Mexican Poker Pro Velador Collects Second WSOP Bracelet

Full Tilt Red Pro Jose-Luis Velador has just picked up a second career WSOP bracelet, after winning Event 33: $2,500 pot-limit hold’em/Omaha.
Velador defeated a field of 482 players to pick up the first place prize worth $260,517 and further consolidate his position at the top of the Mexico All-Time Money List. With his latest win, Velador, originally from Jalisco, Mexico and now living in Southern California, takes his life time tournament earnings to around the $1.5 million mark.
Jose-Luis Velador picked up his first WSOP bracelet back in 2008 at the $1.5K No-Limit Hold ‘em event, but knew he had a tough time ahead if he was to repeat his success at this year’s competition.
Seated at the $2,500 pot-limit hold’em/Omaha final table was a formidable line-up of pros, which included David Chiu, Rob Hollink, Craig Gray, Kevin MacPhee, Victor Ramdin, James Mitchell, Gavin Cochrane, and Matt Sterling.
First to bust out in 9th was Matt Sterling ($20,698), whose Ah-Kh push fell to chip leader Kevin MacPhee’s pocket 10’s. Velador then busted Gavin Cochrane holding As-Jh, out in 8th($26,906) with his pocket 8’s.
Next, James Mitchell was eliminated in 7th ($35,331) and Victor Ramdin in 6th ($46,861) during Omaha rounds. Kevin MacPhee then picked up $62,791 in 5th spot, with Velador the beneficiary of his chips, who was now sitting on a 1.5 million chip stack.
After Craig Gray was eliminated in 4th ($85,030), the three remaining finalists had a total of six career WSOP bracelets between them and after Jose-Luis Velador took Rob Hollink out in 3rd ($116,359), he then faced the formidable challenge of taking on 4 times WSOP winner David Chiu in a heads-up battle for ultimate poker glory.
Velador, however, held a commanding chip lead over his opponent who, despite an early double up, soon fell after being dealt an Ac-10h to Velador’s 7d-6c. From the button, Jose-Luis Velador put in a raise and then called Chiu’s re-raise to take in a flop. The board fell 6s-3s-2d and after Velador lead out with a 372,000 bet, all the chips went to the centre of the table with Chiu hoping for an A or 10 on the turn or river. Neither came and so Chiu narrowly missed out on yet another WSOP bracelet and instead collected $160,902 for his deep run in the tournament.
In the meantime, full accolades and $260,517 went to Jose-Luis Velador who, later commenting on his famous victory said:
“Any bracelet, first, second, or third is always going to mean a lot, especially beating so many tough players. David Chiu is a hell of a player. The whole table was a tough table…I got hit by the deck for a while and my strategy was to push.”