Chris Moneymaker wins his first Triton Poker title in Montenegro

Chris Moneymaker is on fire

The results of the first tournament of the Triton Poker series in Montenegro showed that old-school players are ready to beat modern strategies to win high-roller tournaments with a strong field.

Chris Moneymaker won $903,000 in the Triton SHRS – GG Million$ Live event, a tournament with a $26,500 buy-in.

The tournament gathered 107 players, most of whom were well-known professionals.

For Chris, this victory was the third result in his career in terms of winnings. The American received more money only for 1st place in the ME WSOP 2003 and fifth in the super high roller ($265,500 buy-in) in London in 2023.

Moneymaker became the second World Series of Poker Main Event winner, after Espen Jorstad, in winning a Triton Poker. Interestingly, the 13th in the GG Million$ Live was the 2019 WSOP ME champion, Hossein Ensan.

Recall that Moneymaker finished sixth in The Venom $12.5M GTD in early May and earned $382,007.

Final game day

32 players qualified for the second game day of GG Million$ Live, and 27 of them were to be included in the prizes. The tournament's bubble was on fire.

Players with short stacks regularly won important all-ins. Chris did something similar. With only 1BB left in his stack, he won an essential pot with AJ against Brandon Hamlet's pocket queens, getting an ace on the river.

On his way to the final table, Moneymaker again greatly upset Brandon by taking a considerable pot (AK vs A8), allowing Chris to become a chip leader. Phil Ivey lost all his chips to Moneymaker in the pre-finals.

Before entering the TOP 9, most players had push-fold stacks, and the situation at the table changed constantly. Chris entered the final table as a chip leader with 57BB in the stack.

Another US citizen, Brian Kim, was the lucky one at the beginning of the game at the final table. The most epic hand of his performance was the bad beat to Adrian Mateos, the strongest player at this tournament stage. The Spaniard's pocket jacks lost a preflop all-in 33, which turned into a set on the river.

But Chris regained his leading position in the chip count by the beginning of the heads-up, hitting a two-outer against Ding Biao in 4th place and Igor Yaroshevsky in third place.

Despite the deep stacks, the heads-up game did not last long. Brian fired up the A8 and, after a short thought, received a call from AT. Each player received a pair on the board, and Chris Moneymaker became the tournament winner.

Payouts at the final table of GG Million$ Live:

1. Chris Moneymaker (USA) – $903,000
2. Brian Kim (USA) – $609,000
3. Igor Yaroshevsky (Ukraine) – $419,000
4. Ding Biao (China) – $341,000
5. Danilo Velasevic (Serbia) – $272,000
6. Adrian Mateos (Spain) – $209,500
7. Lewis Spencer (UK) – $153,000
8. Morten Klein (Norway) – $110,500
9. Isaac Haxton (USA) – $91,300

Recording of the final day:

Chris's reaction

After the end of the tournament, the player told reporters the following:

• "I was not going to lose today. After catching one of the three outs on the river in the money hand, I thought, "This is going to be 2003. I'm not going to lose any more big pots today."

• "I rarely participate in high rollers, but I like it when I play. I won't play in any more tournaments in this series, but I'll likely visit the next stage. Triton Poker does its job well. It's crazy how well they run tournaments."

• "This victory is not like the WSOP. To be honest, it was much more complicated. There are very good players here, the elite. Although the WSOP was interesting, competing with these guys at Triton Poker is much more interesting because I know how good they are."

Chris Moneymaker left an emotional post on his Twitter page:

"Last week I final tabled venom and studied ICM. This week I win triton by saying fuck ICM. ICM is for pussies”