Welcome to the WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk Final Table; Aaron Frei Leads Ahead of Faraz Jaka and Jeremy Wood

By Tim Duckworth

Welcome to the final day of the WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk $1,500 Main Event from the Golden Gates Casino in Black Hawk, Colorado.

The early history of Black Hawk saw the town boom in the late 19th century as a historic mining settlement. In the 1990’s, there was a resurgence to the city courtesy of the gambling industry that now sees 18 casinos located around town to cater as the gambling hub for the state of Colorado. One of those casinos is the Golden Gates Casino, and this week it has played host to the inaugural WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk Main Event.

Although the mid-week snow and Mother’s Day played a factor in players getting to Black Hawk, a total of 251-entrants took a seat over the three Day 1 flights, and after 47 players survived into Day 2, just nine players would remain.

WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk Final Table
Seat 1: Zackery Whitney – 730,000
Seat 2: Faraz Jaka – 1,585,000
Seat 3: Krzysztof Stybaniewicz – 470,000
Seat 4: Aaron Frei – 1,965,000
Seat 5: Jeremy Wood – 605,000
Seat 6: Evan Shaughnessy – 365,000
Seat 7: Yang Ruan – 435,000
Seat 8: Ryan Remington – 945,000
Seat 9: William Mietz – 435,000
The button is on Krzysztof Stybaniewicz and there is 6:12 remaining in Level 25 (15,000-30,000 with a 30,000-big blind ante)

Heading into the WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk final table as the chip leader is Aaron Frei (pictured) who finished with 1,965,000 in chips after also finishing as the Day 1B chip leader. Frei soared up the leaderboard in the middle stages of the day, and when he eliminated Wendy Freedman in 13th place, he was on the verge of eclipsing two million in chips. Eventually Frei would end the day with just over a big blind shy of the two-million chip-mark, but he would put himself in prime position to make a run at collecting the WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk title.

Sitting behind Frei is Faraz Jaka who has the opportunity to become the first WPT Player of the Year to also win a WPTDeepStacks Main Event. Jaka launched up the leaderboard to be outright second after eliminating WPTDeepStacks San Diego Champion Maxwell Young on the final hand of the night when he ran out a queen-high straight after all the money went in preflop.

One of the more entertaining players to reach the final table is Jeremy Wood who spoke his mind freely over the past two days. Wood had a roller coaster of a day soaring up the leaderboard and then down before putting 605,000 in the bag. Wood was also featured in the recent WPT Mic’D Up video which can be seen right here.

Each player is currently guaranteed $7,730, but all eyes will be set on the first-place prize of $77,290 that includes a $3,000 buy-in into the season-ending WPTDeepStacks Championship.

The WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk final table begins at 12 p.m. (MDT) on Monday, May 13, so stay tuned right here to WPT.com for the exclusive live coverage of the WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk final table, and see who will be crowned the inaugural Champion and win his way into the season-ending WPTDeepStacks Championship.

Photography by Melissa Haereiti / PokerPhotoArchive

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