The latest Venom ran its course on Americas Cardroom this week. The Winning Poker Network hosted its third Venom of the year.
The first was similar to this one – a regular format with a $10M guarantee on the prize pool. That one didn’t go as planned, as it failed to bring in enough players to meet that guarantee. They even added an extra starting flight to make it five altogether, but it brought in only 3,782 entries. WPN had to put in an additional $545K to keep its prize pool promise. In the end, the tournament paid out the top 591 finishers, with $782,062 for BoBomb14 of Austria for the win, per a 50% ICM payout chart agreed to by all final table players.
The second of 2022 was a Venom PKO, with the popular progressive knockout format in place. This had a $5K guarantee on the prize pool. And it did garner enough players – 2,872 to be exact – to surpass the guarantee and create an actual prize pool of $7.18M. It paid out the top 324 players and ultimately awarded the top prize of $814,498 to oneplusone of Morocco for the win. That money consisted of $503,318 from the prize pool and a two-way chop and $311,180 from bounties.
The most recent one is now in the history books as well.
Extra Day Makes Difference
As the first few starting days played out, it became clear that the entries would not be enough to cover the guarantee. To try to save the day, WPN added another flight, as they did in the previous Venom in January/February 2022. And that made the difference. As this chart shows, it put them over the top to create a solid prize pool that exceeded $10M.
ACR Venom 2022
(Jul-Aug)
$2,650 buy-in ($10M GTD)
Day 1A
459
(455 in previous Venom)
Day 1B
1,035
(895 in previous Venom)
Day 1C
656
(589 in previous Venom)
Day 1D
1,511
(1,492 in previous Venom)
Day 1E
356
(351 in previous Venom)
Total entries:
4017
(3,782 in previous Venom)
Total prize pool:
$10,042,500
623 paid ($3,012.75 min-cash)
Day 2
626 to 71
Day 3
71 to 7
Day 2 brought 626 survivors from those flights back to the tables, with just a couple of them finishing on the money bubble. The top 623 were then paid at least $3K. They played down to just 71 competitors that night.
Day 3 eliminated most of the players on the way to the final table. The goal was to stop at eight players. However, player G26 had something else in mind. It was that player’s As-Kd covering the Ac-Kh of Cheburashkin and Ah-Qs of MvRave. The board delivered Td-Jd-4d-6c-9d, giving G26 the diamond flush to eliminate both players and take the chip lead into the final table.
https://twitter.com/ACR_POKER/status/1554943963290898433?s=20&t=Vb5pHOhv8fsjTQQjlyStVQ
Final Table Action
ACR streamed the final table on Twitch. It was on a 30-minute delay to be able to show face-up hole cards. Justin Kelly, Michael Loncar, and Chris Moneymaker called the action.
It started with the final seven holding these chip counts:
Play started with Amo4sho making moves and manuma29 hitting some flops to chip up. BrockLesnar95 lost ground and sat with about ten big blinds when they shoved pocket jacks on the button. G26 called with A-Q suited, and the board gave an ace on the flop to send brockLesnar95 out in seventh place.
Br3ak_th3_b4nk woke up with jacks in the very next hand and shoved fewer than 16 big blinds all-in. KODA420 had queens, though, and br3ak_th3_b4nk busted in sixth place.
At the first break, one hour into the stream, G26 led the pack with nearly 93 BB, followed by manuma29 with 65, KODA420 with almost 38, Amo4sho with 26, and CBALLBOY holding nearly 20BB.
It was CBALLBOY up next, moving in with Jd-Ts on a 9d-4c-Td-Ad-2d board. But that flush wasn’t enough to beat the As-Kd of manuma29 with the nut flush. CBALLBOY exited in fifth place.
Four-handed play moved forward with manuma29 as the short stack. G26 had queens, so when KODA420 shoved with A-J, G26 called. The board brought nothing to change the outcome, and KODA420 departed in fourth.
Amo4sho got very aggressive during three-handed play, chipping up with some all-in moves. He (Andrew Moreno) climbed to nearly 60 BB, about half of the 120 BB of G26 but quite a bit more than the 21 BB of manuma29. But manuma29 doubled through G26 with A-K over A-J to get back into contention. At the second break, G26 barely held the lead with 74 BB, Amo4sho had 56 BB, and manuma29 had 42 BB.
Thirty minutes later, the three stacks were nearly even. But a big pot developed when G26 had K-Q and Amo4sho had K-3. The pot built on a K-8-Q-2-7 board, and G26 shoved on the river. Amo4sho called and busted in third place.
https://twitter.com/Amo4sho/status/1555055574072537088?s=20&t=Izt2aIsi_GU6QJCNxwq8aQ
G26 started heads-up play with 106 big blinds against the 44 big blinds of manuma29. But the latter chipped up quickly and eventually took over the lead. By the third break, manuma29 had climbed to 114 BB, and G26 had 35 BB. More play led to nearly-even stacks again, and it went back and forth for another hour and a half. Finally, manuma29 had the lead when G26 pushed all-in with Ah-8c. Manuma29 snap-called with Ac-Qc. The board came Tc-Ad-Kc-Jc-As to give manuma29 the win with a royal flush.
