2007 World Series of Poker

The 2007 WSOP Championship Bracelet

The 2007 World Series of Poker (WSOP) began on June 1, 2007. The $10,000 (US) no-limit Texas hold 'em Main Event began on July 6 and was completed on the morning of July 18. All events were held at the Rio All Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada by Harrah's Entertainment, which has run the annual event since its purchase from the Binion family in 2004.

For the first time players began each event with double the amount of chips as the buy-in. This means that players in the Main Event started with 20,000 chips. The blind structure has also been increased and some blind levels removed but slowed to allow for more play.

In addition to the $50,000 H.O.R.S.E. event, which was first played at the 2006 World Series of Poker, this year there were two additional H.O.R.S.E. events with lower buyins ($2,500 and $5,000).

Tom Schneider, who won two events and made one other final table, won the Player of the Year Award. Michael Binger and Chad Brown led all other players with eight money finishes.

The annual celebrity event was changed this year, as it became a pro and celeb event called "Ante Up for Africa", hosted by actor Don Cheadle and poker pro Annie Duke. The final two players, Dan Shak and Brandon Moran, agreed to share first place and donate all prize money to charities in Darfur.

The last woman standing of the 2007 Main Event was Maria Ho who finished in 38th place.

Also this year, KEM Plastic Playing Cards were once again used for the events, rather than Copag brand plastic playing cards, which were used during the 2005 and 2006 WSOP.

Event schedule

Main article: 2007 World Series of Poker results

Event Number	Event	Winner	Prize	Runner-up	Results
1	$5,000 World Championship Mixed Hold'em	Steve Billirakis	$536,287	Greg Mueller	Results
2	$500 Casino Employees No Limit Hold'em	Frederick Narciso	$104,701	Charles Fisher	Results
3	$1,500 No Limit Hold'em	Ciaran O'Leary	$727,012	Paul Evans	Results
4	$1,500 Pot Limit Hold'em	Mike Spegal	$252,290	Gavin Smith	Results
5	$2,500 Omaha/Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo 8 or Better	Tom Schneider	$214,347	Ed Tonnellier	Results
6	$1,500 Limit Hold'em	Gary Styczynski	$280,715	Varouzhan Gumroyan	Results
7	$5,000 Pot Limit Omaha w/Rebuys	Burt Boutin	$868,745	Erik Cajelais	Results
8	$1,000 No Limit Hold'em w/Rebuys	Michael Chu	$585,744	Tommy Vu	Results
9	$1,500 Omaha Hi/Lo Split 8 or Better	Alex Kravchenko	$228,446	Bryan Devonshire	Results
10	$2,000 No Limit Hold'em	Will Durkee	$566,916	Todd Terry	Results
11	$5,000 World Championship Seven Card Stud	Chris Reslock	$258,453	Phil Ivey	Results
12	$1,500 No Limit Hold'em Short Handed	Jason Warner	$481,698	David Zeitlin	Results
13	$5,000 World Championship Pot Limit Hold'em	Allen Cunningham	$487,287	Jeffrey Lisandro	Results
14	$1,500 Seven Card Stud	Michael Keiner	$146,987	Nesbitt Coburn	Results
15	$1,500 No Limit Hold'em	Phil Hellmuth	$637,254	Andy Philachack	Results
16	$2,500 H.O.R.S.E.	James Richburg	$239,503	Walter Browne	Results
17	$1,000 World Championship Ladies No Limit Hold'em	Sally Boyer	$262,077	Anne Heft	Results
18	$5,000 World Championship Limit Hold'em	Saro Getzoyan	$333,379	Geoff Sanford	Results
19	$2,500 No Limit Hold'em	Francois Safieddine	$521,785	John Phan	Results
20	$2,000 Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo 8 or Better	Ryan Hughes	$176,358	Min Lee	Results
21	$1,500 No Limit Hold'em Shootout	Don Baruch	$264,107	Jared Davis	Results
22	$5,000 No Limit Hold'em	James Mackey	$730,740	Stuart Fox	Results
23	$1,500 Pot Limit Omaha	Scott Clements	$194,206	Eric Lynch	Results
24	$3,000 World Championship Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo Split 8 or Better	Eli Elezra	$198,984	Scotty Nguyen	Results
25	$2,000 No Limit Hold'em	Ben Ponzio	$599,467	David Hewitt	Results
26	$5,000 H.O.R.S.E.	Ralph Schwartz	$275,683	Bill Gazes	Results
27	$1,500 No Limit Hold'em	David Stucke	$603,069	Young Cho	Results
28	$3,000 No Limit Hold'em	Shankar Pillai	$527,829	Beth Shak	Results
29	$1,500 Seven Card Razz	Katja Thater	$132,653	Larry St. Jean	Results
30	$2,500 No Limit Hold'em Short Handed	Hoyt Corkins	$515,065	Terrence Chan	Results
31	$5,000 World Championship Heads Up No Limit Hold'em	Dan Schreiber	$425,594	Mark Muchnik	Results
32	$2,000 Seven Card Stud	Jeffrey Lisandro	$118,426	Nick Frangos	Results
33	$1,500 Pot Limit Omaha w/Rebuys	Alan Smurfit	$464,867	Qushqar Morad	Results
34	$3,000 Limit Hold'em	Alexander Borteh	$225,483	Brandon Wong	Results
35	$1,500 No Limit Hold'em	Ryan Young	$615,955	Dustin Dirksen	Results
36	$5,000 World Championship Omaha Hi/Lo Split 8 or Better	John Guth	$363,216	Robert Stevanovski	Results
37	$2,000 Pot Limit Hold'em	Greg Hopkins	$269,274	Jason Newburger	Results
38	$1,500 No Limit Hold'em	Robert Cheung	$673,628	Richard Murnick	Results
39	$50,000 World Championship H.O.R.S.E.	Freddy Deeb	$2,276,832	Bruno Fitoussi	Results
40	$1,500 Mixed Hold'em	Fred Goldberg	$204,935	Rene Mouritsen	Results
41	$1,000 World Championship Seniors No Limit Hold'em	Ernest Bennett	$348,423	Tony Korfman	Results
42	$1,500 Pot Limit Omaha Hi/Lo Split 8 or Better	Lukasz Dumanski	$227,454	David Bach	Results
43	$2,000 Limit Hold'em	Saif Ahmad	$217,329	William Jensen	Results
44	$2,000 Omaha Hi/Lo Split	Frankie O'Dell	$240,057	Thang Luu	Results
45	$5,000 No Limit Hold'em Short Handed	Bill Edler	$904,672	Alex Bolotin	Results
46	$1,000 Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo 8 or Better	Tom Schneider	$147,713	Hoyt Verner	Results
47	$2,000 No Limit Hold'em	Blair Rodman	$707,898	Amato Galasso	Results
48	$1,000 Limit 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball w/Rebuys	Rafi Amit	$227,005	Lenny Martin	Results
49	$1,500 No Limit Hold'em	Chandrasekhar Billavara	$722,914	Taylor Douglas	Results
50	$10,000 World Championship Pot Limit Omaha	Robert Mizrachi	$768,889	Rene Mouritsen	Results
51	$1,000 S.H.O.E.	Dao Bac	$157,975	Adam Geyer	Results
52	$1,000 No-Limit Hold'em w/Rebuys	Michael Graves	$742,121	Theo Tran	Results
53	$1,500 Limit Hold'em Shootout	Ram Vaswani	$217,438	Andy Ward	Results
54	$5,000 World Championship 2-7 Draw Lowball w/Rebuys	Erik Seidel	$538,835	Chad Brown	Results
55	$10,000 World Championship No Limit Hold'em Main Event	Jerry Yang	$8,250,000	Tuan Lam	Results

2007 records

• Steve Billirakis became the youngest person to ever win a WSOP bracelet at 21 years and 11 days. This record was broken three months later at the World Series of Poker Europe by Annette Obrestad, aged 18 years, 364 days.
• Phil Hellmuth became the first player to win 11 bracelets.
• Phil Hellmuth set a record of 63 all-time WSOP cashes.
• June 9 was the busiest WSOP day ever, with 3,009 participants starting in two events on the same day.
• The largest non-WSOP Main Event tournament record was broken. The $1500 Buy In No Limit Hold'em Event #49 attracted a record 3151 players for the noon start. This event broke the single busiest start date set on June 9.
• Annie Duke set the women's record with 33 WSOP cashes.
• 1,286 women set a new record for number of participants in an all women's poker tournament.
• This year's WSOP also boasted the largest number of total registrants in history, with 54,288 registrations for all of the events.
• Michael Binger and Chad Brown tied Chris Ferguson, Phil Hellmuth and Humberto Brenes for most ITM finishes in a single World Series of Poker with eight.

Main Event

The $10,000 No Limit Hold'em Main Event began on July 6 with the first of four separate starting days. 6,358 players entered, 2,415 fewer than in 2006. This is the first time since 1992 that the Main Event experienced a reduction in participants. As the total number of registrants for the 2007 WSOP set a record at 54,288 with a total prize pool of $159,796,918 ($59,784,954 for the Main Event), the decrease in the number of participants in the Main Event has been attributed to a recent law that limits Internet gambling. As a result of this law, Harrah's did not allow online poker websites to directly purchase Main Event seats and offer them as prizes, if the sites conducted business with US citizens. Online entries to the Main Event that were won as prizes on Internet poker sites were a substantial contributor to the dramatic growth the Main Event saw in the 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2006. The reduced field also meant a nearly one-third reduction in the Main Event's grand prize, from the record $12 million (US) in 2006 to $8.25 million.

A different, flatter, payout structure was introduced in 2007 further reducing the prize money awarded to the final table finishers. Players who busted early in the money received a larger share than they would have in 2006. The lowest payouts in 2007 were $20,320 (just over double the buyin), as compared to $14,597 in 2006. Every player who made the final table in 2006 won over 1.5 million dollars.

A minor controversy arose during the main event. The colors of the chips made it very difficult to differentiate between the chip values. Pokernews.com posted the following note on its live reporting log, "It has literally been impossible for us to count these players' stacks due to the positioning of the cameras and the incredibly similar colors of the various chip denominations." Pokernews also reported that the chip color has affected play, "Because of the similarly-colored chips it took the dealer some time to count down Kluber's stack, and not long after Rahme began thinking about his response Kluber called the clock on him." Other players have complained that they can't count their opponents stacks and fear asking for a chip count as speaking may reveal the strength of their hand.

Final Table

Place	Name	Prize
1st	Jerry Yang	$8,250,000
2nd	Tuan Lam	$4,840,981
3rd	Raymond Rahme	$3,048,025
4th	Alex Kravchenko	$1,852,721
5th	Jon Kalmar	$1,255,069
6th	Hevad Khan	$956,243
7th	Lee Childs	$705,229
8th	Lee Watkinson	$585,699
9th	Philip Hilm	$525,934

Other notable high finishes

NB: This list is restricted to top 30 finishers with an existing Wikipedia entry.

Place	Name	Prize
11th	Scotty Nguyen	$476,926
16th	Kenny Tran	$381,302
23rd	Bill Edler	$333,490
25th	Daniel Alaei	$333,490
26th	Roy Winston	$333,490

Performance of past World Champions

Name	Year Event Champion	Eliminated (day)	In the Money Place	Prize
Thomas "Amarillo Slim" Preston	1972	1
Doyle Brunson	1976 and 1977	1
Bobby Baldwin	1978	2
Tom McEvoy	1983	2
Berry Johnston	1986	4	113th	$58,570
Johnny Chan	1987 and 1988	1
Phil Hellmuth	1989	1
Brad Daugherty	1991	1
Jim Bechtel	1993	2
Dan Harrington	1995	2
Huck Seed	1996	5	73rd	$130,288
Scotty Nguyen	1998	6	11th	$476,926
Chris Ferguson	2000	3
Carlos Mortensen	2001	4	217th	$51,398
Robert Varkonyi	2002	4	177th	$51,398
Chris Moneymaker	2003	2
Greg Raymer	2004	1
Joe Hachem	2005	2
Jamie Gold	2006	1

Celebrities in the 2007 Main Event

• Out in Day 1: Kirk Acevedo, Hank Azaria, José Canseco, Steve Davis, Shannon Elizabeth, Janet Jones, Norm Macdonald, A.J. McLean, Nelly, Ray Romano, Teddy Sheringham, Maxime Talbot, Antonio Tarver, Jennifer Tilly
• Out in Day 2: Jason Alexander, Rene Angelil, Tomas Brolin, Brad Garrett, Rick Salomon, Rick Tocchet, Montel Williams
• Out in Day 3: Todd Phillips (380th place, $34,644)
• Out in Day 4: Sam Simon (329th place, $39,445), Tobey Maguire (292nd place, $39,445), Sully Erna (237th place, $45,422)

World Series of Poker Europe

Main article: World Series of Poker Europe

Under the leadership of WSOP commissioner, Jeffrey Pollack, the World Series of Poker Europe (WSOPE) is the first expansion of the World Series of Poker. In September 2007, the first WSOP championship events outside of Las Vegas took place in London. It was the first time that WSOP bracelets were awarded outside of Las Vegas. Three tournaments were held, with the main event being a £10,000 buy-in no-limit hold 'em tournament. The main event was won by Norwegian online prodigy Annette Obrestad, who won on the day before her 19th birthday and became the youngest person ever to win a WSOP bracelet.

See also

• 2007 World Series of Poker results

References

• Official 2007 World Series of Poker results and schedule