JEJU, South Korea — Sebastian Gaehl won the $50,000 NLH Seven-Handed event at the Triton Poker Super High Roller Series, taking home $1,392,000 for his first live major title.
The 28-year-old German, better known as an online grinder, needed just a few hands of heads-up play to put away runner-up Brandon Wilson. The decisive moment came when Gaehl’s A-10 dominated Wilson’s A-9, and the board offered Wilson no help.
“I played so many years for this moment, and finally we are here,” Gaehl said. “Still have to let it sink in, everything. But it feels incredible.”
A Star-Studded Final Table
The 116-entry field generated a $6,960,000 prize pool, and the seven-handed final was stacked. Zhou Quan sat down as chip leader with 7,150,000 (89 big blinds), while Gaehl was fourth with 2,960,000 (37 BBs).
Matthias Eibinger was the first to go. Nursing 11 big blinds from the big blind, he check-jammed a J-6-10 flop with Q-5 for a flush draw, only to run into Gaehl’s top pair, K-J. The flush never came, and the five-time Triton champion was out in seventh for $243,000.
Gaehl kept hunting short stacks. Anatoly Zlotnikov moved in from the button for 12 blinds with Q-J and got a call from Gaehl, who had pocket eights. The 8-J-Q flop gave Gaehl a set and Zlotnikov a straight draw, but the draw never got there. Zlotnikov took $325,000 for sixth.
Zhou Quan’s run ended with five players remaining. Blinded to three big blinds, he got the last of his chips in with A-5 against Alex Kulev’s A-8 and couldn’t improve. Zhou collected $516,000.
Kulev, the last former Triton champion still standing, bowed out in fourth for the same $516,000. He three-bet jammed A-10 into Wilson’s pocket kings, and Wilson flopped a king to leave no doubt.
The Run to Heads-Up
Three-handed, Felipe Boianovsky held 15 of the 58 big blinds in play when he three-bet shoved A-5 into Gaehl’s pocket jacks. A five on the flop kept things interesting for a moment, but the jacks held. Boianovsky earned $626,000 for third.
Wilson declined to look at the numbers before heads-up began, starting the match 20 big blinds deep against Gaehl’s 38. Early in the match, Wilson shoved his last 19 blinds with A-9 from the big blind. Gaehl called with A-10, the board ran clean, and it was over.
A Long Road Back to Triton
Gaehl’s history with Triton goes back three years, when he traveled to the series’ one-time Vietnam stop as an online qualifier and cashed twice, notching what were then the biggest live scores of his career. The road back took time, but his return to the series this week made it count: three cashes across three Triton ONE events, a final table in the $20,000 SHRS opener, and now a victory in the $50,000.
“You have to have patience and wait for your spots,” Gaehl said. “It was a really tough final, only really, really good players at it. I think I got really lucky and I took my spots.”
