The most expensive tournament of the 2024 World Series of Poker, the Event #55: $250,000 Super High Roller, regularly attracts the biggest names in poker. Usually, one of these top pros ends up winning the bracelet such as the defending champion Chris Brewer, who already has more than $23 million in live poker cashes to his name.
This time, the event drew a field of 75 entries and generated a prize pool of $18,675,000, reaching the ballpark figures of the popular Triton Super High Roller Series tournaments. The top 12 finishers were set to receive a cash prize of at least $506,757 and the field was littered with some of the biggest names in the world of poker.
However, after three tournament days, the last man standing was none other than Indian businessman Santhosh Suvarna. Certainly no stranger to the world of high-stakes poker, he has become a familiar face not only in tournaments but also pricey cash game sessions throughout the last few years.
In 2023, Suvarna headed to the WSOP Europe at the King’s Resort in Rozvadov and defeated Ren Lin in the €50,000 Diamond High Roller to win his first gold bracelet along with €650,000 for his efforts. Fast forward a few months to February 2024, Suvarna took down a €25,000 High Roller at the EPT Paris festival and added another title to his resume. More in-the-money finishes followed at the Triton stop on Jeju Island but all of that is now topped by a new high score.
Suvarna defeated online high-stakes cash game legend Ben “Ben86” Tollerene in heads-up to win his second gold bracelet in as many years and a gigantic top prize of $5,415,152. Pretty much all of the other players in the money were well-known poker pros but the businessman defeated them all, and he did so with a big smile on the face as is usually the case whenever he is involved in the poker action.
The final day of the tournament saw 14 players return to the field and the money bubble was looming right out of the gates. Triton Montenegro Main Event champion Mikalai Vaskaboinikau was the first casualty and Brian Kim then crowned the bubble boy when his pair of sixes ended up second-best to the ace-seven of Charlie Hook.
Jonathan Jaffe bowed out first in the money and Phil Ivey saw his pocket queens cracked by the king-ten of Tollerene. Former chip leader Adrian Mateos joined them at the payout desk as each of the trio collected $506,757 and the unofficial final table was reached.
Sean Winter saw his pocket Kings cracked by the pocket Queens of Taylor von Kriegenbergh and Mikita Badziakouski then lost the remainder of his short stack. Tollerene continued his domination at the final table as he dashed out several knockouts and bad beats by dispatching Jeremy Ausmus, Von Kriegenbergh, Hook and Matthias Eibinger.
Suddenly, there were only three players remaining and Suvarna had patiently hung around with a shorter stack. Recent $100,000 Super High Roller champion Chris Hunichen earned another seven-figure score but had to settle for third place this time when he was knocked out by Suvarna. The consolation prize was worth $2,397,312, which isn’t too shabby either.
Tollerene was still in the lead but that all changed when his two pair were no good against the straight of Suvarna, who took a commanding lead. Tollerene doubled once and then tried to repeat the same feat when he jammed with queen-four. Suvarna reluctantly called with ten-seven and spiked a ten on the river to deal the final blow, running over to his rail to celebrate moments later.
He has now cashed for more than $13 million in live poker tournaments and has taken over the top spot of India’s all-time money list on The Hendon Mob. Vivek Rajkumar had occupied the top spot for a long time with just over $8 million in reported MTT cashes but it seems unlikely that Suvarna will surrender first place any time soon, if at all.
There is plenty of poker talent in the top ten though with the likes of Nipun Java, Ankit Ahuja, Abhinav Iyer, Aditya Agarwal, and Kartik Ved all waiting in the shadows. Kunal Patni has also cashed for nearly $1 million and has been a regular visitor on the Asia-Pacific poker scene. India now has a tally of nine WSOP gold bracelets with Java (three) and Suvarna (two) the only repeat winners.
*Article by Christian Zetzsche
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