Australia's James Obst Wins First Bracelet at WSOP 2017

Australia’s James Obst has just won Event #26 of the 2017 WSOP, the $10,000 Razz Championship, after besting a field of 97 players over three days on his way to capturing a career first gold bracelet, as well as a top prize of $265,138.
The 26-year-old pro had already cashed in at four other WSOP tournaments at this year’s Series, including a 2nd place finish at $2,500 Limit Mixed Triple Draw Lowball for $80,922, and an 8th place finish at $10,000 Dealers Choice for $32,474. Obst’s latest victory at the Rio in Vegas now pushes his live earnings to $2,511,949, with the predominantly online pro commenting:
“I guess it’s a new experience to win a bracelet. When you win one and it’s online I’m probably, I’m obviously not celebrating wildly like some people might, because that’s just my nature. Online when no one’s around you can probably be a bit more excited and get pumped up a bit more. But at the moment I’m just a bit, I don’t know how to process it just yet. It’s awesome and I’ll try to win another one before the series is out.”
Given the speciality of the event, the field was populated by some of the game’s most talented pros, and amongst those finishing in a money spot was Roland Israelashvili in 15th ($15,000), Ted Forrest in 14th ($16,437), Stephen Chidwick in 11th ($18,668), and Nick Schulman in 9th ($21,946).
The final table also included a similarly impressive line-up, with Brandon Shack-Harris falling in 6th, Anthony Zinno in 5th, and David Baker in 3rd, leaving James Obst to battle it out with Eric Kurtzman for the bracelet.
At this stage, Kurtzman held a more than 3 to 1 chip lead over his remaining opponent, but Obst soon managed to reverse the roles and eventually lock up the win to secure his first WSOP gold bracelet. Commenting on his plans for the rest of the Series, Obst explained:
“I’m interested in trying to contend for it (POY), but you know at the end of the day I’m not going to be multitabling or doing anything crazy to try to win it. I’m trying to hold onto my money, and make more of it.”
Final Table Results:
1: James Obst $265,138
2: Eric Kurtzman $163,867
3: David Baker $112,645
4: Andrey Zhigalov $79,616
5: Anthony Zinno $57,903
6: Brandon Shack-Harris $43,370
7: Jyri Merivirta $33,485
8: Jack Duong $26,674