Marc Inizan Wins the 2022 WPT Prime Taiwan Main Event (TWD 4,326,600/$138,851)

Marc Inizan

The record-breaking 2022 WPT Prime Taiwan Main Event has crowned a winner. It took fewer than six hours for Marc Inizan to accumulate all the chips as he went wire-to-wire and topped the 877-entry strong marquee event, which came with a buy-in of TWD 33,000 ($1,100).

Three of these entries came from the Frenchman, who couldn’t find any fortune on the first two starting days. However, the third time was a charm and he was second on the leaderboard across all three starting days. Inizan entered the final table as the chip leader and never surrendered the top spot to claim the biggest slice of the  TWD 25,196,700 ($808,623) prize pool at the Chinese Texas Hold’em Poker Association in Taipei City in dominating fashion.

His attendance at the CTP Club was just the second time he entered a live poker event in Asia but it was just a short trip over from Bangkok this time around.

“My girlfriend is Thai and I often fly to Thailand. I have been in Taiwan before for vacation and I really loved it here, so it seemed like a good opportunity to come here as well for some poker,” Inizan said in the interview right after his victory.

The first cash at a live poker event for the Frenchman dates all the way back to 2007 and in 2010, he recorded his biggest payout so far when he finished in third place in the EPT Berlin Main Event for €350,000. Since then, he won a few small events but nothing compares with lifting the trophy here at the CTP Club.

On top of the TWD 4,326,600 ($138,851) cash prize, Inizan has also won an entry to the $10,400 Main Event of the 2022 WPT World Championships. The marquee festival is just around the corner and features 23 events with $22 Million in Guarantees at Wynn Las Vegas. When asked whether he would attend this year or wait for the edition in 2023, Inizan was pretty certain to fly over to Sin City in a few weeks time.

Six local players were aiming to keep the trophy on home soil and Kai Jan “Steven” Chou came the closest to doing so but didn’t stand any chance in a short-lived heads-up duel. Despite entering with nearly 70 big blinds, Chou’s stack was whittled down to zero in a mere 20 minutes and he had to settle for the runner-up spot.

Sumire Hori was the last woman standing in the event and finished in eighth place while South Korea’s Jeyoung Park was then followed by five Taiwanese poker players to the payout desk.

Inizan seemingly couldn’t put any foot wrong during the final day and consistently built his stack. He was responsible for four of the last five eliminations and held more than half of the chips in play with four contenders still in the mix.

Yao Wei Huang became his first casualty when the Frenchman, with the far bigger stack, jammed blind-on-blind with six-four and beat the pocket fives thanks to flopping two pair.

Chou claimed all chips of Yu Fan Chang in consecutive hands and cemented his status as second-biggest stack before Inizan struck again with ace-jack against the ace-ten of Yuan Hsu Lee. Chou then found a fortunate double when he three-bet jammed more than 30 blinds with ace-trey into the ace-king of Inizan and rivered a trey.

That pot seemingly shifted the momentum as both were nearly even atop the leaderboard but Inizan quickly pulled away again. Chih Feng Li became his next casualty shortly thereafter when ace-trey suited couldn’t crack pocket tens.

Heads-up play started with 107 big blinds for Inizan and 68 big blinds for Chou, pointing towards a potentially gruesome grind to determine a champion. However, the Frenchman claimed the vast majority of pots in a 20-minute rush and eventually finished the job with a twist.

Chou four-bet jammed king-deuce suited and Inizan called with pocket tens. The flop brought a king but the rail from Taiwan was silenced when a ten on the turn locked up the victory for Inizan.

This wraps up the largest live poker event in the history of the CTP Club and the island of Taiwan. While most contenders in the marquee Main Event were hailing from Taiwan, there was also an international crowd in contention as well. The Hotstone Group from South Korea sent more than one and a half dozen players and many further of their countrymen joined, as did many poker enthusiasts from Japan.

It was the second attendance record for the WPT Prime brand on Asian soil in the last few months as the stop in at NagaWorld in Phnom Penh drew a staggering 1,050 entries in the Kingdom of Cambodia.

Final Table Result 2022 WPT Prime Taiwan Main Event

1st Place: Marc Inizan (France) – TWD 4,326,600 ($138,851)
2nd Place: Kai Jan “Steven” Chou (Taiwan) – TWD 2,883,500 ($92,539)
3rd Place: Chih Feng Li (Taiwan) – TWD 2,126,400 ($68,241)
4th Place: Yuan Hsu Lee (Taiwan) – TWD 1,585,300 ($50,876)
5th Place: Yu Fan Chang (Taiwan) – TWD 1,195,000 ($38,350)
6th Place: Yao Wei Huang (Taiwan) – TWD 910,900 ($29,233)
7th Place: Jeyoung Park (South Korea) – TWD 702,200 ($22,535)
8th Place: Sumire Hori (Japan) – TWD 547,700 ($17,571)
9th Place: Chang Le Lin (Taiwan) – TWD 431,900 ($13,861)