Zhi Wu Wins 2021 WSOP $600 NL Hold'em Deepstack for $281,604

Zhu Wu of Boston, Massachusetts, proudly earned his first World Series of Poker gold bracelet on Wednesday. Wu topped a field of 4,527 entries in Event #8: $600 No-Limit Hold’em Deepstack and won $281,406.

“It’s pretty good,” Wu told reporters after. “It’s very exciting.”

Wu spent only about an hour on the final day of the event under the bright lights of the main PokerGO stage, but that’s all it took for him to find his way to the winner’s circle. The final day saw five players return with action starting up at 4 p.m. local time. At right around 5 p.m., Wu was posing for photos with his new piece of jewelry.

On his way to victory, Wu eliminated Ryan Chan in fourth place, Chrishan Sivasundaram in third place, and Ari Mezrich in second place. On the final hand, Wu picked up pocket aces and got max value to win it all.

“The time has come,” Wu said about how he felt when he looked down to see two aces. “This is it. The last hand.”

On the button, Wu raised to 5,200,000 on the button with the . Mezrich called from the big blind with the and the flop fell . Mezrich checked, Wu bet 9,000,000, and Mezrich made the call. The turn was the and Mezrich checked again. After Mezrich checked, Wu quickly announced that he was all in. Mezrich thought for a little bit, then announced a call and saw the bad news. Wu went over to his supporters on the rail, turned his back to the table, and held their hands in anticipation of the river card. The hit the river and the title went to Wu.

The win marked the largest of Wu’s career, who came into the event with a career-best live score of $21,015 from a second-place finish in a $1,200 bounty event from WPT Seminole Rock & Roll Poker Open in 2019. In 2017, Wu won a Mega Stack Challenge $400 tournament at Foxwoods in Connecticut for $19,000.

Not a professional but someone who enjoys playing poker tournaments, Wu plans to stick to his schedule of playing events up to $1,500 at the WSOP, including the Millionaire Maker, and also the $10,000 Main Event. With the success he found in Event #8 and the $281,604 he won, Wu and his supporters said that they’ll probably do a little partying before they get back into the grind in order to stick to the schedule they mapped out.