Philip Hilm First Bust of World Series of Poker Final TablePhilip Hilm seemed to have been in control of his own destiny. He entered the 2007 World Series of Poker final table as the chip leader. But within two hours of starting Tuesday, Hilm collapsed and busted. He will get paid just over $525,954.
CardPlayer.com described the sequence of events:
Hilm and Yang clashed again a few hands later, but this battle woud be their last. On a board of K
J 5
2
Jerry Yang bet $4 million and Hilm moved all in. Yang made the call and flipped over A K
. Hilm showed 8 5 and the crowd reacted with a mix of glee, dissappointment from the Denmark contingent, and excitment. The river brought the 6and Hilm was eliminated in ninth place. He played an aggressive game early, but Yang was just as aggressive, and the Scandanavian player went from the largest chip stack at the start of the day, to the first player to be eliminated. He will take home $525,934 in prize money as a consolation prize though. Yang is now the overwhelming chip leader and he has a third of the chips in play with over $44 million.
The Danish player has done well on the European poker circuit.
He has placed 4th in the EPT in Copenhagen and 1st in the WCP in Barcelona.
"Between October and December 2003, I was demonstrating and selling coffee machines in supermarkets. It was a lousy job, but I needed the money to buy Christmas presents," he told PokerTips.org.
That's when Hilm decided to try his hand at poker.
"Around that time a friend of mine, who had been a professional backgammon player for 4 or 5 years, started playing poker and introduced it to me. I decided to give it a real shot, so I studied and practiced intensely. After one month I was making 3 times the money playing poker in the evening, than I did at my job. The decision was easy, and I never looked back."
Hilm told the site how he considers poker both a hobby and a job. His first year he made $50,000 playing.
The 2007 World Series of Poker was now down to 8.
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Ace King, Gambling911.com
Originally published July 17, 2007 5:03 pm ET
