Ray Foley defeats huge field in Event 39
By Andrew FeldmanFinally some good news for someone who works in the auto industry! Ray Foley, a 37-year-old employee of Chrysler Financial, defeated a field of 2,715 players to win Event 39, a $1,500 no-limit hold 'em tournament. While he might play only occasionally, the Eastern Michigan graduate has quite a record at the World Series of Poker. He's played in seven events in his life and has four cashes of 22nd place or better.
To finish first in this event he needed luck. He said, "I'm on the great side of variance," and the $657,969 in first-place prize money will be heading back to Northville, Mich.
"It's still unbelievable at this point that I have a bracelet," Foley said to the WSOP. "I can't even describe it. And $660,000 -- that's a lot of money. It's hard to believe there were 2,715 people in this tournament."
Winning the bracelet heads-up was perhaps the hardest part as he had to defeat a former bracelet winner in Brandon Cantu. After finishing 20th in the 2008 main event, Cantu has made only one cash prior to this event at the 2009 WSOP. He earned $403,951 for second place, but many would argue that the bracelet should've been on his wrist.
Numerous times during heads-up play, Cantu had Foley on the ropes. All-in and behind for his tournament life, Foley hit the cards he needed to keep his dream alive. Foley will never forget two hands during heads-up play: The first was a split pot in which he was holding A-7 versus Cantu's A-Q (8-8-5-6-5) and the second was when he hit a two-outer on the turn with 10-10 versus Cantu's K-7 (after Cantu hit a king on the flop). It just wasn't meant to be Cantu's night.
Foley headed to the WSOP to play in one event, but after a quick elimination in the fifth level of Event 36, he decided to buy into this event. He had a flight out Sunday night that he happily missed, and with a newly augmented bankroll, the recreational player's decision to play full-time has gotten a little more serious.
Other notable finishers included Alex Jacob (fourth), Joe Bartholdi (20th) and Nam Le (23rd).
Below are the complete results of Event 39:
Event 39: No-limit hold 'em
Buy-in: $1,500
Entries: 2,715
Prize pool: $3,705,974
Players in the money: 270
1. Ray Foley ($657,969)
2. Brandon Cantu ($403,951)
3. Wei Mu ($269,609)
4. Alex Jacob ($190,857)
5. Tyler Spalding ($143,421)
6. Jonathan Markham ($114,514)
7. Chairud Vangchailued ($96,355)
8. Richard Lutes ($85,608)
9. Patrick O'Connor ($80,049)
10. Matt Livingston ($56,071)
11. Kelvin Crawford ($56,071)
12. Shawn Glines ($56,071)
13. Raymond Davis ($39,246)
14. Donald Nicholson ($39,246)
15. Zachary Humphrey ($39,246)
16. Michele Iacovone ($27,461)
17. Nicholas Derke ($27,461)
18. John Woolen ($27,461)
19. Moshin Charania ($19,234)
20. Joe Bartholdi ($19,234)
21. Conrad Monica ($19,234)
22. Christopher Kolla ($19,234)
23. Namthien Le ($19,234)
24. Steve Banner ($19,234)
25. Steven Mohs ($19,234)
26. James Mitchell ($19,234)
27. Johannes Korberhillejan ($19,234)
28. Kevin MacPhee ($15,268)
29. Javier Corzo ($15,268)
30. Benjamin Kang ($15,268)
31. Lucas Priour ($15,268)
32. Doug Luther ($15,268)
33. Tristan Wade ($15,268)
34. Christopher Crockett ($15,268)
35. Thomas Antonucci ($15,268)
36. Magnus Persson ($15,268)
37. Mary Jones ($11,488)
38. Kwan Leung ($11,488)
39. Venancio Torres ($11,488)
40. Dmitry Boshenyatov ($11,488)
41. Mario Delis ($11,488)
42. Raymond Bonavida ($11,488)
43. Minor Scott ($11,488)
44. Fred Jensen ($11,488)
45. Zak Gilbert ($11,488)
46. Marc Suckman ($9,079)
47. Torrey Korsog ($9,079)
48. Darius Campo ($9,079)
49. Jon Peachey ($9,079)
50. Sven Wedekin ($9,079)
51. Tom McCormick ($9,079)
52. Franck Cartigny ($9,079)
53. Kevin Dwyer ($9,079)
54. John Ray ($9,079)
55. Sergey Pomerantsev ($7,449)
56. Tom Coan ($7,449)
57. Tommy Le ($7,449)
58. Desmond Portano ($7,449)
59. Lillian Allen ($7,449)
60. Richard Walker ($7,449)
61. Sebastian Bauer ($7,449)
62. Craig Young ($7,449)
63. Lester Lenart ($7,449)
64. Eugene Tito ($6,300)
65. Hubert Evans ($6,300)
66. Paul Stanechewski ($6,300)
67. Ron Linden ($6,300)
68. Uwe Bamminger ($6,300)
69. Sean Peterson ($6,300)
70. Benjamin Vanklink ($6,300)
71. John Repetti ($6,300)
72. Adam Levy ($6,300)
73. Amanda Baker ($5,447)
74. Jean Paul Seatelli ($5,447)
75. David Fox ($5,447)
76. Tommy Grimes ($5,447)
77. Napoleon Ta ($5,447)
78. Julie Farkas ($5,447)
79. Ronald Verstappen ($5,447)
80. Victor Coelho ($5,447)
81. Jan Maarten Meijer ($5,447)
82. Samuel Woo ($4,706)
83. Michael Pitzulo ($4,706)
84. Jerilyn Totani ($4,706)
85. Brett Wiesner ($4,706)
86. Maikel Van Leeuwen ($4,706)
87. Lauchlin McKinnon ($4,706)
88. Sebastien Roy ($4,706)
89. Anthony Bustamante ($4,706)
90. Shane Demler ($4,706)
91. David Tighe ($4,113)
92. Craig Oneil ($4,113)
93. Jody Howe ($4,113)
94. Mimi Tran ($4,113)
95. Kambiz Zamani ($4,113)
96. Mark Newhouse ($4,113)
97. Matthias Neu ($4,113)
98. Matt Calhoun ($4,113)
99. Albert Iversen ($4,113)
100. Francis Rusnak ($3,631)
101. Joshua Engerdahl ($3,631)
102. Zachary Clark ($3,631)
103. Daniel Pinto ($3,631)
104. Robert McLaughlin ($3,631)
105. Jan Christoph Von Halle ($3,631)
106. Scott Seiber ($3,631)
107. Jesse Correa ($3,631)
108. Luke Pauls ($3,631)
109. Brent Vail ($3,631)
110. Luis Sanchez ($3,631)
111. Matthew Berto ($3,631)
112. Keith Greer ($3,631)
113. Darryll Fish ($3,631)
114. Kevin Fassino ($3,631)
115. Chang Luo ($3,631)
116. Farzad Etemadi ($3,631)
117. Chandrasekhar Billavara ($3,631)
118. Kelly Armstrong ($3,631)
119. Bryan Carlin ($3,631)
120. Audley Harrison ($3,631)
121. Tai Phan ($3,631)
122. David Grove ($3,631)
123. Tracey Nguyen ($3,631)
124. Thomas Vinas ($3,631)
125. John Nixon ($3,631)
126. Andreas Ramadanis ($3,631)
127. William Brewin ($3,631)
128. Steven Davis ($3,631)
129. Michael Carroll ($3,631)
130. Shan Jing ($3,631)
131. Claus Vallo ($3,631)
132. Arkadiy Tsinis ($3,631)
133. Oliver Bosch ($3,631)
134. William Pijewski ($3,631)
135. Jeff Williams ($3,631)
136. Micah Raskin ($3,298)
137. Robert Johnson ($3,298)
138. Thomas Johnston ($3,298)
139. Joseph Loguidice ($3,298)
140. Paul Patton ($3,298)
141. John Matteson ($3,298)
142. Brian Barnes ($3,298)
143. Katja Svendsen ($3,298)
144. Regis Burlot ($3,298)
145. Zachary King ($3,298)
146. Antonio Chavez ($3,298)
147. Greg Arzt ($3,298)
148. Ramanan Thiagarajah ($3,298)
149. Kenneth Shelton ($3,298)
150. James Pinpin ($3,298)
151. Karlo Lopez ($3,298)
152. Pete Mavro ($3,298)
153. Charles Threet ($3,298)
154. Marc Miller ($3,298)
155. Eric Lupovich ($3,298)
156. Luke Vrabel ($3,298)
157. An Vuong ($3,298)
158. Hieu Nguyen ($3,298)
159. Leo Labbe ($3,298)
160. Patrick Sacrispeyre ($3,298)
161. Charles Dolan ($3,298)
162. Eric Cheshier ($3,298)
163. Thomas Kasperski ($3,298)
164. Yarron Bendor ($3,298)
165. Judy Lepire ($3,298)
166. Kyle Hegeman ($3,298)
167. Mikael Olsson ($3,298)
168. Marcello Delgrosso ($3,298)
169. John Utley ($3,298)
170. Mark Wilds ($3,298)
171. Chris Arvanitis ($3,298)
172. Frank Blumlein ($3,298)
173. Dennis Tilley ($3,298)
174. Jorge Jesus ($3,298)
175. Priyan De Mel ($3,298)
176. Karl Lundholm ($3,298)
177. Robert Miller ($3,298)
178. Chris Bigler ($3,298)
179. Ramon Vergara ($3,298)
180. John Solis ($3,298)
181. Jakob Tostesen ($3,075)
182. Tyler Patterson ($3,075)
183. Dennis Anderson ($3,075)
184. Andrew Miles ($3,075)
185. Jorge Gonzalez ($3,075)
186. Frank Diaz ($3,075)
187. Steve Bannasch ($3,075)
188. Alex Donofrio ($3,075)
189. Pascal Misteli ($3,075)
190. John Sias ($3,075)
191. Timothy Christensen ($3,075)
192. Christian Bowerman ($3,075)
193. Stan Athan ($3,075)
194. Leopoldo Araneta ($3,075)
195. Brian Gray ($3,075)
196. Robert Merulla ($3,075)
197. Oliver Anderson ($3,075)
198. Yasir Ali ($3,075)
199. Jamie Acevedo ($3,075)
200. Michiel Brummelhuis ($3,075)
201. Chris Wong ($3,075)
202. Konstantin Bucherl ($3,075)
203. Ben Heinrichs ($3,075)
204. Kurt Maier ($3,075)
205. Kun Tong ($3,075)
206. Scott Bohlman ($3,075)
207. Martin May ($3,075)
208. Michael Hertziger ($3,075)
209. Nenad Sizgoric ($3,075)
210. Jeffrey Baylos ($3,075)
211. Michael Sprando ($3,075)
212. Christopher Yee ($3,075)
213. Keith Murrell ($3,075)
214. Matthew Cohen ($3,075)
215. Neil Zimmet ($3,075)
216. Jessica Mendoza ($3,075)
217. Richard Poff ($3,075)
218. Jonathan Gumapas ($3,075)
219. Denny Robinson ($3,075)
220. John Crino ($3,075)
221. Hayden Fitzgerald ($3,075)
222. Michael Larimer ($3,075)
223. Shawn Pilot ($3,075)
224. Waylon Frey ($3,075)
225. David Lam ($3,075)
226. David Smith ($2,890)
227. Richard Hollman ($2,890)
228. Denise Molloy ($2,890)
229. Mike Baxter ($2,890)
230. Thu Tran ($2,890)
231. Angel Guillen ($2,890)
232. Carman Cavella ($2,890)
233. Catherine Calhoun ($2,890)
234. Al Barbieri ($2,890)
235. Robert Brumback ($2,890)
236. Jason Landon ($2,890)
237. Luke McIntyre ($2,890)
238. Brad Steinberg ($2,890)
239. Bruce Dye ($2,890)
240. Jeff Harris ($2,890)
241. Terry Wolthuis ($2,890)
242. Daniel Hood ($2,890)
243. Evgeny Serebryakov ($2,890)
244. Brad Beard ($2,890)
245. John Miller ($2,890)
246. Juan Fregoso ($2,890)
247. Rishabh Gupta ($2,890)
248. Michael Souza ($2,890)
249. Ching Choy ($2,890)
250. Matthew Matros ($2,890)
251. Larry Gerek ($2,890)
252. Thomas Maser ($2,890)
253. Peter Osborne ($2,890)
254. Kathy Baxter ($2,890)
255. Jorgen Erting ($2,890)
256. Justin Bonomo ($2,890)
257. Todd Baker ($2,890)
258. Harry Pozefsky ($2,890)
259. Jason Jung ($2,890)
260. Anthony Robinson ($2,890)
261. Veronica Dabul ($2,890)
262. Tri Maa ($2,890)
263. William Woodzell ($2,890)
264. Arnaud Grumiaux ($2,890)
265. Grant Hinkle ($2,890)
266. Serguei Timofeev ($2,890)
267. Bryan Uyeda ($2,890)
268. Richard Aronow ($2,890)
269. Thorsten Schafer ($2,890)
270. Yueqi Zhu ($2,890)
