Seth Davies Wins $3.2m in Career-High Super High Roller Bowl Victory

At a final table featuring some of the world’s best poker players, Seth Davies triumphed heads-up against Spanish professional Juan Pardo after other such as Jeremy Ausmus and Leonard Maue also fell just short. With a prizepool of over $7 million, Davies’ victory came as he overtook players such as Antonio Esfandiari, Scott Seiver and Brian Rast on the All-Time Money List via The Hendon Mob.

Survivors Assemble

With 24 total entries each paying $300,000, the final four of the ninth Super High Roller Bowl was difficult to reach. Reaching the final six were French player Thomas Santerne and the Montenegran Dejan Kaladjurdjevic, who starred in last week’s $10,300-entry GG MILLION$ among other recent events.

Both those men missed out on the final table action, however, as with just four remaining, Spanish player Juan Pardo (3.5m) had the chip lead from the eventual winner Davies on 2m. Laladjurdjic lost with ace-deuce to Maue’s pocket fives to bubble and everyone still in the tournament got one more night’s sleep.

With four left, it was Davies who accumulated chips early, and crucially at the expense of fourth-placed finisher Leonard Maue. The German shoved for 11 big blinds with ace-jack but Davies called with pocket jacks and Maue failed to spike an ace, cashing instead for $750,000, a return of $450,000 profit on his $300,000 investment.

Soon, play was heads-up, but not until after a period where the chips changed hands with regularity. Pardo lost a chunk to Davies when the latter turned a straight and bet big enough for Pardo to get away from it, albeit not without losing chips in the process. Jeremy Ausmus was behind the pair of them and shoved with king-nine. It was a marginal call for Pardo with ace-six and a king did land on the flop but it was joined by an ace and when no further paint arrived, Ausmus was sent to the rail for a score of $1.2 million.

Pardo Straightened Out by Ruthless Davies  

Entering heads-up with a lead of 4.26 million to Pardo’s 2.94 million, Seth Davies won the opening hand of heads-up play to increase his to lead to around 2:1 in chips. Soon, he had them all. Davies raised it up with eight-seven and Pardo called to the flop with four-three. By the turn, Pardo had made a straight draw, but he had no idea that Davies had turned the nut straight.

On the river, Pardo’s draw came in. Both men had straights, with Davies holding the best possible hand, so it was inevitable that the chips would all go into the middle. In fact, Pardo deserves huge credit that while he did commit his final chips in calling Davies’ shove, he used several time banks to do so and did consider folding. In the end, the hero-fold was beyond him, however, and it was Davies who claimed the $3.2 million top prize.

Finishing as runner-up for $1.9m, Pardo’s result was also the best of his professional career, elevating him to third on the Spanish All-Time Money List with $13.3m behind only Sergio Aido ($21.45m) and the clear leader Adrian Mateos ($49.8m) who also won a Super High Roller Series event during the trip to Northern Cyprus.

Davies Rises on Money List, Ausmus Tops PGT Leaderboard

While Jeremy Ausmus lost out in third place it was yet another major cash for poker’s ‘Mr. Consistent’. Selling some of his action via the staking site PokerStake, Ausmus’ success in Northern Cyprus has propelled him to the summit of the PokerGO Tour leaderboard. Overtaking Michael Rocco at the top of the current 40 players who’ll reach the season-ending million-dollar Freeroll Championship, Ausmus is looking like a lock to reach that event.

Ausmus will hope to win even more before making that event and will have plenty of chances back in his home country, with the Poker Masters returning to action from September 10, and through to September 19. With the Vegas-based Ausmus certain to make an impression, will Davies put on a sprint for the line too? It looks likely, with the American up to 13^th on the PGT Leaderboard following his victory.

Far more important to Davies will be his elevation on the All-time Money List via The Hendon Mob. Now ahead of bona fide poker legends such as Brian Rast, Mike Watson, Daniel Colman, Danny Tang and Antonio Esfandiari, Davies also went past fellow American high rolling poker star Scott Seiver. Given Seiver’s three WSOP bracelets in Las Vegas just a few short weeks ago, this is impressive, and the $3.2m Davies  won in Northern Cyprus counts for by far his biggest cash, trebling the $1m he won as runner-up at the 2023 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure $100k Super High Roller event.

Watch the first hour of the action from this week’s Super High Roller Bowl IX finale for free here then consider signing up as a PokerGO subscriber to view the remainder!