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WSOP Editor in
Las Vegas |
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Day 9 - 10th Aug 2006
After a days rest the World Championship final was played out on
the 10th August at the Rio Suites Hotel in Las Vegas.
Full Championship Results
Gold, a
former Hollywood agent turned television producer from Malibu, Calif., amassed
a commanding chip lead during the first eight days of the tournament and sat
down at the final table with a whopping $26,650,000 in chips - $8.88 million
more than his nearest competitor.
After an exciting 14 hours of play, he
knocked out the rest of the field, including top poker pro Allen Cunningham.
A Hollywood talent agent used to securing big deals for television
stars earned his own multimillion-dollar payday after pulling off the acting
job of a lifetime on a Las Vegas card table.
Jamie Gold's bluff in the
final hand of the world's richest poker tournament won him the top prize of
$12m (£6.3m) and a place among Sin City's legends.
"I knew it was
my chance," said Mr Gold, 36, after seeing off Paul "Kwickfish" Wasicka with a
pair of queens to a pair of tens to win the 37th World Series of Poker.
"I just went into my act. I actually talked him into calling with the
worst of it and that won the whole tournament."
As the last survivor of
8,773 hopefuls who began play on July 28, Mr Gold whooped for joy as security
guards tipped out his prize of 14 briefcases containing half a tonne of $100
bills on the card table at the Rio Hotel and Casino, close to the famous Las
Vegas strip.
Now all he needs is a nickname as he joins previous
tournament winners including The Fossilman, Mike the Mouth and Miami John.
Mr Gold, who once represented actors Felicity Huffman of Desperate
Housewives and James Gandolfini of The Sopranos, dominated the final stages of
the tournament, eliminating six of the final seven players in four days and
amassing almost $79m in chips.
"I thought he was bluffing," said Mr
Wasicka, 25, a former restaurant manager from Westminster, Colorado. "You kind
of just have to go with your gut. That's what I did, and it was wrong."
The World Series is poker's blue riband tournament and has grown
steadily in prize money and popularity since its inception 11 years ago, when
"Action" Dan Harrington emerged from a field of 270 to see off Canadian Howard
Goldfarb and win the $1m pot.
This year's final stages were shown live
on national TV.
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