California resident Pete Uhl bested the field of Event #6 on the schedule of the 2015/16 WSOP Circuit Harveys Lake Tahoe poker festival to collect his first-ever WSOP-related cash of $14,899 and a gold ring.
The two-day $365 No-Limit Hold’em event attracted a total of 191 entries and a prize pool of $57,300 was generated. The top 21 finishers received a share of the money, with payouts starting from $635.
The nine-handed final table was reached late on Day 1 of the event. It started with Nathan Hays as the chip leader, holding a total of 465,000 in chips. Uhl was second in chips at the beginning of nine-handed play with a stack of 350,000. Action was slow at first and it took more than an hour and a half before the first elimination. Richard Orchid left the tournament finishing 9th and his elimination marked the end of the day.
Day 2 started with 8 hopefuls returning to determine the eventual winner. Play started with Raymond Marchi holding the majority of chips. He had a total of 442,000. Uhl was second in chips at the beginning of the day with 320,000. Four players left the table within the first hour of play. And three-handed play saw Uhl take the lead with a massive chip advantage over his two opponents.
The player maintained his lead until the very end. He had to face Jonathan Libiran from Fremont, California heads-up. On what turned out to be the last hand in play, Libiran could not hold up against his opponent’s pocket aces and had to settle for the runner-up finish and a consolation prize of $9,203.
As for Uhl, he captured his first WSOP Circuit cash and a gold ring. The player told interviewers that he was confident in his success last night. He said that he had had a very good feeling about his opponents and that he had had a “really good read” on each one of the players seated at the final table.
And here are the rest of the finalists and their respective payouts:
Jeremy Priest from Watsonville, California finished 3rd for a payout of $6,645. Raymond Marchi from Eureka, California took 4th place for $4,880. David Redlin from Henderson, Nevada received $3,646 for finishing 5th in the event.
Ronald Dechance from San Jose, California took 6th place for $2,770. Nathan Hays from Lincoln, Nebraska finished 7th to scoop $2,140 of the prize pool. William Watchman from Reno, Nevada, the only former gold ring winner at the final table, took 8th place for $1,681. Richard Orchid from Chico, California rounded out the final table for a payout of $1,341.
