September 10 2011, Crystal Quibell

The second Epic Poker League Main Event has ended with Mike “Timex” McDonald coming out on top of the 97-player field to win the $782,410 first-place prize and coveted champion’s ring.

When play began at the eight-handed final table, there was no shortage of talented players. Along with McDonald were Erik Seidel, Dutch Boyd, Fabrice Soulier, David Steicke, Sean Getzwiller, Isaac Baron and Nam Le. McDonald had quite a task in defeating the other seven players, but he proved he was up to the challenge.

The first four eliminations of the day happened relatively quickly. Boyd was the first player to go when his pocket jacks ran into Seidel’s pocket aces. The next player eliminated was Getzwiller. His performance was particularly impressive because he has now participated in both EPL Main Events having won his seats via the Pro/Am Qualifiers. As a result of his final table appearance on Friday, Getzwiller now has a temporary EPL card that will allow him to buy in directly to the next EPL event.

The next two players to be eliminated were Baron and Le. Le’s elimination came on the 46th hand of the day, and that’s when things slowed down quite a bit. Although a number of large hands took place, another player was not eliminated for over five hours. That player happened to be Seidel.

Seidel had a very up and down day, at times being the chip leader and at others ending up as the short stack. Seidel finished second in the inaugural EPL Main Event and has clearly made himself a force to be reckoned with, with this fourth-place finish.

Soulier was very aggressive during the lengthy three-handed play, shoving all-in preflop at least a dozen times without being called. McDonald eventually looked him up with Soulier’s trailing McDonald’s . The board brought no help to Soulier, who headed to the rail.

Heads-up play only lasted 23 hands. Even though their stacks were similar in size for the first part of heads-up play, the turning point came when they got all the chips in the middle in a classic coin-flip situation. McDonald was the one at risk holding against Steicke’s . The board gave McDonald quite a sweat as it ran out . After the hand, Steicke was left with only 230,000.

Steicke was hot on the comeback trail though and doubled up two times, once when his out-drew McDonald’s and then again when his held against McDonald’s . Those two doubles put Steicke back over the one-million mark.

Steicke’s comeback run ended when he moved all-in preflop with and ran into McDonald’s . The board ran out and Steicke was eliminated in second place, making McDonald the winner! Twenty-one-year-old Mike McDonald became the second EPL Champion, winning the Champion’s Ring along with $782,410.

Final Table Results

The next event on the EPL schedule takes place in December. The $1,500 Pro/Am event takes place December 9 through 12 and the $20,000 Main Event takes place December 14 through 18. PokerNews will be there providing live coverage of the event, so be sure to tune in then.

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*Photo courtesy of Epic Poker

August 27 2011, Barry Carter

The PokerNews EPIC League is complete and now all eyes are on the Double Stack Final on August 28 at 1800 GMT. The lucky players that have qualified will be fighting it out for a $2,500 EPIC package to play in the Everest Poker International Cup live final in Alicante, Spain, next month.

The next 15 players will all win tokens to play in a $25,000 direct-entry tournament on August 29 where a further ten EPIC packages can be won on Everest Poker. Everest pro Fabrice Soulier is also playing, and will have a 30,000 Summit Point bounty on his head, which can be used in the Summit Points Store.

The league final was supposed to consist of 50 players, however there were three players at the very bottom with the same points and in the interests of fairness, we decided to let them all in to play in the final.

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The following players have qualified for the final:

If you have missed out on the league final, there is still one more way to play in EPIC. Everest Poker‘s last EPIC Direct Entry on August 29 (2100 GMT) guarantees $25,000 in cash on top of 10 Live Finale Packages. Free feeders and Weekly EPIC Satellites to the last Direct Entry are running until August 28. Players can also buy in directly for 25,000 Summit Points.

Make sure you sign up through PokerNews for a $600 first deposit bonus when you use bonus code “PNEWS600” or a $700 first deposit bonus when you use bonus code “PNEWS700.” This promotion is open to all Everest Poker players, regardless of whether they signed up through PokerNews or not.

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