Justin Pechie Wins WSOP $1.5k Limit Hold’em Shootout
June 27, 2011 7:10 amUS pro Justin Pechie has just triumphed at Event 41: $1,500 Limit Hold’em Shootout, after winning all three of his tables to capture his first WSOP bracelet and the $167,060 top prize.
The 26 year-old outlasted 538 of his fellow competitors to triumph at the event, and almost didn’t even make it to Las Vegas as he was planning to move to Canada in order to continue with his lucrative online career. Deciding to head to the WSOP first, Justin Pechie explained:
“I actually almost didn’t come out because I wanted to go up (to Canada) and get set up online before. I thought that might take too much time. I thought it might cut into the Series so I thought there was a good chance I might just not even come. I made the decision to go after and basically spend a month in my house not doing anything.”
Justin Pechie’s decision to wait would seem to have been a shrewd one as the soon-to-be former Thompson, Connecticut resident has earned a nice payday to help buffer his bankroll affected by the post Black-Friday fallout. With part of his funds still tied up online, Pechie commented:
“It means a lot. The money means more right now just because of Black Friday. Now I have a bigger cushion to fall back on with the uncertainty of online poker. But the bracelet does mean a lot. It’s just shows that hard work will pay off.”
Making his way to the final table of ten, Justin Pechie eventually went heads-up against Dale Eberle.
Falling just short of WSOP glory at the final table was Ari Engel eliminated in 10th ($10,378), Chris Kwon in 9th ($13,269), Dom Denotaristefani in 8th ($17,089), Adam Tyburski in 7th ($22,173), Stephen Bass in 6th ($29,001), Jordan Rich in 5th ($38,268), Eugene Katchalov in 4th ($50,993) and Mathieu Jacqmin in 3rd ($68,715).
Justin Pechie then took a 2 to 1 chip lead against Dale Eberle into the heads-up phase of the competition and 35 minutes later broke his opponent after hitting a set of queens on the flop with Eberle calling all the way. The next hand a depleted Eberle was eliminated holding Kd-4h to Pechie’s Qh-Jh, but collected $103,454 for his runner-up finish.
Justin Pechie, known online as ‘looshle’ has now earned $1,132,461 playing live tournaments, as well as $1,591,764 online.