Phil Ivey Wins 11th World Series Of Poker Bracelet

There were many dramatic and exciting storylines to follow during the third and fourth weeks of action at the 2024 World Series of Poker, including some huge payouts, but nothing tops Poker Hall of Famer Phil Ivey becoming just the second player in history to have won 11 titles at the series.

There are now 56 events in the books from the 99 live tournaments that comprise the 55th Annual WSOP’s schedule, at the time of publishing. More than $181.2 million in prize money has already been paid out in those events, which collectively drew 111,804 entries between them.

Check out who came away with the money and the hardware below.

Ivey Claims Sole Second Place On Bracelet Leaderboard

There were 11 players among this batch of bracelet winners who had already made previous title runs in WSOP events, with Phil Ivey rightfully drawing the spotlight.

After nearly a decade without a win at the series, Ivey broke his slump by taking this year’s $10,000 triple draw deuce-to-seven lowball championship event for $347,440 and his 11th gold bracelet. He closed out the victory by making the best hand possible in the game with 7-5-4-3-2.

The 47-year-old Poker Hall of Fame member now has sole claim to the second-place spot on the WSOP titles leaderboard, trailing only 17-time bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth. Johnny Chan, Erik Seidel, and the late Doyle Brunson now sit in a three-way tie for third place with 10 bracelets each.

“Winning a World Series of Poker event is always special. I’ve been playing the WSOP for 25 years, so it’s really nice to win,” Ivey told PokerGO.

All 11 of Ivey’s bracelets have come outside of no-limit hold’em. He won his first eight bracelets within the span of a decade (2000-2010), then added another two titles during the 2010’s. He then had to wait 3,639 days after his 10th win on June 27, 2014 before finally securing this victory.

Ivey now has over $45.7 million in career tournament earnings, good for 12th place on poker’s all-time money list. More than $10.2 million of Ivey’s lifetime haul has been earned across his 89 cashes and 40 final-table finishes at the summer series.

In addition to the hardware and the money, Ivey also earned 720 Card Player Player of the Year points. This was his first title and sixth final-table finish of the year. With 3,035 total points and nearly $3.7 million, Ivey now sits in 18th place in the 2024 POY standings presented by Global Poker.

Benny Glaser came incredibly close to successfully defending his title in this event, but ran terribly at the end to fall just a few spots short of going back-to-back, finishing in fourth place. The mixed-games standout earned $104,825 for his impressive showing.

That just left bracelet winner Danny Wong and six-time bracelet winner Jason Mercier for Ivey to overcome. Mercier was awarded $151,412 as the third-place finisher, growing his career earnings to nearly $20.9 million. This was the 37-year-old Floridian poker pro’s 23rd WSOP final-table appearance and 77th cash at the series, with more than $5.6 million earned across those scores alone.

Wong earned $225,827 as the runner-up, bringing his career tournament earnings to $5.4 million.

Scott Seiver Keeps A 25-Year Streak Alive

Scott Seiver came into this year’s series on a mission to win the WSOP Player of the Year race and cement his status as a top Poker Hall of Fame nominee when he becomes eligible next year. Things have gone quite well in that regard, as the 39-year-old poker pro has already managed to take down two events.

He earned his fifth career bracelet just a handful of days into the festival, taking down the $10,000 Omaha eight-or-better championship event for $426,744. Twelve days removed from that win (covered in the previous issue of Card Player), he triumphed in the $1,500 razz tournament for his second bracelet of the summer and his sixth overall.

This victory made Seiver just the 23rd player in poker history to have reached six or more bracelet wins. It also saw him maintain the 25-year streak of at least one player earning multiple bracelets in a single year. Chris Ferguson kicked off this run by taking down both a $2,500 seven-card stud event and the WSOP main event in 2000.

Seiver now has two bracelets in razz, joining his two no-limit hold’em victories from 2008 and 2022. His other two wins came in the 2018 limit hold’em championship and this year’s Omaha eight-or-better championship.

Seiver defeated two-time bracelet winner Brandon Shack-Harris heads-up, earning $141,374 to bring his career totals to $26.4 million.

Nick Schulman And Yuri Dzivielevski Join Five-Timers Club

Nick Schulman ran away with the title in the $25,000 no-limit hold’em event, scoring five of the seven knockouts at the final table while maintaining a sizable chip lead for the final few hours of the tournament. As the champion, the 39-year-old poker pro and commentator earned $1,667,842 and his fifth WSOP gold bracelet.

“Five has a really special ring to it,” Schulman told PokerGO. “It really does mean a lot. I’m so thankful. I’m so happy.”

This was Schulman’s first bracelet won in no-limit hold’em. His first two wins came in the $10,000 deuce-to-seven lowball championship in 2009 and 2012. In 2019 he took down the $10,000 pot-limit Omaha eight-or-better championship, while his fourth bracelet came in the $1,500 seven-card stud event last year.

Schulman now has more than $20.3 million in career tournament earnings, with this latest score being the second-highest payday on his résumé. The first remains the $2.2 million he earned as the winner of the 2005 WPT World Poker Finals at Foxwoods.

Schulman scored 750 PokerGO Tour points for topping the 318-entry field. With 1,035, he now sits in seventh place on the PGT season-long leaderboard.

The top 48 finishers earned a share of the $7,473,000 prize pool in this event, with plenty of big names running deep including Dan Smith (13th), Dario Sammartino (10th), Shaun Deeb (8th), and Ben Heath (5th). High-stakes newcomer Noel Rodriguez earned $1,111,897 as the runner-up after battling back from the short stack following a preflop cooler situation against Schulman.

Brazilian poker star Yuri Dzivielevski earned his first bracelet in 2019. In the intervening handful of years, the 32-year-old poker pro from Florianópolis has already managed to grow his WSOP hardware collection to five bracelets, with his most recent victory coming in the $3,000 nine-game mixed. Dzivielevski earned $215,982 as the champion.

Nearly a fifth of Brazil’s 26 total bracelets have now been won by Dzivielevski. He is the nation’s only multi-bracelet winner. He is also just the 40th player in poker history to have won five or more bracelets.

This was the third bracelet in a multi-game event for Dzivielevski, who took down the $2,500 mixed Omaha eight-or-better and stud eight-or-better in 2019 and the $1,500 H.O.R.S.E. last year. His two other bracelet wins came in the 2020 WSOP Online $400 ‘PLOssus’ and last year’s WSOP Online $10,000 PLO championship.

Dzivielevski now has nearly $7.7 million in recorded tournament earnings, with more than $4.4 million of that coming from his successes in WSOP tournaments.

Adding More Gold To Their Wrists

Such is the state of the bracelet arms race that Phil Hui winning his fourth takes this long to get to in our recap. The poker pro based out of Florida defeated a field of 835 entries in the $1,500 H.O.R.S.E. event, overcoming a sizable heads-up chip disadvantage to take home the gold and the top prize of $193,545.

Hui first triumphed at the WSOP in 2014, taking down the $3,000 Omaha eight-or-better event for $158,361. Five years later he emerged victorious in the $50,000 Poker Players Championship, earning nearly $1.1 million while adding his name to the Chip Reese memorial trophy. His third bracelet came in a $1,500 pot-limit Omaha event in 2022, with $311,782 added to his haul.

He now has nearly $2.8 million in winnings in bracelet events, which accounts for the majority of his $4.2 million in overall scores.

Two players grew their collections to three bracelets since our last update, with Timur Margolin and Christopher Vitch finding the winner’s circle. The former was the last player standing from a field of 4,278 entries in the $800 buy-in deepstack event. The Israeli poker pro was awarded $342,551 and his third WSOP bracelet for the win.

Margolin’s first two bracelets were both earned in 2018. He took down the $2,500 no-limit hold’em event that summer in Las Vegas, and then backed that up with a win in the €1,100 buy-in Monster Stack at the WSOP Europe in the fall.

He now has nearly $2.5 million in recorded live tournament earnings to his name, with nearly $1.7 million of that coming from his 36 in-the-money finishes in bracelet events at the series. This was the second-largest payday of Margolin’s career, trailing only the $507,274 he secured with his first bracelet victory.

Vitch defeated a field of 2,212 entries in the $1,000 pot-limit Omaha event to earn his third bracelet and the top prize of $262,735.

This was the second-largest tournament score of the mixed-game standout’s career, trailing only the $320,103 he earned by winning the 2017 $10,000 stud eight-or-better championship. His other bracelet came in the 2016 $2,500 mixed triple draw event, which awarded $136,854.

The Arizona resident now has more than $2.6 million in career tournament earnings, with nearly $2.1 million of that coming from his 49 in-the-money finishes in bracelet events.

Frank Funaro survived the wild ride that was the $10,000 super turbo bounty no-limit hold’em event to earn his second bracelet. The 29-year-old poker pro from Sewell, New Jersey navigated his way through a field of 486 entries to grab the hardware and the top prize of $612,997.

This was the second-largest score of his career, trailing only the $1,301,000 he earned as the fifth-place finisher in the 2022 WPT World Championship. He now has more than $4.2 million in recorded tournament earnings after this massive win.

This was Funaro’s first live bracelet, with his previous victory coming in the 2022 WSOP Online festival. He took down the $1,000 buy-in no-limit hold’em championship during the domestic segment of the series for a $94,096 payday.

The $1,500 seven card stud event saw a field of 406 entries narrowed down to two highly accomplished British poker players. In the end, Richard Ashby overcame Adam Owen to lock up his second gold bracelet and the top prize of $113,725.

This victory came 14 years after Ashby’s first triumph at the series, when he won the 2010 running of this same tournament for $140,467. He now has $2.7 million in career tournament earnings, with the majority of that coming from 41 in-the-money finishes in WSOP competition.

James Obst topped a field of 107 entries in the $10,000 seven card stud championship for his second bracelet and the top prize of $260,658. He now has more than $3.5 million in recorded tournament earnings.

Obst won his first bracelet in 2017, taking down the $10,000 razz championship for $265,354. Then in 2018, he announced that he’d be stepping away from poker to pursue a career in professional tennis. He had been a serious player in his youth, but put his aspirations to the side after dealing with some health issues as a younger player.

After a few years away from live poker, Obst returned to the WSOP in 2023 and made several deep runs, including a fourth-place finish in the $50,000 Poker Players Championship.

Suvarna Banks $5.4 Million And Second Bracelet

Santhosh Suvarna first picked up poker just seven years ago, and only began to try his hand at tournaments in the past few years. But despite his late start, the 43-year-old businessman from India has already accumulated more than $13.1 million in career earnings.

His most recent payday was also his largest, as Suvarna took down the $250,000 buy-in no-limit hold’em event for $5,415,152 and his second career gold bracelet.

“I’m really so happy,” Suvarna told Card Player after coming out on top. “My dream has come true.”

This bracelet victory came just over seven months after Suvarna’s first, which saw him take down the €50,000 high roller at the 2023 WSOP Europe for $689,000.

This event drew a total of 75 entries, creating a prize pool of $18,675,000 that was split up amongst the top 12 finishers. Notables in the money included Jonathan Jaffe (12th), Phil Ivey (11th), and Adrian Mateos (10th).

Suvarna overcame a stacked final table as well, outlasting the likes of Sean Winter (9th), Mikita Badziakouski (8th), Jeremy Ausmus (7th), Taylor von Kriegenbergh (6th), Matthias Eibinger (4th), Chris Hunichen (3rd), and Ben Tollerene (2nd).

Sergio Aido And Chris Hunichen Break Through

Spanish poker pro Sergio Aido bested a sizable turnout of 177 entries in the $50,000 high roller to secure the $2,026,506 score and his first bracelet.

This was Aido’s first win and seventh final-table finish of 2024. He earned 1,326 POY points as the champion, enough to see him surge up the rankings and into fourth place on the leaderboard.

The $8,451,750 prize pool for this event was ultimately paid out between the top 27 finishers, with a min-cash being worth $101,724. Those making the money included Mikita Badziakouski (19th), Chris Brewer (18th), Artur Martirosian (12th), Martin Kabrhel (10th), Leon Sturm (9th), Bruce Buffer (8th), Jonathan Jaffe (6th), Jesse Lonis (5th), Viktor Blom (3rd), and Chance Kornuth (2nd).

Aido now has nearly $21.6 million in total lifetime tournament earnings to his name, good for second place on Spain’s all-time money list. He still has quite a long way to go to try to catch up to Adrian Mateos, who has nearly $49.1 million in career scores. Mateos added to that haul in this very event, in fact, finishing fourth for $681,554.

Mateos remains the POY race leader. He has won two titles and made 11 final tables in 2024. This was Lonis’ 14th final table, with a pair of wins also. He is now the third-ranked player in the standings.

At one point during a wild three-handed stretch of the $100,000 high roller final table, Chris Hunichen was all-in and one card away from elimination. He had gotten the last of his stack in preflop with his pocket fives racing against the A-J of six-time bracelet winner Jeremy Ausmus, but an ace on the turn left him drawing to two outs to stay alive.

Hunichen went for the pre-river handshake, which Ausmus politely waived off. Ausmus may have been able to successfully evade Hunichen’s grasp, but he could not dodge the 5♠ on the end which gave Hunichen a set and much-needed infusion of chips. After plenty more twists and turns, Hunichen was eventually able to close it out, nabbing his first bracelet and $2,838,389 as the champion.

This was the largest live score yet for Hunichen, bringing his earnings to nearly $16 million. The 39-year-old from Clayton, North Carolina also has untold millions in online earnings accrued across nearly two decades of internet play at the highest levels.

Before this big breakthrough, his two largest scores had come in close calls at the series. He finished third in the 2022 $250,000 event for $1,931,718 and second in a $25,000 event held during the 2020 WSOP Online festival for $1,332,097. He had one other runner-up finish with a bracelet on the line, earning $358,677 in the 2017 $5,000 six-max event.

“It has been tough. One of the hardest years of my life, with my Dad passing,” Hunichen said. “He was my biggest fan, he supported me from the beginning. It felt destined. I really felt like I was going to win this one. Some of my friends flew in from all over the world to be here for me for this moment. I couldn’t let them down.”

This event drew 112 entries, building a massive $10,836,000 prize pool. The top 17 finishers made the money, including heavy hitters like Sergio Aido (16th), Nick Petrangelo (13th), Andrew Lichtenberger (12th), Justin Bonomo (10th), Isaac Haxton (8th), Justin Saliba (6th), Aleksejs Ponakovs (5th), Chance Kornuth (4th), and Viktor Blom (3rd).

More First-Time WSOP Champions

The largest field so far at the series came in the $300 buy-in Gladiators of Poker event, which attracted 20,647 total entries across its four starting flights, making this the fifth-largest turnout for any live event in WSOP history.

As a result, the event easily surpassed the $3 million guarantee to create a prize pool of nearly $5.1 million. Six days after the tournament kicked off at Horseshoe Las Vegas, that sprawling sea of contenders was finally whittled down to a single champion in Stephen Winters. The Lyons, Colorado resident earned $401,210.

Daniel Vampan battled his way to gold in the $3,000 six-max limit hold’em event. The Las Vegas resident earned $148,635. This was the second-largest score yet for Vampan, trailing only the $345,000 he earned as the 24th-place finisher in last year’s main event. He now has more than $718,000 in career tournament earnings to his name.

Michael Christ scooped the last pot in the $1,500 Big O tournament. The five-card pot-limit Omaha eight-or-better tournament drew 1,555 entries to build a $2,075,925 prize pool. Christ cashed for $306,884, which was the first recorded live tournament score for the Odenton, Maryland resident.

Evan Benton was one of 2,317 players to take a seat in the $1,500 buy-in no-limit hold’em freezeout. The Louisiana resident had just $24,000 in prior tournament earnings to his name, with all seven of his previous cashes coming since the start of this year. While he began this event as a tournament newcomer, Benton came away as a WSOP champion with the top prize of $412,484.

The $600 mixed no-limit hold’em and pot-limit Omaha event attracted a sizable field of 3,351 entries, resulting in a $1,709,010 prize pool. The largest share of that money was ultimately awarded to Canada’s Alen Bakovic, who walked away with $207,064. This was the largest score yet for the WSOPC ring winner, topping the $34,783 he earned as the 127th-place finisher in the 2023 WSOP Online $5,000 main event.

The $3,000 six-max no-limit hold’em event saw another strong turnout with a field of 1,230 joining the mix during just one starting flight. Nicholas Seward triumphed in the end, earning $516,135 as the last player standing.

Top POY contender David Coleman finished fourth for $168,448. This was his 16th final-table finish of the year with four titles won so far. He now sits in second place in the rankings, trailing only Adrian Mateos.

Chile’s Alex Manzano has more than $1.1 million in career tournament earnings, with seven of his top 10 scores coming in pot-limit Omaha events. His latest PLO victory saw him top a field of 2,402 entries in the $600 pot-limit Omaha event to earn $161,846. This was the fourth-largest score on Manzano’s résumé. His top payday remains the $368,722 he earned for winning a Latin American Poker Tour main event in Brazil back in 2011.

The $2,500 no-limit hold’em freezeout was ultimately won by Antonio Galiana, who earned $439,395 and his first bracelet as the champion. The Spaniard navigated his way through a field of 1,267 entries to make it down to heads-up against Johan ‘Yoh Viral’ Guilbert.

During the final showdown, Galiana pulled off a crazy bluff that ended with him five-bet shoving the river with air. The board had five clubs on deck, making a flush on board. Guilbert had also been bluffing while playing the board, like Galiana.

Guilbert settled for $292,927. This was his third runner-up finish with a bracelet on the line, having also finished second in both the 2021 WSOP Europe main event and the 2019 WSOP $3,000 shootout event.

The final table also featured six-time bracelet winner Jeremy Ausmus (3rd), who despite some bad luck in key spots has put together an incredible summer, with four final tables and nearly $3.1 million in cashes.

The $10,000 buy-in Big O championship made its debut at this year’s series, drawing 332 entries in its inaugural running. After three days of five-card pot-limit Omaha eight-or-better action, John Fauver emerged victorious as the first-ever champion. The West Virginian earned $681,998 for the win.

Pedro Neves grabbed the second seven-figure score of his poker career along with his first gold bracelet by taking down the $1,500 no-limit hold’em Monster Stack event. The cash was worth $1,098,220, and when combined with the $1,183,037 he won at the 2023 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure, takes his total tournament earnings up to nearly $3.4 million. The Portuguese player overcame a field of 8,703 on his way to securing the victory.

Xixiang Luo will go down in WSOP history as the first-ever champion of a double board bomb pot event. The Chinese player outlasted 1,312 entries in the new $1,500 buy-in tournament, which featured a mix of both pot-limit Omaha and no-limit hold’em, to earn $270,820.

The poker world watched with bated breath as all-time bracelet leader Phil Hellmuth made it down to the final four players in the $1,500 mixed Omaha eight-or-better event. The Poker Hall of Famer came within a few spots of securing his record-extending 18th victory at the series, but ultimately bowed out in fourth place.

The player who ended Hellmuth’s run was Magnus Edengren. The Swede earned $196,970 after scooping the final hand in this event, which featured a rotation of limit Omaha eight-or-better, pot-limit Omaha eight-or-better, and Big O (five-card pot-limit Omaha eight-or-better).

Jared Kingery had come close to winning his first bracelet once before. In 2022 he took second in a $500 no-limit hold’em event, banking $433,255, but falling just short of gold. The Washington-based player made the second try the charm when he won the $2,000 no-limit hold’em event, earning $410,359 as the champion.

It took five days of play, but finally, a champion was decided in the $10,000 H.O.R.S.E. championship event. Russia’s Maksim Pisarenko emerged victorious from a field of 181 entries to secure his first gold bracelet and the top prize of $399,988. He now has more than $1.2 million in recorded tournament earnings to his name.

A total of 7,984 players aged 50 or higher turned out for the $1,000 no-limit hold’em seniors championship, resulting in a prize pool of $6,999,520. Khang Pham walked away with the largest chunk, earning $677,326 and his first gold bracelet as the champion.

A total of 2,110 entries turned out for the ultra-fast-paced $1,500 super turbo bounty, resulting in a prize pool of $2,816,850. While 315 players lasted long enough to earn a piece of that pot, only one would walk away with the bracelet. That player was Peter Park, who earned $240,724. This tournament took a single day to finish.

Erlend Melsom topped a field of 1,252 players in the $3,000 no-limit hold’em freezeout, earning his first bracelet and the largest chunk of the $3,342,840 prize pool. Melsom walked away with $523,195, and became just the eighth player from his home country of Norway to win a bracelet, with Thor Hansen and 2022 main event champion Espen Jorstad having both won two titles at the series to bring the nation’s total to 10.

George Alexander cashed in six $10,000 championship events at the WSOP from 2019 through 2024, but had always fallen just short of grasping the coveted gold bracelet. Finally, with his seventh championship event cash, he managed to close out the win in the $10,000 razz championship. Alexander, who is based out of Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, earned $282,443 and the hardware.

Australia’s Mostafa Haidary earned $656,747 as the champion of the $5,000 no-limit hold’em six-max event. The event had 817 total entries, resulting in a prize pool of more than $3.7 million. This was the largest score yet for Haidary, besting the $119,662 he earned as the third-place finisher in the 2023 WPT Prime Gold Coast main event in his native country.

Rounding out the first-time winners for this issue is Patrick Moulder. The Las Vegas resident topped the field of 371 entries in the $2,500 mixed triple draw lowball event, securing the first-place prize of $177,045. Moulder now has more than $319,000 in recorded career scores after his strong start this summer with three final tables. ♠

*Photos by Card Player, PokerGO, and WSOP