Sebastian Pauli has won the London leg of the 11th season of the European Poker Tour, with the 25-year-old management and economics student at Ruhr-University in Bochum never surrendering the chip lead from the moment eight players sat down for the final table at the Grand Connaught Rooms.

The German was the absolute measure of calmness for the 11 hours it took to outwit some of the world's most celebrated poker talents to take home the £499,700 top prize after beating Kevin MacPhee heads-up to take the title.

"I was confident that I had a good chance with the chip lead," said Pauli. "People are afraid of the chip leader and I knew I could apply a lot of pressure... I'm not really the party guy, I'll sit down with my friends and talk about what has happened."

At the start of play Pauli was chip leader on 6.13m, with Spain's Pablo Gordillo the short stack on 975k. The rest of the field, including France's Jonathan Bensadoun, Britain's Jake Cody, Ireland's Kevin Killeen, Artur Koren of Germany and American MacPhee were all wedged in between 2.5m and 2m chips, with Poland's Jakub Mroczek on 1.3m

The day got off to a flying start with a succession of big hands clashing but surprisingly there were no casualties until Gordillo called a shove by Killeen, who found pocket threes in the cut-off. Gordillo, one seat to his left, was the only player at the table with fewer chips at that stage and he followed Killeen all-in with AH-10C, but Killeen flopped another three to knock the Spaniard out.

Bensadoun, at 38 the oldest player at the final, was the next to hit the rail, getting the last of his chips in the middle with AD-QC only to run into Koren with pocket kings. A queen on the flop couldn't save the Frenchman and he went out in seventh place.

After losing a pot worth about a million chips, Mroczek was left on the ropes and shortly afterwards he was on the rail after shoving with AS-8S into Killeen's pocket tens.

Two players at the final table, Cody and MacPhee, were bidding to become double EPT champions and the battle between them to achieve that goal sprang into life five-handed.

First the American won a race for his tournament life with KD-QD against Cody's AH-3H; then Cody raised from the small blind with QC-JC and MacPhee shoved from the big blind with AH-8H with the man from Rochdale calling with almost double MacPhee's stack. Cody was again the loser in the race and three hands later they were at it again, with Cody now at risk.

His KD-JC was racing MacPhee's pocket sixes and even though a jack flopped and a king turned, all five cards on the board were hearts and they chopped the pot.

And Cody's tournament came to an end two hands later when his KD-10D connected with the JH-KC-KD flop and he shoved all-in. MacPhee called with pocket queens and spiked another on the turn to send Cody home in fifth place.

With MacPhee and Killeen resurgent and Pauli still sitting pretty at the top, Koren was the man in trouble. But when he found pocket eights, Irishman Killeen had no choice but to call with his QC-JD and he hit both to send the German player to the rail.

With only three players remaining, they talked for the first time about a chop, but couldn't agree whether to split according to ICM or based on chip counts so play continued.

And so it was Killeen who went out in third place, when he got his chips in with AD-7D and ran into MacPhee with AH-QS. Although there was a seven on the flop to put the Irishman in front, a queen on the river confirmed his exit in third place.

Pauli talked briefly again about chopping the remaining prize money with MacPhee but again they couldn't agree terms and on they went, with MacPhee eventually getting his chips in with AD-10C but running smack into Pauli's AC-QS. There were no miracles and there was no double EPT champion, just one very good player from Germany, who could finally let out his emotions.

"It means the world to me," Pauli said. "I was really calm for the whole final table, but when I realised I'd won it all came out and I couldn't control my emotions."

EPT11 London, 12-18 October
1 Sebastian Pauli, Germany, £499,700
2 Kevin MacPhee, United States, £308,500
3 Kevin Killeen, Ireland, £220,500
4 Artur Koren, Germany, £168,900
5 Jake Cody, UK, £133,800
6 Jakub Mroczek, Poland, £104,200
7 Jonathan Bensadoun, France, £75,900
8 Pablo Gordillo, Spain, £51,900