The structure available here could have afforded us a long heads up battle, but the cards had another idea.
We were up to 15,000-30,000 blinds and Jamie Nixon raised it to 60,000.
Then Danny Pyke cut out the three-bet to 235,000.
It was a smooth four-bet from Nixon. Little in the way of hesitation as he slid rippling pink 100,000 chips across the line — for a total of 660,000. Nearly an ominous number if you are into all that numerology business.
Pyke moved all-in very quickly and just as Nixon called.
Pyke: Kc Kd
Nixon: Ad Qd
The flop was fairly definitive: Ks 4h 7s
Nixon could turn a gutshot on a broadway card.. the Kh hit the turn, so not that one. It was quads and overkill for a pot that had about 99% of all chips in play in this tournament. The river was the irrelevant Ac.
They counted the stacks down and it was a clean double of 2,280,000 for Pyke. Once Nixon had paid that, he had maybe 80,000 left? We couldn’t count it in time, it was already in the middle the next hand.
Nixon started to stage his comeback. First he doubled with Ac 2c facing Qc 2d. Now he had four big blinds or so. The next double was Ad Kh doubling through Qh Td. Jamie had gotten up to ten big blind territory. This wasn’t over yet.
Very next hand, all-in preflop again, for the fourth time in a row.
Pyke: Ad Js
Nixon: 2d 2s
The flop came Tc 8s Kc and this tournament was perilously close to wrapping. The turn Qd did the trick. Both players stood up and shook hands as the dealer rolled out the inconsequential 4c.
Well that was a bang to finish! Pyke received a round of applause, he had run the gauntlet of 157 entries over two days and he never lost his cool. We know that because he only took his aviators off for the winner’s photo, which you can scope below.
