Viacheslav Buldygin bags Triton Victory and $1,342,000

Russia’s Viacheslav Buldygin steamrolled his way through the final table of the Triton Poker North Cyprus $50k NLH to pocket $1,342,000 and claimed his winning approach relied on “intuition” more than study.

The 2-day, 7-handed event at the Merit Casino and Resort attracted 104 entries, with 41 of those re-entries, boosting the prizepool to just over $5million, with 15 players set to cash.

That number was reached when both Ben Heath, unfortunately repeating his bustout of event #1, and Soon ewe ran into kings and aces respectively at neighbouring tables, leaving everyone else with $88,400 sewn up.

Among them, Steve O’Dwyer, Dan Smith, Artur Martirosian, Justin Bonomo, Mike Watson and Jason Koon, revealing the strength in depth that Triton’s SHR boasts without setting foot in the USA.

Jason Koon was looking to land his 7th Triton title, having bagged number 6 just a few days previously. It wasn’t to be for the brand ambassador, however, falling in 7th spot for $241k.

Buldygin then took over, felling David Yan with 9s against 7s and then took out Mulder’s A♣ K♣ with a lowly 7♥ 4♠ followed by disposing of Sean Winter with K♣ 4♣ against A♦ Q♠.

That left the podium spots decided, but with almost $3million to be shared out, it was far from over. Punsri was left with fumes and handed those over to Buldygin who, running hot as can be, naturally rivered an ace.

Heads-up, Brian Kim could do nothing to stop the juggernaut, his jacks unable to hold up against K5 off and the title belonged to Buldygin, along with $1,342,000.

Remarkably, it not only took the Russian though the $5million career earnings milestone, but was his first-ever recorded tournament win, his biggest cash being a $1.4million runner-up spot at the 2017 PokerStars Monte Carlo $100k SHR.

Final results