Christopher Marcadet has won the PokerStars Open Aix-en-Provence Main Event and a career-best €130,000. The €1,100 buy-in tournament drew 859 entrants over four days, built a €824,640 prize pool and ended without a heads-up deal, even though first and second place were separated by €43,000. For a player whose previous best score was less than a third of this one, per PokerNews, it is a life-changing result and a good case study in how a final table plays out when two relative newcomers decide to play for the trophy rather than chop. We covered the earlier high roller at the same festival in our Aix high roller report.
The Result
According to PokerNews, Marcadet, a native of France who now lives in Budapest, travelled home for the event. He described the win as a "real milestone" and said he was still struggling to process it. His €130,000 prize is nearly four times his previous best result, and the win pushes his lifetime earnings toward $350,000.
Here are the final table payouts:
| Rank | Player | Country | Prize |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Christopher Marcadet | France | €130,000 |
| 2 | John Rezzonico | Switzerland | €87,000 |
| 3 | Jordan Ayasse | France | €62,000 |
| 4 | Dinh Nguyen | Vietnam | about €45,000 |
| 5 | Omar Lakhdari | Algeria | €34,000 |
| 6 | Krzysztof Zapolski | Poland | €26,000 |
| 7 | Laurent Lebar | France | €20,340 |
| 8 | Arno Peonnet | France | €16,200 |
| 9 | Chenxiang Miao | China | €13,000 |
PokerNews' table lists Nguyen's payout as €45,500 while the text says €45,000, so we show it as approximately €45,000. The top 129 finishers were paid.
The Field and the Prize Pool
With 859 entries at €1,100, the prize pool of €824,640 works out to roughly €960 per entry, meaning the rake and fees take a little over 12 percent of each buy-in. That is typical for live events at this level; always check the structure sheet before you register, as fees affect your long-term return. If you want to understand how fees compound, our rakeback explainer covers the online equivalent.
The paid places (129 of 859) represent around 15 percent of the field, and the winner collected about 15.8 percent of the pool. That is a fairly flat payout curve by the standards of large-field events: the champion earns around 1.5 times the runner-up, whereas in many mega-field tournaments the winner earns three times as much or more as second. A flatter curve narrows the difference between first and second, which sets the stage for deal talk.
Why No Deal?
PokerNews notes that heads-up play ended without a deal. The gap between first and second was €43,000, a significant sum relative to both players' career earnings. Rezzonico had less than $2,000 in earnings before this result, so €87,000 for second was itself a landmark payday.
Deals in heads-up play usually turn on three factors:
- Chip counts. A chip leader has more to gain by playing on, and a short stack has more to gain from a chop.
- Skill perception. If one player believes they have an edge, they will favour playing on; the other may want a deal to reduce variance.
- Prize and title value. Trophies, ranking points and sponsor visibility matter more to some than the guaranteed money.
Under an ICM-style chop, the money is split in proportion to chips; under a "chip chop" it is split purely by stack ratio. We explain both methods, with worked examples, in our guide to final table deals and the ICM glossary page. With a €43,000 gap, the maximum shift between first and second is large, but the actual deal amount depends on chips. We do not have the chip counts, so we cannot say what any offer would have looked like.
What the result does show is that players are not obliged to deal. If both are comfortable with the variance, playing it out is a legitimate choice.
The Supporting Cast
Several finalists had stories of their own, per PokerNews:
- Chenxiang Miao, the first finalist eliminated, has more than $2 million in live tournament winnings.
- Omar Lakhdari recently won two WSOP Circuit rings in Paris.
- Dinh Nguyen's previous five-figure score was €50,800 in a 2023 event.
- Rezzonico's runner-up finish more than made up for a thin results record.
The mix of experienced and newer players is typical of PokerStars Open events, where mid-priced buy-ins attract a wide range of talent. If you want to compare similar events, our tournaments page lists live and online series.
Marcadet's Reaction and What Comes Next
Marcadet praised the event's organisation and structure and said he plans to return to defend his title. The next PS Open is a €1,650 buy-in event running December 2 to 7 at EPT Prague. For context, the 2025 edition drew 3,024 entries and a €4,354,560 prize pool, and Yulian Bogdanov won it, according to PokerNews. Those numbers show how much bigger the Prague stop is than Aix.
How Do Results Like This Happen?
A four-day tournament with 859 starters requires a player to navigate multiple levels of variance. Strong results for amateurs and semi-pros are common in big-field live events precisely because luck plays a large role in no-limit hold'em tournaments. That is not a reason to dismiss the win: Marcadet needed to make good decisions, avoid major mistakes and run well. But it is a reason to be realistic about expectations when you enter. Our poker strategy hub and bankroll management guide both stress that tournament players should expect long stretches without cashing.
What This Means for Players
Plan your bankroll for variance. In a field of 859, the chance of any given entrant cashing is about 15 percent, and the chance of winning is under one in 800 on average. Bankroll rules for multi-table tournaments should reflect that. We recommend reading our bankroll management guide.
Know your deal options before you reach the final table. Decide in advance whether you will consider a chop, and what method you will accept. A calm pre-decided approach beats a rushed negotiation in the middle of a heads-up match.
Use satellites to reduce buy-in cost. Many players reach live events such as PS Open stops via online qualifiers. See our PokerStars-related coverage and the review pages for sites with satellite schedules, such as Americas Cardroom.
Learn the maths. Understanding pot odds and equity helps in every spot, from the first level to the final table.
The Bigger Picture
PokerStars Open stops across Europe have become a staple of the live calendar, bridging the gap between small local events and the EPT. A €130,000 first prize at a €1,100 buy-in is meaningful money, and Marcadet's win is the sort of story the series relies on: a player from France, living abroad, returns home and takes the title. For the rest of the field, it is another reminder that the biggest prize in poker is often decided by a handful of hands, and that the winner is frequently the person who simply stayed in the tournament long enough for those hands to arrive.