Pius Heinz Crowned 2011 WSOP Main Event Champion

Pius Heinz, 22, has just won the 2011 World Series Of Poker Main Event, after this year’s tournament drew to an exciting conclusion last night at the Rio Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.
Going into the Mondays’s finale with blinds at 600K/1.2M and an ante of 200K, Pius Heinz started as chip leader on a huge 107,800,000 stack, followed by Ben Lamb (55,400,000) and Martin Staszko (42,700,000).
In an explosive start to the day, the very first hand saw Ben Lamb (Kh-Jd) push all-in over the top of Staszko’s raise with the Czech making the call with his pocket sevens. The board then ran out 9-3-2-3-10 to drop Ben Lamb down to 12.7 million chips
Hand 4 saw Ben Lamb’s incredible run at the 2011 Series finally come to an end after he was dealt Qs-6h on the small blind and shoved his remaining chips into Martin Staszko on the big blind with pocket Jacks. The board of 5-5-2-2-7 was no help to Lamb who was eliminated in 3rd place for $4,021,138.
What then ensued was six hours of heads-up play in which Martin Staszko started with 117,300,000 chips compared to Pius Heinz on a 88,600,000 stack.
Within four hands, however, Heinz was ahead but a little later when the blinds reached 1M/2M ante 300K, Martin Staszko recaptured the lead after winning a 38 million chip pot. Heinz was holding Q-6 on a J-10-3-Q-6, but Staszko (K-9) had made a straight.
Nonetheless, Heinz fought on bravely to go less than 2 to 1 behind, when his fortunes turned around big time. Heinz was dealt A-Q to Staszko’ Qc-9c with Heinz raising pre-flop. The flop then fell 10c-7c-Ks, with Heinz betting out and then going all-in in response to Staszko’ re raise. However, a 3h and 6s on the turn and river failed to complete Staszko’ draws and he was reduced to 44,400,000 chips to Pius Heinz’s 161,500,000.
Twelve hands later, Staszko shoved his remaining chips with 10c-7c into Heinz’ As-Kc and the 5-2-9-J-4 sealed his fate as the Czech player finished the runner-up for a $5,433,086 payday.
In the meantime, Pius Heinz became the first German player ever to win the Main Event and collected $8,715,638 for his outstanding victory.Commenting after his win, Heinz said:
“It’s got to be the happiest day of my life. But I can’t believe what happened, it’s unreal.”