Aussie Millions:Not Your Average Freeroll

Yesterday Full Tilt Poker hosted a freeroll for its Aussie Millions qualifiers. But this wasn’t your average freeroll. For starters, there was a hefty $60,000 in the prize pool. Also, the overall quality of was a bit higher than you’d find in your average freeroll. To give you an idea of the level of play, consider the lineup at one of the starting tables. It included Erik Seidel, David Singer, Lee Watkinson, David Grey, Perry Friedman, Chris Ferguson, and Farzad Bonyadi. The Full Tilt pros were out in force.

The two qualifiers who shared the table with this murderer’s row were presented with both a daunting challenge and profitable opportunity. There was a bounty on each pro. The minimum bounty was $250, and an additional $250 was added for each WSOP bracelet or WPT title held by the individual pro. Erik Seidel, with 7 bracelets, had the biggest bounty — $2,000.

One of the qualifiers at this table, thebryguy5, was amazed by his opponents. “My heart was pounding,” he said, “talk about being nervous.”

Full Tilt qualifier, thebryguy5 playing with David Singer, Lee Watkinson, and David Grey

Scattered around the room was a who’s who of professional poker players: Chris Ferguson, Huck Seed, Clonie Gowen, Howard Lederer, Jeff Madsen, and Andy Bloch, to name just a few.

Lucky man: Clonie Gowen and Kristy Gazes with online qualifier suckoutrabbit

Tough spot: qualifier cmm4104 between Huck Seed and Allen Cunningham

The day before this freeroll, Erik Seidel entered a $100,000 buy-in tournament. He came in second, taking a $450,000 profit. Would these pros who regularly play for enormous stakes take this freeroll seriously? Indeed they would.

By the time the tournament was whittled down to the final ten players, four pros remained. At one table Clonie Gowen, Allen Cunningham, and Ross Boatman battled two qualifiers. At the other table, Jeff Madsen was the lone pro, clinging to a short stack.

Blind vs. blind: Allen Cunningham plays yazem1000

Jeff Madsen with xxdiplomatxx

Play was slow and deliberate toward the end. Pots were small, with most hands decided by a preflop raise or a post-flop stab. Then, in one massive confrontation, two qualifiers were all-in against Allen Cunningham — and Cunningham was in terrible shape. One qualifier held AA to Allen’s QQ. The third player in the hand was on the short stack, and he held the worst possible hand for this confrontation, A-Q.

The flop and turn were safe, and Allen seemed likely to lose almost all of his stack. But then the river brought the case Queen, and Allen was catapulted to the chip lead.

Allen steadily built his stack, helped by a few more fortunate cards. Boatman dropped, and a little while later Clone was all-in against Allen, her A-T a favorite or Allen’s K-9. But a King on the flop eliminated Clonie in fourth place.

Finally, it was down to heads-up play. Cunningham took on a qualifier in a matchup the 21-year-old online player described as, “a dream come true.”

Allen won the tournament when, on a ten-high flop, the players got all in. Allen outkicked his opponent, his K-T besting T-7.

Later in the evening, Full Tilt hosted a catered dinner in one of Crown’s lovely function rooms. A live band played, while the Tilters drank and ate.

Howard Lederer presented Allen with his winner’s trophy. And then it was time to call it a night. Half the players were scheduled to play in the opening heat of the main event today. A good night’s rest was in order.