Antonio Esfandiari Wins the WPT Five Diamond for $870,124

Antonio "The Magician" Esfandiari took out Andrew Robl in a hard fought heads-up match to take down his second WPT title, six years after his first. Robl took home $549,003 for second place while Vanessa Rousso placed third for $358,964.

Source: Pokerstarsblog

Antonio Esfandiari's (pictured right) birthday wish came true this year and what he got was $870,124 and a long awaited second WPT title. He started the final table as the second shortest stack, but played his way back into contention and eventually knocked out good friend Andrew Robl to take home the prize.

The final table was a marathon session which lasted for 11 hours, with the heads-up match alone lasting for over two hours. It was an action packed final table, especially when it got down to the final three of Esfandiari, Robl and Rousso.

Final take turns with the chip lead

After John Racener was eliminated in fourth place, Robl had a big chip lead, while Rousso was down to just 22 big blinds. But she was not going to go easily. Rousso was eventually knocked out by Esfandiari but lasted for three hours and actually took the chip lead herself at one point.

With Rousso out, Robl and Esfandiari went heads-up with chip stacks of 9.5 million and 8.2 million respectively. With the big blind at 200k, there was still a lot of play left and they were still at it, at three o'clock in the morning. By the time the last hand was dealt, the blinds had doubled.

Esfandiari had a 1.8:1 lead then, and Robl shoved for 15 big blinds with after Esfandiari min-raised. Esfandiari called with , the board ran out and Esfandiari won the hand to take down the tournament. Happy birthday, Antonio!

To read all the action on the final table as it developed, you can also check out the hand by hand updates on WPT.com.

The finish positions and prize money for the final 6 are as follows:

WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic Final Table Results
Rank	Name	Prize
1st	Antonio Esfandiari	$870,124
2nd	Andrew Robl	$549,003
3rd	Vanessa Rousso	$358,964
4th	John Racener	$232,271
5th	Kirk Morrison	$168,924
6th	Ted Lawson	$126,693

Antonio Esfandiari interviewed by Tournament Director Matt Savage