No Shortage of Lunacy at Lúnasa
With ‘Back To School’ just around the corner there was a strange but happy atmosphere at the Green Isle for Lúnasa Lunacy. Everyone wanted one last blow-out before waving goodbye to the Summer.
The weekend kicked off with the Paddy Power Poker Mystery Bounty, which had €5,000 added by the sponsors and the new twist of the Misery and Advantage Bounties. During levels 13 and 14 players that knocked out an opponent drew from a box of 20 bounties; 10 helpful, 10 unhelpful. 13 players were knocked out over these two levels and, unbelievably, all 10 Miseries were drawn out and just three Advantages. T.D. Ramona swears that she did not put a hex on the box but nobody believes her.
The main Advantage prize of a seat at the FT with an average stack was not drawn so we will never know if the winning player would have accepted the prize or carried on playing in the hope of building a bigger stack or gaining some big money bounties.
In the finish Steven Bartley (known back home as the Demented Lamp-post) picked up another trophy after a deal with Graeme Watts and Thomas Cochrane. Thomas had proved to be the best at plucking by taking out €6,300 in Mystery Bounties.
The Main Event attracted 625 entries for a prizepool of just under €130,000. Early on in the final day Joe O’Neill hit an astonishing run of cards to get his stack up to 4.5 million when the average was about 500k and he held on to the chip lead until the final table but, eventually the luck ran out for the Joe Show and he fell in fourth for €9,000. Straight away, the remaining three took to talking and after an ICM chop Wai Hang Wong, known as Lok to all in Cork, took the trophy and €20,430. Andriuska Nerijus trousered €19,345 and Con Collins €15,385.
Con’s is a great story; he hadn’t played a hand of poker for five years before Friday night when he entered the €5k NLH. Con’s first tournament in five years lasted exactly ONE HAND as he attempted to bluff flopped trips. Con’s next effort was a little better.
His Excellency, Ambassador Darren Harbinson won the Lúnasa 400 and Sia Browne rushed back from Nottingham’s Amateur World Championship to win the Irish Poker Tour NLH.