Aleksey Badulin Wins WPT Russia
The World Poker Tour just completed its Season XVIII trip to Casino Sochi in Russia, with Aleksey Badulin winning the WPT Russia title for $261,571.
Badulin topped a field of 489 entries to become the newest member of the WPT Champions Club and he’s earned a $15,000 entry into the season-ending WPT Tournament of Champions.
WPT Russia Final Table Results
- Aleksey Badulin – $261,571
- Vlada Stojanovic – $185,831
- Ernest Shakaryan – $135,833
- Vahe Martirosyan – $102,488
- Sergey Kharlamov – $78,837
- Roman Timergazin – $60,254
The final day of the event began with 12 players remaining, including one of Russia’s top tournament players, Anatoly Filatov. After the elimination of Mikhail Sokolovskiy in 12th place, Filatov was next out the door in 11th. He was done in by Roman Timergazin.
Badulin started the final day in fifth chip position and quickly got to work building his stack. Early on the final day, he added about a million in chips to the 1.79 million he started with, and it was a nice cushion to have when Vahe Martirosyan double through him.
When the tournament was down to nine players, Badulin was sixth in chips, and then when they got down to six players, he sunk to the bottom of the leaderboard. Vlada Stojanovic was the player to extend a big lead during six-handed play, but it was Ernest Shakaryan and Badulin scoring the first two knockouts at the official WPT final table.
After Shakaryan busted Timergazin in sixth place, Badulin took out Sergey Kharlamov in fifth. Against Kharlamov, Badulin held the 
against the 
and the money went in preflop. Badulin spiked an ace on the flop and held from there to score the elimination.
With four players left, Badulin scored a pivotal double up against Martirosyan. Badulin had limped in from the small blind with the blinds at 100,000-150,000 with a 150,000 big blind ante, and Martirosyan shoved all in from the big blind. He had Badulin covered and Badulin quickly called with the 
. Martirosyan had the 
. The kings held for Badulin and he improved his stack to 4.3 million.
Martirosyan would then bust in fourth before it was Badulin picking up pocket kings to knock out Shakaryan in third place. Once again, Badulin was in a very good spot, as his 
was up against the 
for Shakaryan. The kings held and Badulin soared to more than 10 million in chips.
Badulin took the heads-up chip lead against Stojanovic very early in the match and then worked to extend the lead from there. As was the theme of this WPT Russia final table, Badulin picked up kings again and won a big pot off Stojanovic to further extend his lead. Shortly after that, it was all over.
On the final hand, Badulin’s 
held against Stojanovic’s 
.
WPT Player of the Year Update
Winning WPT Russia earned Badulin 1,000 points in the Hublot WPT Player of the Year race for Season XVIII, but he’s still a ways away from the top of the leaderboard, sitting in 22nd place. The player leading is Brian Altman, who recently won the WPT Lucky Hearts Poker Open. Altman is the leader with 2,100 points.
Winning WPT Lucky Hearts gave 1,200 points in the Hublot WPT Player of the Year race. He also picked up 200 points for a third-place finish in WPT Maryland at Live! Casino and 200 points for a 10th-place finish in the WPT Legends of Poker.
Altman’s lead is a rather healthy one, as he’s 700 points ahead of Alex Foxen and Toby Joyce, who sit in second and third places, respectively, with 1,400 points each. Foxen holds the tiebreaker of money won over Joyce.
- Brian Altman – 2,100 points
- Alex Foxen – 1,400 points
- Toby Joyce – 1,400 points
- Donald Maloney – 1,350 points
- Geoffrey Hum – 1,300 points
- Aaron Van Blarcum – 1,275 points
- Milen Stefanov – 1,200 points
- Kevin Albers – 1,200 points
- Simon Brandstrom – 1,200 points
- Peter Neff – 1,150 points
WPT Borgata Running Now
The Season XVIII WPT Borgata Winter Poker Open is next up for the World Poker Tour in Season XVIII. In fact, it’s running now, January 26-30, at the Borgata Hotel & Casino in Atlantic City, NJ. The $3,500 buy-in event has a prize pool guarantee of $3 million and the final table will be filmed for television.
The official WPT final table of six will be set on January 30 and then those final six players will be on hiatus until April 1 when they’ll play for the title at the HyperX Esports Arena in Las Vegas.
