Aaron Zang Wins Triton Million For £13.8 Million

The biggest-ever buy-in poker tournament has crowned its champion and it is Chinese businessman Aaron Zang who goes down in history after triumphing in the £1,050,000 buy-in partypoker LIVE Triton Million – A Helping Hand for Charity event.

A field of 54, made up of professional poker players and rich businessmen and women, exchanged £1,050,000 for the chance to win the largest first-place prize in poker history. A gargantuan prize pool of £54 million was created and this was shared among the top 11 finishers.

Triton Million Bubble Bursts

Team PokerStars Pro Igor Kurganov was the player who burst the money bubble, running his pocket tens into the pocket jacks of multi-millionaire Bill Perkins. Perkins would go on to cash in sixth-place for £2,200,000.

Winfred Yu and Chin Lim both banked £1,100,000 for their 11th and 10th place finishes, with Wai Chan banking £1,200,000 after falling in ninth-place and setting the official final table.

Canada’s Timothy Adams was the first casualty of the final table. Adams committed his stack in good shape, holding a pair of red kings and looking set for a double-up as he was up against the ace-ten of Vivek Rajkumar. That was until an ace appeared as the door card. Rajkumar’s hand remained the best and Adams headed to the cashier’s desk to collect £1,400,000.

Alfred DeCarolis was the next to fall, his seventh-place finish adding £1,720,000 to his already considerable fortune. DeCarolis came unstuck when he made an ill-timed move with ace-trey only to discover Stephen Chidwick was laying in wait with pocket aces. The five community cards provided no drama and DeCarolis was sent on his way.

Bryn Kenney the Aces Magnet!

Perkins then busted against a pair of aces. Perkins found himself all in with king-ten and in a whole world of trouble against Bryn Kenney’s aces. Perkins failed to shoot down those rockets and the player count reduced by one.

Amazingly, Kenney found pocket aces again to bust another player. This time it was Rajkumar who became Kenney’s victim. The high stakes poker guru three-bet all-in with a suited ace-eight and failed to improve against the aces in Kenney’s hand. Rajkumar walked away with his head held high and with £3,000,000 reasons to do so.

Four-handed play for another 46 hands before the dangerous Chidwick was sent to the rail. It was a classic coinflip with Chidwick holding pocket sevens against the king-jack of Kenney. A king on the flop flipped the hand on its head, Kenney’s hand held and Chidwick crashed out. The £4,410,000 Chidwick won was the largest cash of his illustrious career so far and propelled him to eighth in the all-time money listings.

The final three became two when Dan Smith saw his ace-ten lose to the dominated queen-ten of Kenney. Kenney paired his queen on the flop and improved to trips on the turn to send Smith to the showers with £7,200,000 in his back pocket.

Deal Made

Although Kenney held a massive chip lead going into heads up against Zang, the last standing duo struck a deal that made the massive pay jump less. Despite being by far the superior player, Kenney saw his lead eroded and Zang took the lead for himself when his pocket sixes held against Kenney’s king-queen.

Zang extended his lead when Kenney decided to bluff with a missed flush draw when Zang held trip kings. The final hand saw all the chips go into the middle with the flop reading eight-four-three with two spades. Kenney held ace-six of spades, and Zang the eight-five of diamonds. The turn and river both missed Kenney and the most unlikely of players had won poker’s biggest-ever tournament and a cool £13,779,491 in prize money.

Zang was gracious in his victory, stating that he was lucky to have won because Kenney played far better poker than he and that it was a great honor to have played poker against such talented opponents. Zang now is the winningest live poker tournament from China and goes straight into 32nd place in the all-time money listings.

Triton Million Final Table Results

Place	Player	Country	Prize (GBP)	Prize (USD)
1	Aaron Zang	China	£13,779,491*	$16,754,497*
2	Bryn Kenney	United States	£16,890,509*	$20,537,187*
3	Dan Smith	United States	£7,200,000*	$8,719,164
4	Stephen Chidwick	United Kingdom	£4,410,000*	$5,340,488
5	Vivek Rajkumar	India	£3,000,000*	$3,632,985
6	Bill Perkins	United States	£2,200,000*	$2,664,189
7	Alfred DeCarolis	United States	£1,720,000*	$2,082,911
8	Timothy Adams	Canada	£1,400,000*	$1,695,393

Charitable Causes are the Biggest Winners

While the players won astronomical sums of money, the biggest winners were the charitable causes of the Triton Poker Super High Roller Series. A cool £2,700,000 was raised from the buy-ins alone and no doubt some of those who won big will have also donated to the various causes.

With this second-place finish, Kenney soars into the lead in the all-time money listings with a massive $55,505,634 in winnings, eclipsing the $45,014,707 won by Justin Bonomo.

Matthew Pitt

If it’s something you can play online for real money, chances are Matthew knows a bit about it. He’s been writing about slots, craps and poker for the better part of the last decade. He’s written for PokerNews, PartyPoker and many other respected online gambling websites during the last nine years.

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