Tom Marchese Wins WPT Super High Roller For $1.3 Million

Tom Marchese has won the 2012 WPT Super High Roller, after defeating a field of 27 players over three days to capture the title, and the $1,308,405 first-place prize.
The $100,000 buy-in event managed to create a prize pool worth $3,315,000 by the time all the re-entries and late registrations were counted. Both Andrew Robl and eventual winner Tom Marchese bought back into the competition after being eliminated and commenting on his decision, Marchese said:
“I wasn’t sure about re-entering, but I had some friends who told me it would be silly not to. I was on the way home then, so I just stopped off, took a shower to refresh myself, drove back to the Bellagio and managed to run it up to this, so it all worked out.”
As the Super High Roller played down to its final five paid places, Justin Bonomo exited on the $263,160 money bubble after being dealt A-10 and calling John Juanda‘s pre-flop shove with pocket kings.
Twenty hands later, and Bill Klein was eliminated in 5th ($26,316) having shoved pre-flop with 3-3 into the J-J of Daniel Perper with both players catching a piece of the A-3-2-J-7 board. Still, Perper’s joy was short lived and he departed three hands later having gone all-in pre-flop (K-K) and being looked up by Juanda (Ad-10d). who then hit his cards on a 10-8-2-8-A board to eliminate Daniel Perper in 4th for $394,740.
Nevertheless, John Juanda bowed out next in 3rd ($526,320) holding 9-9 to Andrew Robl’s pocket aces, to kick-off the heads-up phase of the competition with Marchese (7.025m) with a slight lead over Robl’s (6.585m).
There was to be no quick finish, though, and it wouldn’t be until two and a half hours later that the deciding hand was played. Down to just 10BB, Andrew Robl was all-in (A-4) against the 8-8 of Marchese, with the 10-8-5-J-Q board then relegating Andrew Robl to a runner-up finish worth $822,375. Meanwhile, Tom Marchese captured the title, taking his live tournament earnings to over $3.7 million.
The WPT Super High Roller payouts were as follows:
1 Tom Marchese     $1,282,905
2 Andrew Robl     $822,375
3 John Juanda     $562,320
4 Daniel Perper $394,740
5 Bill Kline     $263,160