Brendon Rubie Wins Aussie Millions Opening Event

The 2012 Aussie Millions Opening Event has come to an exciting conclusion with Poker Asia Pacific blogger Brendon Rubie crowned champion.  He picks up $200,000 for his efforts as well as a coveted Aussie Millions Gold Ring.

The Opening Event of the Aussie Millions schedule is always an exciting one, as Crown Poker were aiming to better the $1,000,000 prizepool set last year when Martin Drewe was victorious.  This year fell just short with 946 entrants taking to the felt over the three day one flights. 34, 32 and 66 players survived respectively from the opening flights as 132 players combined on day two.

The money for the top 81 players would be reached fairly swiftly following the elimination of Andrew Hinrichsen as the bubble boy when he was the victim of an unfortunate two –outer.

From there eliminations would steadily fall as all players had locked up a guaranteed $2,500 in prize money, but the Crown Poker Room staff wisely decided to pause play for the night once the final ten were reached following last year’s epic final table lasted until 7:00am.

Once that last hand was dealt, the final table would be led by Scott Wilson who had amassed a stack with a buffer of close to one million over his nearest rival Brendon Rubie - one of the most feared young players in Australia.

As the final table kicked off Monday afternoon it would be Sean Robey quickly out the door in tenth, followed by Tamara Volkoff in ninth place.  Rubie spiked a huge double when he flopped a set of eights against Naz Sibaei who made a move at the wrong time with just king-high. Sibaei and his short stack wouldn’t last too much longer as he bundled out in eighth before a break in play only lengthened the stay of Sherif Derias as he bluffed his way out the door in seventh.

Local Crown regular Manny Stavropoulos would nurse the short stack for as long as possible before running a small pocket pair into a slightly bigger one to bow out in sixth before Tam Truong’s button push with a weak ace wouldn’t be rewarded when he was outdrawn to depart in fifth place.

John Thomson would exit after the break in fourth place before the UK’s Rob Angood would lose a race holding pocket sevens against the ace-jack of Rubie to exit in third.

Fittingly the last two players remaining would also be the two chip leaders to start the day, but after four hours of play, it would be Rubie leading the two with roughly 6,400,000 to Wilson’s 3,000,000.

Rubie began the contest like he always plays – with aggression – and furthered his advantage over Wilson as the rail grew stronger with both players having more-and-more support to watch on. After roughly an hour of play, Rubie would nearly end the contest when he fired out 1,200,000 on the river with the board reading . Wilson would make the call, but couldn’t better Rubie’s .  Rubie thought it was all over and celebrated with his rail, but in fact Wilson was still alive with a stack of just 305,000 – or 5 big blinds. Wilson then managed to double up and then double again as Rubie started to wonder what a huge mistake he had made letting his opponent back into the contest.

In the end, it didn’t matter as Rubie eventually got the better of his opponent once and for all. Rubie’s would hold true on a flop against Wilson’s  as the turn and river rolled out and  to see Brendon Rubie crowned the 2012 Aussie Millions Event 1: $1,100 Opening Event Champion!

Final Table Payouts

1st: Brendon Rubie - $200,000
2nd: Scott Wilson - $125,000
3rd: Rob Angood - $80,000
4th: John Thomson - $61,000
5th: Tam Truong - $49,000
6th: Manny Stavropoulos - $39,000
7th: Sherif Derias - $29,000
8th: Niz Sibaei - $19,000
9th: Tamara Volkoff - $14,500
10th: Sean Robey - $10,900