May 20th, 2019 (Harrah's New Orleans) – Chris Lane, from Jackson Mississipi, has just become the last Main Event champion of the 2018/2019 World Series of Poker Circuit season. Lane outlasted a field of 582 players to walk away with the Harrah’s New Orleans Main Event title, $185,158, and a WSOP Circuit ring.
Lane is a graphic designer and only plays poker for fun. However, he’s been around poker long enough to understand the game perfectly. Indeed, his victory speaks for itself.
“I’m a graphic designer. But I’ve been playing poker for about six, seven years. I’m at a driving distance of three different Circuit stops, so I go to those. ”
Lane bagged a decent stack on the first day of the Main Event and managed to stay near the top of the leaderboard all the way, eventually closing it out.
“My run overall was pretty good. I was really short stacked coming from the dinner break on the first day. I was down to 14,000, then I started getting some good momentum, picked up from there and never stopped I guess."
When the final day started, only eight players were still in the hunt, led by Dustin Stewart. Lane was in the middle of the pack sitting 4th in chips. He stayed patient, slowly stacking chips, and within the first level of the day, he found himself at the final four.
“There were some good players at the table. Three chip stacks that were above me. They weren't just above me. They were way above me. Some people made some dumb mistakes. Then others were just unfortunate. Sometimes you can’t see stuff coming. Some big people take out other big people and that helps out the smaller ones. I just slowly built up.”
Lane really took off when the four-handed portion of play started. He was responsible for the elimination of John Cressend in 4th place when he made two pair with king-seven against Cressend’s queens in an all-in preflop situation. He then managed to crack Dustin Stewart’s aces with trip jacks, and kept on winning pot after pot from him, eventually taking over the chip lead. His next victim was Jon Guidry when he sent him home in 3rd place after flopping a queen with ace-queen against Jon Guidry’s sixes.
In the end, it was Stewart and Lane battling for the Main Event title. While Stewart was pursuing his second ring, Lane was striving for his first. The battle could have been an extensive one as both stacks were close. However it was all over within an hour and Lane was crowned the champion of the final Main Event of the season.
“I started catching cards left and right constantly. It was great. I never had cards just come to me like this before.”
Lane doesn't plan to stop here. Indeed, he intends to take a shot at the WSOP Main Event in Vegas next.
Official final table results:
1st place: Chris Lane - $185,158 + 2019 GCC Seat
2nd place: Dustin Stewart - $114,528
3rd place: Jon Guidry - $83,747
4th place: John Cressend - $62,144
5th place: John Templeton - $46,758
6th place: William Phillips - $35,666
7th place: Yousef Saleh - $27,581
8th place: Allen Brivic - $21,620
9th place: Stephen Bierman - $17,176
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