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Poker Tournament Results

39th World Series of Poker 2008

Event #13 - WSOP No Limit Hold'em

June 7, 2008 at 12:00 PM
Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino
Tournament Schedule

Buy-In	$2,500
Prize Pool	$3,213,100
Entries	1397
Report Available Live Coverage

Duncan Bell

Place	Name	Prize
1	Duncan Bell AKA "pumper" (Vancouver, BC, Canada)	$666,697
2	Steven Merrifield (Fairmont, WV, USA)	$428,949
3	Nathan Doudney (Dallas, TX, USA)	$260,261
4	Shawn Buchanan (Abbotsford, BC, Canada)	$218,491
5	Brent Hanks AKA "Brent" (Las Vegas, NV, USA)	$178,327
6	Jason Sanders (Simi Valley, CA, USA)	$139,770
7	Ariel Soffer (Hollywood, FL, USA)	$107,639
8	Brent Ditzik (Phoenix, AZ, USA)	$83,541
9	Nicolas Levi AKA "CroqueMonsieur" (London, UK)	$59,442
10	Adam Katz (Las Vegas, NV, USA)	$38,235
11	Napoleon Ta (Palo Alto, CA, USA)	$38,235
12	Yuri Shapiro (Chicago, IL, USA)	$38,235
13	Jason Mercier (Fort Lauderdale, FL, USA)	$30,203
14	Joel Casper (Chicago, IL, USA)	$30,203
15	John Roveto AKA "Junior" (Duluth, GA, USA)	$30,203
16	Michael Kamran (Los Angeles, CA, USA)	$22,170
17	Jacques Zaicik (Paris, France)	$22,170
18	Frank Vukasin	$22,170
19	Aaron Been (Gainsville, FL, USA)	$17,350
20	William Ragatz	$17,350
21	Peter De Best (Yorba Linda, CA, USA)	$17,350
22	Jason Manger	$17,350
23	Pascal Baumgartner	$17,350
24	Patri Forwalter-Friedman (Mountain View, CA, USA)	$17,350
25	Theo Tran (Las Vegas, NV, USA)	$17,350
26	Samuel Rosenzweig (Dallas, TX, USA)	$17,350
27	Dean Bui (Seattle, WA, USA)	$17,350
28	Liz Lieu (Los Angeles, CA, USA)	$14,137
29	Thong Tran (West Hills, CA, USA)	$14,137
30	Michael Snorden (Indianapolis, IN, USA)	$14,137
31	Scott Freeman (Oak Park, CA, USA)	$14,137
32	Scott Cook	$14,137
33	Mathias Kuerschner AKA "the real magic" (Duesseldorf, Germany)	$14,137
34	Vanessa Selbst (Brooklyn, NY, USA)	$14,137
35	Andrew Balduff	$14,137
36	Yuval Bronshtein AKA "Yuvee" (Atlanta, GA, USA)	$14,137
37	Salvatore Simeone (Florham Park, NJ, USA)	$10,924
38	Brian Wildman	$10,924
39	Asger Boye	$10,924
40	James Hall (Lynchburg, VA, USA)	$10,924
41	Jim McCrink (Las Vegas, NV, USA)	$10,924
42	Mihai Manole (Targoviste, Romania)	$10,924
43	Chau Giang (Las Vegas, NV, USA)	$10,924
44	Jake Solis (USA)	$10,924
45	Peter Robinson	$10,924
46	Craig Gray AKA "MrCasino" (Portland, OR, USA)	$9,960
47	Howard Boyd AKA "Terry" (West Chester, OH, USA)	$9,960
48	Anthony Phillips (UK)	$9,960
49	Phillip Duca (Bayshore, NY, USA)	$9,960
50	Fred Ford	$9,960
51	Marty Wong (Napa, CA, USA)	$9,960
52	Charles Chattha AKA "Chaz" (London, UK)	$9,960
53	Benjamin Zamani (Boca Raton, FL, USA)	$9,960
54	Tom Lee (Denver, CO, USA)	$9,960
55	Jonathan McGowan (San Diego, CA, USA)	$8,996
56	Jeffrey Wan AKA "JooWish622" (Staten Island, NY, USA)	$8,996
57	Joe Simmons (Philadelphia, PA, USA)	$8,996
58	Rodney Pennington (White Rock, BC, Canada)	$8,996
59	Matt Brown (Australia)	$8,996
60	Stuart Baum	$8,996
61	Loren Klein (Golden, CO, USA)	$8,996
62	Paul Kobel AKA "Tashi" (Oakland, CA, USA)	$8,996
63	David Gent	$8,996
64	Nghia Le AKA "3 Putts" (Apple Valley, MN, USA)	$8,032
65	Joseph Perrelli	$8,032
66	Jeffrey Tomlinson	$8,032
67	Justin Phillips (Oregon City, OR, USA)	$8,032
68	Peter Moore (Fernandina Beach, FL, USA)	$8,032
69	Nick Gibson (Windsor, UK)	$8,032
70	Chris Bell (Raleigh, NC, USA)	$8,032
71	Mark Gengaro	$8,032
72	Binh Ly (Garden Grove, CA, USA)	$8,032
73	Jean C Moussa (Webster, MA, USA)	$7,068
74	Vladimir Poleshchuk (Moscow, Russia)	$7,068
75	Chad Cunningham	$7,068
76	Michael Dumas (Anniston, AL, USA)	$7,068
77	Roland Isra (Forest Hill, NY, USA)	$7,068
78	Nils Bardsley (Denver, CO, USA)	$7,068
79	David Zeitlin (New York, NY, USA)	$7,068
80	Michael Martin AKA "Martine23" (Washington Crossing, PA, USA)	$7,068
81	Anthony Young (Ireland)	$7,068
82	David Woo (Atlanta, GA, USA)	$6,426
83	Jamel Maistriaux (Marcinelle, Belgium)	$6,426
84	Brian Cospolich (New Orleans, LA, USA)	$6,426
85	David Cai (Westminster, CA, USA)	$6,426
86	Tristan Wade AKA "Cre8ive" (Boynton Beach, FL, USA)	$6,426
87	Danny Lee (Hacienda Heights, CA, USA)	$6,426
88	Steven Goldberg (CA, USA)	$6,426
89	Gary Varner AKA "Noochie" (Lexington, KY, USA)	$6,426
90	Jarod Drennen (Odessa, TX, USA)	$6,426
91	Lee Watkinson (Cheney, WA, USA)	$5,783
92	Dustin Woolf AKA "Neverwin" (Los Angeles, CA, USA)	$5,783
93	Mike Collins (Hingham, MA, USA)	$5,783
94	David Paul Steicke (Hong Kong)	$5,783
95	David Redlin (Las Vegas, NV, USA)	$5,783
96	Kenna James AKA "Cowboy" (Las Vegas, NV, USA)	$5,783
97	Joe David	$5,783
98	Greg Sellgren (Las Vegas, NV, USA)	$5,783
99	Matt Sterling AKA "Indiana" (Brownstown, IN, USA)	$5,783

Tournament Report

Tournament Notes:

• The $2,500 buy-in No-Limit Hold'em event attracted 1,395 entrants. The prize pool totaled $3,213,100. The top 99 places collected prize money.
• The turnout for this year's tournament increased by 7.5 percent over the previous year. In 2007, 1,290 players registered for this event.
• The tournament was played over three consecutive days. Day Two ran longer than usual, due to the large field. On Day Three, the final table was dealt out on the ESPN stage, also known as the 'feature table.' The secondary final table, located adjacent to the main stage area, featured the conclusion of Event #14 in an intentional scheduling overlap. Most days at the WSOP this year will include two final tables.
• Proving that the World Series of Poker is truly international event, players from 12 different nations finished in-the-money in this tournament - including Denmark, Switzerland, Belgium, Canada, England, China, France, Germany, Romania, Russia, Scotland, and the United States.
• The winner was Duncan 'Pumper' Bell from Vancouver, BC (Canada). He is a 32-year-old professional poker player. Bell is married to his wife Joyce, and has one son, Ian.
• 'Pumper' Bell got his poker nickname from playing aggressively. Friends say he likes to 'pump up the pots.' He concentrates mostly on live-action games played near his hometown. However, Bell has played at casinos throughout Western Canada.
• Bell collected $666,697 for first place. He also earned his first WSOP gold bracelet. To date, Bell now has two cashes at the WSOP. He took 318th place in the Main Event in 2005.
• Prior to turning pro, Bell played ice hockey in the amateur ranks, He also worked as a bellman at the famous Banff Springs Hotel, a luxury resort in the Canadian Rockies.
• The real story of this final table was the remarkable dream come true scenario for the champion (Bell) and his poker pal, Shawn Buchanan, from Abbotsford, BC (Canada), who finished fourth. Many friends say they hope to play against each other for a gold bracelet at the WSOP. In this case, the dream really came true. Bell and Buchanan play together regularly in casinos and some home games around Vancouver. They ended up making it all the way to the final table in this event, with Bell winning the bragging rights.
• Following his victory, Bell stated in a post-tournament interview: (Winning this gold bracelet) means a lot to me. Every poker player's dream is to win a bracelet. Some people have 11 of them. I will happy with just one. But we will see what happens.
• This was one of the least-experienced final table lineups in WSOP history. In fact, none of the nine finalists had ever played at a WSOP final table before. Four of the nine had never previously cashed in a WSOP event of any kind. The highest prior finish belonged to Nicolas Levi, who took 26th place at last year's WSOP Europe championship.
• Nicolas Levi, from Paris, France, brought along the most interesting cheering section of supporters. He wore a checked fedora while sitting at the final table. A group of seven supporters wore identical hats in the gallery. 'We Frenchmen are not very many people here, so we must all stick together,' one of them said. Unfortunately, the Champs-Elysees fashion parade did not last long. Levi busted out in ninth place.
• So far at this year's WSOP, the average final table has run about seven hours in duration. However, this finale ended in slightly more than three hours. Only 73 hands were dealt. It was the quickest final table of the year.
• The final hand of the tournament pitted 'Pumper' Bell's pocket aces against Steven Merrifield's pocket tens. The rockets held up.
• The second-place finisher was Steven Merrifield, from Fairmont, WV. He is a recent graduate of West Virginia University.
• Last year's champion, Francois Safieddine entered the tournament, but did not cash.
• The champion's curse continues. To date at this year's WSOP, no defending champion has cashed in their respective event.
• Notable in-the-money finishers included former WSOP gold bracelet winners Patri Friedman (24th), Chau Giang (43rd), Paul Kobel (62nd), and Lee Watkinson (91st).
• Three former world poker champions entered this event - including Jerry Yang (2007), Jamie Gold (2006), and Phil Hellmuth (1989). None cashed.
• Talk show host Montel Williams played in this tournament. He was one of the chip leaders after Day One in last year's Main Event. Williams says he intends to play in four or five events at this year's WSOP, including the Main Event.
• Former Oscar-nominated actress Jennifer Tilly played in this event.
• Through the first 13 events, professionals now lead amateurs in the gold bracelet count - 10 to 3.
• This was the fourth WSOP event of the year to be featured by Bluff Media on the ESPN360 website. Viewers around the world can log on at www.espn360.com and watch final tables live. Bluff will feature 20 more WSOP events to be held over the next month. The broadcasts begin daily at 2 pm PST. Note: On some days, events will begin later due to unforeseen tournament length times on the previous day.