The $1,600 Parx Big Stax XXIV 1500 tournament held at Parx Casino in Bensalem, Pennsylvania, ended with an unlikely result, announcing Greg Weber and Anthony Garofalo co-champions. The two were near even in the final heads-up before agreeing to chop the pot.
The $1,600 Parx Big Stax XXIV 1500 started Friday, March 16 at Pennsylvania’s Parx Casino and gathered a total of 376 entrants for a prize pool of $546,780. U.S. player Greg Weber dominated the tournament keeping his chip lead from the first level of Day 2. During a four-handed play, Joe Palma managed to steal the lead temporarily and became the deep-stack, but Weber overtook again and banked the largest prize.
Gaining a slight edge in the final chip count, Weber was officially awarded the first place, along with a higher payout of $104,233, while Anthony Garofalo scooped $97,521 after the heads-up deal. Despite being shared with another player, this is the second trophy for Weber from a live tournament after his win at $ 300+50 No Limit Hold’em Borgata Winter Open in 2011. In September 2017, he took his biggest cash prize of $471,059 scoring second at the $3,300 WPT Borgata Main Event. With this win, Weber’s total earnings from live events reach almost $1 million ($992,831).
For Garofalo, on the other hand, this is the largest cash win after a series of not-so-impressive results. In January, he finished 44th at the $540 WPT Borgata Winter Poker Open Kick-Off event in Atlantic City, when he took home $5,794. He won his only first-place trophy in 2012 at the $200 Buy-In 2012 Empire State Poker Championship in Verona.
Parx Big Stax XXIV 2018
The Parx Big Stax XXIV 1500 Main Event started with a 376-entry field, but only 44 players reached the money level on Day 2, getting guaranteed prizes of at least $3,556. Thirteen of them remained for the final day when Malik Saunders, Guoliang Chen and Peter Beshay were eliminated. Greg Himmelbrand was the first to leave the final table, pocketing $8,316. He was followed by Scott Blumstein, who took down the 2017 WSOP Main Event, but was now eliminated by Christian Harder and took $10,012.
Aaron Overton finished 8th with a prize of $12,473 after being defeated by Weber, who continued his winning streak against Justin Liberto (7th, $16,194), and Jasone Deane (6th, $21,063). Joe Reddick left the table with $27,956 and a fifth place, followed by Harder (4th, $37,311). The last three to remain were Weber, Garofalo and Palma who took the lead for a while before Weber found his game again and eliminated him. Palma’s consolation prize was $51,043, while Weber and Garofalo agreed to a heads-up deal, chopping the pot and sharing the Parx Big Stax XXIV 1500 Main Event trophy.
