Laura Cornelius
Life on the Road
EPT Grand Final Travel Diary
Monaco: The second smallest country in the world (behind Vatican City) and a hub for the rich and famous. It is glitzy, full of glamour and very apt for the 2012 PokerStars and Monte Carlo® Casino EPT Grand Final. Season 8 was about to come to an end and we were going to do it in style.
Having come straight from Berlin to Monaco, I was already fighting the fatigue, but to arrive in this Billionaire’s Playground, the sun shining, the sky blue and the Mediterranean glistening a beautiful turquoise, I woke up again. Taking a stroll around the famous Princess Grace Avenue and becoming lost on winding pieces of Grand Prix track, I was made fully aware how beautiful this tiny municipality was. It’s the only place I have been to where instead of getting woken up by a cleaning lady hoovering out in the corridor or banging on my door, I was woken instantaneously by the whirr of a Ferrari engine. Morning, noon and night, all I could hear was fast cars, sounds of laughter, champagne pouring and wads full of money being flashed about. This place wasn’t cheap, but having explored the streets for 2 days before the tournament got underway, I was learning how to economize in a place built for multi-millionaires.
Everywhere we walked, there were signs of the preparation for the Formula One Grand Prix taking place in just a few weeks time. I would have loved to have been in Monaco for this, but we knew having the EPT Grand Final and the F1 Grand Prix at the same time might have been a recipe for disaster in terms of the amount of people in this tiny country. We arrived in Monaco for the poker just the day after the Monte-Carlo Rolex Masters tennis took place as well, so I was hoping for a surprise soiree with Raphael Nadal who took it down (unsurprisingly) but it was not to be. I did however meet Djokovich’s economist in the pool doing some lengths at Le Meridien Beach Plaza, who was full of surprisingly interesting conversation and we swapped poker gossip for tennis chat, which pleased me no end.
Here is our sightseeing tour video for Monaco. Please note, obviously as I stated previously Ferraris are everywhere here, but when we are waiting for one to feature in our video, does it want to arrive? The answer is no, but waiting for it did help my tan to progress a lot:
The Grand Final began with the €100,000 Super High Roller event, which to me is an insane amount of money; I still can’t quite get my head around it. Nonetheless, there were still 38 entrants and a total of 45 registrations as players did have a choice to re-register if they lost all their chips at the beginning. This created a prizepool of €4,432,500 and it was just as good Justin Bonomo did decide to re-register when he bust out, because he went on to win the event for €1,640,000. Not bad for 3 days work.
The main event had already got underway by the time Justin had shone in the glory of taking down the Super High Roller title. Play moved pretty quickly through the first few days and we saw a total of 665 players take their seats, creating a prizepool of €6.65m and a first place prize of €1.35m. 5 Team PokerStars Pros made the money, including Max Martinez (Italy) for €15,000, Angel Guillen (Mexico) and Sandra Naujoks (Germany) for €20,000, and Richard Toth (Hungary) and Matthias De Meulder (Belgium) for €30,000. Yet 34th was to be the best place for our Team Pros. Justin Bonomo had also made the money, after not feeling completely satisfied by his win of €1,640,000 in the Super High Roller; he also cashed for €35,000 in 28th place. Yet, it was Mohsin Charania who eventually took the EPT Grand Final down. He was heads-up against French mademoiselle and well-known online player (known as SoMuchB online), Lucille Cailly, who was the only lady to have ever made a final table at the Grand Final. She played superbly with a huge amount of aggression, but Charania just had the edge in the action of a very fast-paced final table.
Now, because this was The Grand Final, things just didn’t end once the winner of the main event had been announced. There was still the €25,000 Hi-Roller, Tournament of Champions and the EPT Awards and party to contend with. (I told you we were going to go out with a bang!) To say Justin Bonomo was running-good was an understatement. He wins the Super Hi-Roller, cashes in the main and now suddenly becomes chipleader going into the final table of the €25,000 Hi Roller. He didn’t eventually win it, but he still made 4th place for another €266,000. Madness. We left it to Daniel Negreanu and Igor Kurganov to battle it out for the €1,080,000 first prize, yet it was Kurganov who eventually took this one down, though we could tell Daniel really wanted his first EPT title. There was always the party, which we of course saw him at partying away until the wee small hours of the morning. As I prepared for the EPT Awards and my final night in the Billionaire’s Playground, Christophe Benzimra was busy winning the Tournament of Champions (with EPT Loutraki Champ Zimnan Ziyard coming 2nd and EPT Deauville Champ Jake Cody in 3rd) netting themselves a huge amount of buy-ins for Season 9 on the EPT.
Head over to the www.pokerstars.tv homepage to see the EPT Awards and Party, which show some of the winners for Player of the Year, Online Qualifier of the Year, Player’s Choice, Achievement of the Year and Country of the Year. No doubt about it, Season 8 and all its 13 stops had been a whirlwind of poker, travel and fun explorations, but we have even more hope and anticipation for Season 9 on the greatest poker tour of them all, the EPT.
Magic in Madrid
So, indeedio from San Remo it was onwards-bound to our next stop of Madrid, Spain. Only thing, we couldn't get a direct flight, oh no, that would be far too simple. From San Remo, we flew to Nice, to fly back to London City for a 4 hour stopover and then to Madrid. Obviously, living in London I really didn't want to spend 4 hours just sat waiting at the airport, so decided I was going to be really romantic and find my boyfriend and see him for perhaps 20 minutes before shooting back to the airport. Well, 20 minutes turned into about 7 minutes as he rushed out of work to find me, I went all a bit clumsy, bleated out some nonsense about what had happened in the last 7 days and then watched him wander off back to his office. Not even anytime for nooky, which deeply tormented me. It was like something from a movie. What made matters even worse, the sun was shining so brightly and the sun never shines in London! Oh well, at least there will be sangria on the other side (that's what I'm talkin' about!) So we boarded our final flight of the day to Madrid and eventually, a few wines down the road, landed and got to the hotel around midnight. It had been an excruciatingly long day, but the next day was free for us to spend how we wished, so being of the 'Night Owl' persona, there was not a way in the world I was letting this Wednesday night out of my grasp. Everyone on the flight I was with was tired and just wanted bed, so I got thinking, I was so eager to get out and see Madrid that night we arrived I would have gone out on my own, but it just so happened I found some of the card dealers from the EPT and it was one of their birthdays, BOOM! It was great to get out and really experience the nightlife of Madrid and one of the guys I was with was originally from Madrid, so all the better that he knew where to take us. There was drinking, drinking, dancing and then a bit more drinking as we left Pacha (yep the club - not quite Ibiza standards but fun nonetheless due to the copious bottles of vodka we had necked) and I must have fallen into my bed around 7am, though I really have no idea... and that was my first night in Madrid. There, of course have been many more since.
A stonking hangover was unfortunately present the first time I met Sarah Grant. I had pre-warned her of this and it perhaps made me a tad more endearing to her, well, I hoped so. I was excited that Sarah had come over from Vegas to help me out with the videos at the Grand Final. Double Trouble, and that's exactly what we have been up until now. We wanted to both get involved in the welcome video to Madrid so were keen to think of something completely stupid we could do in it. A Love Story. Perfect! Here it is....
So we're into Day 3 now at The Grand Final and I finally feel like I am becoming part of this world slowly as poker players from around the world are recognizing me more and actually coming up to speak with me, and I to them, which is great. I still am desperate to play some poker and though in a world where I am surrounded with it, its never possible for me to play. So I look forward to getting back to London in a few days and hitting up The International where I usually play. Its been near enough 3 weeks on the road now and while it has been an amazing time, I have no clean underwear left, so it really is time for Home Sweet Home!!
I've had three phonecalls today, for work once I get back, which has been fantastic. Two of them un-poker related and I shall probably divulge more if and when I take them on. However one was a call to do some commentary over a poker game with Mr Blackbelt Poker, Neil Channing. I have no idea what the game is, but said I would be delighted to be the 'colour' in this equation. I was perhaps more excited by the fact its a job I can do in my tracksuit bottoms and no makeup. Sod it I might even wear my pyjamas just for the sake of it! So I'll be sure to bring you more details on that one and probably the faux-pas falling out of my mouth on the job!
So, back to the grindstone here in Madrid, just two more full days to go and I have no idea who will be taking home the 1st prize of €1.5m but I wish it were me! I'm off to find some horribly greasy food right now which is simply the only answer to the amount of caphirinas I drank with some new Dutch friends last night! In the meantime, here is Sarah and I again, being silly little sausages!
