France's Hugo Pingray Wins $1,500 NL Monster Stack For $1.3m

Frenchman Hugo Pingray has won the $1,500 NL Monster Stack (Event #51), after besting a massive field of 7,862 players over five days on his way to capturing a gold winners bracelet, as well as the huge $1,327,083 first place prize.
Pingray recently earned a Hospitality Management degree from a Swiss university, but has also been playing poker online for more than three years, hoping to determine whether he could earn a living from the game long-term. The 23-year-old’s bumper payout now makes that dream a reality, and as he explains:
“I planned on giving myself a year to play poker and see how it goes. Actually, this is a good help if I may say. I’m probably going to play the live circuit for a year or so and enjoy now that I have the chance to win this money.”
Event #51 produced the second largest field of WSOP 2014, and the third biggest in live tournament history, to create a prize pool worth $10,613,700.
After making it through to the final table of nine, Hugo Pingray (Q-Q) then proceeded to eliminate Zachary Gruneberg (A-J) in 8th ($163,238), before being dealt pocket queens once more and doing likewise to Lynne Beaumont (A-K) in 6th for $273,090. Eventually, Pingray (A-4) dispatched a short-stacked Sean Drake (J-2) to the rail in 3rd ($619,521) to go heads-up against USA’s Joe McKeehen for the title.
As the final showdown got underway, Pingray held a near two-to-one chip advantage over McKeehen, but there would still be another 80 hands before the defining hand was played with Pingray’s A-K up against the J-10 of his opponent. The dealer subsequently rolled out an A-5-2-9-9 board to consign Joe McKeehen to a runner-up finish worth $820,863, while Pingray picked up a career first winners bracelet. Commenting after his victory, the Frenchman, said:
“I’m happy. I’m exhausted..This final table was really tough, with a lot of good players. All these guys were really, really good and I had to stay focused. I had to believe in myself every second of the final table.”
Final Table Results:
1 Hugo Pingray – $1,327,083
2 Joe McKeehen – $820,863
3 Sean Drake – $619,521
4 Claas Segebrecht – $468,594
5 Thayer Rasmussen – $356,620
6 Lynne Beaumont – $273,090
7 Bobby Bryam – $210,469
8 Zachary Gruneberg – $163,238
9 Joshua Hillock – $127,364