German Rainer Kempe entered poker history as the player to emerge victorious in the second-ever edition of the Super High Roller Bowl, a $300,000 buy-in event that took place at Aria Resort & Casino over the past four days. Kempe captured a first-place prize of $5 million, his career’s best cash, and the special champion’s ring.
His achievement is a particularly notable one due to the fact that a player with a relatively modest portfolio of poker accomplishments triumphed over a field of some of the world’s most seasoned high rollers, people with years and decades of experience on the big poker scene.
The German kicked off the Super High Roller Bowl’s final day as the chip leader, holding more than a third of all chips in play. Fellow countryman Fedor Holz was second in chips at that point. Over the course of the day, an it was a particularly long day, the two players maintained their top chip counts positions and were eventually the last two men standing. The all-German finale lasted almost four hours, during which chips went back and forth and back and forth.
But first things first. This year’s Super High Roller Bowl featured a field of 49 entries. The overall prize pool amounted to $15 million and the 7 finalists were the only players to receive a share of the money. The lowest payout amounted to $600,000. And as mentioned above, the eventual winner was to collect $5 million for his victory.
Dan Shak was the first player to leave the official seven-handed final table. Bryn Kenney left next after he fell short of luck in a hand played against Holz. Kenney took home the amount of $800,000. Shortly after, Matt Berkey was busted in 5th place by Kempe himself. Berkey’s payout totaled $1,100,000.
Later on, Kempe busted none other but fourteen-time WSOP gold bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth. The Poker Brat was paid $1,600,000 for his deep run into the high roller tournament. Erik Seidel was the next to hit the rail for a payout of $2,400,000.
Two-handed play started with Kempe holding two times more chips than fellow countryman Holz. As already mentioned, it took a little less than four hours for a winner to be determined, four long hours during which the two remaining survivors exchanged the lead several times.
On the very last hand of play, Holz raised to 400,000 and Kempe re-raised to 1.2 million. Holz moved all in and his opponent called instantly, turning over [8d][8s]. Holz held [2h][2d]. The board ran out [5h][10g][9s][4c][3d], securing Kempe with the pot and the title. Holz, on the other hand, collected $3,500,000.
Holz was really close to winning a third major high roller tournament over the past several months. In December, the young German took down the WPT Alpha8 Las Vegas for a first-place prize of $1,589,219. Less than a month later, he emerged victorious in the first-ever WPT National Philippines $200,000 Triton Super High Roller, taking home the amount of $3,463,500.
