Home / Poker News February 2012 / The Poker Grapevine – Joe-Boy Rahme Wins WSOP Africa
The Poker Grapevine – Joe-Boy Rahme Wins WSOP Africa
Posted by: James Carter. - Tue, 2012-02-28 15:34
The Main Event of the WSOP Africa is in the books and Joe-Boy Rahme is the one who had his hands raised in victory at the end of the $3.3k affair. Rahme was one of the home players. Based in Johannesburg, he survived a starting field of 218 players, which – although not as celebrity-laden as a Las Vegas event – had its fair share of ‘name’ participants. Scotty Nguyen was there, together with Warren Zackey and Mark Vos. Rahme picked up $158.5k for his efforts, after he bested Ivan Pakkiri heads-up.
At the beginning of the final day, James Parker had the biggest stack. Gregory Ronaldson was second in chips. The two front runners had more than half the chips in play in their possession. None of them was obviously a master of the large stack: they both fell, in 4th and 5th places respectively.
Jason Strauss got his chips in well, with A,Jo against Rahme’s A,6o. Unfortunately for him, Lady Luck had different ideas as to who should make it to the heads-up stage and his A,J fell, leaving him chipless on the rail in 3rd.
The heads-up stage of the event wasn’t exactly a marathon affair. Pakkiri didn’t waste any time shoving all-in on a Q,10. Rahme had pocket Js which held up and the
poker tournament was over.
In other news: the Chicago Poker Classic is underway and its first event has already managed to attract a record-breaking field. Last year, when the Series was hosted by the Horseshoe Casino in Hammond, Indiana, it drew 6,700 players. This year, the opening event saw no fewer than 2,621 players belly up to the tables, taking an earth-shattering first step towards a new record.
Paul Gibbons won the opening event, taking home $97.1k for his efforts.
The second event saw 868 players cough up the buy-in. Paul Han won this one for a $56.8k reward.
