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Taylor Black wins the WPT Five Diamond Classic

Taylor Black wins the WPT Five Diamond Classic

Taylor Black wins the WPT Five Diamond Classic


The WPT Five Diamond Classic was the last very big live tournament this year. With over 700 entries the $10k main event in Las Vegas was comparable in size to the WSOPE Main Event earlier this month. The Californian Taylor Black won the event this weekend and took home over $1.2m and the 2nd big title of his poker career.

Taylor Black
Taylor Black

Key Facts: WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic 2021

  • Venue: Bellagio Resort & Casino Las Vegas
  • Buy-In: $10.400
  • Players: 716 Entries
  • Prize Pool: $6,945,200
  • Winner: Taylor Black
  • Prize Money 1st place: $1,241,430

The WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic is one of the most prestigious events of the World Poker Tour and has produced some of the most well-known winners of all long running poker series. Among others Dan Smith, Antonio Esfandiari, Joe Hachem, Daniel Negreanu and Gus Hansen have won this event in the past.

After last year’s edition of the World Poker Classic was axed because of the pandemic situation, the event was back almost full steam this year. Although the player numbers dropped noticeably compared to 2019, this year’s event was still the 5th biggest WPT World Poker Classic Main Event ever held.

This is how the number of players at the WPT World Poker Classic developed since the inauguration in 2002:

WPT Five Diamonds Player Numbers
YearEntrantsPrizepoolWinner
2002146$1,416,200Gus Hansen
2003314$3,044,750Paul Phillips
2004376$5,470,800Daniel Negreanu
2005555$8,075,250Rehne Pedersen
2006583$8,482,650Joe Hachem
2007626$9,390,000Eugene Katchalov
2008497$7,231,350David Rheem
2009329$4,761,450Daniel Alaei
2010438$4,261,267Antonio Esfandiari
2011413$4,006,100James Dempsey
2012503$4,879,100Ravi Raghavan
2013449$4,355,300Dan Smith
2014586$5,684,200Mohsin Charania
2015639$6,198,300Kevin Eyster
2016791$7,672,700James Romero
2017812$7,876,400Ryan Tosoc
20181,001$9,709,700Dylan Linde
20191,035$10,039,500Alex Foxen
2021716$6,945,200Taylor Black

Taylor Black wins after final table roller coaster ride

The eventual winner Taylor Black started the final table of this year’s main event as the clear chip leader with more than half of all the chips but managed to lose most of his stack and found himself at the end of the leader board after 160 hands played.

Black managed to double back into the lead with a flush against Gianluca Speranza’s trips. From then on Black never again gave away his lead. He eliminated Lorenzo Lavis with top pair against Lavis’ flush draw which never materialized and after the Italian Sperenza was eliminated in 3rd place, Black was heads-up against Vik Shegal.

This heads-up only lasted slightly more than 10 hands, then both players found decent aces and were all-in preflop. Shegal moved all-in with A 8 and Black called with A K . After the board came down K 10 6 Q 9 the better ace won and Taylor Black was crowned winner of the WPT World Poker Classic 2021.

It was Black’s 2nd big title. The 1st one was his triumph at the partypoker Millions in Kahnawake in 2018.

Taylor Black wins the WPT Five Diamond Classic
Taylor Black wins the WPT Five Diamond Classic

Final result WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic 2021

#PlayerPrize Money
1Taylor Black$1,241,430
2Vik Shegal$827,620
3Gianluca Speranza$609,960
4Lorenzo Lavis$454,590
5Mohsin Charania$342,645
6David Kim$261,235
7Bryn Kenney$201,480
8Dylan Linde$157,220
9Pat Lyons$124,145
10Sean Ripp$124,145
11Tony Wasaya$99,205
12Justin Saliba$99,205
13George Wolff$80,245
14Jacob Ferro$80,245
15David Mock$65,705
16James Hundt$65,705
17Sergio Fernandez$54,475
18Markus Gonsalves$54,475
19Elio Fox$54,475
20Marty Mathis$54,475
21Aaron Massey$45,735
22Maz Abdallah$45,735
23Brek Schutten$45,735
24Ray Qartomy$45,735
25Sam Panzica$38,890
26Peter Mugar$38,890
27Matt Berkey$38,890
28Bob Buckenmayer$38,890
29David McGowan$38,890
30Mike Liang$38,890
31Larry Greenberg$38,890
32Andrew Lichtenberger$38,890
33Matt Affleck$33,495
34Stephen Foutty$33,495
35Jeff Trudeau$33,495
36David Marshall$33,495
37Bradley Berman$33,495
38Glenn LaFaye$33,495
39Bill Klein$33,495
40Yuri Ishida$33,495
41Jeffrey Tanouye$29,230
42Ralph Perry$29,230
43Matthew Su$29,230
44Alex Condon$29,230
45Johan Schumacher$29,230
46Erik Seidel$29,230
47Ed Sebesta$29,230
48Z Stein$29,230
49Maxi Lehmanski$25,850
50Nacho Barbero$25,850
51Mike Meskin$25,850
52Jason Koon$25,850
53John Andress$25,850
54Steve Zolotow$25,850
55Arkadi Onikoul$25,850
56Anthony Zinno$25,850
57Dorian Rios$23,165
58Damjan Radanov$23,165
59Ben Hamnett$23,165
60Nick Schulman$23,165
61Zach Donovan$23,165
62Paul Fisher$23,165
63Ariel Mantel$23,165
64Joseph Cheong$23,165
65Darren Elias$21,045
66Steve Karp$21,045
67Henrik Hecklen$21,045
68Vanessa Kade$21,045
69Mitchell Halverson$21,045
70Boris Akopov$21,045
71Eric Ting-Yi Tsai$21,045
72Tom Marchese$21,045
73Chris Moorman$19,385
74Justin Bonomo$19,385
75Martins Adeniya$19,385
76Felipe Ramos$19,385
77Michael Shanahan$19,385
78Brian Green$19,385
79David ODB Baker$19,385
80Amir Mirrasouli$19,385
81David Gonzalez$18,110
82James Calderaro$18,110
83Will Berry$18,110
84Christopher Frank$18,110
85Kainalu McCue-Unciano$18,110
86Landon Tice$18,110
87Pavlo Veksler$18,110
88Jeremy Ausmus$18,110
89Nate Silver$18,110
90Alex Foxen$18,110