Eirik Kristiansen Wins The Festival in Tallinn Main Event
After four starting flights, six real-life days, 552 entries, and countless beers, The Festival in Tallinn Main Event is over.
After the swift early eliminations of Sascha Manns in ninth and Toivo Ojasoo in seventh - the two shortest stacks at the start of the day - as well as last Brit standing Greg Partridge in eighth (who also won the Luxon Pay Last Longer Bet), there was a long period of back and forth before the elimination of Rando Liiber in sixth place - a hand that nudged Kristoffer Winterstein into the chip lead on 6 million, just ahead of Eirik Kristiansen who had held the lead since around halfway through Day 3. Kristiansen also knocked out fifth place finisher Jero Keitaanranta and fourth placer Mikael Viggander, and had half the chips in play when they went three-handed.
Jari Mähönen was at this point the shortest of the three, but he swiftly doubled through Kristoffer Winterstein, leaving the latter with just five big blinds. Winterstein doubled up several times, but ultimately couldn't recover - he finally succumbed when he desperately smacked his K6 into Mähönen's KQ for third place, and Mähönen - already the chip leader before that - now went heads up with a 2:1 chip lead over Eirik Kristiansen.
It didn't take long for Kristiansen to double back up to the chip lead, and just a few minutes later it was all over.
After the victory, our Patricia Rimfire took a few minutes to talk to Eirik Kristiansen:
The Hilton Tallinn Park, under the aegis of Olympic Casino, outdid itself this week as it hosted this monstrous Main Event as well as almost 40 official side events, not to mention the 24-hour cash games and endless hilarious flips in the hallway. Indeed, even as we write, the short-deck and ladies' event are still underway. It wasn't just poker either - side events included the Gambling Cabin Sportsbook Championship, the Matching Visions Slots tournament, and events in roulette and blackjack. You can see the full schedule here and view the results for all events here.
Some impressions from Sunday's Festival Queens Event:
In addition to the gambling action, there were a variety of parties, dinners and other shenanigans that I can't really commit to posterity here. Nevertheless, it has been on balance a most enjoyable week, and we extend our sincerest thanks to everyone involved. We look forward to seeing everyone again at The Festival in Bratislava this October - but until then, 🍻.
