PRNewswire/ – The 2006 WPT World Championship will be remembered in a string of superlatives — the most, biggest and first! Joe Bartholdi of Las Vegas, defeated the brightest poker talent from nearly 40 countries.

The finale of WPT’s Season IV drew a record-breaking 605 entrants, generated the highest ever WPT prize pool of more than $15 million, and for the first time in WPT history, awarded more than a million dollars to a player that qualified on a $25 satellite! Bartholdi pockets a coveted first prize of $3.76 million, the enviable title of WPT World Champion and a seat in the 2007 WPT World Championship at Bellagio.

The WPT World Championship is the crown jewel of the WPT’s fourth season. Its $15 million purse brings the total prize money for the 17 Season IV tournaments to a staggering $85+ million. The riveting shows, currently airing on the Travel Channel every Wednesday night at 9 p.m. ET/PT, have revealed the 20 newest WPT Poker Millionaires. After the WPT World Championship that number rises to 23 as the tournament paid more than $3 million to first place, nearly $2 million to second place and $1 million to third place.

New champion Joe Bartholdi was cheered on by a sizable hometown crowd. His post-tournament plans include taking his cheering section out to “celebrate for a while,” and once the party ends he intends go out and “buy a house.” His friends were also heard to be talking about a Bartholdi-funded trip to the Caribbean. Money is no object for the newest WPT Millionaire.

Second place finisher, Davidson Matthew of Toronto, Canada, enthused, “This tournament has turned me from an amateur to a professional. It’s set me up to play poker. Now if I lose, financially, it just doesn’t matter.”

To put his accomplishment in perspective — his $25 spent on a satellite buy-in to cash over $1.9 million puts his winnings at $76,000+ for every dollar spent — now that’s good investment!

Roland De Wolfe, of London, England, was the only previous WPT winner (Grand Prix de Paris, Season IV) to make the Final Table. De Wolfe also joins the ranks of WPT Millionaires as his third place finish awarded him $1,025,205. Claus Nielson of Las Vegas finished in fourth and cashed $659,120. Fifth place, with an award of $439,375, was given to James Van Alstyne also of Las Vegas. Sixth place and $292,915 goes to the legendary Men “the Master” Nguyen of Bell Gardens, California.

This tournament marked the closest yet that a woman has come to making the Final Table of the WPT World Championship. Vanessa Russo of Miami, FL, finished “on the bubble” — seventh — but took home to the “Sunshine State” a consoling $263,625.

The $25,500 buy-in tournament at Las Vegas’ Bellagio proved to be a lure to marquee players from all around the globe. Among those who took to the felt for the WPT World Championship were defending champion Tuan Le and Alan Goehring, plus T.J. Cloutier, Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi, Doyle Brunson, Antonio “The Magician” Esfandiari, Jennifer Harman, Daniel Negreanu, Scotty Nguyen, Erick Lindgren, David Williams, Allen Cunningham, Men “The Master” Nguyen, Phil Ivey, Kathy Liebert, Chip Jett, Ted Forrest, Gavin Smith, Barry Greenstein, Paul Darden, Nick Schulman, Freddy Deeb, Jennifer Tilly, Michael Gracz, John D’Agostino, Hasan Habib, Scott Fischman and James Woods.

The 2006 WPT World Championship will air on the Travel Channel on Wednesday, June 28th
at 9 p.m. ET/PT.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 26th, 2006 at 10:31 am and is filed under Poker Industry News, Poker Tournaments, Poker Winners. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.