Bernd Gleissner Captures Maiden Bracelet in WSOP Europe €1K Turbo Freezeout (€46,700)

After ten and a half hours of play, a new bracelet winner has been crowned at the 2023 World Series of Poker Europe at King’s Resort in Rozvadov. Bernd Gleissner topped a field of 182 entrants in Event #14: €1,000 No-Limit Hold’em Turbo Freezeout, last defeating Candido Cappiello in heads-up play to capture his first WSOP gold bracelet and the lion’s share of the €200,000 prize pool.

The win marks Gleissner’s third cash at the 2023 WSOPE and is by far his biggest of this series, with the next closest being a 27th-place finish in Event #6: €5,000 Pot Limit Omaha for €8,625. The German pro has enjoyed several five-figure scores at King’s Resort over the past two years, including a 27th-place finish in the 2022 WSOPE Main Event for €39,368 and a ninth-place finish in a €10,000 PLO High Roller event this past September for €46,000. His career-best cash comes from a win at the 2011 EPT London for £70,000.

WSOP Europe €10,350 Main Event Live Updates

Event #14: €1,000 No-Limit Hold’em Turbo Freezeout Final Table Results

Action of the Day

The fast structure of this event, featuring 20-minute levels, ensured that the action would be non-stop from start to finish. The field was whittled down from 182 entrants to 28 paid spots after roughly six hours of play, with notables such as Barny Boatman, Julien Sitbon, Tobias Garp, Roland Israelashvili, Martin Kabrhel, Max Pescatori, Sonny Franco and Randy Lew all falling short of the money.

Junhyoung Ki would end up becoming the event’s bubble boy despite being among the chip leaders for most of the early and middle stages of the tournament. Ki’s downfall began after Moritz Dietrich called a massive bluff from Ki near the bubble in what was the biggest pot of the tournament by far up until that point. Ki would lose the rest of his chips to Gleissner shortly afterwards, and from that point on, all remaining players were guaranteed at least a min-cash of €1,885.

The eliminations came at a rapid pace after the money was reached, taking less than two hours for the field to be reduced from 28 paid places to the unofficial final table of 10. Among those eliminated at this time was German pro Rainer Kempe (18th – €2,065), who had become short-stacked and ultimately ran into Simone Piazzini’s ace-king before seeing his run come to an end.

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Gleissner, who was short-stacked upon reaching the money, began to pick up momentum around the final two tables, particularly after winning a three-way all in that eliminated Bastien May and left Kalle Persson short-stacked. Gleissner would double up shortly afterwards to enter the unofficial ten-handed final table as the third-biggest stack.

Play slowed down considerably once the final table had been reached, with many pots being taken down preflop and players generally acting conservatively as the pay jumps grew larger. Simon Wilson and Jan Bogas would be the first to fall in tenth and ninth place respectively.

James Chen was perhaps the most experienced player coming into the final table, but with the blinds continuing to escalate he was forced to commit his stack with ace-deuce only to run into Dietrich’s ace-king and bow out in eighth place. Angelos Michael, Veronica Tuscano and Alessandro Predaroli were next to fall in seventh, sixth and fifth place respectively, with Dietrich scoring two of the knockouts and emerging as a significant chip-leader going into four-handed play.

Gleissner would pull even with Dietrich after eliminating Simone Piazzini in a dramatic runout that saw Gleisser hit a three-outer on the turn to send Piazzini packing. The three remaining players were fairly close in chips, but a run of bad cards saw Dietrich become short-stacked. He would eventually move in with a straight draw against Gleissner, who had bottom pair and dodged a plethora of outs to eliminate the Upswing Pro in third place.

Heads-up play between Gleissner and Cappiello was a brief affair, lasting roughly ten minutes, but the duel was action-packed and saw the chip lead change on two occasions. After winning a flip against Cappiello with pocket nines, Gleissner would claim the last of Cappiello’s chips in another preflop battle that saw Gleissner’s queen-nine hold against Cappiello’s queen-three to win the final pot of the tournament.

2023 WSOP Europe Winnner