Lloyd Wins 2008 CPC

Saturday, November 22, 2008

The Recap: David Lloyd Wins 2008 CPC!

By Matthew Showell | Other

There were many likely candidates for champion here at the 2008 Caribbean Poker Classic, but in the end, it was a player who flew under the radar for much of the tournament that took it all down.

David R. Lloyd, the middle initial to distinguish him from the many others of the same name, won $91,200 and CPC glory here on the high seas.

Against our better judgment we thought it would be Mark Phillips, the brazen Brit who rode a run of great cards into the final table, or perhaps Sol Bergren, the clever Canadian who demonstrated the most skill from what we saw.

Phillips' luck ran out, however, and Bergren made it all the way to heads-up, but today was Lloyd's day, and since there's only room for one at the top it's Lloyd's name that graces the 2008 CPC entry in the poker history books.

Covering smaller-buy-in tournaments like this one isn't something PokerListings does every day, but in the case of the CPC we made an exception. Some might say it was the Caribbean sun and the days in Puerto Rico, St. Martin and St. Thomas that lured us here, but they'd only be partially correct.

There's something to be said for events that don't cost $10,000 or more to get into. Online qualification is the name of the game at the CPC and the truth is there's so much skill these days at the lower levels of Internet play that today's CPC qualifiers could very well be tomorrow's major title holders.

Two years ago Denmark's Peter Jepsen chopped the first-place prize, and barely six months later he had his first EPT win under his belt.

One table of many.

This year's CPC played out over two days, the first being a marathon and the second a sprint. Another thing about smaller-buy-in tournaments is the relative shortness of the structure. As a result, when we reached the final nine the players were somewhat hampered by the blinds and didn't have the chance to really put their skills to work.

David Lloyd was perhaps the best at adapting to the situation in which he found himself. He made it into the money on Day 1 with a workable stack and when other players were hanging on, their eyes on a seat at the final table, he went about the business of building a decent stack.

When player No. 10 hit the rail and the final table was set, Lloyd was second in chips and in a great spot to make a truly deep run.

At today's finale he picked his spots well and gave the dangerous players at the table a wide berth. He played on the tight side but when he went heads-up with Sol Bergren he opened his game up immensely.

Good cards were undoubtedly a big factor in Lloyd's domination of the heads-up match, but he backed it up with relentless pressure. He and Bergren started near even, but for the first 20 hands almost every pot was pushed to Lloyd's side of the table.

Blinded by the light.

Lloyd whittled his opponent's stack down to next to nothing with a few truly pivotal hands. Chipping away pre-flop with button raises and frequent three-bets, Lloyd took control of the match.

It's impossible to say how good he was running, and there were no hole cameras so we won't get a sneak peak after the fact. But Lloyd really did look like a different player from what we had previously seen. When heads-up started we put the advantage clearly with Bergren. We'd watched him all day and he is a very strong player.

One heads-up match isn't much of an indicator but, as we said before, today was David R. Lloyd's day.

This is neither the time nor the place for hand reports; the live updates speak for themselves and we implore you to give them a listen. Additionally, check out the results page for a full rundown of everyone who cashed in this event.

PokerListings.com would like to extend our gratitude to the event's sponsor sites, whose logos can be found in almost every photograph we took, and our congratulations to David Lloyd and everyone else who cashed in this event. It was a memorable week.

The majority of the players in this event qualified for mere cents on the dollar, and if you think you've got what it takes to stand among them, take advantage of our sign-up bonuses and give yourself a chance. It's possible - just ask David Lloyd.