Alin Ivan Wins Triton ONE Title in North Cyprus with Heroic Call

The first-ever Triton ONE festival held on European soil is off to a strong start. The $3,000 no-limit hold’em QQPK Genesis event drew 912 entries, making for a healthy prize pool of $2,443,248. After four starting flights and two more days of combined-field play, Alin Ivan emerged victorious with the title and the top prize of $450,000. This was the largest live tournament result by far for the 26-year-old from Romania. “This is a completely surreal experience,” Ivan told Triton staff after coming out on top. “It’s one of those moments you dream of when you start playing poker. To win out of 1,000 players, it’s hard to even think about. It’s crazy.”

Prior to this, his top score was the $80,000 he earned for a 113th-place showing in the 2025 World Series of Poker Paradise super main event. Ivan now boasts career earnings in excess of $673,000. The 1,368 Card Player Player of the Year points that came with this win were enough to move him inside the top 500 in the 2026 standings presented by CoinPoker.

Xuan Liu, who won the Triton Montenegro WPT Global Slam last spring to become the first-ever female Triton champion, made it to the official final table in this event. Liu earned $59,048 for her seventh-place showing. She now has nearly $4.3 million in recorded scores to her name. Kudinov held the overnight chip lead among the six players who returned for the unscheduled extra day. Ivan was second in chips when play resumed. Ivan landed the first knockout blow of the final session, winning an all-in with A♥K♠ against the K♦7♥ of Peng Chen. Ivan scored another elimination shortly after the first, with pocket aces besting the pocket fives of Yang Zhang. Pavel Ignatov was the next to fall, with his pocket queens cracked by the K-3 of Ruslan Kasper. The next key hand began with Ivan limping for 3,000,000 total from the small blind with Q♣2♣. Kudinov checked his option in the big blind with 6♥2♥ and the two saw a flop of Q♦8♦5♣. Ivan checked his top pair and called Kudinov’s 4,500,000 wager. The turn was the 4♣ to give Ivan a flush draw to go with his pair of queens. Ivan called and the K♥ completed the board. The overcard on the end prompted another check from Ivan. Kudinov moved all-in, putting Ivan to the test for his remaining 43,600,000. After a long tank, Ivan made the hero call with second pair to double into the chip lead. Ivan soon picked off the last of Kaspar’s stack with pocket fives besting A-4 suited. With that, Ivan entered heads-up play with better than a 2:1 chip lead. He had pulled even further ahead before the final hand of the tournament arrived. Kudinov got all-in with A♣4♣ trailing A♦Q♥ for Ivan. The board came down K♠K♥Q♣7♥4♠ and Ivan made kings and queens with an ace kicker to secure the pot and the title. Kudinov was awarded $272,000 as the runner-up.