Martin Zamani Wins Penultimate PokerGO Tour Last Chance Event

The second-to-last event of the PokerGO Tour Last Chance series drew 121 entries, a new record for a $10,100 buy-in event inside the PokerGO Studio at ARIA Resort & Casino Las Vegas. The $1,210,000 prize pool was paid out amongst the top 18 finishers, with the largest share going to eventual champion Martin Zamani. The two-time bracelet winner walked away with $302,500 as the champion, growing his lifetime earnings to nearly $7 million in the process.

Zamani also earned 660 Card Player Player of the Year points for the win. He now sits in third place in the 2025 POY standings presented by Global Poker.

The 303 PGT points he secured with this title run moved him into fourth place in the series-long standings.

Zamani came into the second and final day of this event with the chip lead. Super-short-stack Joey Weissman was the first to fall, with his K-10 outrun by the K-9 suited of Zamani. Weissman earned $48,400 for his seventh-place showing. The bracelet winner now has more than $7.8 million in recorded cashes to his name.

Two-time bracelet winner Chris Brewer soon joined Weissman on the rail when his A-J suited lost a preflop race to the pocket eights of World Poker Tour champion and bracelet winner Brek Schutten. Brewer bricked out on a queen-high runout and was eliminated in sixth place ($60,500). This score ticked his career earnings over $26.7 million.

During five-handed play, Zamani bluffed Schutten off of a full house in a wild hand. With blinds of 40,000-80,000, Schutten min-raised from under the gun with 77. Zamani three-bet to 800,000 with AQ out of the big blind and Schutten called. The flop came down 874 and Zamani bet 500,000 into the pot of 1,720,000 with the nut flush draw. Schutten called with his middle set and the 8 paired the board on the turn. Zamani bet small, firing 660,000. Schutten called with his full house and the 8 rolled off the deck on the end. Zamani moved all-in on the river, putting Schutten to the test for his tournament life. Schutten folded and was shown the bluff. While he remained in second chip position with 2,660,000, Zamani surged to 7,030,000.

Big Stacks Collide! Martin Zamani Applies Maximum Pressure at PGT Last Chance!

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— PokerGO (@PokerGO) January 8, 2025

Ren Lin was at his second final-table finish of the series. He got the last of his stack in with pocket fives trailing the pocket queens (‘Lady Gagas’ in Lin’s parlance) of Rania Nasreddine. The larger pair held and Lin was knocked out in fifth place ($72,600). He is approaching $15 million in lifetime scores after this latest deep run.

Nasreddine doubled up through Zamani twice during four-handed action to briefly take the chip lead, but she then doubled Zamani up when he flopped trip tens against her jacks and tens with an ace kicker to slide back down to the short stack.

Schutten got the last of his chips in with A-J suited leading the A-8 of Zamani, but an eight on the flop turned the tables. Schutten picked up a flush draw on the turn but bricked the river to finish fourth for $102,850.

Nasreddine also lost a big pot with A-J after leading preflop, with five-time bracelet winner Kristen Foxen spiking a ten with A-10 and holding from there to leave Nasreddine on fumes. Zamani claimed Nasreddine’s last couple big blinds to send her home in third place ($133,100). The two-time European Poker Tour final tablist grew her career haul to more than $1.9 million with this score.

Heads-up play began with Zamani holding 12,875,000 to Foxen’s 2,250,000. It took just two hands for him to convert that lead into the title. The final hand saw Zamani open rip from the button with A10. Foxen called off her last 1,875,000 (9.5 big blinds) with A8. The board came down 766Q2 to bring the event to an end.

Foxen walked away with $187,550 as the runner-up. With $10,458,236 in lifetime earnings, she is just the second female player in poker history to accrue eight figures in tournament scores. She now trails female all-time money leader Vanessa Selbst ($10,899,027) by just $440,791.

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

Photo credits: PokerGO / Antonio Abrego.

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