UKIPT Galway Latest Update, Clarke Triumphs in Bolton

Alan Going for Gold in Galway

Despite 860 players anteing up €1,100, this year’s UKIPT Galway failed to meet its lofty €1,000,000 guarantee but that didn’t stop a slew of top pros shooting for the €205,600 top prize.

Indeed, amongst the famous faces tussling at the felt this weekend was the likes of Viktor Blom, Jake Cody and local legend Liam Flood, but as the tournament wore on it was the relatively unknown Tim Michels who thrived.

Having made his way through Day 2 and into the final 51 players, the German qualifier looked like the man to beat as yesterday’s penultimate session got underway.

Indeed, with more than 800,000 chips Michel was able to make his way through the Day 3 masses, however, as the field was reduced to two tables he eventually faltered and hit the rail in 12^th place.

With the Michel now watching from the sidelines it looked as though Max Silver would make his mark on the tournament. However, despite bearing the name of a precious metal, Silver wasn’t able to increase his chip value and eventually had to make way for another shining grinder: Alan Gold.

Indeed, by the close of play it was Silver who was left without any chips whilst Gold was sitting atop of the Day 3 chip counts.

Today’s session kicked off earlier with just eight players left and at the time of writing only five players remained.

Clarke Dominates GUKPT Bolton

GUKPT Bolton came to a conclusion on Sunday and when the dust had settled it was Michael Clarke who stood victorious amongst his fallen opponents. After working his way through more than 120 players on the previous two days, Clarke entered the final table as one of the top stacks.

With a wave of momentum already on his side Clarke began the finale looking every bit the champion elect as he immediately eliminated Martin Hogarty.

After holding his ground in a pre-flop raising war with pocket tens, Clarke was eventually able to fend off Hogarty’s A-K and eliminate the first player of the final table.

After Clarke’s fast start he soon took a backseat as Todd Robinson eliminated Liam Batey, James Conway and Kerry O’Connor to take the tournament down to five players.

At this point it was Clarke who resumed control of proceedings, dispatching with Don Alpert in fifth before hitting a royal flush to deal a tough beat to Alan McLean who held a straight flush.

Mark Dyson was the player hitting the rail in third, setting up an inevitable heads-up battle between Clarke and Robinson. Despite being relatively even in chips the match was soon over after both players moved all their chips in the middle.

Clarke’s pocket eights not only started the hand in the lead but finished ahead, a result which gifted him the final pot and a top prize of £20,000.

1st – Michael Clarke £20,000

2nd – Todd Robinson £14,140

3rd – Mark Dyson £8,810

4th – Alan McLean £5,480

5th – Don Alpert £4,330

6th – Kerry O’Connor £3,320

7th – James Conway £2,660

8th – Liam Batey £2,000

9th – Martin Hogarty £1,500