The European Poker Tour has a new champion tonight with German PokerStars player Martin Schleich winning the title, the EPT trophy and a first prize of €850,000.

Schleich bested a field of 811 players to win the Season 8 €5,300 EPT Barcelona Main Event, the biggest poker tournament ever held in Spain. Spain’s hopes for a first EPT champion were dashed when Schleich beat Dragan Kostic heads-up but Kostic’s runner-up prize of €532,000 was the biggest sum ever won by a Spanish player on the European Poker Tour.

Schleich, 29, from Munich, who works part-time in customer service, was clearly stunned by his victory which came at the end of a gruelling 14-hour final. He said: “I can’t take it in right now. I’m very tired and my flight leaves in two hours!! I’m really happy but it’s too early to think about what I’ll do with the money.”

Team PokerStars Pro Eugene Katchalov came third at the event – after starting the day as the short stack. The 30-year-old, who won his first WSOP bracelet this summer and the PCA Super High Roller in January, won €315,000.

More than 170 players won their seat to EPT Barcelona on PokerStars and 20 made the money including Spanish player Marcos Fernandez who came 13th for € 29,000.

As well as Katchalov, seven other Team PokerStars Pros finished in the money. Belgium’s Matthias de Meulder very nearly made the final table, bettering his 37th place here last season to finish tenth for €50,000, the best live result of his career. Team PokerStars SportStar and tennis legend Boris Becker cashed for the first time in an EPT Main Event, finishing in 97th place for €8,000. Other members of Team PokerStars Pro to cash included Russian Alex Kravchenko (39th, € 16,000), Andre Akkari (61st, € 14,000), Victor Ramdin (64th, € 12,000) plus Vanessa Selbst , Juan Manuel Pastor and Rino Mathis, all picking up €10,000.

EPT Barcelona, which was filmed for TV broadcast, attracted a record field of 811 players. Since the EPT first visited Barcelona – it was the debut event of season one - the prize pool has swelled from €229,000 to €4,055,000 and the first prize is now more than ten times bigger than the €80,000 won by Alexander Stevic, the first ever EPT champion.

As well as the Main Event, there were 19 other side events held at Casino Barcelona this week. EPT Prague champion Roberto Romanello won the €5k NL Turbo for €110,250, German pro Phillip Gruissem won the €10k High Roller for €234,500 while Alexander Vaserfirer and Joe Ebanks chopped the €2k for €100,750 each. There were also a host of turbo bounty events, a €300 Ladies Event and Estrellas Poker Tour Special. Spanish pro Guillermo Garcia won the €3k Heads-Up event for €43,200.

A total of 811 players competed at this season's €5,300 EPT Barcelona Main Event making it the biggest poker tournament ever held in Spain.

The next event of EPT Season 8 is the EPT London Poker Festival, the first of Season 8's full-on poker festivals which is running September 30 - October 6, 2011 at the Hilton Metropole Hotel. Satellites for EPT London are running now on PokerStars as well as qualifiers for EPT San Remo and the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure in January. See www.ept.com for further details.