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Event 46, Seven-Card Stud Hi-Lo Eight-or-Better

Buy-In: $1,000
Entrants: 668
Final Table: June 30, 2007
Bracelet Winner: Tom Schneider wins $147,713

Author of the poker and business book entitled "Oops! I Won too Much Money: Winning Wisdom from the Boardroom to the Poker Table" Tom Schneider has been around the poker scene to be one of those faces that most people recognize but can't quite put a name to. Winning final table finishes in WSOP Hold'Em events since 2002 the bracelets have always managed to elude him, until now. This year he won twice: Event 5 (Omaha/Seven-Card Stud Hi-Lo Eight-or-Better) and here again in Event 46 (Seven-Card Stud Hi-Lo Eight-or-Better). "Jewelry isn't important to me but it's nice to say I've won a WSOP event," he said after the victory. One wonders if his next book is going to be entitled "Ooops! I Won Too Many Bracelets". Perhaps not.

Event 47, No-Limit Hold'em

Buy-In: $2,000
Entrants: 2,038
Final Table: July 1, 2007
Bracelet Winner: Blair Rodman wins $707,898

Blair Rodman's gambling activities have occupied much of his 53 years: sports betting, blackjack tournaments, casino tournaments, golf gambling, craps and poker have all been counted amongst his pastimes. He began attending the WSOP in 1985, though he admits that it was mostly for the cash side games and not actual participation in the official events that attracted him. He started playing the Event games in the 90s and had a string of pay-outs which culminated in string of cash circle placements in recent years: six in 2004, three in 2005 and other four in 2006. Clearly he was set to breakthrough and did so this year with two more cash finishes and finally a bracelet in this event. Among his other accomplishments he's written a book on how to beat the poker pros entitled "Kill Phil".

Event 48, 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball (Limit) w/Re-buys

Buy-In: $1,000
Entrants: 209
Final Table: July 1, 2007
Bracelet Winner: Rafi Amit wins $227,005

Israeli-born Rafi Amit holds the dubious distinction of being the first non-US player to make headlines in USA Today for dropping the "F***!" bomb at the final table of a WSOP Event, taking his 10 minute penalty and then coming back to win the bracelet. That was 2005 and it was Event 35, the $10,000 Pot-limit version of his specialty game, Omaha. Although he's consistently finished in the cash since -- no less than six times in WSOP '06 -- it hasn't been an easy road for the young player. "In Israel, if you're a poker player, it's like you're a drug dealer," Amit said in the USA Today article, and his family was as slow as his countrymen to come around. But today it's different and his parents now just call it "business".

Event 49, No-Limit Hold'em

Buy-In: $1,500
Entrants: 3,151
Final Table: July 2, 2007
Bracelet Winner: Chandrasekhar Billavara wins $722,914

Indian born Billavara has quite a story: he only started playing poker a couple years ago, never plays in a casino or online preferring the company of friends at weekly home games, and this is only the second WSOP event he's entered, he won his buy-in at the Craps table after busting out of his first event in three hands, and he entered the final table with by far the shortest stack. Now he's on his way back to a coffee shop he co-owns in San Francisco with a gold bracelet and 3/4 of a million dollars: nice work!

Event 50, World Championship Pot-Limit Omaha

Buy-In: $10,000
Entrants: 314
Final Table: July 3, 2007
Bracelet Winner: Robert Mizrachi wins $768,889

The $10,000 World Championship Pot-Limit Omaha event is one of the most prestigious tournaments at the WSOP. Excellent players from around the world, especially Europeans who are rated tops in the world in this event, come to the WSOP to meet and compete and this year was no different.

"It was very exciting because I think it was more challenging than any other event," said Mizrachi. It seems he was on his game though with four cash finishes in earlier WSOP '07 events including top-ten places in two H.O.R.S.E tournaments. After taking the bracelet in this star-studded Omaha event, including denying Doyle Brunson his 11th WSOP gold, he went on to finish in the money in the Main Event.

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