"I dedicate it to the kid in me, in my 20s, who chased this dream for so long...you end up getting to the point where you don't think it can happen," said Hakim in an interview with Jeff Platt after coming out on top. "Definitely hasn't sunk in, as everyone says."
Thanks to this victory, his career earnings now sit at nearly $2.6 million. The 1,620 Card Player Player of the Year points that Hakim secured as the champion were enough to move him inside the top 350 in the 2024 standings sponsored by Global Poker.
Hakim was hardly the only highly-accomplished player to run deep in this event. Five other players among the final nine had multiple millions in prior earnings.
Matthew Frankland had finished eighth in the Rock'n'Roll Poker Open $3,500 main event just days before making this final table. He backed up that deep run with a sixth-place finish good for $152,300 and 540 points.
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