The Party Poker Open 3 competition, which took place in London lately, saw veteran competitors feuding again in the last round of the latest series, and the winner this time round last the previous time. Anthony 'The Booky' Hardy, the forty five year old ex-betting shop proprietor and opposite poker professional player Ian Woodley opposed each other in the finals; however, this tryst was not like the previous ones and held a different outcome. The two participants are British professionals, and in their last fight in the 2005 Poker Den 3 competition, Woodley triumphed. Then, Woodley triumphed over his opponent, however on the current occasion, Hardy was the one who went home with two hundred thousand dollars of the victor's prize money and all honors. Beginning with a field of seventy two participants, that comprised tough opponents such as Juha Helppi, Roland de Wolfe, Liz Lieu, Dave 'Devilfish' Ulliott, Hendon mob members, Ian Frazer and Thomas Wahlroos, the Party Poker World Open was a hard contest to break through, and moving on to the last table, Woodley gave the appearance of the ruling player and leader of chips who had to be broken, as he held 859,000 chips out of the one point two million chips while playing right down to when only the last three participants remained in the game. Following a tough contest against Woodley flavored with entertaining comments, 'The Booky' – his private listed car plate number – eventually came out victor. Hardy claimed that it was only Ian and that he constantly let him know that he could triumph and this was the revenge due to his victory over him in the Poker Den a few years back. Winning the competition is a dream, the delighted Hardy said. He further claimed that in the semi-finals or finals he did not hit a lot of cards, but rather simply went on hanging in. Having played professionally for eight years, Hardy is not new to heavy competition victories, and that includes a one season two Poker Den performances. Yet, it disappointed Woodley, who came off with a soothing one hundred thousand dollars second price. Posted on: May 1, 2007
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