Hays' rail snaps pictures of their friend as he takes his winner photo

After four days of play, the largest $1,500 No Limit Hold’em field in WSOP history, coming in at 3,157 players,  is down to just one: Foster Hays.  At a final table where just about everybody had trouble picking up chips and even more difficulty holding on to them, Hays amassed a big stack and the momentum necessary to defeat the masses and pick up his first WSOP bracelet as well as one of the biggest WSOP paydays so far this year.

There will be no celebrating on the Strip for Hays though. The medical researcher from Dallas, Texas has a plane to catch, as he has an appointment to keep on Tuesday. For the amateur player, the bracelet is the culmination of a lifelong dream, but it will not be a life changing event.

“It had actually been a goal of mine to play in a World Series of Poker event. It was just a standard Vegas trip for me, but it kind of morphed into something bigger,” Hays said of his decision to give the WSOP a shot.

The first few hours of final table action in the event saw twelve all-in situations where the short stack prevailed all twelve times. Along the way, six of the nine final tablists saw their short stacks multiply and Jordan Young mounted an impressive comeback after running his Big Slick into Tristan Wade’s aces to be left with only one big blind.

The run for Young included four double ups, but despite his best efforts, he was still the ninth place finisher. He shoved from the small blind with K6 and Robert Koss called out of the big blind with A3. The JJ4A board left Young drawing dead by the turn and his hopes of a chip and a chair WSOP story extinguished.

Though the table got one elimination out of the way, that didn’t stop the short stacks from continuing to survive their all-in situations. It was almost another hour before Philippe Vert busted in eighth place, losing the bulk of his stack when Foster Hay’s K9 bested Vert’s AJ in an all-in preflop confrontation. The next hand, Vert picked up pocket nines, but ran into Stanley Tavanese’s pocket jacks to hit the rail.

Hays continued to push the action, open shoving in a number of pots. While he tended to be hitting flops, Wade was much less fortunate, frequently losing two and three-out situations. Running low on chips, he shoved in with A9 from the cutoff, only to run into Koss’ pocket aces and bust in seventh place.

Shortly after Wade’s elimination, play ended for the night. The fourth and final day of play started in sharp contrast to the long periods without an elimination that dominated Day 3 play. Instead Koss and Tavenese exited in quick succession. First, Koss busted in fifth when Hays’ KQ bested his AJ in an all-in preflop situation. Then Casey Kelton dispatched with Tavanese when his pocket fives prevailed over Tavenese’s AK.

Allan Le finished the event in fourth place after battling the short stack for several hours. He shoved all-in, getting calls from Kelton and Hays. Hays bet Kelton out on the turn of an 874Q board when he paired up holding KQ. Le had a pair too, but his A4 needed to improve and failed to do so with the J on the river. Le headed home in fourth place and Hays’ big stack just got bigger.

Hays’ stack surpassed the 10-million mark when he eliminated Jeff Lavelle in third place when Lavelle ran top pair into Hays’ aces. That set up a heads-up battle between the talkative and active Hays and the player who kept the lowest profile of all the final tablists, Kelton.

Hays began heads-up play with a 3-1 chip advantage, but once the field got down to two, the momentum went soaring in Kelton’s direction as he doubled up twice to make this match a contest.  In the end, Hays prevailed though.  On the final hand of play, the two both flopped top pair, but Hays’ ace-kicker played to give him the pot.  The stacks were so close, that it required a full count to determine that Hays just had Kelton outchipped and picked up his first career gold bracelet.

The payday is one of the biggest of the WSOP so far, but Hays has pretty conservative plans for how life will be now that he is $735,400 wealthier.

“I’m not going to change my plans for the fall. Maybe I’ll buy a car,” he mused.

As for the toll the marathon final table took on his emotions, Hays admitted it as tough, but there was a silver lining beyond just picking up the bracelet.

“When we did not have a player bust for four levels, [it was tough.] Nobody really had a short stack and mentally it was very tough to try and get through that five-hour stretch. The crowd definitely helped. I think it was one of Jordan’s fans who yelled out, ‘Foster: Australian for awesome’ and I thought that was pretty funny and got a big kick out of that.”

Here are the final table results from the $1,500 No Limit Hold’em event:

1st: Foster Hays – $735,400
2nd: Casey Kelton – $459,920
3rd: Jeff Lavelle – $321,947
4th: Allan Le – $233,043
5th: Stanley Tavanese – $170,648
6th: Robert Koss – $126,409
7th: Tristan Wade – $94,700
8th: Philippe Vert – $71,728
9th: Jordan Young – $54,936

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