NIAGARA FALLS, Ont. — A pair of twos turned out to be enough to win a 27-year-old Oshawa man $1.35 million early Monday morning in the final hand of the World Poker Tour's North American Championship.
Soren Turkewitsch, a factory worker living with his girlfriend of six years in her parents' basement won a marathon final table in the $4.8-million tournament, held at Niagara Fallsview Casino Resort.
Five Canadians and one American started playing the final table at 5 p.m. Sunday and it wasn't until Turkewitsch's opponent Jason Sagle went all-in at 12:50 a.m. Monday that the tournament finally came to an end.
Sagle, convinced his ace-five combination would hold up, put all his chips on the line, only to have a two come up on the flop that gave Turkewitsch a tournament-winning pair.
Turkewitsch ran over to his girlfriend Michelle Markov, who was in tears and gave her a hug, as if to say `life just got better.'
For all intents and purposes, Turkewitsch didn't enter the World Poker Tour thinking he would walk away with more money than some people make in a lifetime.
Why would he? He had never even played in a major poker tournament before.
"Never did I think I could win. It was just a chance to play poker," he said.
The avid recreational player came to Fallsview Casino Aug. 14 for a qualifying tournament, which cost him $90 to enter. He won that and then won the second round a few weeks later to make it into the full WPT tournament that started Wednesday with 497 players.
He nearly lost all his chips in the second-to-last day here Saturday, but survived and came into the final table sitting in a close third.
One by one he and Sagle knocked off their opponents, until they were the last men standing in a heads-up battle.
It took 26 hands before Turkewitsch outwitted Sagle, who still earned $676,000 for second.
"For the longest time I wasn't thinking about No. 1 because I didn't have enough chips. Just making it through Day 1 was something. Then, when I got into the money, I was just grinding hard to try and get a little more," Turkewitsch said.
The player knows his life will change a bit now, but he's hoping not too much.
"I have no idea what I'm going to be doing now. It doesn't even feel like I've won," he said. "I won't be going back to work, that's for sure."
What likely won't happen is Turkewitsch heading south of the border to play in other World Poker Tour events.
"You're not going to see me playing against the top dogs. That's just not me," he said.
His girlfriend Markov has only one request.
"I hope we'll be moving out of my parents' basement," she said. ``It's crazy, crazy, crazy. I can't believe it."
The tournament marked the first time the WPT had ventured into Canada for one of its events, the first in a five-year contract for the WPT to host events at the Fallsview Casino.
source : http://www.thestar.com
