WSOPC Middelkerke 2026: Ingo Paulus Wins €550 Mystery Bounty, Titeca and Mathisen Also Take Rings

Four rings have been awarded and five are still to come. The World Series of Poker Circuit’s Belgian stop at the Partouche-run casino in Middelkerke is now in full swing. The €550 Mystery Bounty, the biggest event of the opening weekend so far, has gone to Germany’s Ingo Paulus.

Paulus beat Italy’s Salvatore Ciccarelli heads-up to claim €13,500 in prize money. That was only part of his win. He also pulled €19,970 from the mystery bounty envelopes, which took his total to €33,470, roughly 61 times his buy-in. Belgian Pierre Titeca won the Seniors ring and Norwegian Sebastian Mathisen won the Knockout, rounding off a busy run of results before today’s €1,500 Main Event starts.

Event #3: €550 Mystery Bounty – Paulus Takes the Biggest Slice

The Mystery Bounty drew 253 entries and built a total pool of €116,531. That money was split almost evenly. €60,720 went into the bounty pool and €55,811 paid for the regular prizes. Thirty-nine players finished in the money, and the minimum cash was €430.

Place	Player	Country	Prize	% of cash pool
1	Ingo Paulus	Germany	€13,500	24.2%
2	Salvatore Ciccarelli	Italy	€8,300	14.9%
3	Quentin Destoky	Belgium	€5,700	10.2%
4	Tim Vandemoortele-Coppieters	Belgium	€4,102	7.3%
5	Frederic Soete	Belgium	€3,020	5.4%
6	Praveen Sewnarain	Netherlands	€2,240	4.0%
7	Yusuf Kaya	Netherlands	€1,670	3.0%
8	Maxime Loste	France	€1,250	2.2%
9	Pieter Van Leemput	Belgium	€950	1.7%

The prize column shows cash payouts only. Bounty totals for players other than the winner were not published.

Why Paulus’s bounty haul matters

The most striking number is this: Paulus collected 32.9% of the entire bounty pool by himself. In a mystery bounty, you only find out what a knockout is worth when you draw an envelope, and most of the money usually sits in a few big envelopes. Paulus clearly drew at least one of them. His bounty winnings were worth almost 50% more than his first-place prize.

This matters if you’re new to the format. In a standard freezeout, the final-table payout ladder decides how much you win. In a mystery bounty, a player who goes out in 15th but draws the top envelope can leave with more than the runner-up. That changes how you should think about calling all-ins once the bounty phase starts, because covering a short stack is worth more than the chips alone.

Why the minimum cash was below the buy-in

New players are often surprised to see a €430 minimum cash in a €550 tournament. It isn’t a mistake. More than half of the pool goes to bounties, so the regular cash pool is smaller and the first payouts come in below the buy-in. The 20 players paid from 20th to 39th received €430 to €530 in cash. Whether they made a profit depended on knocking someone out after the bubble.

Who made the money

Of the 37 named players in the money, 15 were Belgian, eight were French, four were Dutch and four were German. There was one player each from Italy, Ireland, Tunisia, the Czech Republic, Norway and Spain. That’s a strongly regional field, which is typical for Middelkerke, close to the French and Dutch borders.

Event #2: €550 Senior (50+) – Home Win for Pierre Titeca

The Seniors event was much smaller, with 59 entries building a €27,175 prize pool. Only nine players were paid, so cashing meant reaching the final table. Belgium’s Pierre Titeca won it for €8,600.

Place	Player	Prize	% of pool
1	Pierre Titeca	€8,600	31.6%
2	Joerg Wilms	€5,400	19.9%
3	Willem De Graaf	€3,485	12.8%
4	Rolf Polaczek	€2,440	9.0%
5	Michiel Jonker	€1,900	7.0%
6	Anne Trebitsch	€1,600	5.9%
7	Olivier Baeten	€1,400	5.2%
8	Miguel Coussement	€1,250	4.6%
9	Raynald Coppin	€1,100	4.0%

Putting the two €550 events side by side shows how field size shapes payouts. Titeca took 31.6% of his prize pool, while Paulus took 24.2% of his cash pool. Smaller fields pay fewer places and push more of the money to the top. So a Seniors ring can take a bigger share of its pool even when the prize itself is smaller.

Event #4: €500 Knockout – Mathisen Takes the Ring

The €500 Knockout drew 156 entries for a €65,988 prize pool, with 24 places paid. Norway’s Sebastian Mathisen beat Belgium’s Bryaton Aernoudt heads-up and banked €8,758 plus €3,000 in bounties.

Place	Player	Total (incl. bounties)	Bounties	Bounty share
1	Sebastian Mathisen	€11,758	€3,000	25.5%
2	Bryaton Aernoudt	€7,590	€2,000	26.4%
3	Francois Jaecque	€4,940	€1,200	24.3%
4	Michael Madur	€3,390	€800	23.6%
5	David Riha	€3,060	€1,200	39.2%
6	Olivier Arnault	€1,980	€600	30.3%
7	David Debue	€2,460	€1,400	56.9%
8	Joao-Victor Bacelar	€1,650	€800	48.5%
9	Pierre-Frederic Claes	€1,110	€400	36.0%

Look at seventh place. David Debue went out before Olivier Arnault but still earned €480 more, because he had collected €1,400 in bounties. Only the top two collected more. Knockout events reward aggression in a way regular tournaments don’t, and Debue’s result shows it most clearly on this final table.

Same Players, Two Final Tables

The Mystery Bounty and the Knockout ran close together, and several players went deep in both. Most results summaries miss this:

• Sebastian Mathisen min-cashed in 30th place in the Mystery Bounty for €430, then won the Knockout ring.
• Bryaton Aernoudt finished 20th in the Mystery Bounty (€530) and second in the Knockout (€7,590).
• David Riha (Czech Republic) placed 27th in the Mystery Bounty and fifth in the Knockout.
• Pierre-Frederic Claes came 25th in the Mystery Bounty and ninth in the Knockout.

That’s a useful lesson for anyone planning a festival trip. Low buy-in bounty events reward the same skills: picking good spots to cover short stacks, staying patient while bounty values grow, and playing a high volume of hands well. If one of these formats suits you, the other usually will too.

How Middelkerke’s Mystery Bounty Compares

The WSOP Circuit came back to Belgium in November 2025 after an eight-year gap, and Middelkerke is now on the calendar every year. Here’s how this year’s €550 Mystery Bounty compares with the same buy-in at other European Circuit stops.

Stop	Date	Entries
Aix-en-Provence, France	Apr 2025	571
Slovakia	Aug 2025	355
Middelkerke, Belgium	Nov 2026	253

With 253 entries, Middelkerke is a mid-sized stop, which is good news for players. There are fewer opponents per ring than at the big French venues, and each buy-in buys the same value. Each €550 buy-in put about €460 into the combined pool (roughly 84%). Around €90 went on fees and staff, which is normal for Circuit events at this level.

What’s Next: The €1,500 Main Event

Flight A of the €1,500 No-Limit Hold’em Main Event starts today, Wednesday, November 11. The series runs until Sunday, November 15, and five more rings are still to be won. Turnout from Belgium, France and the Netherlands has been strong so far, so expect a busy Main Event. Nathan Gullentops, who won the €300 Mini Main last weekend, is one to watch if he plays.

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