The 2022 World Poker Tour Five Diamond World Poker Classic is currently running at the Bellagio Hotel Casino in Las Vegas. The $5,000,000 guaranteed $10,400 buy-in WPT main event got underway on Wednesday, Oct. 19, but before that marquee event kicked off, a pair of $25,000 buy-in high rollers played out with seven figures in prize money awarded between them.
The first of the two high-stakes events was a pot-limit Omaha tournament. With 23 total entries, the prize pool grew to $575,000. In the end, Isaac Kempton emerged victorious with the title and the top prize of $264,500.
This was Kempton’s second recorded live tournament title, with his first being a victory in the 2020 World Series of Poker Circuit Seminole Hard Rock Tampa $1,700 main event for $290,974. His largest cash ever came when he finished as the runner-up in this year’s Wynn Millions main event for $1,093,314. Kempton now has more than $2.4 million in lifetime tournament earnings to his name.
Kempton has now made seven final-table finishes so far this year, with more than $1.8 million in earnings accrued across those scores. With the 252 Card Player Player of the Year points he earned for this latest victory, he now has a total of 3,260 points, which is good for 32nd place in the 2022 POY race sponsored by Global Poker.
Kempton was not the only top POY contender to make the money in this event. Five-time WSOP bracelet winner Jeremy Ausmus secured $161,000 and 210 POY points as the runner-up finisher. This was Ausmus’ 20th final-table finish of the year, with five titles won and nearly $2.5 million in POY earnings accrued along the way. He now sits in third place on the POY leaderboard, with his 5,176 points being just 22 shy of second-ranked Sean Winter.
Kempton and Ausmus are also both now inside the top 15 in the PokerGO Tour points race, with Kempton in 13th place and Ausmus 15th.
| Place | Player | Earnings | POY Points | PGT Points |
| 1 | Isaac Kempton | $264,500 | 252 | 159 |
| 2 | Jeremy Ausmus | $161,000 | 210 | 97 |
| 3 | Ronald Keijzer | $92,000 | 168 | 55 |
| 4 | John Riordan | $57,500 | 126 | 35 |
The following day the game switched to no-limit hold’em for the next $25,000 high roller. A total of 17 entries were made before registration came to a close, building a prize pool of $425,000 that was ultimately split up among the top three finishers.
The last player standing was none other than all-time tournament earnings leader Justin Bonomo. The 37-yar-old three-time bracelet winner and three-time Super High Roller Bowl champion earned $229,500 for the win in this event, growing his lifetime earnings to just shy of $60.8 million.
This was his second title of the series, having won a 410,000 buy-in just shy of a week earlier for another $75,792.
Bonomo defeated bracelet winner Sam Soverel heads-up to lock up this win. Soverel earned $127,500 as the runner-up. Current POY and PGT points leader Stephen Chidwick finished third for $68,000. This was his 25th POY-qualified final table showing of the year with five titles won and more than $6.2 million in POY earnings secured along the way.
Chidwick now has 6,499 POY points to his name, good for a 1,301-point lead over second-ranked Sean Winter. With $44,794,605 in lifetime earnings, Chidwick now sits in fourth place on poker’s all-time money list.
| Place | Player | Earnings | POY Points | PGT Points |
| 1 | Justin Bonomo | $229,500 | 168 | 138 |
| 2 | Sam Soverel | $127,500 | 140 | 77 |
| 3 | Stephen Chidwick | $68,000 | 112 | 41 |
Photo credits: PokerGO / Antonio Abrego.
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