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Brazilian Wins Second and Bigger ACR Venom

Written by Jennifer Newell
Last updated on
Jennifer Newell

The second iteration of the Venom is in the books for Americas Cardroom. With a $6.74 million prize pool, it eclipsed the size of the inaugural Venom and created another online poker millionaire.

Flashback to the First

The Winning Poker Network flagship poker site wanted to do something huge. Earlier in 2019, the folks at Americas Cardroom set out to market a massive online tournament, one that would outdo all others ever offered by offshore online poker operators.

They called it Venom and promoted it for six months. It was to guarantee a $5 million prize pool and pay at least $1 million of that to one winner.

It happened. The thousands of entries created an actual prize pool of $6,382,500, significantly beyond the guarantee and an unmitigated success.

In the end, Rafael “TheBigKid” Moraes of Brazil won the tournament for $1,050,559.50.

Further, Moraes agreed to be paid in cryptocurrency. That put ACR in the history books with the “Guinness World Record for Largest Cryptocurrency Winning Jackpot in an Online Poker Tournament.”

Encore?

It was no surprise that ACR quickly announced another Venom tournament. It was set for December with an increased prize pool guarantee of $6 million.

The buy-in would remain the same at $2,650 but offer numerous satellites in the months leading up to it. And there would be four starting days from November 27 to December 8.

Done and Done Better

The second edition of Venom did better than the first. With 2,696 total entries, the final prize pool was $6,740,000.

After the four starting days, there were 453 players who advanced to Day 2 on Monday, December 9. The action took the final 367 players into the money that evening, and when play stopped, only 49 competitors remained in the field.

Those 49 returned for Day 3 with a Brazilian player named galodoido13 sitting ninth in chips.

By the time the action determined the final eight players, galodoido13 was second in chips but a solid distance behind gillobono. The minimum payout at that point was $74,814.

When the eight returned on Wednesday, December 11, the shorter stacks exited first. One of them, though, ZackThornton, made it through to finish in fourth place. Gillobono then busted in third to leave galodoido13 to fight off Saranga of Argentina.

The heads-up battle lasted well over one hour. Finally, Saranga was shorter and pushed with K-Q with a queen on the flop. Galodoido13 was in with 10-7 with a seven on the flop, but another seven appeared on the turn. The blank river gave the Brazilian the victory.

The final table results were as follows:

1st place:  galodoido13 ($1,039,982)

2nd place:  Saranga ($746,118)

3rd place:  gillobono ($553,354)

4th place:  ZackThronton ($363,960)

5th place:  Crusher1991 ($234,552)

6th place:  mozart528 ($155,694)

7th place:  SebTozzi ($109,188)

8th place:  FindTheTruth ($74,814)

Preparing for 2020

ACR spokesperson Michael Harris expressed what the social media feeds showed. “Our players drove us to this, and we couldn’t be more excited about what has transpired. We made another millionaire in a matter of months. And we can’t wait to do it again next year.”

With that, Harris made news in alluding to another Venom tournament in 2020.

While there is no exact date or prize pool guarantee set yet, ACR does hope to host a Venom tournament every six months going forward.

 

 

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