A 30-year-old immigrant from South Korea who has been playing poker professionally in the USA for five years has beaten out 2,719 other competitors to win Event #39 at the 2008 World Series of Poker (WSOP) in Las Vegas.

David “The Magnificent” Woo, who now calls Atlanta, Georgia, USA home, will be taking a magnificent $631,656 home to Dixie for winning the event, a $1,500 buy-in, no-limit Texas hold ‘em tournament that had 2,720 entrants, 270 payouts and a total prize pool of about $3.7 million.

The runnerup in the event was almost another Woo, save for one letter–Matt Wood, of Whitby, Ontario, Canada, who collected $389,844.

Third was Eric Beren of Dallas, Texas, USA, snagging $278,460.

Fourth was Habib Khanis of San Diego, California, USA, pocketing $233,906.

Fifth was Tom “Big Baller” Werthmann of Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, USA, increasing his worth by $191,209.

Sixth was Curt Early, also of Dallas, who stayed up late and won $150,368.

Seventh was Thandat Tran of El Monte, California, USA, banking $113,240.

Eighth was Mike Glasser of Plantation, Florida, USA, picking up $85,394.

Ninth was Jim Paras of Arlington, Massachusetts, USA, amassing $58,290.

Tenth was Paul Kerr of Strathclyde, Scotland, scotching $36,756.

Well-known names finishing in the money in the event include Barry Greenstein in 108th place and Humberto “El Wacko” Brenes in 184th place.

After his big win, Woo dumped any pretension of modesty and told reporters: “Every time I play poker is a learning experience. I would have been sick with anything less than first place. I really expected to win.”

(E-mail Tom Somach at tomsomach@yahoo.com.)