Hi everyone. Paul here.
One of the great stories in sport is when an outsider wins the big prize. Boris Becker at Wimbledon back in 1985. Leicester City winning the English Premier League last year. Greece winning the European football championships in 2004. Everyone loves an underdog, and when the underdog goes on to win the big prize, it’s really special. It gives everyone hope they too can achieve their dreams. But these occasions are rare.
The improbable can happen in Texas Holdem poker, though, and that’s one of the reasons why I love it. Experience, bankroll, knowledge – yes, they count for a lot. But you also see lots of different players winning the main tournaments. Bad cards can send a great player to the rail. And an unknown player can take a true pro by surprise.
Last week you’ll have seen, if you followed me on Twitter (@paulphuapoker), that the impossible did indeed happen. A total unknown outsider won the big prize at a tournament in Australia.
The man of the moment is a guy called Shurane Vijayaram from Melbourne. And he became an overnight millionaire with an initial stake of just 130 Australian dollars. Yes not 130,000, or 13,000. Just 130. His story is worth telling in full because it’s so great.
He didn’t even get to enter directly into the main tournament. Like in golf or tennis, where they have qualifiers, here it was the same. Over a week before the final game, Shurane entered a feeder poker tournament at the Crown Casino in Melbourne, his home city, where the Main Event would also be held. He had to pay the A$130 (almost exactly US$100) to enter. The reason why this was attractive was that the winner of this tournament would go on to get an entry into the main Aussie Millions event. Professional players from around the world were turning up for this a few days later, hoping to win the million dollar plus prize. Luckily for Shurane he did win that feeder tournament. And that gave him the golden ticket worth A$10,600 (around US$8,150) into the Aussie Millions main event.
So he enters what we now know to be his first ever big time cash tournament. It’s being streamed online, with the coverage hosted by pro Jason Somerville. 30,000 people are watching.
And after eight full days of play, if you include the preliminary and main events, he beats 723 other opponents to win the A$1.6m pot (about US$1.23m). It was his first ever cash tournament so he had no experience of high stakes tournament play! Even more incredible. And he beat some top pros along the way. People who play month in month out in cash games for big prizes.
But it’s not just that which is so impressive. It’s the way the whole tournament ended too.
In the final hand Shurane ended up heads up against pro Ben Heath who went “all in” against him. Heath is a highly regarded up-and-coming pro poker player who had already won some big pots at some big tournaments. All Shurane had was a pair of fives. Not a great hand. But he went ahead and called Heath’s “all-in” anyway. And he was right to do so because his opponent was just holding a king and an eight.
Such a brave thing to do, especially for such an inexperienced player. And it won him a large amount of money. The commentator called Shurane’s play “unreal”. He’s right.
After his unlikely win, Shurane said “I’ve always just tried to play cards and relax, it’s only a game. I just try to play my best game and not think about people that are really good players. It doesn’t matter who you are, you just have to get the cards.”
Yes, Shurane, but you also have to know how to play them! And your call on the pair of fives shows us you can play even when you don’t have great cards.
I look forward to seeing you back at a tournament soon Shurane!
FINAL RESULTS
1 Shurane Vijayaram (Australia) – A$1.6 million and gold bracelet worth A$30,000
2 Ben Heath (United Kingdom) – A$1 million
3 Tobias Hausen (Germany) – A$620,000
4 Jeff Rossiter (Australia) – A$440,000
5 Fedor Holz (Germany) – A$335,000
6 David Olson (United States) – A$270,000
7 Luke Roberts (Australia) – A$210,000
