Friday, Sept. 19, 2008

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WPT record broken with Rajkumar win

By Sarah Polson

The World Poker Tour was in Atlantic City this week for the Borgata Poker Open. Once again the WPT hit a new record, but not for attendance or money this time.

Vivek Rajkumar pulled off a record-setting win by taking down the final table of the WPT Borgata Open in just 48 hands. It was an appropriate accomplishment for the pro, who dominated the event and has been on the cusp of a big live-event win for years.

Rajkumar had racked up nearly $500,000 in tournament cashes in the past few years through WPT, World Series of Poker and other events. His only win before the Borgata Poker Open was an L.A. Poker Classic event in February, though he did make the final table of a WSOP event in 2007.

On his path to victory, Rajkumar worked his way up through a field of 516 players in the $10,000 buy-in event.

That playing field included plenty of professional player power as well. John Phan, Carlos Mortensen, David Singer, Michael "The Grinder" Mizrachi, Mark Newhouse, John Juanda, Tuan Le and others made an appearance and busted on Day 1.

Michael DeMichele, Alex Jacob, Matt Graham, John D'Agostino, Jon Friedberg, Bryan Devonshire, Glenn Chorny, Victor Ramdin, John Racener, David Pham, Beth Shak, Matt Stout, J.C. Tran and Jared Hamby were among the pros who made it to Day 2 only to find themselves on the chopping block.

By the end of Day 3, Rajkumar broke into the top 10 in the chip count, coming in second behind Dan Heimiller while pros such as Brandon Cantu, Tiffany Michelle, Joe Sebok, Lee Markholt and Robert Mizrachi headed to the rail.

Day 4 saw 27 players come back to the tables at the Borgata to battle for the six spots at the final table. Ted Forrest was chopped down early when his pocket aces ran into Thayer Rasmussen's pocket eights, and Rasmussen hit an eight on the flop.

However, Rasmussen wouldn't be so lucky later in the day when he ended up all-in with K-5 offsuit against Rajkumar's A-4. The board came down 9-8-2-3-2, and Rasmussen earned $65,000 for 12th place.

Other pros who fell before the final table was set were Michael Binger and Steve Dannenmann. John Myung was the unlucky bubble boy in the event, going out in seventh place to miss making the televised final table.

That left Rajkumar leading the way into the final table with more than $6 million in chips. His nearest competitor was Dan Heimiller with $3.3 million in chips and behind him were Andrew Knee, Mark Seif, Jason Strochak and Sang Kim.

They came together again on Thursday for the final battle in front of the TV cameras. Forty-eight hands later, it was all over and Rajkumar had become the latest member of the WPT million-dollar club.

The final-table results were as follows:

Place	Name	Prize
1st	Vivek Rajkumar	$1,424,500
2nd	Sang Kim	$750,000
3rd	Dan Heimiller	$387,500
4th	Jason Strochak	$337,500
5th	Mark Seif	$287,500
6th	Andrew Knee	$237,500

More details from the WPT Borgata Open can be found in the Live Tournament section. The PokerListings team is also currently on the road covering the World Series of Poker Europe for your viewing pleasure as well.

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