Poker Press Release

The Big One III Spring Final
By PokerPagesKev

2003 Spring Results
2003 Summer Report

441 players signed up after qualifying to enter the PokerSchool Online main promotion, The Big One III. This year the Big One III is split into 3 finals: the Spring, Summer and Winter finals. Top prize on offer in each of the 3 finals is 15,000 sponsorship points, which can be traded to enter into any live event around the world with a buy in of over $500. The top prize is available to anyone who qualifies with a D rating. Players qualified in 3 different ways to gain their rating, through Annual Members Events, Round 2 qualifiers and Last Chance Events so Annual Members have a distinct advantage for gaining the top rating.

The Spring Final on the 26th April was one of the best we have had in the Big One series of promotions and the tournament always seems to generate plenty of interest in the build up to the final. The actual event spread over about 7 hours culminated in a fantastic final table but first to the early action.

Boo II took the wooden spoon by going out first in the field of 441, and the early chip lead was held by cr8zy with 40,000 chips from an initial starting stack of 10,000 using our 20 minute tournament structure 7.

Hurricane had the distinction of constantly having his blinds in constant jeopardy as he sat between Thief 21 and Robber. However they were both caught red handed and went out in 413th and 406th respectively. By this stage Drawing Dead was certainly making sure his opponents had no outs as he stormed to a commanding chip lead of 74,200 chips.

Notable big names to fall in the early stages were RioRita who was 2nd in the Big One II, sho-nuff a prolific winner in BugsysClub, Lyckoper, the Easter tournament winner, pokermats, the heads up specialist, and jmuzzey.

With 140 players left Hitman H hit the front with over 140,000 chips and looked certain to make the final however he eventually fell short going out in 26th place. With 70 players left bobdylan sang his way into a commanding lead with over 269,000 chips and looked a certain winner, but he to came up short and could not keep hold of the large stack, falling in 19th place.

Meanwhile some very good players were gathering at the top of the leader board and one player getoutnow! had a D qualification as the tournament entered the final stages, which put him in with a chance of the 15,000 top prize. DrawingDead was still there as well with a B qualification with the rest of the field left with an A or X qualification.

getoutnow! departed in 14th and earned 700 sponsorship points for the evenings work and the final table was set when d.a.bree left in 11th place.

Final table

The chip counts and seats were as follows lining up for the final

BlueLake 829,000 seat 3
DrawingDead 581,000 seat 10
gojacketz 492,000 seat 6
4sticks 483,000 seat 2
MsMaverick 473,000 seat 1
lion 406,000 seat 7
RIVERC 348,000 seat 9
FreddieBoy 325,000 seat 5
Joker 319,000 seat 8
JCastle 182,000 seat 4

So with BlueLake with the chip lead, JCastle had drawn the worst possible seat holding the smallest stack and surely couldn't win from there.

The final got underway with loads of railbirds at the table and plenty listening to FreddieBoy's broadcast which was in a yahoo chat room. Freddie was putting on a great performance for his loyal followers and really is a special person when it comes to entertaining the crowd. The blinds were 15,000 -30,000 when this memorable hand came up. Freddie was in the big blind and with 2 callers and over 100,000 in the pot the flop came 8h 7s 4d putting a straight on board. Freddie first to act bet 73,000 which could be seen as a strange bet as it was not the size of the pot and he had about another 100,000 left in his stack. DrawingDead folded but 4Sticks thought for ages. Was Freddie sweating or could he have flopped the straight in the big blind and was trying to suck them in? So while the thinking is going on Freddie plays to the audience. 'Do you want me to show' he said, 'I have something'

4Sticks retorted 'you betting I fold Freddie or you have something?'

'will you show if I fold' asked 4Sticks

'yes I will, I'm a man of my word' said Freddie who had done this previously and always showed a top hand.

4Sticks promptly folded and Freddie sure enough to his word showed Queen 3 off suit winning a pot of 135,000 in the process. What a class move this was that had the railbirds gawping and his admirers laughing.

The joy was short lived unfortunately as Freddie was the first to go out in the final a few hands later, and there were no hard luck stories for one of the best players the school has ever had. Joker, MrsMaverick, and 4Sticks then went out 9th 8th and 7th respectively and with 6 left we still had a B qualifier in DrawingDead.

Gojacketz played a fantastic game throughout and was particularly unlucky to go out in 6th place. Holding Ace-Ace under the gun he raises for 210,000 only to be reraised by lion who made it 670,000 to go. Of course gojacketz called and lion turned over a pair of nines. The flop brought a nine for lion and gojacketz had suffered the worst bad beat of the tournament but he played like a future champion and took the beat very well considering the circumstances.

RIVERC who some of you may notice lives at PokerSchool, as he always plays more tournaments than any other player each month, put up his best performance ever in a school tournament. Coming 5th was a fantastic achievement for this ever improving player and please give him the credit this performance deserves when you see him at the tables.

Down to the last 4 and DrawingDead our last B qualifier was next out, but had the comfort of gaining 700 sponsorship points to an event of his choice and good luck wherever that may be. So we were left with the original chip pauper JCastle, the original chip leader BlueLake, and lion to fight out the finish.

BlueLake played brilliant throughout but could not find a hand at the death and went out in third place and so it was left to lion with the chip lead and JCastle. JCastle had nursed his chips well throughout the final and made the right moves at the right time. He showed the rest of the field all about patience and when he did get some cards he used them aggressively and extracted the maximum chips from the pots he contested. lion is a player that is just unbelievable and even though he got lucky against gojacketz his performance at the final table was magic to watch. The final hand saw lion dealt A-2 and JCastle 10-Jack with a flop of 9-9-K the turn a 8 and the river a Queen this gave JCastle a straight, the tournament win and 3,500 sponsorship points for his qualification.

The next Big One Final is the Summer one on the 23rd August and qualification has already begun. My advice to you all is to become an annual member, as you have more chances to gain a good qualification and plenty of players at the final table were saying they wished they had put in more effort in qualifying.

2003 Spring Results | 2003 Summer Report