PokerStars Carribean Adventure Part 3

John Dibella, a 43-year-old stock trader from New York, has won the 2012 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure for $1,775,000.

STOCK TRADER JOHN DIBELLA WINS $1,775,000 AT THE 2012 POKERSTARS CARIBBEAN ADVENTURE

John Dibella, a 43-year-old stock trader from New York, has won the 2012 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure for $1,775,000. The married father-of-two only came to this year’s PCA to play some of the smaller side events but won a live $1,000 satellite into the $10,000 Main Event last Saturday. Now, a week later, he has won himself one of the biggest poker prizes in the world.

Dibella bested a 1,072-strong field to win the 2012 PCA Champion’s title and coveted trophy. He faced tough competition in the final including his heads-up opponent, internet pro Kyle Julius, as well as Faraz Jaka, Xuan Liu, 2009 PCA runner-up Tony Gregg and Dutch pro Ruben Visser.

Dibella, who hails from Westchester, New York, said he was totally overwhelmed by his win, calling it “surreal”. He said: “I make more money at poker than as a day trader but I’m not going to call myself a professional just yet. I’m a recreational player, but maybe I’ll take it a bit more seriously from now on. It’s definitely much safer than my day job!”

Xuan Liu, 25, from Toronto, who finished fourth for $600,000, was the first woman to ever reach a PCA Main Event final. She first came to fame last April when she finished third at EPT San Remo for €360,000.

This year’s PCA field included 481 players who won their seats online with PokerStars. Canadian student Mark Drover made it the furthest. He won his seat via PokerStars’ Steps satellites and finished fifth for $468,000. Brewery sales manager David Bernstein, 30, from Toronto won his seat to the PCA for nothing at all after entering a free draw run by UKASH — and finished seventh for $260,000. Canadian Warren Strong, 49, from Port Perry, also free-rolled into the PCA Main Event after winning the Class of 2004 promotion, part of PokerStars’ 10th Anniversary celebrations. He finished 29th for $46,000.

This year’s $10,000 Main Event attracted a total of 1,072 players, creating a $10,398,400 prize pool. Team PokerStars Pro Barry Greenstein fared the best out of the Team PokerStars Pros, finishing 25th for $46,000. Other Pros who cashed included Luca Pagano (30th, $46,000), Jan Heitmann (38th, $41,000), Arnaud Mattern (58th, $32,500) plus Leo Fernandez, Christian De Leon, Joao Nunes, Noah Boeken, Liv Boeree, Juan Manuel Pastor and four members of Team PokerStars Online: Javier Dominguez Gomez, Randy Lew, Anders Berg and Shane Schleger.

PokerStars-sponsored Spanish golf star Sergio Garcia was taking part at his second PCA and cashed in 51st place for $35,000.

This year’s PCA has featured more than 40 events and attracted thousands of poker players from all over the world. The festival continues tomorrow with the televised final of the $25k High Roller on PokerStars.tv, Day 2 of the PokerStars World Cup of Poker VIII, $5k Heads-Up Championships and £1k Ladies Event and a host of other tournaments. So far, this year’s PCA events have attracted more than 4,000 entries and awarded more than $20 million in prize money.

Team PokerStars Pro Viktor “Isildur1” Blom won his first major live title when he took down the $100,000 Super High Roller at the start of the festival for $1,254,400. His fellow team-mates Jonathan Duhamel and Daniel Negreanu finished fourth and fifth.

Outside of the Main Event, the clear star of this year’s PCA has been Team PokerStars Pro Jonathan Duhamel. His phenomenal performances have already netted him more than $570,000 and he is second in chips going into the final of the $25k High Roller event tomorrow. The 2010 World Champion was on fire from the get-go, finishing fourth for $313,600 in the three-day $100k Super High Roller event, fifth in a $5k NL Turbo event for $17,990 and winning the $5k NL 8-Max event for $239,830.

The $25k High Roller attracted 141 entries creating a $3,626,000 prize pool and $1,134,930 first prize. Tomorrow’s finalists include online pro and former athlete Jason Koon, Isaac Haxton, Govert Metaal and PokerStars Team Online’s Randy “nanonoko” Lew who earlier in the week set a Guinness World Record for most online poker hands played in eight hours. The $25k final webcast starts on PokerStars.tv at 14:00 ET with expert commentary from James Hartigan, Joe Stapleton and members of Team PokerStars Pro. Full reports will be on the PokerStars blog.

Other events this week included the $5k PokerStars PLO Championship, won by Canadian Adam Coviensky. American Mike Gorodinsky took down the PokerStars 8 Game Championships for the second time. He also won the event in 2010, and was runner-up last year. Team PokerStars Pro Joe Cada won the $2k NL event while PokerStars Team Online’s Adrienne “talonchick” Rowsome won the $1k Omaha 8 / Stud 8 event and PokerStars Greek Challenger Georgios Kapalas won the the $1k NL 6-Max.

Main Event final table/payouts: 
1 John Dibella USA $1,775,000 
2 Kyle Julius USAs $1,500,000 
3 Faraz Jaka USA $755,000 
4 Xuan Liu Canada $600,000 
5 Mark Drover Canada PokerStars qualifier $468,000 
6 Tony Gregg USA $364,000 
7 David Bernstein Canada $260,000 
8 Ruben Visser Netherlands $156,400

The next PokerStars live event is European Poker Tour Deauville in northern France from January 31 — February 5, 2011. Satellites are running now for the €5,300 buy-in event at Deauville Casino. For more information, please visit http://www.ept.com.