Patrick Serda Wins 2018 World Poker Tour Montreal Main Event

Patrick Serda has won the 2018 World Poker Tour Montreal $5,300 CAD buy-in, $5 million guaranteed no-limit hold’em main event. The 28-year-old Canadian poker pro defeated a field of 792 total entries to capture his first WPT title and the top prize of $855,000 CAD ($668,388 USD).

Serda entered the final day of the event as the chip leader with six players remaining. Serda had plenty of staunch competition to contend with at the final table, including two-time World Series of Poker bracelet winner Upeshka De Silva, Canada’s fourth-highest earning live tournament player Sorel Mizzi ($12.1 million) and 2017 WPT Playground Winter Poker Festival main event winner and first-ever female WPT main event champion Ema Zajmovic. Serda is no slouch himself, having accumulated roughly $1 million in lifetime live earnings before entering this event.

The first elimination of the final table came in a three-way all-in. Jiachen Gong got his last chips in preflop with the AA up against the AK of Kauvsegan Ehamparam and the AQ of Zajmovic. The board brought four spades and made the nut flush to secure the massive pot, knocking Gong out in sixth place ($134,116 USD). De Silva was the next to hit the rail when he ran pocket fours into the pocket jacks of Mizzi and failed to improve. De Silva earned $175,956 for his fifth-place showing at his first WPT final table, bringing his career live earnings to $2,291,849.

Mizzi, Serda and Zajmovic were all relatively close in chips at the top of the leaderboard at the start of four-handed play. Zajmovic separated herself by busting Kauvsegan Ehamparam in fourth place ($233,424 USD), her pocket nines winning a preflop race against Ehamparam’s QJ.

Mizzi began to fall behind as three-handed play wore on. Eventually, he picked up the 66 on the button and moved all-in for 3,200,000. Serda moved all-in for more from the small blind with the 99 and Zajmovic folded. Serda’s bigger pair held up and Mizzi was knocked out in third place, earning $313,320 USD at his fourth WPT final table.

With that Serda took 16,150,000 into heads-up play against Zajmovic, who sat with 15,675,000. On the 11th hand of the final showdown, the two got involved in what turned out to be the decisive pot of the tournament. Zajmovic picked up the K9 and raised to 500,000 on the button with blinds of 100,000-200,000 with a 200,000 big-blind ante. Serda three-bet to 1,600,000 from the big blind holding the 75. Zajmovic considered her options before cutting out a four-bet to 3,800,000. Serda made the call and the flop brought the 1076.

Both players checked and the turn brought the A. Serda checked again and Zajmovic bet 3,000,000. Serda made the call and the 3 completed the board on the river. Serda checked yet again and Zajmovic moved all-in for 8,500,000. Serda went into the tank, but eventually found the hero call with his third pair. It was good, as Zajmovic could only produce king high and a missed straight flush draw. With that Zajmovic fell just short of becoming the first ever two-time female WPT main event champion, earning $424,893 USD as the runner-up finisher.

Serda was awarded 1,824 Card Player Player of the Year points as the champion of this event. This was his third final table of 2018, and as a result of the huge win he has climbed in to 71st place in the overall POY race standings.

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

Winner photo provided by WPT.

The 2018 WPT Montreal festival saw the WPT team up with partypoker LIVE, a partnership that is set to produce plenty more huge events like this in the coming years.

With this series now in the books, the next festival on the agenda for partypoker is the Caribbean Poker Party (CPP), which will take place from Nov. 9-18 at the Baha Mar Casino & Hotel in Nassau, Bahamas. There are 13 events set to take place during the festival, but the whole affair is centered around two gigantic tournaments: The $10,000,000 guaranteed $25,500 buy-in MILLIONS World and the $10,000,000 guaranteed $5,300 buy-in Caribbean Poker Party Main Event.

“There are many coveted titles in poker, from the EPT and WPT Grand Final titles to WSOP and WSOPE Main Event and Players Championship bracelets, and not forgetting our own MILLIONS Grand Final crown,” said partypoker LIVE president John Duthie. “However, a $10,000,000 guaranteed, $25.5K buy-in tournament is just as important as any of those. We can’t wait to hand the trophy over to our first winner in November. Let’s hope it’s one of the 100+ online qualifiers partypoker will be sending, as that would be quite some story."

Following on the heels of that huge series in the Carribean will be the MILLIONS Online. As previously mentioned, the $20 million guaranteed $5,300 buy-in online event will run from Nov. 25 – Dec. 5 and is expected to be the biggest online tournament ever, with $2.5 million going to the eventual champion.

Information about all of these upcoming events can be found on mypartypokerlive.com

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