Pulkit Goyal Wins 2020 GGPoker WSOPC Event #5: $600 Pot-Limit Omaha ($82,052)
The fifth champion has been crowned during the 2020 GGPoker World Series of Poker (WSOP) Winter Online Circuit. India's Pulkit Goyal earned the lion's share of the $593,370 prize pool after coming out on top of a field of 1,041 entries, which consisted of 619 unique entries and 422 re-entries.
Only the top 179 spots were paid and Goyal defeated Loucas "Rage Monkey1" Kourtoumbellides in heads-up to claim the top prize of $82,052, while his opponent from South Africa had to settle for a consolation prize of $61,530.
Prior to this victory, Goyal had five WSOP cashes to his name including three cashes at the King's Resort in Rozvadov and two scores during the 2020 GGPoker WSOP Online Bracelet Events earlier this year. He has eclipsed his recorded career cashes and follows in the footsteps of fellow Indian players Nipun Java, Abhinav Iyer, Nikita Luther, Aditya Sushant and Kartik Ved, who all have a WSOP bracelet to their name.
Runner-up Kourtoumbellides was by far the most-aggressive player during the late stages and fell short of victory while the final table also featured Austria's Karl "Rossz" Schedlberger, Nikolay "boryan4ik" Prokhorskiy of Russia, and Brazil's Eduardo Pires.
Final Result WSOPC Event #5: $600 Pot-Limit Omaha
| Place | Winner | Country | Prize (in USD) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Pulkit Goyal | India | $82,052 |
| 2 | Loucas "Rage Monkey1" Kourtoumbellides | South Africa | $61,530 |
| 3 | Karl "Rossz" Schedlberger | Austria | $46,141 |
| 4 | 1bloodflood | Russia | $34,601 |
| 5 | Nikolay "boryan4ik" Prokhorskiy | Russia | $25,947 |
| 6 | SlonoSarSki | Israel | $19,458 |
| 7 | SK72 | Germany | $14,591 |
| 8 | SunOfABeach | Austria | $10,942 |
| 9 | Eduardo Pires | Brazil | $8,205 |
The Action of the Day
More than 300 players were in their seats in the first level of the day and the all-in showdowns never really stopped with blind levels of 12 minutes each. There were several double eliminations even before the blinds increased for the first time and new faces as well as re-entries kept on coming. The tournament offered up to three re-entries for each participant and that resulted in more than 40.5% of re-entries once the registration closed towards the end of level 15.
By then, fewer than one-third of the field remained and they raced towards the money bubble in an extraordinary fashion. Some of those that fell prior to the money were Kosei Ichinose, Niklas Astedt, Sami Kelopuro, Hun Wei Lee, Mike Watson, Blaz Zerjav, Bernardo "GGeKKo" Dias, Julien Martini and Felipe Ramos.
Steve O'Dwyer was unable to turn a late entry into a payday and close to the bubble, further familiar faces such as Dante Goya, Jessica Teusl, Joao Simao, and Noah "TheVaccine" Schwartz departed. Anton Wigg had his aces cracked and while Chris Moorman doubled on the bubble, it was then George Wolff who became the bubble boy.
Dylan Linde, Dario Sammartino, Alex Difelice, Toby Lewis, Ole Schemion and Mark Herm were among those who cashed and joined the rail outside of the top 100. One rather unusual name in contention in a PLO tournament was GGPoker ambassador Fedor Holz, who eventually departed in 38th place.
The non-stop action whittled down the field at a rapid pace and former big stacks such as Dorel "DorelEl" Eldabach and Yonathan "ninoboys80" Journo came up shy of the final three tables, as did PLO specialist Gavin Cochrane. En route to the final table, Pulkit Goyal scored two high-profile eliminations after knocking out Craig "GoBlue" Varnell and Andreas Christoforou in 15th and 14th place respectively.
Final Table Action
Russia's "1bloodflood" entered the final table as the chip leader followed by Goyal but it was Loucas "Rage Monkey1" Kourtoumbellides who quickly rose to the occasion and dominated the action with a very aggressive playing style. Eduardo Pires fell to Goyal when a wrap and flush draw missed and half an hour there were only four contenders still in the mix.
"SunOfABeach", "SK72" and "SlonoSarSki" all hit the rail in quick succession and Nikolay "boryan4ik" Prokhorskiy got it in preflop with double suited connectors only for Kourtoumbellides to hold with aces. Goyal then notched up another elimination when his flopped nut straight prevailed against a turned set by "1bloodflood" and Karl "Rossz" Schedlberger saw his hopes vanish with an inferior full house.
ICM deal discussions broke down twice and the lead switched back and forth. Eventually, Kourtoumbellides became short and jammed with an ace-king high in a three-bet pot to get called by Goyal with the middle pair and a gutshot. Two blanks concluded the four-card action after almost ten hours of play and Goyal was crowned the champion.
That wraps up the PokerNews coverage for this event but check back regularly to follow exclusive live updates for each Ring Event of the 2020 GGPoker WSOP Winter Online Circuit!
2020 WSOP Winter Online Circuit Winners so Far
| Event # | Event Name | Buy-In | Prize Pool | Entries | Winner | Top Prize |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | BIG $50 | $50 | $1,439,386 | 31,291 | Aleksey "ImLuckPads" Savenkov | $168,810 |
| 2 | Super MILLION$ | $10,300 | $5,110,000 | 511 | Joaquin Melogno | $636,072 |
| 3 | Deepstack NLHE Championship | $3,000 | $1,436,400 | 504 | Christian Jeppsson | $244,202 |
| 4 | Monster Stack NLHE | $800 | $1,060,200 | 1,395 | Sihao "Mr_3rdBullet" Zhang | $140,472 |
| 5 | Pot-Limit Omaha | $600 | $1,060,200 | 1,041 | Pulkit Goyal | $82,052 |
| 6 | Mini Main Event | $170 | $2,733,559 | 17,478 | Final Table Reached | tba |
flop and Kourtoumbellides jammed near instantly. Goyal needed some additional time to make the call but did so after brief consideration.
turn gave Kourtoumbellides a wheel draw but he missed it all on the 
river to finish in second place for $61,530. Goyal accumulated all the chips and collects the top prize of $82,052 along with the WSOP Online Circuit ring.
flop, action checked to Pulkit Goyal and he bet 396,000. Schedlberger called and Kourtoumbellides came along.
river for 2,388,000. Goyal tanked for a while and eventually folded, Schedlberger jammed for 5,728,882 and Kourtoumbellides snap-called.
for kings full but he was done and dusted as Kourtoumbellides had turned a superior full house with 
and all three players checked. On the 
turn, Goyal checked and "1bloodflood" bet 400,000 to pick up one call. Goyal check-raised the pot to 2.8 million and "1bloodflood" called all-in, Kourtoumbellides folded.
flop was a sweat with the wrap and the 5Qh] turn provided an additional flush draw. However, the 
river to let the kicker play, sending "SunOfABeach" out in 8th place for $10,942.
