WSOPC Event #13: $1,700 MAIN EVENT

Event #4
No Limit Hold'em
Buy-In: $500 (+$80)
Total Entries: 138
Prize Pool: $69,000

Chris Leong Wins Third Career Circuit Ring, First At Home Casino Foxwoods

Mashantucket, Connecticut (August 22, 2016) – After an extended two day fight to the finish, Chris Leong has just won his third World Series of Poker Circuit ring, having taken down Event #4. While he is happy to have won a third ring, this one is especially important to him, given that it's his first ring won at Foxwoods, his home casino.  

"I love Foxwoods, and I am never leaving. Any time they have a big event I'm always gonna be here," Leong said.

Last night, the unofficial final table of seven was formed around 11:45 pm.  Play slowed considerably from that point on, with two 50-minute levels playing out before Michael Sheldon was eliminated in 7th place ($2,456).  After Sheldon's elimination the action picked back up again, and they reached three handed play in the beginning of Level 21, at around 2:45 in the morning.  The floor decided to let the final three play a few more levels, and at 4:00 in the morning it was heads up between Philip Sing (who won this event last year), and Leong. The two players bagged up their chips, and returned today at 1:00 pm to play down to a winner.

Leong started today with1,170,000 in chips, and Philip Shing started with 487,000. When asked about his strategy coming into today, Leong said that he wanted to play "small ball" pots in order to reduce variance. The chips shifted back and forth quite a bit over the course of the first two levels of play today. Leong explained, "I chipped him down and then we got it all in, his jacks versus my fours, and that evened the game again. Then I chipped him back down to 2:1 again, and he hit two pair on the river in a big pot to even it back up. So I had to chip him down again and (in the end) he shoved eight three, and I had queen three suited, and he was short stacked enough that I had to call."     

This win not only grants Leong a third career Circuit ring, it also puts him in the running for Casino Champion here at Foxwoods, a feat that not many thought was possible given Andrew Lauer's back to back wins (Event #1 - $365 No Limit Hold'em,  and Event #3 - $365 NLH Turbo).  But after winning this event, and having finished 5th place in Event #1, Leong is still very much in contention, and feels confident moving forward because he plans on playing all of the remaining events in the series.

"Andrew (Lauer) crushed my dreams when he won his second ring, but it's so nice to have a sweat again after this. There's not too many people here that I have seen that are going to stay the whole series. Even in the beginning I felt like I had a huge edge over everyone, being able to play every tournament," Leong said confidently.  

When asked to sum up how he was feeling after this win Leong said, "I feel great. I had a losing summer in Vegas, so it's nice to get all of that money back and rebuild. Any tournament win is a huge confidence booster for me, and I feel really good."

Below are the results of the final table. Full results from this event are available by clicking the Results tab above.

1 – Christopher Leong – $19,665
2 – Philip Shing – $12,158
3 – George Alex– $8,763
4 – Jarbas Neto – $6,341
5 – Carlos Monteiero – $4,610
6 – Andrew Heckman – $3,366

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At the conclusion of this event, Andrew Lauer in still leading the Foxwoods Casino Champion race. Lauer won Event #1, the $365 No-Limit Hold'em on Friday, and then took down Event #3 ($365 No-Limit Hold'em Turbo) yesterday, giving him a total of 100 points.  But with eight more ring events to play out at this stop, it's still anyone's game. 

The player who accumulates the most overall points in the twelve gold ring tournaments at Foxwoods Casino earns the title of Casino Champion, and receives an automatic entry into the $1 million 2017 WSOP Global Casino Championship. The winner of the Foxwoods Main Event earns an automatic entry to the Global Casino Championship as well. All players who cash in ring events will receive points that apply to both the Casino Champion race and the season-long race to claim one of the 50 at-large Global Casino Championship bids awarded to the top point earners throughout the season. More information on the points system is available on WSOP.com.