A 45 year old former bookmaker called Anthony “The Booky” Hardy won the PartyPoker World Open last week, defeating a stellar field of 72 to take the $200,000 first prize.
Hardy overcame a tough field including pro players Roland De Wolfe, Dave “DevilFish” Ulliot, Juha Helppi, Liz Lieu, Thomas Wahlroos, Ian Frazer and the members of the Hendon Mob.
Hardy used to own a betting shop before he became a professional poker player eight years ago, and made his name on The Poker Den television series, winning two tournaments on the show in one season.
“The Booky” made the final table alongside Hendon Mob member Ram Vaswani and old nemesis Ian Woodley, a fellow London poker pro who denied Hardy a third Poker Den title in 2005. Ian Woodley began as the favourite, arriving at the final table with the chip lead and collecting 859,000 of the 1.2 million chips in play by the time the play got three-handed. But that was no obstacle to Hardy.
“When it was just me and Ian I kept telling him I would win it,” said Hardy. “It is sweet revenge for when he beat me in the Poker Den a few years ago.”
“It is a dream to win the tournament,” he continued. “I’m so chuffed. I didn’t hit many cards in the semis or the final but I just hung on in there.”
Ian Woodley had to make do with the $100,000 runner-up prize. The payouts are below:
1st - Anthony Hardy - $200,000
2nd - Ian Woodley - $100,000
3rd – Ian Cox - $50,000
4th – Ram Vaswani - $40,000
5th – Ian Frazer - $30,000
6th – David Rudling - $20,000