Forget Jack 4s, the biggest poker hand in Hustler Casino Live history went down over the weekend when Nik Airball landed a $870,000 pot against ButtonClickr.
Just a couple of weeks on from Bill Klein’s mega-bluff against Brian Kim, the Poker world is once again talking about the action on the Hustler Casino Live stream from Saturday.
Nik Airball, who by day goes by the name of Nikhil Arcot, an investment banker, is a regular on the Hustler Casino Live stream and in the game, he went head-to-head against Henri “buttonclickr” Puustinen, the 22 year old Finnish poker star who has earned a solid reputation for himself in NLH online games.
Admittedly, this isn’t the type of hand you are often going to find when playing the latest offerings at bet365 Poker, but given the cooler dealt to the Finnish youngster, that is probably a good thing!
Blind Call
The record-breaking hand began in somewhat humorous fashion when one player, Andy, who was away from the table blind-called with 94 suited. Buttonclickr raised to $1,900 with pocket sevens while Bill Klein called with pocket nines.
The action then came around to Nik Airball, who had 4 and 5 suited and he somewhat surprised many people with a three bet to $13,000.
Unsurprisingly, Andy folded at this point, but both Buttonclickr and Bill called to join Nik Airball in seeing the flop.
At this point, Bill was the 60% favourite to win the hand, with Buttonclickr 21% and Nik Airball just a 19% chance to land the win.
The Flop & Turn
However, those odds totally changed when the flop was revealed to be a rainbow flop of 6 of clubs, 7 of spades and the 3 of diamonds.
That flop gave buttonclickr the set he had been hoping for, but it also gave Nik Airball a straight, putting the Finnish youngster in a very tricky situation.
Nik bet $20,000, which Buttonclickr quickly called, while Bill, who now knew his opponents held something better than his pair of nines, quickly folded his hand to leave the two others going heads up.
Buttonclickr was now just a 3% chance to win the hand, although those odds improved when the River showed the Jack of spades. Nik checked at this point, clearly intending to check raise and Buttonclickr fell for it, raising by a further $45,000.
Nik then indulged in a little amateur dramatics for the benefit of those watching while he considered his next move. It was simply a question of how big the raise was going to be and he decided to go all out here, shoving.
That all-in call was for an effective $350,000 which after a short time considering his options, Buttonclickr decided to call.
And when the players revealed their cards for the river, the look on buttonclickr’s face revealed all you needed to know about how he felt about the hand.
The River
The players agreed to run the River twice and the first card was revealed to be the King of Spades, which meant that Nik landed the first run and then on the second river, another King was revealed, this time of hearts, to hand Nik the second pot and send Buttonclickr back home on his ‘bike” as the Finnish player put it.
The win eclipsed the previous Hustler Casino Live record pot by almost $100,000, which was the pot won by Alan Keating back in August for $749,000.
You can watch the whole hand unfold in the Tweet below:
The unfortunate buttonclickr, who was enjoying his first appearance on Hustler Casino Live will certainly be back. The Finnish ace has emerged as one of the brightest young talents on the online NLH scene for many years and has been crushing the competition in numerous online events over he past 12-18 months.
Let’s now recap some of the other main poker stories of the past week.
Poker Stars And Poker Power Offering Women’s Boot Camp
After the announcement that showed just 4% of the poker playing public are women, Poker Power has teamed up with PokerStars to launch a special four-week long boot camp to hopefully inspire and encourage a new generation of female players to try the game.
The camp promises to be “aimed at women with a keen interest in the game [and] who want to strengthen their skills and evolve their experience.”
Part of the camp will see female players give a chance to participate in practice sessions using the Poker Power teaching app. Additionally, they will be able to compete in specialist tournaments and home games on the PokerStars platform.
These games will have a variety of themes linked to specific skills and mindsets in poker, such as “confidence, boldness, determination, perception and discipline.”
Three female PokerStars Ambassadors Jen Shahade, Lali Tournier and GJ Reggie will also be hosting one-on-one tutorials with players with the aim of preparing them to play in a tournament that could result in them earning a place at a special event on the European Poker Tour’s event in Prague slated for December.
Erin Lydon, the MD of Poker Power, commented:
“Our four-week course will not just teach women about poker but equip them with important life skills that can be applied to business, parenthood and general life,”
“I hope through this partnership, we can create more opportunities for women, and that perceptions of poker will begin to shift and more will feel empowered and safe to step up to the gaming table.”
Luis Faria Wins 2022 WCOOP Main Event For Almost $1.3m
Portugal’s Luis Faria “luis_faria” won the $10,300 buy in WCOOP Main Event last week, pocketing $1,293,825 in the process.
A stellar field of 760 entries entered the tournament creating a $7.6m prize pool and after an exciting tournament, Luis Faria outlasted his opponents at the final table to clinch the win.
Faria boosted his total winnings online to over $4.6m with the victory and it was a triumph for his patience as he spent the majority of the final two days of the tournament as the chip leader.
There should also be special mention of the Hungarian runner up in the event “boerni21” who came into the final table with the smallest stack of chips at the table, but outlasted seven other opponents to finish a huge creditable second and pocket $950,078 in the process.
WCOOP $10,300 Main Event Final Table Result
- Luis_faria (Portugal) – $1,293,825
- Boerni21 (Hungary) – $950,078
- Prudently (Denmark) – $697,658
- YannickPoker1 (Austria) – $512,302
- yAAwn (Canada) – $376,192
- Ant1K1iller (Kyrgyzstan) – $276,244
- Amadi_017 (Spain) – $202,850
- kZhh (Hungary) – $148,956
- ServlaMin (UK) – $122,217
