Event 1 Recap

$500 + $60 Deep Stack NL (2 Re-entry)            

After nearly 32 hours of poker over two days, the opening event of the 2011 Borgata Winter Poker Open finally came to an end shortly before 7am Friday morning.

Alex Rocha of S Setauket, NY, outlasted the field of 1,472 entrants to claim the top prize of $150,850. Alex is on a roll after winning the $350 No Limit Hold'em event at the WSOP Circuit event at Harrah's Atlantic City in December ($33,183).

Runner-up was Joshua Lawson of Quarryville, PA.  He earned $94,236 for his efforts.

Most notable at the final table was Alex Bolotin of Brooklyn, NY.  Alex has more than $ 2 million in lifetime tournament earnings and is currently 275th on the Hendon Mob's All-Time Money List.  His 6th place finish earned him over $31,000 and will boost him up a few notches on that list.

The last woman sitting was Gina 'Gin-evil' Cannone of Staten Island, NY.  Gina was the lone female remaing after local/regular tournament grinder Joanne Monteavarro (Bronx, NY) busted out in 32nd place.  Gina held on all the way to 10th place, where she eventually bubbled the final table.  Her 10th place finish was good for $8,566.

Another regular tournament grinder here at Borgata who went deep was Eric 'clown fish' Doerr (Newark, DE).  Eric re-entered the tournament once and held on all the way to 17th place ($3,927).

Four WSOP bracelet holders were in the field, the most notable of which was Robert Varkonyi, (Great Neck, NY) who won the main event in 2002.  Mike 'Little Man' Sica, (North Brunswick, NJ) Chris Reslock, (Atlantic City, NJ) and Jason Young (Suffern, NY) were the other three.  Mike Sica was the only one to cash, finishing in 83rd place ($1,285).