All hail Lex Veldhuis: It’s long been clear that there’s nothing Lex Veldhuis cannot do. He’s a brilliant poker player, a superlative commentator and broadcaster, and he’s been the top poker Twitch streamer for so long that he’s also been the top streamer of any kind in the world. Last night, Veldhuis added yet another string to his bow when he became a Stadium Series champion, beating a field of 243 entries to win the $2,100 buy-in Heat 16 and earning himself $96,143. Veldhuis streamed the whole thing, of course, for tens of thousands of viewers, but was still too good for some of the best players in the world. Mike “SirWatts” Watson was runner up, Ivan “Negriin” Luca was fifth and Pablo “pabritz” Brito Silva was sixth. Recent SCOOP winner “Bomber&Granater” was at the final table too. Here’s the moment Velduis locked it up:

Crema leads the crop: There’s an all-star cast at the top echelons of the $2,100 buy-in Heat 17. The final 29 players are led by Platinum Pass winner Thiago “KKremate” Crema, of Brazil, with Anatoly “NL_Profit” Filatov in second and Diego “Die Ventura” Ventura in third. All of “WATnlos”, Mike “SirWatts” Watson, “tinnoemulder”, Dominik “Bounatirou” Nitsche and Simon “C. Darwin2” Mattsson are in the top 10. The prize pool is set at $500,000 with $45,142 up top — before bounties are taken into consideration. It’s highly likely that the bounty total for the winner will be about that again.

Finals at the finals: The three weekly finals all reached their final tables overnight, with the biggest prizes of the week all still on the line. Here’s a look at how they all stand now there are nine players in each of them:

Low: The full global appeal of the low buy-in events is never clearer than if you look at the last nine in this week’s $11 Weekly Final. Players from nine countries occupy those seats, including representatives from Uzbekistan, South Korea and Armenia alongside the familiar Brazilian, Belgium, Russian and German. It’s the Uzbek who leads, with “Khursik” holding a narrow advantage over Brazil’s “marcelotutu”. With $47K up top, and next man out guaranteed $3,158, there’s plenty to play for.

Stadium Series Weekly Final – Low
Buy-in: $11
Dates: July 19-21, 2020
Entries: 43,212
Prize pool: $500,000

Final table standings:

1 – Khursik (Uzbekistan) – 228,927,476
2 – marcelotutu (Brazil) – 198,788,182
3 – likimoou (Chile) – 171,947,960
4 – lensia (South Korea) – 122,433,528
5 – lou43lou (Belgium) – 83,317,266
6 – max_sich (Russia) – 81,972,403
7 – Soul4444 (Armenia) – 74,834,055
8 – amaricutei33 (Germany) – 59,962,276
9 – jenqae (Belarus) – 59,116,854

Blinds are 1,250,000/2,500,000 (325,000 ante)

Medium: The headline act at the medium buy-in final table is former Team PokerStars Online member Shane “shaniac” Schleger, who now plays from Mexico. Schleger sits fifth in chips with nine left from the 11,292-strong field, with Brazil’s “|Chompiras|0” in front. There’s only five big blinds separating the top three. This one has close to $200K up top, with the prize pool set at $1.5 million. The highest finishing current Team PokerStars members were Felix “xflixx” Schneiders, who busted in 59th, and Ben “Spraggy” Spragg, who fell in 95th.

Stadium Series Weekly Final – Medium
Buy-in: $109
Dates: July 19-21, 2020
Entries: 11,292
Prize pool: $1.5 million

Final table standings:

1 – |Chompiras|0 (Brazil) – 109,552,224
2 – CoolerAHAH (Malta) – 104,211,050
3 – Goallinfishara (Russia) – 102,608,038
4 – thx4your$ (Canada) – 83,130,078
5 – Shane “shaniac” Schleger (Mexico) – 53,303,749
6 – fozzzi (Ukraine) – 46,970,973
7 – Hookz (Canada) – 35,245,774
8 – Blunty2004 (Germany) – 18,083,154
9 – Pimello (Belgium) – 11,494,960

Blinds are 700,000/1,400,000 (175,000 ante)

High: Another former Team PokerStars member, Marc-Andre “FrenchDawg” Ladouceur, sits in second place as the final table begins in the $1,050 high buy-in event too. Ladouceur is sandwiched between three Brazilians, with Luan “Pseudo Fruto” Felipe sitting pretty at the top. He has close to double Ladouceur’s stack, with “heyalisson” and “Breno2728” in fourth. There are two Russians and two Netherlands-based players also at the final, with $234,451 on the line for the win.

1 – Pseudo Fruto (Brazil), 33,390,252
2 – Marc-Andre “FrenchDawg” Ladouceur (Canada), 19,449,172
3 – heyalisson (Brazil), 17,545,357
4 – Breno2728 (Brazil), 11,814,410
5 – Zar77262 (Russia), 11,738,652
6 – K0SICE (Netherlands), 10,990,032
7 – Razer2311 (Austria), 10,443,689
8 – _m0ney2_89 (Russia), 10,205,636
9 – tinnoemulder (Netherlands), 9,122,800

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TODAY’S RESULTS

STAT TRACKER

Tournaments completed: 51
Tournaments ongoing: 6
Entries so far: 405,730
Prize pools so far: $17,172,994.50
First place prizes so far: $2,264,718.05

*Data includes completed tournaments only

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MORE ABOUT STADIUM SERIES:
OFFICIAL SITE | OVERVIEW | START PLAYING
SCHEDULE & RESULTS | LIVE COVERAGE | ALL BLOG REPORTS
WHO’S WHO? MATCHING NAMES TO SCREEN-NAMES

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TWITCH WATCH

It’s difficult to look anywhere other than at Lex Veldhuis after yesterday’s brilliant win, but it’s easy to forget that he came into the day with the smallest stack in the tournament. However things can change so quickly in no-limit hold’em, and Lex’s moment came six-handed when he found aces on the button. It turned out nicely for him…

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AS IT STANDS

In addition to the Weekly Finals, Heat 17 is also at its half-way stage. Here are the important stats from those tournaments:

Heat 17-L: $22 6-Max PKO
Entries: 13,622 (inc. 4,491 re-entries)
Prize pool: $275,000
Leader: cacopoker (Brazil) | 48 players left

Heat 17-M: $215 6-Max PKO
Entries: 2,557 (inc. 823 re-entries)
Prize pool: $511,400
Leader: DeZauZeR (Russia) | 47 players left

Heat 17-H: $2,100 6-Max PKO
Entries: 232 (inc. 76 re-entries)
Prize pool: $500,000
Leader: KKremate (Brazil) | 29 players left

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STARTING TODAY

Heat 18: No Limit Hold’em
Starting time: 1:05pm ET (18:05 BST)
Buy-ins: $22, $215, $2,100
Guarantees: $200,000, $400,000, $500,000

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