Eastgate Becomes Youngest WSOP Champion

Published on: November 12, 2008 

The 2008 World Series of Poker is over, and a new champion has been crowned.  22 year old Danish poker professional Peter Eastgate, the youngest poker player in the history of the No Limit Texas Hold’Em tournament and main event, finished off the game with ace-to-five straight on the turn calling an all-in bet from Ivan Demidov on the river and took home the title.  Demidov, who came in second, was holding two pair: twos and fours.  Eastgate took home over $9 millions in winnings.  He broke Phil Hellmuth’s record for youngest tournament winner.  Hellmuth was 24 years old when he first won the WSOP.

Prior to the game, Eastgate took a good luck phone call from Hellmuth before the over three hour poker game.  Said Eastgate during a photo session with stacks of bills and his new gold winner’s bracelet, “It feels good to beat Phil's record.  I was not focused on the record that I could break; I was just focused on the game.”  Eastgate is from Odense, Denmark and he was able to stop Russian Demidov by bluffing on a pot that was worth 44 million chips with a diamond flush.

Demidov went home with over $5 million for second place and commented to the media when interviewed, "I'm someone who's not going to cry.  I'm disappointed, but I'm going to be happy. That's the way it turned out.”  Demidov made Eastgate fight for the win, wiping out his 24 million chip lead during the first 30 minutes of the game.   

Eastgate didn’t stay down for long and the first break in game play earned him a new 35.8 million chip lead.  At one point he was sitting with a nearly 2 to 1 advantage and stated that Demidov was playing an aggressive game.  Eastgate admits that he tried to trap Demidov a few times and the two men went back and forth this way all the time.  Eastgate had to collect all of the chips that were in play in the game, somewhere in the vicinity of 137 million.   

The two players took their time with each hand and were deliberate in how they made their bets.  The further Eastgate got away from Demidov however, the more apparent it was that the Russian was going to need to double his stack in order to stay in the game.  Demidov admitted that the tournament taught him that his hands-on game needed work.  The entire tournament, though, was a dream for Demidov from the first table back in July through the final table.  He is hoping that his successful run helps promote poker in his native country.  He is planning on playing more high-stakes live tournaments now that the WSOP is over.

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