Dan Smith Wins European Poker Tour Barcelona €50,000 Super High Roller

Dan Smith has won the 2012 European Poker Tour Barcelona €50,000 super high roller event, topping a tough field of 64 to take home the $1,186,420 first-place prize and 612 Card Player Player of the Year points. Incredibly, this was Smith’s fifth title of the year, propelling him into the outright lead in the POY race with 4,100 total points and more than $3.3 million in year-to-date earnings. His nearest competition is Kyle Julius, who is 348 points back at 3,752.

Smith entered the eight-handed final table with 5,108,000 in chips, which was nearly 2 million more than five shortest stacks combined. Despite his massive stack, the final table was hardly easy going, as Smith had to do battle with a number of top pros including Erik Seidel (6th – $189,251), Mike McDonald (5th – $265,025), Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies (4th – $359,650), Michael Watson (3rd – $492,224) and runner-up JC Alvarado.

Smith took a 5-to-3 chip lead into the heads-up battle. The two made a deal to play for €100,000 and the title, with Smith locking up €862,925 and Alvarado €788,675. Alvarado battled back, and at one point held the chip lead, but Smith retook the advantage and then never looked back.

Alvarado got his last 21 big blinds in as a favorite in a cooler situation, with his KK well ahead of Smith’s AK. Smith found an ace on the flop, however, to take the lead in the hand. The turn in the river changed nothing, and both the pot and the title were shipped Smith’s way.

Smith has excelled in high buy-in events against tough fields so far in 2012, with the average buy-in for his seven final-table finishes this year being $27,508. He started the year off winning the $100,000 buy-in event at the Aussie Millions, and then won three €5,000 no-limit hold’em events at the EPT Grand Final in the span of a week. At the World Series of Poker he continued his run of success in $5,000 buy-in no-limit hold’em events with a third place finish out of 1,001 players for $368,943.

Here is a look at the payouts and POY points awarded at this final table:

Photos courtesy of PokerStars and Neil Stoddart.

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