I was going to get there one day and this was it. I thought it was going to be today because this was the 64th tournament, number eight is a very lucky number in Hong Kong where I live and this was the eighth tournament at Crown and I don't know what else I can say.
I am a Christian and I give all the praise to God for giving me the strength to play in this.
Taking on 22 of the best players in the game was a daunting task. What do you think made the big difference between you and them here?
The rest of the field have won 20 times more than I have. I've never won anything and we had people that have won. Erik Seidel was here and how many bracelets has he won - we're losing count.
The cards come and just like here tonight in the crown poker room, there are a lot of players. The $100k tournament is not for everyone. It is a large buy-in, but a lot of unknown poker players are winning tournaments today and I'm another one of them.
Having final-tabled the last two high roller events at APPT Macau, it seems these big-buy-in tournaments are really your thing. Why is that David?
I play more properly because it is a large buy-in. In the smaller events I just try to double up early. Also in the high roller events you get more chips. You get a lot of chips and you can be more patient.
Do you think part of the difference here was that you were relatively unknown to the majority of the field? That you kind of flew in under their radar?
Yeah; that was a positive for me. Yesterday the first table I sat down on there was Gus Hansen and Patrik Antonius, and they didn't know me from a bar of soap. They were having their little raising war between one another and they obviously go back a long ways, lots of final tables together and they know how each other plays and I thought I could use that to my advantage.
You flopped quads yesterday against J.C. Tran and got paid off; then you flopped a straight on Patrik Antonius to win another big pot. Were those really the key hands that got you here?
The first one was when I flopped quads. That put me up into the chip lead on $360,000. But actually, after that, J.C. Tran sort of whittled me back. He's a great player; from what I saw he's just really at a high level. That's another reason I wanted to play this. To play against such good players. If you want to beat the best you've got to play the best, you know?
So as I said, J.C. Tran got me back down to $150,000; then I moved tables over to Patrik Antonius table. [Then I flopped the straight.] I bet about three-quarters of the pot and he put me all-in. I thought, ouch, has he got the bigger straight? Then I thought he's probably got trips or something, but anyway, I've got to call. So I call and he's still got outs. Any one of three jacks makes the straight for him. I had to sweat it out.
The other key one of course was here at the final table. Tony Bloom was getting control of the table and in the end it was a bluff ... at the time I wasn't really sure. I thought I had the jack of diamonds at first. I guess he laid down top pair, but I've laid down top pair before when there was four to a flush on board.
So how did you get started in poker, David?
My first tournament was the APPT in Korea. My second tournament was in 2007 and then I went to Macau. I didn't do well in the Main Event. The high roller came up and I was (deciding) whether to play it or not and my wife said to just to come home to Hong Kong. But I was splashing around with the cash machine, got the money together and decided to play.
I didn't really know what I was doing, but I found my way to the final table. Anybody that has watched that knows I didn't know what I was doing. But of course, I've played so many tournaments since then. It's a funny thing, the more you play, the more you know you don't know. There's so much to learn, but in the end you just have to go for it sometimes.
I just play for fun really. I'm a trader. I trade commodities. I do that Monday to Friday and then Saturdays and Sundays for some recreation I play some poker.
And you're still involved in the market?
Yeah.
I guess poker may be more profitable these days?
After this one, yeah!
* * * * * * * * * * *
It's pretty scary that the man who just won the 2009 Aussie Millions $100k No-Limit Hold'em Challenge is an amateur just learning the game. We're not sure what's next for David Steicke, but if this win is any indication, you can expect big things!
Comments
0