Christophe Benzimra, a French business man who confessed he only plays poker part time for fun, took down the PokerStars European Poker Tour Warsaw final table over the weekend, earning to top prize worth over a half million dollars.

Despite Benzimra's admitted amateur status, not only did he outlast a total field of 203 players to win the tough Polish event, but he also survived a surprisingly daunting final table that held both PokerStars PRO Luca Pagano and a SuperNova Elite online pro named Alfio "aLFiosNob" Battisti, who Benzimra was forced to vanquish heads-up in order to earn his first major poker tournament title.

Pagano, for his part, was unable to surpass fourth place in this event, but even by falling short he still set numerous records as this was his fifth EPT final table and his 12th cash overall, according to the tour's official site EuropeanPokerTour.com.  Luca now sits above even Bertrand "ElkY" Grospellier at the top of the EPT Leader Board, although his overall EPT tournament winnings- having never won an EPT event- are still barely a third of Mr. Grospellier's. 

The final table finish positions for the 2009 PokerStars European Poker Tour Warsaw main event were as follows:

1st.  Christophe Benzimra- EUR358,644

2nd.   Alfio Battisti- EUR200,520

3rd.  Oleksandr Vaserfirer- EUR120,311

4th.  Luca Pagano- EUR85,938

5th.  Ruslan Prydryk- EUR71,041

6th.  Clayton Mozdzen- EUR56,144

7th.  Alexander Klimashin- EUR44,687

8th.  Anatoly Gurtovoy- EUR32,082

For more information on this most recent stop of the European Poker Tour, visit the sponsor blog at www.pokerstarsblog.com.


Story by Mark Anderson