Ben Wilinofsky talks to Laura Cornelius about 'dominating' the table and being near the top of the field with his chips towards the end of Day 1a of the EPT Grand Final Main Event. An awesome hand from the European Poker Tour (EPT) 7 Berlin as Joep van den Bijgaart, Ben Wilinofsky and Jeffrey Hakim battle it out. On the flop, van den Bijgaart has top two pair, Wilinofsky has.

1. Ben Wilinofsky Poker Player
2. Ben Wilinofsky Poker Tournament

After a layoff since early May, the European Poker Tour (EPT) is finally back in action with EPT Barcelona. The Main Event kicked off Monday with 554 players registering for Day 1A and 44 paying for one re-entry (this is a single re-entry event). Ben Wilinofsky is the chip leader of the 202 remaining players with 330,000 chips after Level 10.

Right now, it is Ben Wilinofsky and everybody else. After Wilinofsky, the second place player, Haoxiang Wang, has 239,300 chips, nearly 100,000 chips behind. And with stacks at those levels, 100,000 chips is massive. Six more players have over 200,000 chips, so it is a tight race behind the pole setter.

In a tournament, being dealt pocket Aces right away is one of those things you either love or dread. Clearly, Aces are awesome, but you know that if push comes to shove, you are going to have to go to the mat with them pre-flop, so there’s always a chance you get bounced before you even get comfortable. Now, Wilinofsky didn’t get Aces on the first hand, but those hole cards showed up for him in the first level of the day. According to the PokerNews.com report, Wilinofsky moved all-in on a board of T♥-3♦-7♦-J♦ and Max Silver made the call with Queens. No luck for Silver on the river and Wilinofsky quickly had almost double his starting stack.

Silver was a good sport, though, posting on Twitter, “Haven’t busted an EPT level one in a while, feels like old times.”

Wilinofsky has a short live tournament resume, but it is a nice one. He has just six recorded cashes, but his very first was a win in another European Poker Tour Main Event, the 2011 EPT Berlin, where he won €825,000, or about $1,174,143. That makes up the vast majority of Wilinofsky’s earnings total, but he also had a six-figure cash at the 2012 WPT Vienna Main Event, where he placed third.

Online poker is Wilinofsky’s forte, though, where he has millions in tournament cashes.

It’s been a tough road to this point for Wilinofsky. At the end of 2015, he decided to retire from professional poker to address his mental health. Suffering from depression, he realized, as he told PokerListings in 2016, that he “was looking for external ways to fix an internal problem.”

That WPT Vienna final table was a key event, as he said he was “devoid of any kind of emotional response” when most people would either be thrilled with the finish, disappointed in getting so close to the win and falling short, or some of both.

“No matter how things get on the outside,” he told PokerNews, “it doesn’t really change anything for more than a couple of days.”

It will always be an ongoing battle for Wilinofsky, as it is with anyone who is trying to tackle depression or another mental health challenge. But he is there in Barcelona, kicking some butt through Day 1A, waiting to see what Day 2 has in store, along with a couple hundred competitors.

2018 European Poker Tour Barcelona Main Event – Day 1A Chip Leaders

1. Ben Wilinofsky – 330,000
2. Haoxiang Wang – 239,300
3. Miguel Use – 228,900
4. Lawrence Bayley – 224,200
5. Kalidou Sow – 220,000
6. Benjamin Pollak – 219,800
7. Upeshka De Silva – 218,100
8. Antoine Labat – 210,800
9. Adrian State – 186,200
10. Luis Rodriguez Cruz – 182,400

Canadian pro Ben Wilinofsky has taken down the World Poker Tour DeepStacks Championship (WPTDS) Main Event in Calgary, after making his way past a field of 529 players on his way to claiming a top prize of C$223,359 (US$167,990).

Wilinofsky Mostly An Online Pro

Ben Wilinofsky is an online pro who has amassed $5,233,921 in winnings under the screen name NeverScaredB, including $3,674,788 earned on PokerStars. In terms of live tournaments, the player’s recent victory represents just his tenth cash to date.

In 2011, Wilinofsky took down the €5,300 EPT Berlin Main Event for a whopping €825,000 ($1,174,143), and the following year recorded a 3rd place finish at the €3,500 WPT Vienna Main Event for €122,910 ($163,725). The $167,990 he recently won on his own home soil completes a trio of six figure scores for the young pro, while also bumping up his live earnings to $1,590,398. Commenting upon his WPTDS Championship title, Wilinofsky said:

“I don’t see myself playing anymore tournaments this year, and I’m not going to make a special effort to do it next year. I enjoy the Canadian stops, but mostly I travel when I want to be somewhere and see friends, and it’s an excuse to head somewhere and sometimes we pick up a bunch of money.”

WPTDS Championship Main Event

The C$2,500 (US$1,865) WPT DeepStacks Championship Main Event took place at the Grey Eagle Resort & Casino, and featured a C$1,155,867 (US$ 869,334) prize pool, meaning 67 money places were paid. As one might expect, the tournament was a mostly Canadian affair, and by the time the final table had been reached all nine remaining players hailed from the country.

Wilinofsky entered the final table as chip leader, and was cruising along smoothly until losing a huge pot against John Foley in a full-house versus full-house encounter. That’s when his momentum spiraled down for a while, before getting back on track after sending Tyler Warken to the rail in 5th.

Wilinofsky (10-9) then eliminated a short-stacked Tyler Bonkowski (A-K) in 4th, before doing likewise to John Foley in 3rd to force heads-up play against Steven Dahrouge for the title.

Heads-Up Recap

Wilinofsky started the final battle holding a 3-2 chip lead against Steven Dahrouge. Despite an initial slow start to proceedings, post-break saw all the chips soon pushed to the center of the table with Wilinofsky’s pocket tens up against the A-Q of his opponent. Wilinofsky sealed his victory after the dealer laid out a K-J-9-K-Q board, while Dahrouge had to settle for a runner-up finish worth $117,759, representing more than half of his live earnings to date. Commenting after the contest was won, Wilinofsky said:

Ben Wilinofsky Poker Player

“I don’t think I was as level headed as I would have liked to be. I was playing a little fast, I was not taking my time, not taking those deep breaths. I’m glad that we just banged it off in a lucky pot, and we didn’t have to grind it out, because it easily could have gone the other way here.”

Final Table Results

1st: Ben Wilinofsky $223,359
2nd: Steven Dahrouge $156,573
3rd: John Foley $100,687
4th: Dave McLeod $70,612
5th: Tyler Bonkowski $54,222
6th: Tyler Warken $44,814
7th: Eric Wasylenko $37,277
8th: Duff Charette $29,764
9th: Raymond Trieu $22,331

Next WPTDS Stop

The World Poker Tour DeepStacks has since moved onto the Casino Barrière de Deauville in the Normandy region of France. On December 6th, its €1,200 Main Event subsequently kicked off one of three starting days, with Day 2 scheduled to get underway on Saturday, and a winner crowned on Sunday, December, 9. Last year, the WPTDS Deauville Main Event attracted a total of 421 players, resulting in a €444,567 ($525,158) prize pool, and was eventually won by French player Bruno Benveniste for €93,700 ($110,686).

Ben Wilinofsky Poker Tournament

The WPTDS is then scheduled for a break over the holiday period, before returning to the action at the Casino Spielbank Berlin in Germany on January 11.