An Austrian player going by the moniker “72oooo” pulled off one of the biggest upsets in the history of poker this Tuesday, as he took down the weekly GGMillion$ High Roller on GGPoker after qualifying through a $10 satellite tournament.
72oooo started his journey to the prestigious tournament in a $10 satellite, advanced through three qualifying stages, and then went on to beat a stacked field of 210 of the world’s best tournament poker players.
With just $55,453 in previous GGPoker earnings, 72oooo entered the GGMillion$ final table as the short stack, with just 14 big blinds in his stack and a payout of $51,480 already guaranteed, nearly doubling his lifetime earnings.
This was far from enough for the ambitious Austrian, who would ride the wave all the way to victory after making several fantastic folds and winning crucial all-ins at just the right times.
With his incredible run, 72oooo spun $10 into $411,843, plus a $10k WSOP Paradise package, marking one of the biggest and most unlikely runs in the history of tournament poker.
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72oooo Wins a Seat in GGPoker’s Toughest Tournament
Qualifying for a poker tournament with a big buy-in for just a few dollars is not unheard of, but is usually reserved for big-field tournaments like the WSOP Main Event, where thousands of players take their chances in the lead-up to the tournament.
The Austrian player had a different plan in mind this week, as he set out to win a seat in the $10,000 GGMillion$, a weekly high roller tournament reserved for the most elite players at GGPoker.
The list of top performers in GGMillion$ includes the likes of Artur Martirosian, Michael Addamo, and Niklas Astedt, along with dozens of other elite tournament grinders from all over the world.
72oooo joined a field of 210 to kick things off and played alongside legends of the game, perhaps for the first time in his life, although he’s had a few other performances in high buy-in events on GGPoker over the years.
Yet, the player seemed undeterred by the odds, which were stacked against him, and was able to make his way to the final table with 14 big blinds, the biggest cash of his poker career locked up, and a dream of winning it all.
Riding the Wave All the Way to Victory
72oooo entered the GGMillion$ final table with just over 820,000 in chips, good for 14 big blinds and 9th place on the leaderboard, just a few chips fewer than Chris Rudolph in 8th.
The GGMillion$ betting odds on the Austrian to win the event outright were set at 22.92 before the final table started, while Rudolph, with nearly the same amount of chips, was priced at 17.96.
72oooo’s inexperience and lack of performance in tournaments of this scope were expected to be a huge hindrance in his final table journey, and the likes of Aram Oganyen and Bernhard Binder having well over 70 big blinds to start would be a huge problem for the short stacks.
Yet, 72oooo took things one step at a time, getting his first double-up through Binder, when his AQ held up against A3, and building his stack up to 32 big blinds shortly after, when his pocket Aces held up against Alexey Borokov’s Jacks.
There were plenty of opportunities for the Austrian to make a mistake and bust out as well, as he was forced to fold a pair of Jacks before the flop on two occasions, both times up against bigger pocket pairs.
He was lucky enough to survive a coin flip with TT against AK shortly after, before sucking out on Lucas Rocha’s pocket Queens with AJ to get down to five players.
Once action was down to five players, 72oooo held an overwhelming chip lead, and he used it to his advantage, putting maximum pressure on the short stacks and leveraging ICM pressure to force his opponents into submission.
He entered heads-up play against Calitox as an approximately 3:2 chip leader, and eventually won a coin flip with pocket Fours against AT.
The win was good for $411,843, many times more than 72oooo’s previous record cash of $14k, as well as a $10k GGMillion$ Live Paradise package, which will take him to one of the most prestigious live tournament stops of the year in December.
The Poker Dream Is Still Alive
Back in 2003, Chris Moneymaker turned an $86 satellite entry into a ticket to the WSOP Main Event, and eventually changed the course of poker history, as he became the World Champion and sparked the Poker Boom.
23 years later, the same poker dream is still alive, with players across all levels still in with a chance to turn a small satellite buy-in into a major tournament entry, compete with the best, and come out triumphant.
72oooo’s most recent victory proved once again that poker is a game that makes dreams come true, and that every poker player with the courage and conviction to sit down at the felt can compete with the champions.
His story is all the proof we need to know that the poker dream is still alive and well, and that the new generations of poker players have a lot to look forward to even in the age of growing competition and tougher tournament poker fields.
