Jonathan Tamayo Wins WSOP Circuit Event at the Kennel Club

Jonathan Tamayo the 27 year old pro from Humble Texas played a hard fought game to take his second WSOP Circuit ring at the main event in Palm Beach. The Cornell University graduate also pocketed a sweet $206,020 taking his WSOP earnings to around the $900,000 mark. At only 27 he has plenty of big tournament experience, running deep in the WSOP Main Event back in 2009 where he finished a respectable 21st place. He said that the experience in that main event taught him a lot about big tourneys and how to handle things as the field got smaller. He has another Circuit ring to his name too after winning the Harrah's New Orleans main event some three years ago. After his win Tamayo said, "It helps having been through this before, when I made my deep run in the WSOP main event a few years ago, I learned a lot of stuff from that. I basically learned that it's very much a process. If you keep in mind that it's a process then everything will take care of itself." Although the main event placing was an outstanding achievement he considers this to be the bigger one and added, "Anytime you are the last one standing, it supersedes any deep run, second is disappointing, third is disappointing. Winning is the goal."

How it all Played Out

This years event at the Kennel Club attracted a very good 670 players which took the prize pool over the million dollar mark and the top 72 players made the money. This was the third year running the event has been held in Palm Beach and event #1 got things started with a bang as 2,539 players bought in smashing the $1 Million guaranteed amount. However, we digress....back to the main event. Of the nine players that took to the final table Tamayo stood third place in chips and it was a hard fought battle. Out in 9th place was two time Circuit event winner Nancy Birnbaum and she was followed in 8th position by Tom Gleason who had an outstanding three cashes during the whole event. Entering the final day David Grandieri was chip leader however the 33 year old pro finally went to the rail in 7th place. Luke Graham the only non US player at the table was out in 6th place and he was followed by Chris Hyden of St Petersburg Florida. William Looper went in fourth, mark Rose in 3rd and we hit heads up play between Tamayo and Clint Tolbert from Moore Oklahoma. The session lasted a total of 14 hours and was tough on the players to say the least and in the end all the hard work paid off for Tamayo, albeit with a little luck running his way. It was one of those coin flip kinda hands with Tamayo holding an ace jack and Holbert with pocket fives. Sadly for Tolbert an ace paired things up for Tamayo and the fives stood little chance with Tolbert finishing second taking a second place win amount of $127,484. The series as a whole in Palm Beach was an outstanding event with a record breaking number of players in the first event and let's hope that the Kennel Club makes the schedule for 2014.