Piotr Nurzynski is a Polish amateur poker player who entered a $250 online poker satellite competition whilst travelling in South America and won a seat in the Euro 5,300 buy-in European Poker Tour Barcelona Main Event.
Today he is Euro 1,037,109 wealthier after winning the event following a four-way chop…and he has a $30,000 PokerStars Platinum pass to boot.
This year’s main event attracted a record field of 1,931 entries, boosting the prize pool well beyond the guarantee to Euro 9,365,350
On the final day, with the final table roll call down to just four players, a halt was called to negotiate a chop. Nurzynski, Chinese amateur Haoxiang Wang, Ognyan Dimov from Bulgaria and Portugal’s Pedro Marques agreed to a division which would see a Platinum pass, the trophy and Euro 180,000 left on the table for the winner, and play resumed.
Marques was the next to head for the exit at fourth place with his agreed share of the chop of Euro 698,369, and he was followed by Dimov at third for Euro 725,621.
That left Wang holding a significant chip lead and facing Nurzynski in the heads up, but the Pole was far from done, exhibiting a steely determination and unreadable face as the two played on. Then a key point in the competition was reached when Nurzynski scored a big pot with pocket kings against the middle pair and straight draw of Wang, helping him to grab the lead soon after.
A little later the Pole followed that crushing blow by winning another major pot with jacks vs. nines; Wang was unable to recover and soon after he was eliminated, collecting Euro 1,023,701 as his runner-up reward.
In related news, UK poker pro Max Silver emerged victorious from the Euro 10,000 buy-in EPT Barcelona High Roller, winning Euro 600,924 after a three-way chop involving Norbert Szecsi of Hungary and Joris Ruijs from the Netherlands. The agreement left the trophy and Euro 60,000 on the table for the winner.
439 entries were recorded for the event, which took three days to complete.
With the chop agreed, the action resumed with Szecsi holding the chip lead, but Silver took it away from him after eliminating Ruijs at third for Euro 488,819.
Heads up, Silver made short work of the Hungarian, eliminating him at second for Euro 626,357 to claim the trophy and the main prize of Euro 600,924.