Tom Marchese Wins Aria Super High Roller for $1.3m

Last weekend in Las Vegas, the Aria Resort & Casino held the $100,000 Super High Roller event and eventually topping the 22 player field to capture the $1,306,800 first-place prize was none other than Tom Marchese. Following his impressive victory, Marchese now boasts 10 career tournament titles, as well as $7.5 million in live tournament winnings.
The event attracted some of the most talented players in the game to generate a prize pool worth $2,178,000, but the small field meant just three money spots would be paid. Amongst those players seeing no return on their $100k investment was David “Doc” Sands, Philipp Gruissem, Joseph Cheong, Igor Kurganov, and Doug Polk.
Andrew Robl would then be eliminated on the bubble after going all-in preflop with K-9 but running into the K-Q of Brian Rast. Despite assuring himself a cash prize, however, Rast (A-6) would then be the next to fall when his all-in on a 10-6-5 flop was called by Tom Marchese with A-10, and after a 2 and K fell on turn and river, Brian Rast picked up    $217,800 for his hard-fought efforts, while Tom Marchese and Cary Katz progressed through to heads-up for the title.
Following a tough hour of heads-up play, the outcome was eventually decided when Cary Katz’s K-J fell to Marchese’s A-Q to consign Katz to a runner-up finish worth $653,400, and assuring Marchese the victory and his third best result to date of $1,306,800. Marchese’s biggest score came just a few months ago when he finished the Bellagio $100,000 Super High Roller in 3rd place for $1,465,451, and in 2012 Marchese won the WPT Bellagio $100,000 Super High Roller for $1,308,405.
Final Table Results:
1 Tom Marchese    $1,306,800
2 Cary Katz     $653,400
3 Brian Rast     $217,800
As well as being a top tournament pro, Tom Marchese is also a cash game specialist and discussing his break through from being a mid-stakes cash games player to a high stakes poker pro, Marchese had these words to say:
“For me my biggest problem was that I was always playing 9-12 tables. Because of this, I was making a lot of money but never really working on my game and improving.. I found that playing heads up greatly improved my hand reading skills along with improving my game in blind battles and when playing OOP. Most of my success at the 5/10 – 25/50 level has come when I was playing 1-5 tables and truly concentrating on every hand instead of just going through the motions.”