Roberly Felicio Wins The Colossus For $1million

Brazil’s Roberly Felicio had one million reasons to be happy yesterday after taking down the Colossus, the biggest by numbers event on the World Series of Poker roster – the 49-year old lifting his first bracelet and $1million after defeating Sang Liu heads-up

The massive event with a lowly $565 buy-in may have been struggling to match previous versions in terms of numbers – this year’s event down 28% on last year’s 18,000+ runners – but it kept it’s hugely attractive top prize, with $500,000 going to the runner-up from the $6,535,000 prizepool.

The final table kicked off the fourth day of frantic action, John Racener the best-known among the final nine fighting it out for glory…

…whereas Felicio was an almost complete unknown, his previous three World Series of Poker cashes, two of which were Circuit events, totalling a mere $4,682 – a figure he’d already doubled just by making the final 100.

The 49-year old entrepreneur and restaurant owner, however, outlasted everyone, explaining through an interpreter afterwards:

“I’m very happy. It was a very tough final table with very tough opponents. And the heads-up, especially, was much emotional. But I’m very happy to be able to win”.

The heads-up finale witnessed one of those sporting moments which bring equal parts laughter and cringe, Felicio all-in and at risk, his opponent Liu jumping for joy and dancing around the table as he realised he was just two cards away from victory and $1million…

…the 3-outer on the river destroying Liu’s dance routine, Felico explaining afterwards:

“That was really the key moment. I know that in poker these things happen and afterwards, he pulled even again. I looked at Andre Akkari and he told me to keep calm and play my game. That’s what I did and that came my result.”

Final Table Results: