The World Poker Tour Legends of Poker championship got under way at the Bicycle Casino in Los Angeles, California over a period of 6 days from August 25, 2007 to August 30, 2007. The tournament saw 485 entries, each paying $10,000 to buy-in and play for a shot at the total pool prize of $4,607,000. There were 45 payouts ay the end of the tourney and six powerful players were left at the final table.

Final table play began at Level 27 with blinds at 150,000 – 300,000 and 30,000 antes. Shi Jia Liu was the amateur who was in Seat 1 with a chip count of 1,305,000. In seat 2 was “Action Dan" Harrington with 2,230,000 chips. The seating arrangement and chip count for the rest of the players were:

• Tom Schneider in Seat 3 with 3,495,000 chips
• Thu Nguyen in Seat 4 with 1,475,000 chips
• David “The Dragon” Pham in Seat 5 with 470,000 chips
• Michael McClain in Seat 6 with 725,000 chips

Shi was the first to exit the game with winnings of $137,175. He was followed to the door by McClain who collected $182,900 for his efforts. In fourth place was Schneider who bagged $228,625 in prize money and Nguyen hit the rails with $388,660 in cash.

That left Harrington and “The Dragon” Pham at heads up play which lasted 3 hours. With his tight, conservative play, Harrington was able to beat Pham into runner-up with a winning hand of 10 hearts 5 spades to Pham’s 7 clubs 5 hearts. Dan Harrington won $1,599,865 and the championship title while Pham went home with $800,185.

Harrington, now aged 63, was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts on December 6, 1945. Known as a quiet and dignified player showing respect for the game and his opponents, he has stated that his motivation for playing poker is the money. He was a former bankruptcy lawyer and chess master who was once a US champion backgammon player.

Harrington graduated from Suffolk University and was once part of an MIT team of students that calculated the odds for roulette correctly and in the process, they beat the game. Now a professional poker player, Harrington holds 2 WSOP bracelets and has accumulated total live tournament winning of more than $6.5million as at end 2008. He also works in real estate and dabbles in the stock market. Currently living in Santa Monica, California, Harrington has authored three books on tournament poker and two on cash games.

-- Reinu C.