Benjamin Leblond Wins Canadian Heads-Up Champ.

The Canadian Open Poker Championship $5,000 heads-up no-limit hold’em main event attracted 93 players this past weekend to the Stampede Casino in Calgary, Alberta. The tournament featured a total prize pool worth $425,000 and a best two-out-of-three format to decide the winner of the event. Amateur Benjamin Leblond from Hull, Quebec, beat Jeff Madsen 2-1 in the finals of the event to take home $100,000 in prize money. Madsen was awarded $50,000 for his runner-up finish.

Madsen won the first game in their finals match, but Leblond rallied to win the next two games and take home his first tournament title. In the final hand, Leblond held pocket fours and Madsen held A-10. Leblond hit a four on the flop, and Madsen made trip tens when a second 10 hit the board on the river, but those tens also made a full house for Leblond, and he won the tournament.

The biggest test of the tournament for Leblond came when he played a six-hour match against Phil Hellmuth in the quarter-finals of the event. Leblond emerged with the win when he made a set of sixes on the river of a hand where Hellmuth was in the lead with pocket nines. Leblond then beat Canadian professional Brad Booth in the semi-finals to advance to the final match against Madsen.

Leblond attributed his success to the many hours of heads-up play he has booked online, and he plans to play in the main event at the 2009 World Series of Poker this summer. Perhaps the most surprising upset of the entire event came when 2008 defending champion Huck Seed lost in the first round on Thursday, May 14.

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