PokerStars reached a special milestone this week, dealing hand number 10,000,000,000. Hang on while I double check if I used the correct amount of zeros? That is a big pile of zeros to keep track of, but then 10 Billion is a big, big, (BIG) number!

To celebrate this milestone hand PokerStars awarded a $100,000 bonus to the winner of the hand. So let me tell you how this hand was dealt, and all about its lucky winner.

More than 100,000 players were packing PokerStars tables, as busy a Saturday afternoon as PokerStars has seen. I'm sure plenty of those players were looking at the hand count number in the top left of their table, hoping it would read #10,000,000,000 for them.

At 6 handed No Limit Hold'em table 'Venusia' sat PokerStars players Rechargeable, inwooke, The_Moog, XTedForrestX, Ferius, and justine0003.

Suddenly, everything stopped as the game was paused, and the hand number at the top of the Venusia table read: 10,000,000,000.

An announcement was made, and soon the rail was flooded with observers offering congratulations and advice. 122 players joined the waiting list for this lucky table, of course they would be too late to get dealt into this special hand!

The Big Ten Billion. PokerStars Host Jeff was there to oversee the action.

HostJeff [observer] said, "Guess what?"

justine0003 said, "?"

The_Moog said, "wowowow"

HostJeff [observer] said, "Don't leave your seat -- you're all winners!"

And indeed they were. I mentioned $100,000 to the winner. Did I also mention that there was a $10,000 prize to everyone else dealt into this game?

Four of the six players got their chips in the middle, as the board came out Ac Kc Td 9c 8h.
Rechargeable showed 5c, 4d - high card Ace.
The_Moog showed 9h Th - two pair, Tens and Nines.
Ferius mucked.
justine0003 showed 3c 8c - a flush, Ace high.

Justine0003's low cards were clubs, and the flush gave her the $100,000 win. Every other player at the table received $10,000.

So, who is the mystery woman who walked away with $100,000? Her name, as you might expect, is Justine. Justine Hall, in fact.

The 19-year-old woman is a university student from Canada who is waiting tables for the summer. She started playing poker in high school about four years ago and fell in love with the game. So, naturally, she gravitated toward PokerStars.



While she knew the BIG Ten Billion promotion was going on, she wasn't expecting to hit it. In fact, when her table stopped, she didn't even realize that she had hit the big one.

"It was a total fluke," she said. "I didn't even realize that it was the major big hand right away,. I thought it was just another one leading up to it!"

So, now, Justine has $100,000 which she plans to use to pay for her education, and, she said, "of course, a little shopping. I'm just really thankful and feel extremely lucky."

Congratulations to all the players who won money in the milestone hands leading up to the BIG Ten Billion, especially to justine0003 who has three zeros in her PokerStars name, six zeros in her new poker bankroll, and has the ten zeros of PokerStars 10 Billionth hand to thank for this.