In a sight reminiscent of Olympic medal podiums of the 1980s, the PokerStars World Championship of Online Poker Main Eventconcluded with Germans taking the gold, silver, and bronze. PlayinWastedemerged as the champion after a three-way chop with his fellow countrymen, winning almost $1.5 million.

The Main Event was a two-day affair, with 2,133 people paying the $5,200 buy-in on Sunday to take a shot at history. This created a prize pool of $10.6 million with 243 players getting paid. All nine members of the final table were guaranteed six-figure cashes. According to the PokerStars Blog, the 66 events in this year’s WCOOP paid out $62.3 million in prize money, demolishing the $40 million stated guarantee and eclipsing last year’s total prize pool by nearly $7.0 million.

By the end of Day 1 in the Main Event, 296 players remained, so those at the bottom of the chip counts had to sweat out a nervous night, not knowing if they would be able to make the money after hours upon hours of play. It took less than two hours for the money bubble to burst, thanks to a tough cooler that saw PureCash25flop a set of threes, only to watch Luke IWEARGOGGLES Staudenmaier best him with a flopped set of queens, which turned into quads to add insult to injury.

Shane shaniac Schleger (pictured) was the final member of the PokerStars team to be seated with chips, making it all the way to the final table. He was not able to go the entire distance, though, getting ousted in sixth place. He had won a few coin flips to stay alive in the hours leading up to the final table, but finally lost when his 5-5 fell to A-K.

While anyone would be disappointed to fall short so close to the ultimate goal, Schleger was still in good spirits after his elimination, Tweeting, “That’s a wrap. Lost the ultimate crucial flip 55 to AK for heaps, still feeling pretty f’ing good about this run.”

Perhaps the most heartbreaking hand, though, came during the next elimination. With blinds at 70,000/140,000, alexandrapauraised to 280,000 pre-flop, Daniel “Allanon85” Drescherre-raised to 765,432, and alexandrapau 4bet to 1,400,864. At that, Drescher moved all-in for just over 10.0 million, a sum that alexandrapau had no problem calling, though that meant his own tournament life was at stake, as Drescher had him covered.

When the cards were turned over, it looked harmless enough: a battle of pocket aces. But, the flop produced all diamonds and Drescher had the ace of diamonds, so just like that, there was a sweat. The turn was a club, but a fourth diamond was dealt on the river, giving Drescher the unlikely flush and alexandrapau an unceremonious path to the door.

When the tournament was down to three players – PlayinWasted, Allanon85, and SwissCantMis – play was paused so they could discuss a deal. Allanon85 had the most chips at that point at 18.4 million, followed by PlayinWasted with 15.8 million and SwissCantMis with 8.3 million.

This corresponded to a chop of $1.4 million for Allanon85, $1.3 million for PlayinWasted, and $1.1 million for SwissCantMis, with $160,000 remaining to play for. Allanon85 and SwissCantMis lobbied for more, but after PlayinWasted refused to move off his number, the three agreed to the deal and played for the remaining money and the title.

On the final hand, Drescher raised pre-flop, PlayinWasted moved all-in with As-Ks, and Drescher called with Kc-Qs. The board ran out 4s-2c-Ts-Jh-Js, icing the hour-and-a-half heads-up match for PlayinWasted and giving him the 2013 WCOOP Main Event title.

The 2013 PokerStars World Championship of Online Poker Main Event final table results were as follows:

1. PlayinWasted – $1,493,499.15
2. Allanon85 – $1,415,238.66
3. SwissCantMis – $1,101,835.44
4. 1M.BanKroLL – $599,906.25 (yndzone)
5. alexandrapau – $426,600.00
6. shaniac – $291,154.50 (shaniac)
7. Pokerl)eviL – $213,300.00 (Pokerl)evil, pictured)
8. flippetyflop – $159,975.00
9. Vampyboy – $106,650.00

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