blonde poker forum

It's probable that Tighty, who used to do these so wonderfully for us, will be too busy this year, so I think we'll try & do the same as we did last year, which was to lift the Updates from Next Door. Barny will be doing them again, as he did last year, & I've sought his permission to use them.

Of course, if anyone else is able to chip in, all the better. 

Please always note that Vegas is 8 hours behind the UK.

The 50th Annual WSOP started today. The Casino Employees' event as per tradition kicks-things off, but is shortly followed by the first of the big boy events, a $10K Super Turbo Bounty job. Full schedule (typos permitting) is:

29/05/19 Event 1 - $500 Casino Employees NLH, 3 Day Event
29/05/19 Event 2 - $10K Super Turbo Bounty NLH, 2 Day Event
30/05/19 Event 3 - $500 Big 50 NLH, 4 Days, 4 starting flights Thu/Fri/Sat/Sun
30/05/19 Event 4 - $1500 Omaha Hi/Lo 8 or Better, 4 Day Event
31/05/19 Event 5 - $50K High Roller NLH, 4 Day Event
01/06/19 Event 6 - $2500 Limit Mixed Triple Draw, 3 Day Event
01/06/19 Event 7 - $400 WSOP.com Online NLH, 1 Day Event
02/06/19 Event 8 - $10K Short Deck NLH, 4 Day Event
03/06/19 Event 9 - $600 NLH Deepstack, 2 Day Event, $500K guaranteed prize pool
03/06/19 Event 10 - $1500 Dealers Choice, 3 Day Event
03/06/19 Event 11 - $15K NLH, 4 Day Event
04/06/19 Event 12 - $1000 NLH Super Turbo Bounty, 1 Day Event
04/06/19 Event 13 - $1500 NL 2-7 Lowball Draw, 3 Day Event
05/06/19 Event 14 - $1500 HORSE, 4 Day Event
05/06/19 Event 15 - $10K Heads-up NLH, 4 Day Event
05/06/19 Event 16 - $1500 6-max NLH, 3 Day Event
05/06/19 Event 17 - $1500 NLH Shootout, 3 Day Event
06/06/19 Event 18 - $10K, Omaha Hi-Lo 8 or Better, 4 Day Event
07/06/19 Event 19 - $1500 Millionaire Maker, 5 Day Event, 2 starting flights Fri/Sat
07/06/19 Event 20 - $1500 Seven Card Stud, 4 Day Event
08/06/19 Event 21 - $10K No Limit 2-7 Lowball Draw, 4 Day Event
09/06/19 Event 22 - $1000 Double Stack NLH, 2 Day Event
09/06/19 Event 23 - $1500 Eight Game Mix, 3 Days Event
09/06/19 Event 24 - $600 WSOP.com Online PLO 6 handed, 1 Day Event
10/06/19 Event 25 - $600 PLO Deepstack, 2 Day Event
10/06/19 Event 26 - $2520 NLH Marathon, 6 Day Event
10/06/19 Event 27 - $1500 Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo 8 or better, 4 Day Event
11/06/19 Event 28 - $1000 NLH, 3 Day Event
11/06/19 Event 29 - $10K HORSE, 4 Day Event
12/06/19 Event 30 - $1000 PLO, 3 Day Event
12/06/19 Event 31 - $3K NLH 6-max, 4 Day Event
13/06/19 Event 32 - Seniors NLH, 4 Day Event
13/06/19 Event 33 - $1500, Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw, 3 Day Event
14/06/19 Event 34 - $1000 Double Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, 2 starting flights Fri/Sat
14/06/19 Event 35 - $10K Dealers Choice 6 Max, 4 Day Event
15/06/19 Event 36 - $3K NLH Shootout, 3 Day Event
16/06/19 Event 37 - $800 NLH Deepstack, 3 Day Event, $750K guaranteed
16/06/19 Event 38 - $600 WSOP.com Online NLH Knockout Bounty, 1 Day Event
17/06/19 Event 39 - $1000 Super Seniors NLH, 3 Day Event
17/06/19 Event 40 - $1500 PLO, 3 Day Event
17/06/19 Event 41 - $10K Seven Card Stud, 4 Day Event
18/06/19 Event 42 - $600 Mixed NLH/PLO deepstack, 8-max, 2 Day Event, $500K Guaranteed prize pool
18/06/19 Event 43 - $2500 Mixed Big Bet, 3 Day Event
19/06/19 Event 44 - $1500 NLH Bounty, 3 Day Event
19/06/19 Event 45 - $25K PLO High Roller, 4 Day Event
19/06/19 Event 46 - $500 WSOP.com Online NLH Turbo Deepstack, 1 Day Event
20/06/19 Event 47 - $1000/$10K Ladies NLH, 4 Day Event
20/06/19 Event 48 - $2500 NLH, 4 Day Event
20/06/19 Event 49 - $10K Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw, 4 Day Event
21/06/19 Event 50 - $1500 Monster Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, 2 starting flights Fri/Sat
21/06/19 Event 51 - $2500 Mixed Omaha Hi-Lo/Stud Hi-Lo, 3 Day Event
22/06/19 Event 52 - $10K PLO 8-max, 4 Day Event
23/06/19 Event 53 - $800 NLH Deepstack 8-max, 2 Day Event. $750K guaranteed prize pool
23/06/19 Event 54 - $1500 Razz, 4 Day Event
23/06/19 Event 55 - $1000 WSOP.com Online NLH double stack, 1 Day Event
24/06/19 Event 56 - $1500 NLH Super Turbo Bounty, 1 Day Event
24/06/19 Event 57 - $1000 NLH Tag Team, 4 Day Event
24/06/19 Event 58 - $50K Poker Players Championship (mixed games), 5 Day Event
25/06/19 Event 59 - $600 NLH Deepstack Championship, 3 Day Event, $500K guaranteed prize pool
25/06/19 Event 60 - $1500 PLO High/Lo 8 or better, 3 Day Event
26/06/19 Event 61 - $400 Colossus, 3 Day event, 2 starting flights Wed/Thu
26/06/19 Event 62 - $10K Razz, 4 Day Event
27/06/19 Event 63 - $1500 Omaha Mix, 4 Day Event
28/06/19 Event 64 - $888 Crazy Eights NLH, 4 Day Event, 4 starting flights, Fri/Sat/Sun/Mon
28/06/19 Event 65 - $10K PLO Hi/Lo 8 or better, 4 Day Event
29/06/19 Event 66 - $1500 NLH, 3 Day Event
30/06/19 Event 67 - S10K Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo 8 or better, 4 Day Event
30/06/18 Event 68 - $1000 WSOP.com Online NLH Championship, 1 Day Event
01/07/19 Event 69 - $1000 Mini Main Event, 2 Day Event
01/07/19 Event 70 - $5K NLH 6-max, 4 Day Event
02/07/19 Event 71 - $500 Salute to Warriors NLH, 3 Day Event
02/07/19 Event 72 - $10K Limit Hold'em Championship, 3 Day Event
03/07/19 Event 73 - $10K MAIN EVENT WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP NLH, 10 Day Event, 3 starting flights Wed/Thu/Fri
03/07/09 Event 74 - $3200 WSOP.com Online NLH High Roller, 1 Day Event
06/07/09 Event 75 - $1111 Little One for One Drop, 4 Day Event, 3 starting flights Sat/Sun/Mon
07/07/19 Event 76 - $800 WSOP.com Online NLH 6-max, 1 Day Event
08/07/19 Event 77 - $3K Limit Hold'em 6-max, 4 Day Event
09/07/19 Event 78 - $1500 PLO Bounty, 3 Day Event
09/07/19 Event 79 - $3K NLH, 4 Day Event
10/07/19 Event 80 - $1500 Mixed NLH/PLO, 3 Day Event
10/07/19 Event 81 - $1500 Bracelet Winners Only NLH, 4 Day Event
11/07/19 Event 82 - $1500 NLH Double Stack, 2 Day Event
11/07/19 Event 83 - $100K NLH High Roller, 3 Day Event
12/07/19 Event 84 - $1500 The Closer NLH, 2 Day Event, 3 starting flights Fri/Sat/Sun
12/07/19 Event 85 - $3K PLO 6-max, 4 Day Event
13/07/19 Event 86 - $10K NLH 6-max, 4 Day Event
14/07/19 Event 87 - $3K HORSE, 3 Day Event
14/07/19 Event 88 - $500 WSOP.com Online NLH Summer Saver, 1 Day Event
15/07/19 Event 89 - $5K NLH, 2 Day Event

Way more bracelet events than in previous years, with a significant rise in Online events.

I'll try to keep you all updated as much as life permits, hope to see many other posters putting their tuppennce worth in as well, the more the merrier. And of course if you're going to the WSOP to play one or more events, let us know and I can look out for you in updates and chip counts.

Play is underway in the 2019 WSOP with cards in the air in the Casino Employees' Event. I'm betting that neither you or I will have ever heard of 99% of the players in this, so I will be reduced to picking out one or two based on "interesting" names.

Well we've come up trumps already, as the winner of the second hand related in the official WSOP updates goes by the name of Brian Booze.

This is a $500 event, but later tonight the first of the big boy tournaments starts, the $10K Super Turbo Bounty NLH competition, where I'll probably have a better grasp on a few of the players.

(https://media2.giphy.com/media/1BFDUGgRKDlgVimWcW/giphy.gif?cid=790b76115cef0d79492e7466770f06e6&rid=giphy.gif)

I'll nick some stuff from Pokernews if I remember.

Final table of 6 in the turbo
Has Daniel Negreanu on in 4/6 with 1 mill n 15 k Chips

Ben lamb 13 th 99 v king ten- Reading updates others went onwards or out with a mixture of hands - guess it’s the turbo formula ?
Maniac loser - love this guys name ! 17 th
Dan Shak 22 nd
Erik Seidel -25 th

Updates courtesy of wsop updates / poker news

Didn’t see a mention about plinlop in the couple pages I read

Toby lewis squeaked into the money
But being British doesn’t really get mentioned by the very USA player biased updates !

Patrick went out AQ vs KJ all in pre for a considerable amount of big blinds, but it was a knock out.   It was about level 8 or so.

WSOP 1 - $500 Casino Employee's NLH, Day 1 of 3, 686 entrants


After a drop in entries the last two years, the tide has been turned with over 100 extra buy-ins in the prize pool. Longer levels and more play has certainly attracted more entrants.

Early on, it looked like it could be a headline writers dream. Diana Plant was in a lot of pots, Cody Boyles was getting hot and Brent Pontius was on auto-Pilate.

But all those and more (including WSOP tweeter-in-chief Kevin Mathers and open Bracelet winners Dutch Boyd and Jonathan Aguilar) went out to leave 103 players overnight

No Brits involved (the only one mentioned at all was Olvier Biles who departed early, so the top three are Cosmo Andoloro, Christopher Bowen & Miguel Cardenas.

They will play down to a final six today.


Event 2 - $10K Super Turbo Bounty NLH, Day 1 of 2, 204 entrants
Extended into a two day event this year, but down from 243 to 204 players.

Six players go into Day 2 with the big name amongst them Daniel Negreanu. Daniel hasn't wan a bracelet since 2013, and one in Vegas for a scarely believeable 11 years, but he is in the middle of the pack aiming for his 7th bracelet.

He is accompanied on the FT by 4 Americans, Asher Conniff and Loren Klein having the big stacks, Ali Imsirovic a middle stack and both Ping Liu and Brian Green needing something to happen quickly when they restart.

Klein has won bracelets in each of the last three years, and a fourth would put him in very rare company.

We had our first two GB cashes, Toby Lewis and Matas Cimbolas among the money (there may have been some others who had bounties - $3000 each, but these are not recorded.

This will be the first event to be decided, restarting at 12noon Vegas time with just 20 minute levels and even the chip leader having just over 50BB at the re-start


To Start Today
Event 3 - $500 Big 50 NLH, 4 Days, Starting Flight A
Event 4 - $1500 Omaha Hi/Lo 8 or Better, 4 Day Event

How does Dutch Boyd get into that? What Casino would employ him?

Event 2 has resumed and I mentioned before that both Liu and Green needed something to happen early, well it did and they both doubled up through Loren Klein. Not so good news for Negreanu, his wait for his 7th bracelet goes on as he was first man out today.

Same way most wronguns get on, I'd guess. Gift of the gab.

https://twitter.com/AllenKessler/status/1134316566621765632

That's what you get for playing limit.

blockers :P

Amazing what you see in WSOP O8 stuff.

I was down to the last few tables in one & got it all-in with the nut high on a high-only Board & villain puffed his chest out, & said "no mate, THIS is the nuts, I got quads", & proudly turned over 2-2-2-2.
 

No doubt he has whinged at the player, put him right and held the game up whilst taking a photo.   Rest of table sniggering quietly.   

All the best Omaha players play Quad deuces.

Event 1 - $500 Casino Employee's NLH, Day 2 of 3, 686 entrants

The 103 qualifiers from Day 1 have been reduced to just 6 after a second day of action.

The chip leader is a WSOP insider, Media Relations Manager Isaac Hanson is the overnight big stack ahead of Jorge Ruiz and Nicholas Haynes

Two Canadian players (Adam Lamers and Jeffrey Fast) are still in the hunt for a rare non-US win in this event.


Event 2 - $10K Super Turbo Bounty NLH, Day 2 of 2, 204 entrants

Daniel Negreanu was among the final six going for his 7th bracelet, but in true Turbo style (the whole FT took only 72 hands) he shoved very early on, was called and beaten to finish in 6th.

Ali Ismirovic has been one of the hotter players of the last 12 months, and he entered heads-up play with Brian Green with a deficit to make up. He got very close after doubling up on hand 70, but two hands later his pocket kings failed to hold against Green's A9 as a nine came on the flop and another on the river.

Green takes his first bracelet and $345K, Ismirovic $213K and third placed Asher Conniff $145K (all excluding any bounties)


Event 3 - $500 Big 50 NLH, 4 Days, Starting Flight A, 6148 entrants

The mass participation event of this year's WSOP is the "Big 50" named for the 50th WSOP, with 50 minute levels and 50,000 starting chips.

Each of the 4 flights will see massive numbers, the first seeing over 6100 of which 1579 were still in play at the end of the night.

It is a European 1-2 with Cosimo Bisgno (Italy) and Luis Pinho (Portugal) bagging the biggest stacks ahead of Nevada local Andrew Baldwin.

You've got to look quite a way down for the first GB player, Joel Isla from Cardiff (84th spot) with Calin Trif, Iain Paterson, Dean Hutchison and Daniel Ezekiel in the top 300.

In an unusual development, the survivors from Day 1A will play Day 2A today, while the next starting flight, 1B is also in play. Then, Day 3 isn't until next Wednesday.


Event 4 - $1500 Omaha Hi/Lo 8 or Better, Day 1 of 4, 853 entries

The first non NLH event of the series, 373 of the 853 players successfully navigating the ten levels of Day 1.

The chip leader is Lawrence Michael from California while Andrew Brown is second and Derek McMaster third.

Several multiple bracelet winners are in the field, Ian Johns, Eli Elezra and Frank Kassela among them (3 each) while Daniel Negreanu after his near miss in Event 1 is trying again here.

I can see four Brits listed, in chip order Manpreet Sangha, Philip Long, Patrick Leonard and Mel Judah.


To Start Today
Event 5 - $50K High Roller NLH, 4 Day Event

Plus Flight B of the Big 50

Might have to flick it in for a  PokerGO sub... This has got me itching to get out there punting!

Sure I read that they don't have all events this year, so PokerGo might not cover the event you want.

Like with my food, I'm not fussy ;D

50 k$ buy in started got 60 runners
Amazing amount of money to me !
Mind boggling

All relative, though.

Lots will be pieced out, or they'll be successful businessman etc.

$50k to them is like us playing a 25/25 at the Grosvenor.

nine high call for your tournament life anyone?

If you gave me $50 k to buy in with no strings attached
I don’t think I could let go of it at the cashiers window ! 😂😂😂

if you had 5m in the bank you wouldn't think twice though.

Exactly :D

Event 1 - $500 Casino Employee's NLH, Day 2 of 3, 686 entrants

Nicholas Haynes, a dealer at the Aria casino in Las Vegas took down the Casino Employees' event for his first bracelet and $62K

Very much a recreational player, he picked up a few tricks watching the pro players at the Aria and put them to good use. He beat WSOP insider (Media Relations Manager) Isaac Henson heads-up and another Vegas dealer, Jorge Ruiz (Montego Bay) finished third.



Event 3 - $500 Big 50 NLH, 4 Days, Day 1B & 2A in play


Two different bits of the Big 50 in play today.

Taking 1B first, 6048 entries were logged, and on one hand the WSOP have Alexander Kartveli as the chip leader but on the reports fellow east-coaster Matthew Keegan has the biggest stack. No argument about who is third - Canada's Glenn Swanlund.

With 1269 names going through, there's not much value in going through them with a fine-toothed comb, but everyone's (well nearly everyone's) least favourite contender, Chris Ferguson is amongst them.

Alex Jennings is top GB player, with Ludo Geilich and Chihao Tsang both having decent stacks.

While 1B was in play, Day 2A for those who qualified yesterday was also taking place.

They've played down to just 316 players with Russia's Mikhail Vilkov the leader ahead of Joshua Thibodaux and Amer Torbey

Four Brits remain, lead by the concisely named Tsz Ho in 71st place accomapnied by Calin Trif, Day 1A top Brit Joel Isla and Nicholas Gott.

These players now get a few days off and will return with the other Day 2 survivors on Wednesday.


Event 4 - $1500 Omaha Hi/Lo 8 or Better, Day 2 of 4, 853 entries

2 days down 2 to go, with 46 players still in contention.

The Day 2 leader is Richard Fuller, who dominated the last hour of play to end up with the biggest stack.

Several multiple bracelet winners still involved including Ben Yu, Mike Matusow, Jeff Madsen and John Monnette.

There were four Brits entering the day, at the end of it only Patrick Leonard survives, exactly in the middle of the pack.




Event 5 - $50K High Roller NLH, Day 1 of 4, 92 entries


This is one of the events the WSOP is trialling with a "shot clock" of 30 seconds with each player having a number of extensions he/she can use as required.

Late reg is still open for another four hours (one hour levels) but we currently have 92 entries (including a single re-entry or two) and only 52 of them have made it through.

I mentioned re Event 2 that Ali Imsirovic is one of the breakout players of the past 12 months, and he is showing those qualities again here as he has built the biggest stack so far

In second place is the first of four GB players, Ben Heath. Well known to Sky Poker TV audiences (remember Sky Poker TV?) Sam Grafton is in 12th, Conor Beresford is 32nd while Toby Lewis is near the bottom of the pack in 50th.

Daniel Negreanu has been mentioned every day so far and he's at it again and some other "names" among the 52 are Erik Seidel, Isaac Haxton, Joe McKeehen, Joe Cada & Kenny Hallaert.



To Start Today

Event 6 - $2500 Limit Mixed Triple Draw, 3 Day Event

Event 7 - $400 WSOP.com Online NLH, 1 Day Event

Plus Day 1C and 2B of the Big 50



The WSOP have tweeted that when Martijn Gerrits was eliminated in 7th place from the 10K Super Turbo Bounty, he collected the three-billionth dollar awarded in prize money at the WSOP. Think how much rake that means Caesars have taken over 50 years!

Cheers Tikay.

That amount of rake doesn't bear thinking about. just imagine what Stars have had!

Have nicked this for elsewhere, and might buy you a sticky bun in a couple weeks ;)

And I lifted it from Next Door.

All on the blag :D

In the $1,500 Limit O8.....


Patrick Leonard Eliminated in 9th Place ($15,897)
 

Congrats Pads, O8 is the way forward, not sure about limit though.

Sam Grafton is in the final 12 of the 50k.

As is Ben Heath, who is leading it.

Figured I don't really know him that well, and most people would know Sam Grafton more.  Is Ben Heath a Blonde?   

FWIW I realised I did once watch a video he did with Charlie Carrel.

Yes, Sam is much more high-profile, but I mentioned Ben as he used to play a lot Next Door. I get confused as to which Forum I'm on these days.   

Ben has been beasting high rollers all over the place the last year or two but he's still under the radar to some degree.

Would prefer Sam to win, simply because I know him much better, but either will do.

What did he use to play there?   Can't say he has knowingly crossed my radar online. 

Just the big cash games, if my memory serves me correct.

Event 3 - $500 Big 50 NLH, 4 Days, Day 1C & 2B in play


Again, two different sessions of the Big 50 in play today. I'll be glad when it settles down and everyone is at the same stage of the tournament.

We had Day 1C and Day 2B in play on Saturday

Another 6000-odd played Day 1C and it was Leandro Padilla who was the chip leader, one of only two players to bag over a million in chips. Second was one of the many poker-playing Nguyen's, this time Phuoc Nguyen and Daniel Hirleman was third.

Several more Brits made their Day 2, Anthony Gardener, Paul Housam, Ben Dobson, Kevin Houghton and Sergi Reixach the best placed of them.

Some other names through include former bracelet winners Todd Witteles, Shaun Deeb and Steve Zolotow, plus 2006 ME winner Jamie Gold. Both Daniel Negreanu and Phil Hellmuth were among the late registerees (is that a word?) but neither lasted very long.

If my reading of the schedule is correct, these qualifiers get a day off and play their Day 2 on Monday.


From the Day 2B tables, it was Jerald Williamson who took the lead when he took down a huge pot near the end of the evening.

That was enough to overtake previous leader Azad Arazm who was losing a chunk of chips on another table, he eventually bagged up in third with Daniel Hughes splitting the pair in second.

There are four Californians in 2nd-5th spot and 8 in the top 20 and not far behind that is the leading British player, Ludovic Geilich.

There other British players made it through 2B, Brian Leddy, Catherine Hanna and Jason Chapman although the latter has a home town listed as Sabadecco which may well be on the island of Bonaire in the former Dutch Antilles. Perhaps more will become clear later.


Event 4 - $1500 Omaha Hi/Lo 8 or Better, Day 3 of 4, 853 entries


We're down to just 7 players in the running for the win and the bracelet, with John Esposito in pole position. He hasn't won a bracelet since we partied like it's 1999 but has a decent chance of a second here.

Just below him in chips and sat next to him on the FT is Jason Berilgen and three-time bracelet winner Ben Yu lies third.

First prize is $228,228 while all seven have guaranteed themselves at least $27350.

Last Brit standing, Patrick Leonard, was eliminated late on Day 3, taking $15987 for 9th place.


Event 5 - $50K High Roller NLH, Day 2 of 4, 110 entries


Only 8 of the planned 10 levels were played as the eliminations came at a faster than expected pace, with the 12 players all left guaranteed a 6-figure payday.

We have a British player at the top of the listings, Ben Heath who got a lot of chips when busting Daniel Negreanu, his kings holding up against the Canadian's queens.

Lined up behind Heath are a number of former bracelet winners Elio Fox, Dmitry Yurasov, Chance Kornuth and Nick Petrangelo.

Kornuth was the victim of the first Phil Hellmuth rant of the series when Kornuth making a backdoor flush against him. Cue Hellmuth, and when he calmed down he re-entered and lasted all of two hands when losing house-over-house to Day 1 chip leader Ali Imsirovic.

Imsirovic was later another of Kornuth's victims and after the bubble we also lost Eric Wasserson, Johnanes Becker and Bryn Kenney.

If Heath can't convert, there is a second British possibility as Sam "The Squid" Grafton has made Day 3 although he has less than a third of the chip leader's stack.


Event 6 - $2500 Limit Mixed Triple Draw, Day 1 of 3, 296 entries


296 have become 112, with two players separated by just 200 chips at the top of the listings. Jake Schwartz and Julien Martini each have over 117K, with the American marginally besting the Frenchman

It's a long gap back to Jordan Siegel in third with his 95K and 2010 ME runner-up John Racener lies fourth.

Gerald Ringe is the best of the Brits in 14th, with Benny Glaser not far behind with the considerably less-heralded Xunen Zheng in 99th.

The first prize in this event has been confirmed as just over $160K.


To Start Today


I got Event 7 wrong saying it was yesterday, it is actually today


Event 7 - $400 WSOP.com Online NLH, 1 Day Event

Event 8 - $10K Short Deck NLH, 4 Day Event


Plus Day 1D of the Big 50

Event 3 - $500 Big 50 NLH, 4 Days, Day 2C in play


Things are beginning to sort themselves out as there is just one more Day 2 to play before the whole field converges for Day 3.

Saya Ono was all-in and covered on the bubble, but she had the second nut straight so she was not too concerned while other all-ins were played out, and she progressed from there to be the Day 2C chip leader. She has less than Day 2B leader Jerald Williamson, but her 3.8 million chips are a decent start on acquiring the over 1 billion chips that will be in play.

Not far behind Ono is Dorset's Ben Dobson and another Brit is also inside the top 10, Samuel Welbourne (the WSOP have him from Cittcehampton which I think may be Chittlehampton or more likely Littlehampton. Along with those two, Sergi Reixach, Kevin Houghton, Kenneth Broad and Sam Razavi made Day 3.

A few players I've noted before in these updates over the years are also through - Ari Engel, Matt Stout and Eric Baldwin spring to mind.


Event 5 - $50K High Roller NLH, Day 3 of 4, 110 entries

BRITISH BRACELET ALERT



Hopefully the first of many, it's a first UK bracelet and a first for 27-year old Ben Heath from Sussex. He was the only non-bracelet holder on the FT of 6, but he's corrected that omission from his poker CV (oh and by the way he collects almost a million and a half dollars)

Andrew Lichtenberger was the defeated heads-up opponent while Sam Soverel ended up in third.

The elimination of 4th placed Dmitry Yurasov was a little controversial. I don't like lifting things directly from the WSOP official site, but can't really avoid it here:

"With Soverel and Yurasov on equal stacks of twenty-five big blinds each, the former opened for a min-raise. Yurasov shoved all in, and Lichtenberger got out of the way from the small blind.

Heath in the big blind, though, asked for a count and contemplated his next action for a bit. With the tournament utilizing a shot clock, Heath was soon out of time, and he tossed in a small red time bank card to gain thirty more seconds to act. Soverel, still in the hand as the initial raiser, wasn't paying attention and tossed his cards in the muck right away, seemingly registering Heath's time bank card as either a muck of his cards or a call with a single chip. Now, not facing Soverel anymore, Heath instantly called.

To say that Yurasov wasn't happy is pointing out the obvious. Yurasov showed ace-ten of diamonds and lost to Ben Heath's ace-queen of hearts."



Event 6 - $2500 Limit Mixed Triple Draw, Day 3 of 3, 296 entries


Dan Zack is a man after my own heart. He nursed a short stack for most of the last two days before coming to the FT, having less than 2 Big Bets not just once but twice. He exhibited true Barnacle style and kept up hanging on while others were eliminated and once he made the FT, surged through the field to win the bracelet.

He has previously made 7 FTs but this was by far his biggest WSOP cash ($160K) besting the $97K he got for 4th in an on-line bracelet event two years ago.

It was an all-American FT, Sumir Mathur and Brayden Gazlay ending up 2nd and 3rd.


Event 8 - $10K Short Deck NLH, Day 2 of 3, 61 entries so far


The pace of play has meant that this has been changed from a 4-day event to a 3-day one.

I mentioned yesterday that there may be value for late regging this with so few players making it through from Day 1, well 53 did just that almost doubling the size of the field.

Chance Kornuth made the FT of the High Roller, but lasted just three hands (losing them all) before leaping in this event, and that proved to be a wise decision as he is the Day 2 chip leader.

7 player remain, 3 of them of Asian heritage - Yong Wang, Thai Ha, Anson Tsang (both Yong & Thai cashed in the other $10K event played so far, Event 2) and Jiaxiu Liu was the 8th placed finisher.


Event 9 - $600 NLH Deepstack, 2 Day Event, $500K guaranteed prize pool

Yes, it's a deepstack but it's also a Turbo as they played 20 levels on Day 1 and only 582 of the 6151 players needs bags at the end of the evening.

The Day 1 Leader is Canadian player Paul Dhaliwal who finished in the Top 60 of the 2017 Main Event, ahead of Michael Morhaime and David Elet.

Ylon Schwartz (4th 2007 Main Event) has made Day 2, as has the omnipresent Daniel Negreanu and 8-time bracelet winner Erik Seidel.

Robert Cowen is top Brit, ahead of Calin Trif, Florian Duta, Andrew Hills, Jamie Geraghty and Richard Hasnip.

With nearly 600 players left, even given the Turbo nature of the event, I wouldn't have been surprised if a Day 3 is needed.


Event 10 - $1500 Dealers Choice, Day 1 of 3, 470 entrants


470 may not seem a huge field for a $1500 event, but it is a record for this event so it seems that mixed-games (this one includes 20 variants) are becoming more popular.

Danny Noam was the leader for most of the day but was overtaken late on by Jim Collopy.

Some well known players involved include Robert Mizrachi, Dan Shak, Chris Ferguson (boo), Max Pescatori, Eli Elezra and previous Dealers Choice bracelet winner Quinn Do.

For the UK, I can see 4 names, most of them very familiar by now - Benny Glaser, Mel Judah, William Mitchell and Patrick Leonard.



Event 11 - $5K NLH, Day 1 of 4, 343 entrants so far

A straight-forward NLH event with no gimmicks. Late reg is open for 4 more levels so that field size will doubtless increase.

Dan Smith leads 137 who have made it through to Day 2 the hard way, but with British players having a good day it's good to see Simon Deadman in second place.

Actually it's quite a decent GB contingent including Niall Farrell, Javier Fernandez, Chris Moorman, Ben Heath (fresh from winning the High Roller earlier on) and Daniel Tang.


To start today

Event 12 - $1000 NLH Super Turbo Bounty, 1 Day Event

Event 13 - $1500 NL 2-7 Lowball Draw, 3 Day Event


Plus Day 2D of the Big 50.

Is Mel Judah not Australian ?

Yes, but he is (or was until recently) London based, and always put London down as his home.

Big 50 - Day 2D, end of day chip counts;


RANK PLAYER CITY / STATE / COUNTRY CHIP COUNT ROOM / TABLE / SEAT
1 Zachary Ackley ARVADA, CO, US 2,925,000 Pavilion / 119 / 9
2 Dennis Brinn West Palm Beach, FL, US 2,745,000 Pavilion / 219 / 8
3 Richard Trigg SHEFFIELD, , GB 2,690,000 Pavilion / 291 / 7

From WSOP.com;


Day 2d has come to a close and with 2,925,000 in chips, Zachary Ackley has claimed the overnight chip lead. Dennis Brinn is hot on his heels with 2,745,000 in chips, and Rick Trigg (2,695,000), Wilburn Hutcheson (2,620,000), Albert Bragg (2,500,000), and David Frenkel (2,450,000) round out the top 5. Bracelet winner Anthony Reategui also found himself high up the leaderboard with 2,355,000 in chips.

The day started with 2,110 returning players; by the time the last hand was completed that number was whittled down to 553 players, who will be joining the remaining players that survived the other three flights. It appears that 1,594 out of the record-breaking field of 28,371 players have made it to the third day.

(http://i.imgur.com/eIQ4RMa.jpg) (https://imgur.com/eIQ4RMa)

Didn't you promise some news on Trigg the other day? 

Certainly did, promised & delivered, except I posted it on the wrong thread. Don't ask.



http://blondepoker.com/forum/index.php?topic=68465.msg2255927#msg2255927

I believe that as well as flushes beating full-houses in short-deck poker, three-of-a-kind beats straights.

I played a lot of what was known as stripped-deck five-card stud in my early poker days in which the sixes were also removed. One of my earliest games in which I was a most welcome regular was at The Mint Casino in Kilburn High Road which was situated above a Wimpey Bar and had a dealer known as "Chinese Willy", the one and only Willy Tann.

In those games flushes did beat full-houses, but straights beat three-of-a-kind so those few who understood the odds spent all of their time going for obscure straights which were clearly(now!) overpriced as they are now correctly ranked below threes.

Tikay has led me astray onto the wrong thread - perhaps a mod would be kind enough to move my post above on short-deck poker to the WSOP updates thread.

TIA

Sorted, apologies.

Event 3 - $500 Big 50 NLH, 5 Days, Day 2D in play


The final split day and at the end of it we have 1597 players out of 28371 entries (including re-entries etc.) still in play.

From Day 2D, 551 made it through with the big stack belonging to Zachary Ackley ahead of Dennis Brinn, but we have a British player in third in the shape of Richard Trigg.

Other Brits through include Craig Beardsworth, Nickolay Ponomarev, Prabhat Kumar Ranjan, Dragos Trofimov, Fraser MacIntyre and Daniel Wendorf.

Big names are thin on the ground in this group, but there is one last year's ME FT there, Alex Lynskey.

Now all the groups get together and it will be a lot easier following the tournament from Day 3 onwards.


Event 8 - $10K Short Deck NLH, Day 3 of 3, 114 entries


The first ever Short Deck event went to Alex Epstein as the champion. His main game is PLO, but decided to play this as a game of higher variance.

Thai Ha finished second, having to come from behind by doubling up 5 times during the FT with Anson Tsang from Hong Kong third and Day 2 chip leader Chance Kornuth fourth.

Epstein collected nearly $300K and of course a gold WSOP bracelet.


Event 9 - $600 NLH Deepstack, Day 2 of 2, 6151 entries


As I predicted, this has had to run into a third day, as 9 players are still involved despite playing until almost 4am.

Seven Americans, 1 Canadian and 1 Mexican so it's an all North-American FT, headed by Paul Jain from Jeremy Pekarek and David Elet.

923 got paid, Calin Trif the last GB survivor in 76th for $4205, just outlasting Jamie Geraghty (82nd for $3554). Some other GB cashers - Robert Cowen, Andrew Hills, Daniel Heald, Pamela Pease and David Stones.

Some others who cashed - Daniel Negreanu (got to get a Daniel mention in), Joe Cada, Ylon Schwartz and Phillip ****.


Event 10 - $1500 Dealers Choice, Day 2 of 3, 470 entrants


21 players bagged chips at the end of Day 2, and we have a British leader, 3-time bracelet winner Benny Glaser. Glaser moved to the chip lead on the very last hand of the night as he hero-called Frankie O'Dell in a hand of Limit Hold'Em with just King high, being proved right when O'Dell showed ten high.

John Cernuto, John Monnette, Robert Mizrachi and Josh Arieh are among the other 20 players left in, but unfortunately no other British players after Mel Judah went out in 36th ($3299)


Event 11 - $5K NLH, Day 1 of 4, 343 entrants so far


The field bulged from 343 to 400 with some Day 2 late reg,and they've been reduced to 27 after another ten levels. All 27 of them are guaranteed nearly $12K but there's $442K waiting for the overall winner.

One of the late entries was Finn Pauli Ayras who bagged "around 1 million" at the end of the night, with regular WSOP cashers Ognjen Sekuralac (20 cashes) and Daniel Strelitz (38) in second and third.

Some bracelet winners in contention include Maria Ho, Giuseppe Pantaleo, Jeremy Ausmus & Niall Farrell, plus a second Brit in Simon Deadman.


Event 12 - $1000 NLH Super Turbo Bounty, 1 Day Event, 2452 entries


Done and dusted within 27 20-minute levels to the favour of Daniel Park. Down to a "Chip and a chair" with five left, he was automatically all-in with an ante plus one chip for a blind, he got through that and prospered from then on to win $226K.

Canadian Erik Cajelais too second and Jennifer Dennis, who looks in all the pictures like she was having a blast all day, third for just over $102K.

Gerald Ringe was top Uk player in 57th for $3354 while the other cashers from this country were David Winter, Ludo Geilich, Andrew Wilson, Jacobo Roth, Sergi Reixach, Barny Boatman and Ariel Shefer.

All these dollar amounts exclude any money won in bounties ($300 per player eliminated)


Event 13 - $1500 NL 2-7 Lowball Draw, Day 1 of 3, 296 entries


A slow start with only "a few dozen" players seated, but as late reg progressed more turned up, eventually enough to make it a record field for this event and contributing to a first prize of $96,278.

Steve Tabb took the day 1 leader, with 63 players making it through but only 45 are to be paid.

Two former winners of this event remain (Ryan D'Angelo and reigning title holder Daniel Ospina) plus Daniel Negreanu (whoops, two Daniel mentions), Chris Ferguson (booo) and Ryan Riess, plus just the one Brit - Cody Wagner.


To start today

Event 14 - $1500 HORSE, 4 Day Event

Event 15 - $10K Heads-up NLH, 4 Day Event

Event 16 - $1500 6-max NLH, 3 Day Event

Go on, Trigg!

Percy wants a kids Lambo ;D

I'm 2 Updates behind as I've been MIA for 36 hours.

I'll get them up to date now & then it should be BAU.

Sorry this is a bit late, didn't get home from work until after 7!

Event 3 - $500 Big 50 NLH, 5 Days, Day 3 of 5


At the end of Day 3, the 28000 odd have become just 126, headed by Venezuela's Amer Torbey who has what would normally be a massive 32 million in chips, that will soon be dwarved as players get 9 and even a 10 figure stack.

David Rasmussen is second and 2018 bracelet winner Diogo Veiga is third.

There isn't a lot of big names in the chip counts, this is a $500 tourney after all, but lurking in 15th spot is 5-time bracelet winner Allen Cunningham

It wasn't a good day for the Brits - Prabhat Kumar Ranjan snuck into the field in 121st place and four spots above him is Edward Slack, allegedly from Pertasgure, GB. Pertasgure is actually in Guatemala, Hendon Mob have two Edward Slacks listed, one from Scotland and the other from Guatemala, there's even a chance they could be one and the same but who knows?


Event 9 - $600 NLH Deepstack, Day 3 of 2, 6151 entries


Extended into a third day, this one took six more hours of play before Jeremy Pekarek won the bracelet and more than tripled his entire poker career earnings with a prize of $398K.

Contrasted with the rest of the event, heads up was short and sweet as it took Pekarek just two hands to dispatch Dan Kuntzman and Mexico's Juan Magana.


Event 10 - $1500 Dealers Choice, Day 2 of 3, 470 entrants


After a gap of 12 years, Scott Clements has won his third bracelet. He has previously won bracelets in PLO and Omaha Hi/Lo, picking the latter for his last 13 choices during heads-up play with Tim McDermott.

McDermott mixed it up a little more (although with a preference with No Limit 2-7 Single Draw) but it was in the field of NLH that the bracelet was decided as the victor's K10 held up against K2. It was never in doubt after a flop of 10-K-10!

Last British player Benny Glaser made the FT, but was eliminated in 5th spot for a smidgin under $19K.


Event 11 - $5K NLH, Day 3 of 4, 400 entrants

We're down to a FT of 6, and unusally for a big-money tournament, they're all still looking for a first bracelet.

Some like Maria Ho (I incorrectly credited her with a bracelet yesterday), Shannon Storr and Daniel Strelits have come close before. Ali Imsirovic as mentioned already is one of the hottest players of the last 12 months, Ognjen Sekularac is looking for the first ever win for Serbia and Arsenii Karmatckii (love those two double i's) has over a million career earnings but has never been better than 10th at the WSOP.

Last UK player standing was Simon Deadman, who bowed out in 13th for $17K.


Event 13 - $1500 NL 2-7 Lowball Draw, Day 1 of 3, 296 entries


Down to a FT here too, 4 Americans plus one from Israel and one from Germany.

Jerry Wong has a ME FT to his credit but has never finished in the Top 3, he's got a great chance here lying second to Ajay Chabra. Steve Tabb lies third, guaranteed an improvement on last year when he finsihed 10th in this very event.

Cody Wagner from Warrington was the last UK player, he made the cash but was knocked out in 33rd for $2780.


Event 14 - $1500 HORSE, Day 1 of 4, 751 entries


Must resist horse puns. Must resist horse puns. Must resist... no, can't be doing that.

Front runner at the end of Day 1 is Mark Castagnini who galloped to the head of the field during the last couple of hours of play, with Jean Gaspard (winner of the 10K Dealers choice in 2016, so well versed in mixed games) second and Canadian Clayyon Mozdzen third.

Some other prominent figures covered up midfield waiting for a chance to open up include Chris Klodnicki, David "ODB" Baker, Chris Tryba and Andre Akkari, while Bart Lybaert, Calvin Anderson and Ian Johns are being held up near the back.

Mel Judah is top Brit, but only in 158th with David Tarbet and Paresh Doshi his only two compatriots of the 291 making Day 2.


Event 15 - $10K Heads-up NLH, Day 1 of 4, 112 entrants


After three rounds of play, the Heads-up is down to a Sweet Sixteen with probably the best known heads-up player John Smith headlining the field.

2015 winner Keith Lehr is still there too as are Brian Rast, Kristen Bicknell, Ole Schemion and Cord Garcia. Most of them have been kept apart in the draw, but the Bicknell-Rast tie could be the big draw. Smith has to face Jimmy Dambrosio whose only cash in this was making the last 32 in 2009.

There is one British player left in, Simon Burns who will face Lehr in the last 16.


Event 16 - $1500 6-max NLH, Day 1 of 3, 1832 entrants


Close to the money after Day 1, with 272 to be paid and 289 players still in contention.

The chip leader is Britain's Richard Hasnip who has already cashed in Event 9. He's had a few nice cashes over the last 18 months (best of them £48K for winning a £550 deepstack at DTD in Nottingham, but this is a major step up.

It's an international leader board, as the top eight include players from the US, France, Singapre, Israel, China and Germany as well as the UK.

Some well known pros making Day 2 include David Benyamine, Jeff Madsen and Shaun Deeb, trying to repeat as WSOP Player of the Year.

There's half a dozen other Brits too including Elliott Peterman, Daniel Wendorf and Ben Farrell (there seems to be a disproportionate number of UK poker players called Ben)


To start today

Event 17 - $1500 NLH Shootout, 3 Day Event

Event 18 - $10K, Omaha Hi-Lo 8 or Better, 4 Day Event

Event 3 - $500 Big 50 NLH, 5 Days, Day 4 of 5


Getting down to the business end, with 7 players challenging for the $1.15million prize and the fold bracelet (having already bagged at least £182K)

The chip leader is Femi Fashakin who is recording his very first WSOP cash. He leads Paul Cullen (1 WSOP cash back in 2015) and Adrian Curry (no WSOP cashes) in an inexperienced (in WSOP terms at least) top 3 spots

Curry was the one who knocked-out 5-time bracelet winner Allen Cunningham down in 47th spot.


Event 11 - $5K NLH, Day 4 of 4, 400 entrants


We were bound to have a bracelet virgin take the prize, and it was Daniel Strelitz who the fates determined would be the one breaking his duck.

He beat Shannon Storr in a heads-up match which was practically level at the start, but soon took control and finished him off when a pair of tens held up.

Strelitz gets $442K, Storr $273K and Serbian Ognjen Sekularac $186K for third.


Event 13 - $1500 NL 2-7 Lowball Draw, Day 3 of 3, 296 entries


It's a bracelet for Israel in the guise of Yuval Bronshtein who took a title at his 10th FT.

Asaf Chabra held a 2:1 chip lead a the start of heads-up, and at one point Bronshtein was all-in for his tournament life, but he survived and then flourished sufficiently to at first take the lead and then dominate.

Former November Niner Jerry Wong finished third.


Event 14 - $1500 HORSE, Day 2 of 4, 751 entries

Down to 28 runners with two Jasons in the top 2 positions. Jason Acosta leads Jason Stockfish, with a significant gap between those two and Russian Sergey Altbregin in third.

A couple of the well-known names I picked out yesterday are still there - Chris Klodnicki & Andrew Akkari

No Brits made it to Day 3, in fact none even managed a min-cash.

Down near the bottom of the pack we've got a classic sports car (Ferrari) and a tractor (David Brown). Both of them will need to do a lot of overtaking to make the FT.


Event 15 - $10K Heads-up NLH, Day 1 of 4, 112 entrants

Sixteen were first sorted in to eight, and then to a final four.

Those four will be, in alphabetical order, Cord Garcia, Keith Lehr, Sean Swingruber and Ben Yu. All but Swingruber have one previous bracelet to their credit. Swingruber will play Garcia in the first SF, while fairly obviously Yu & Lehr will meet in the second.

From that you will be able to see we've lost the last Brit (Simon Burns) and the favourite John Smith


Event 16 - $1500 6-max NLH, Day 2 of 3, 1832 entrants

21 left in the 6-max, with a French player in the lead - Romain Nussmann who ended Day 1 with over 200BB, ahead of Ong Dingxiang from Singapore and Pierce McKellar (US) the only others with over 100BB.

Day 1 chip leader Richard Hasnip continues to fly the Union Jack but is now settled in midfield, guaranteed at least $16K but still with eyes on the first prize of $407K.


Event 17 - $1500 NLH Shootout, Day 1 of 3, 917 entrants

100 tables of 9 or 10 all played down to a finish with the winners all guaranteed a min-cash of $5279, but you don't get a prize ladder until you win your Day 2 table as well when you will get at least $15K, a place on the 10-handed FT and a chance to play for $238K.

Chip leader isn't really a worthwhile concept at this stage although stacks do vary slightly so I'll restrict myself to noting a few names through.

These include a couple of ME winners (Joe Cada & Qui Nguyen), a couple of well known female players (Loni Harwood & Jen Tilly) and several Brits or at least players with United Kingdom beside their names (Florian Duta, Jonathan Proudfoot (these two will share a Day 2 table), Yiannis Liperis, Dragos Trofimov and Brandon Shiels)

We've also got a pair of twins through - 2017 ME runner-up Daniel Ott will share table 410 with his brother Dillon.


Event 18 - $10K, Omaha Hi-Lo 8 or Better, Day 1 of 4, 173 entrants so far

90 players remain, but late reg (like all the other 10K "Championship" events) is open until hours into Day 2. There is a chance that the record field for this event (212) could be matched or broken.

Of the 90, the biggest Day 1 stack belongs to Yarron Bendor who has form in this event (3rd in 2017). David Benyamine (1 bracelet) and Shaun Deeb (4 bracelets and 2018 Player of the Year) are his nearest challengers.

Still in - Perry Friedman, Mike Matusow, Ben Lamb, Brandon Shack-Harris and 2018 winner Paul Volpe.

Benny Glaser and Tim Flanders are both inside the Top 30, while Richard Ashby is shown as with 1 chip which usually means there was a misunderstanding somewhere along the bagging process.


To start today

Event 19 - $1500 Millionaire Maker, 5 Day Event, 2 starting flights Fri/Sat

Event 20 - $1500 Seven Card Stud, 4 Day Event

Back in business!

Did your man manage to get someone from the Venetian to whip him up an ITIN?

Any sticky buns?

Not seen him yet, will be hooking up tonight, so I'll see where it's t then.

Sticky buns? I'm easing myself in at the mo, barely had a minute to breathe so far, but I got started last night.



 (http://i.imgur.com/lzx136U.jpg) (https://imgur.com/lzx136U)

Is that from the deli, as opposed to the 'All American Grill'?

Look almost like proper chips, too.

Sports Deli, yeah. God's food.

After 5 months of hard-dieting, living on Ryvita & fruit, can't begin to tell how how delish that was.

Was going to give Dave $300, but might just give it to the Sports Deli and Haagen Daz.

Where did action man finish?

I'll have a proper look later Adzy, but a quick peruse suggests he failed to make it to Day 4.

Pretty sure he cashed for about $1,600, but I'll check properly later, unless anyone else has the result to hand. 

383rd for £5144

Cheers.

That's a proper start for backers...... ;whistle;

Event 3 - $500 Big 50 NLH, 5 Days, Day 4 of 5


Getting down to the business end, with 7 players challenging for the $1.15million prize and the gold bracelet (having already bagged at least £182K)

The chip leader is Femi Fashakin who is recording his very first WSOP cash. He leads Paul Cullen (1 WSOP cash back in 2015) and Adrian Curry (no WSOP cashes) in an inexperienced (in WSOP terms at least) top 3 spots

Curry was the one who knocked-out 5-time bracelet winner Allen Cunningham down in 47th spot.


Event 11 - $5K NLH, Day 4 of 4, 400 entrants


We were bound to have a bracelet virgin take the prize, and it was Daniel Strelitz who the fates determined would be the one breaking his duck.

He beat Shannon Storr in a heads-up match which was practically level at the start, but soon took control and finished him off when a pair of tens held up.

Strelitz gets $442K, Storr $273K and Serbian Ognjen Sekularac $186K for third.


Event 13 - $1500 NL 2-7 Lowball Draw, Day 3 of 3, 296 entries


It's a bracelet for Israel in the guise of Yuval Bronshtein who took a title at his 10th FT.

Asaf Chabra held a 2:1 chip lead a the start of heads-up, and at one point Bronshtein was all-in for his tournament life, but he survived and then flourished sufficiently to at first take the lead and then dominate.

Former November Niner Jerry Wong finished third.


Event 14 - $1500 HORSE, Day 2 of 4, 751 entries


Down to 28 runners with two Jasons in the top 2 positions. Jason Acosta leads Jason Stockfish, with a significant gap between those two and Russian Sergey Altbregin in third.

A couple of the well-known names I picked out yesterday are still there - Chris Klodnicki & Andrew Akkari

No Brits made it to Day 3, in fact none even managed a min-cash.

Down near the bottom of the pack we've got a classic sports car (Ferrari) and a tractor (David Brown). Both of them will need to do a lot of overtaking to make the FT.


Event 15 - $10K Heads-up NLH, Day 1 of 4, 112 entrants


Sixteen were first sorted in to eight, and then to a final four.

Those four will be, in alphabetical order, Cord Garcia, Keith Lehr, Sean Swingruber and Ben Yu. All but Swingruber have one previous bracelet to their credit. Swingruber will play Garcia in the first SF, while fairly obviously Yu & Lehr will meet in the second.

From that you will be able to see we've lost the last Brit (Simon Burns) and the favourite John Smith


Event 16 - $1500 6-max NLH, Day 2 of 3, 1832 entrants


21 left in the 6-max, with a French player in the lead - Romain Nussmann who ended Day 1 with over 200BB, ahead of Ong Dingxiang from Singapore and Pierce McKellar (US) the only others with over 100BB.

Day 1 chip leader Richard Hasnip continues to fly the Union Jack but is now settled in midfield, guaranteed at least $16K but still with eyes on the first prize of $407K.


Event 17 - $1500 NLH Shootout, Day 1 of 3, 917 entrants


100 tables of 9 or 10 all played down to a finish with the winners all guaranteed a min-cash of $5279, but you don't get a prize ladder until you win your Day 2 table as well when you will get at least $15K, a place on the 10-handed FT and a chance to play for $238K.

Chip leader isn't really a worthwhile concept at this stage although stacks do vary slightly so I'll restrict myself to noting a few names through.

These include a couple of ME winners (Joe Cada & Qui Nguyen), a couple of well known female players (Loni Harwood & Jen Tilly) and several Brits or at least players with United Kingdom beside their names (Florian Duta, Jonathan Proudfoot (these two will share a Day 2 table), Yiannis Liperis, Dragos Trofimov and Brandon Shiels)

We've also got a pair of twins through - 2017 ME runner-up Daniel Ott will share table 410 with his brother Dillon.


Event 18 - $10K, Omaha Hi-Lo 8 or Better, Day 1 of 4, 173 entrants so far


90 players remain, but late reg (like all the other 10K "Championship" events) is open until hours into Day 2. There is a chance that the record field for this event (212) could be matched or broken.

Of the 90, the biggest Day 1 stack belongs to Yarron Bendor who has form in this event (3rd in 2017). David Benyamine (1 bracelet) and Shaun Deeb (4 bracelets and 2018 Player of the Year) are his nearest challengers.

Still in - Perry Friedman, Mike Matusow, Ben Lamb, Brandon Shack-Harris and 2018 winner Paul Volpe.

Benny Glaser and Tim Flanders are both inside the Top 30, while Richard Ashby is shown as with 1 chip which usually means there was a misunderstanding somewhere along the bagging process.


To start today

Event 19 - $1500 Millionaire Maker, 5 Day Event, 2 starting flights Fri/Sat

Event 20 - $1500 Seven Card Stud, 4 Day Event

Don't know when I'm going to do a full update today (Saturday) - I'm out at what will almost certainly be my last football of the season, so here's an interim update on those events that were already in play. A fuller update plus a review of the events that had their Day 1 on Friday will follow at some point.

Event 3 - $500 Big 50 NLH, 5 Days, Day 5 of 5


The largest field in WSOP history has been whittled down to just one player, Femi Fashakin. The WSOP recorded yesterday that he had not previously recorded a single WSOP Cash but actually he had two, both in 2016 for a little under $11K. He's bested that by 100 times as he collected over $1.1m and a gold bracelet.

He finished off heads-up with Paul Cullen in style as after his oppenent raised with QJ, he shoved with the best hand in poker and the aces held. He ended up with 1.418 billion chips. Yes, that's billion. With a "B".

Israel had a bracelet yesterday and it was almost another one in this massive event as Rafi Elharar finished third.




Event 14 - $1500 HORSE, Day 3 of 4, 751 entries


This one may finish within 3 days, they're currently playing heads up and have two more levels to play tonight.

The battle is down to Jason Stockfish v Murilo Souza with the former holding a marginal lead as I type.



Event 15 - $10K Heads-up NLH, Day 3 of 4, 112 entrants


It's a day off, the semi-finals (Sean Swinghuber v Cord Garcia and Ben Yu v Keith Lehr) will take place on Saturday.


Event 16 - $1500 6-max NLH, Day 3 of 3, 1832 entrants


Heads-up and in-play in this one too - Ong Dingxiang has just overtaken Isaac Baron but with only about 22BB in play between them, this could crack at any moment.


Event 17 - $1500 NLH Shootout, Day 2 of 3, 917 entrants

The FT has been set as all 10 tables have finished, and we go from A to Z as in seats 1 and 2 are going to be Brett Apter and Anatoli Zyrin.

I don't think a single player that I mentioned yesterday made it through!

The only one of the ten who already have a bracelet on their CV is Tommy Nguyen although Cary Katz is 24th in the all-time money list and has 5 scores of over a million dollars (including 8th in the Big One for One Drop in 2014)


Event 18 - $10K, Omaha Hi-Lo 8 or Better, Day 2 of 4, 183 entrants


Still playing with 33 or so left with Robert Mizrachi holding the big stack. Two Brits left, both in the middle of the pack - Tim Flanders & Richard Ashby



Started Friday, will update later


Event 19 - $1500 Millionaire Maker, 5 Day Event, 2 starting flights Fri/Sat

Event 20 - $1500 Seven Card Stud, 4 Day Event

To start today


Event 21 - $10K No Limit 2-7 Lowball Draw, 4 Day Event

Niall Farrell
‏
 
@Firaldo87poker
 Jun 5
 
In light of the recent “angling” controversy - petition to have 1 tournament a year during the series where anything goes. Angling, collusion, hand signals, the lot. All scummery allowed and indeed encouraged. Call it the “Big Purge” or the “Men Nguyen Invitational” or something

https://twitter.com/robertgoldfarb/status/749101749030367233

Updates from a donkey

Great flight on virgin in a new dream liner
Plotted up at the encore no suite ready
That’s ok 2 bloody Mary’s 2 vodka cokes $70
Nearly spat my dummy out
Felt raped
Nice room not as nice as Wynn
Played roulette lost $400
Played $2_5 lost $400\500 bunch of lunatics
Idiot guy raises to 20 I re raise to 60 ak
He calls
Flop ace 4 7
He bets 60
I make it 120
He calls
Turn is a 10
He check I bet 150
He call
River a jack
He leads for 120 I call
He has jack 4 off suit
I fold ace9 on a 972 spade spade club flop to a raise n a receipt raise
Idiot jams 74
8-10 spades calls n gets there

Get a text rooms ready
Un pack
Go down few goes on slots $209|300 down
But get 4/5 vodka cokes for a dollar - bargain ??
Get a reasonable nights kip

Update number two

Denise’s birthday Saturday
Pool day down there 9 am get beds
Meet4 brits have a lovely day
Go up at 330 pm kip n jiggy jiggy
Dinner 6 pm
Diana Ross @8 pm
Dinner n show pkg $333 each
Meatballs chicken parmigiana tiramisu plus 2 coronas [$29] plus 2 comp Prosecco which I give mine to Denise !

$400 on roulette
$200 on slots
4-5 vodkas n it’s bed at 11 pm
Awake at 330 am
Nap 6-8 am
Bally’s Sunday brunch was $100
Now $125 plus tax $270 for 2 people
V nice though
Lose $400 on roulette- by now I’m thinking fk roulette
Win $200 on a slot
Uber there n back
Having a chill , in th3 room - watch uporn n have a wank maybe as
Denise gone to fashion show mall 😂😂😂
Omaha at Rio 11 am in the morning
Gl me

Keep 'em coming Tony ;) and GL tomorrow.

Anybody bringing the Mrs or GF go see Diana Ross at the encore till the 15 th she was amazing
1 hour 8 mins of singing
Then she pulls a chair on stage n asks for audience questions
It took a couple of mins but folk soon got in the swing of it
I assumed she may be a  bit big headed / arrogant / aloof .
Not at all she was incredible

One guy aged 30 ish if that
 said he knew at aged 5/6 he was “ different “ I.e gay
as in his words he danced around his parents living room singing chain reaction !
It helped him come to terms with it all

Another woman spoke of her decision to divorce aged 30 listening to ? I’ve forgotten which song lol
It was getting a bit Jerry springer tbh
Diana wasn t phased
She gave some lovely answers to these people
It left us with a warm fuzzy glow !
Then I realised I’d peed my pants ! - not really ! Joking

Sorry I never got around to doing a second post yesterday, just too tired to even switch the computer on when I got home.

Therefore this is an update on both the Friday action and that from Saturday.


Event 14 - $1500 HORSE, Day 4 of 4, 751 entries


There's not much that can top a British rail at a WSOP FT, but a Brazilian one may just do.

Murilo Souza had the benefit of that rail and used it to his advantage as he took his first WSOP gold bracelet.

He had just the one cash outside his native country before today, for the grand total of $327 in a deepstack in Vegas last summer. Now he's got a cash for over $270K on his Hendon Mob page.

Heads up lasted six hours, ended by Souza turning quads on a hand of Omaha Hi-Lo and fading the low draws of Jason Stockfish.

For Stockfish, it's a frustrating 4th runner-up spot on a WSOP final table.


Event 15 - $10K Heads-up NLH, Day 4 of 4, 112 entrants


In the first semi-final, Ben Yu saw off Keith Lehr after 81 hands, while in the second Sean Swinghuber made quick work of Cord Garcia in less than 40 hands.

The final was a more drawn-out affair. Yu won a big hand early (hand 7) with a full house, and held that for nearly 80 hands before Swingruber grinded back to overtake. Yu did wrestle back a small lead at hand 120, but not long after the lead had changed hands again, and this time it was for good as Swingruber went on to be another first-time WSOP bracelet winner (and collect $186K)


Event 16 - $1500 6-max NLH, Day 4 of 3, 1832 entrants


This didn't end on time as heads-up play between Isaac Baron and Ong Dingxiang played over 100 hands of heads-up before a halt was called.

Coming back on Saturday, it took just 4 hands to find a winner when Baron picked up the aces and Dingxiang's KQ found a queen on the flop. All the chips went in on the turn and Baron looked on content as the river was a meaningless 3.

Baron has been playing WSOP events for 12 years but he too is winning his first one. He is no stranger to big Final Tables though as he has several very large cashes to his credit.


Event 17 - $1500 NLH Shootout, Day 3 of 3, 917 entrants


The theme of the day is first time WSOP winners, so let's carry on with that in Event 17 with Brett Apter.

Like Baron, Apter's winning hand was pocked aces, an easy call on a Q-10-4 board after Anatolii Zyrin had shoved with top pair


Event 18 - $10K, Omaha Hi-Lo 8 or Better, Day 3 of 4, 183 entrants

Robert Mizrachi was chip leader last time I reported on this event, and he still is as six players will come back to play the FT.

He ended day 3 with 33BB, almost twice the stack of his nearest rival, Nick Guagenti. Mizrachi has 4 bracelets already in his drawer, while both Owais Ahmed and Frankie O'Dell are also former bracelet holders.

Richard Ashby was the only Brit to cash, finishing 14th for almost $22K.


Event 19 - $1500 Millionaire Maker, Day 1 A/B of 4, 8809 entries

Another huge field, with 2268 of them making Day 2.

Noah Schwartz in the combined chip leader from the two starting flights, with 2-time bracelet winner Calvin Anderson not far behind and also inside the top ten heads-up semi-finalist Keith Lehr.

The top three Brits are all within 2000 chips of each other, Robert Cowen, Stefan Fabian and Steven Warburton lie clustered in 73rd, 74th & 76th respectively. Looking deeper down, Ben Heath, James Dempsey, Sam Grafton, James Rann, Niall Farrell and Barny Boatman are also part of a deep British contingent.


Event 20 - $1500 Seven Card Stud, Day 2 of 4, 285 entries

In contrast, no Brits remain in Event 20 - the final 10 are all American. The plan is to play just down to 6 on Day 3, but there must be a chance of the players wanting to play on to a winner, especially if the early eliminations come quite quickly.

For a $1500 event, there's a comparitively loaded final table, chip leader is Anthony Zinno, Valentin Vornicu, Rep Porter, Eli Elezra and Scott Siever are also among the final 10.

Two GB cashers, who disappeared in quick succession, Ludovic Geilich went out in 17th for $3061 while Gerald Ringe was the very next player out but he managed a ladder and picked up an additional $504.


Event 21 - $10K No Limit 2-7 Lowball Draw, Day 1 of 4, 83 entries so far


We could be heading towards another of those Brazilian rails as the Day 1 chip leader is Pedro Bromfman, ahead of just 28 others who have made Day 2. Late reg is still open so we could see some other entries (or indeed players using their single re-entry) during the first couple of hours of Day 2 play.

Majid Yahyaei is second overnight and event 6 winner Dan Zack lies third.

As you would expect in a $10K event, there is several braclet winners (including multiple bracelet winners) still involved like Frank Kassela, Daniel Negreanu, the UK's Benny Glaser, Brian Rast, Billy Baxter, Jennifer Harman etc.


To start today

Event 22 - $1000 Double Stack NLH, 2 Day Event

Event 23 - $1500 Eight Game Mix, 3 Days Event

Event 24 - $600 WSOP.com Online PLO 6 handed, 1 Day Event

I was just thinking that the only thing TonyT hadn't mentioned was having a shit, but then he mentions he had a wank.

On this basis, I guess he must be constipated.

Not got quite the same flow or colour of other diary posts, but at least each one doesn't finish with a Gif.

I see how Vegas makes its money now.

This is an interesting hand

https://uk.pokernews.com/tours/wsop/2019-wsop/event-22-1000-double-stack/chips.225026.htm (https://uk.pokernews.com/tours/wsop/2019-wsop/event-22-1000-double-stack/chips.225026.htm)

It may be misreported, but it seems to me that if she has only put 105,000 chips over the line and never said all in, then I don't see how the ruling was that it was all in.

Her opponent has checked the amount of call and called that amouny, and has accepted the action as presented to him.  I don't understand how they can say he had accepted any other action.  I fully accept that he is very likely to have just shoved the extra if he thought that she was 25k short, or that they would have got it all in on the flop, but thes things shouldn't matter?  If my intention is to raise 600, and I say raise and put in 5100, nobody ever rules that I only ever intended to raise 600.  And if they both turn there hands over pre, then neither can take an aggressive action after the flop?  It also grates a bit because she benefits as she is the only one of the two who knows that she has held the 25k back.   I don't think any of this is an angle.

Are they not using the allin button this year?

Ditto - enjoyed those!

If she lost the hand do you think she would have just handed over the 25k chip too, or claimed she wasn't all in?

I really don't know.  She seems nice enough, and I can't remember any real complaints abut her (I am sure I have heard the odd bit of chauvinst crap), but I have no idea what her intentions were.  It seems odd to have got to the end of the hand before she remembered she hadn't put 25k in.  You'd think she'd just flip the 25k in when she turned over if she believed it was all in, or at least say "whoa I still have 25k" when he flips.  The whole thing seems odd, which makes me think it was just misreported.  We all have brain fades every so often, but even if it was one, why does she get the extra 25k?

Aye, giving her the extra 25k seems a mistake imo.

Paul Fowler ex Luton reg 5 th in aria plo for $3500 yesterday
Playing the Rio $600 plo today and the 1 k weds
I think you know him tony ? / met him late on in a plo event last year

Some good news about a special blonde in Vegas.

Tal has made Day 2 of the WSOP Doublestack.

Not in good shape, he has 106k at 6k/12k/12k & it's a Super Turbo thing, but he's in the money, that's the main thing. First WSOP cash is the best thing ever for a rec.

Given his precarious stack, I was there just after the noon start, & I promised not to hang around given my bokking abilties.


Lovely picture, though it's a shame about the shirt;


(http://i.imgur.com/Gw6e9Ka.jpg) (https://imgur.com/Gw6e9Ka)

Slightly intimidating to be sitting to the right of Billy Big Stack too;


(http://i.imgur.com/QZ1M06z.jpg) (https://imgur.com/QZ1M06z)

But then, before I could depart, a problem arose.

Fella round the back opens, & Tal jams.

I almost ran away, what with my rep & everything.

Villain has the A-Q, & our man had the 7-7;



(http://i.imgur.com/DGTGBpW.jpg) (https://imgur.com/DGTGBpW)

Never in doubt.

Lord Bok? Not me Sir, not me.

Don't think I'll press though.

Flipadelphia!

Good luck, Tal.

Love the shirt Simon - Swallows and Amazons possibly?

GL that man  ;cheerleader;

Event 18 - $10K, Omaha Hi-Lo 8 or Better, Day 4 of 4, 183 entrants


Frankie O'Dell became the first person in WSOP history to win a third bracelet exclusively in Omaha Hi-Lo as he took the $10K event to add to bracelets way back in 2003 and 2007.

This one earned him more than the other two put together, $443,641. The new grandfather deafeated Owais Ahmed heads-up with another former bracelet winner Robert Mizrachi in 3rd.


Event 19 - $1500 Millionaire Maker, Day 2 of 5, 8809 entries


Its The Cosby Show in the Millionaire Maker as Samuel Cosby is the Day 2 chip leader, the only player over 3 million in chips.

The second placed player is listed as "Did Not Report" with Nathan Russler in third.

Former ME winner Joe McKeehen is the first well known player in 4th spot, while Calvin Anderson is near the top of the listings for the second day running and some other players inside the top 200 of 309 are Kathy Liebert, JC Tran, Bruno Politano and Brock Parker

Brits? Stefan Fanian (42nd), Paul Hizer (98th) and Ben Farrell 118th, with others including Sam Welbourne and Peter Charalambous


Event 20 - $1500 Seven Card Stud, Day 2 of 4, 285 entries


They did stop at 6 players and will resume for the FT with almost a two-way at the top between Anthony Zinno and Eli Elezra who between tham have over 80% of the chips in play.

They each have over 50 Big Bets, Valentin Vornicu has 11, while Rep Porter, Phongthep Thiptinnakon and David Singer are on fumes, with only about 5 Big Bets between the three of them so we may some laddering up considerations even at this level.


Event 21 - $10K No Limit 2-7 Lowball Draw, Day 2 of 4, 91 entries


In contrast to Event 20, this one will finish with only 3 days play but not today as they have reached a Final Table, but will take a day's break before playing to a finish on Tuesday.

Some well known names among the 7, with Jean-Robert Ballande the chip leader, Prahland Friedman in second and Paul Volpe (who won this corresponding event in 2014) third.

I'm not finished yet, as the most successful player in WPT history Darren Elias 4th, 1993 ME winner Jim Bechtel 5th and 2-7 lowball specialist Vince Musso trailing in 7th.

That leaves Brazilian Pedro Bromfman who the most impressive thing I can say about is that he was the Day 1 chip leader.


Event 22 - $1000 Double Stack NLH, Day 1 of 2, 3253 entries


Nearly 90% of the players were eliminated by the end of Day 2 with an Bulgaria/Israel/Portugal top 3 - Ivan Uzunov, Timur Margolin and Jose Carlos Brito the players concerned.

It's rare that the biggest name in a WSOP event isn't actually a poker player, but that's possibly the case here as sitting in 50th spot is former Olympic boxing champion Audley Harrison nowadays listing Westlake Village, California as his home town.

Jennifer Tilly & Maria Ho are perhaps the two best known actual poker players, but this is going to be fast and furious on Day 2 playing down to a winner and my money is on a comparitive unknown taking the bracelet.


Event 23 - $1500 Eight Game Mix, Day 1 of 3, 612 entries


A record field of 612 entered, 225 are still with 92 to be paid after the bubble bursts some time on Day 2. The winner will take home $177K

Aleksandr Gofman currently has the chip lead and there's a decent gap back to second placed Mihails Morozovs with the first of the big names, Michael Mizrachi 3rd and "Miami" John Cernuto 4th.

Phil Hellmuth has had a relatively quiet time in the live events so far, but he's made two here alongside both David Bakers, Chris Ferguson (boo), Allen Kessler, Jen Harman, Shaun Deeb etc.

Philip Long took this bracelet for GB last year and he's still involved, as is another former winner Ron Ware, and some more UK players Patrick Leonard, David Tarbet, Toby Lewis and Adam Owen (first mention this year I think)


Event 24 - $600 WSOP.com Online PLO 6 handed, 1 Day Event, 1216 entrants

13 hours of online PLO were necessary to reduce a field of 1216 down to 1, and when all the virtual chips had settled, they were in the possession of Josh Pollock who was collecting his second overall bracelet, his first also coming in PLO but in the live environment back in 2013.

Jason Gooch and Jared Bleznick were second and third while the best known player on the FT was 3-time bracelet winner Phil Galfont who went out in 5th.



To start today

Event 25 - $600 PLO Deepstack, 2 Day Event

Event 26 - $2520 NLH Marathon, 6 Day Event

Event 27 - $1500 Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo 8 or better, 4 Day Event

632k.

A not inconsiderable amount of fortune has helped.

GL Tal if king bok hasn't struck

Wowzer, good start Simon.

Don't think I dare push my luck & visit him again.

Think you should piss off to Arizona for the day.

I watched the whole final, and he was down to 1bet at one point.

Shame he won, though.

White 112 if you change your mind.

Good stuff Tal.  All done in 2 days too.   I have probably planned my trip badly, my tournaments seem to be lengthening in duration.

I chanced it one more time, he has 600,000, which is exactly average. 3,200 entries, 215 left.

 (http://i.imgur.com/JPEzJ9G.jpg) (https://imgur.com/JPEzJ9G)

2 tables away & still going along nicely is Audley Harrison, & 1 table in the other direction is Sam Razavi, first time I've chatted to him since last year's WSOP. Got a lot of time for Sam. 

There's a guy at my table who's spent the entire time sweating exits to secure the next pay jump. "One more to go and we are there" "alright! Another $100"

Same guy just berated a player for taking too long to play a hand.

Some people just like moaning, don't they?

Was laughing about this today.

They definitely do :D

Good luck Tal!

Good luck Tal

Hit an iceberg. Shove button with A8. Called by A4. Four on the flop. Fortunately, he had less than me.

Down to 215k at 20k/40k with 40k big blind ante.

That would be borderline playable in an O8 comp. In holdem, not so much.

Goggles down, loins girded, spin time.

Doubled but still short.

390k at 20k/40k/40k

Spin, spin, spin!

New table. 745k. Sam Razavi to my right and Yian Liperis has just doubled up, three to my left

Lovely stuff. Good luck!

90 left in the second break of the day. At least one olympic gold medallist remains.

As he's a gooner, it would be a pleasure to beat Audley heads up.

I still need a double up. Think I've been saying that for 20 something levels now.

:D

GL mate!

Sam Razavi opens to 130k. I shove 640k with AK.

Sam calls with aces, which seems reasonable.

I offered him a chop before the flop, telling him it was his final chance. He declined and luckily got away with the win.

80th place. Won't lie: pretty chuffed. I should be gutted at getting past over 3,000 people and being 79 away from $400,000. But, no, I know I've played fine, ridden my luck and have everything I could fairly have asked for when I sat down yesterday to play.

We'll get 'em next time.

Damn!

Great run, and cold exit. Well played, mate.

Excellent stuff old chap. A great start.

Can't help noticing though maybe you should grasp the nettle and take a leave out of the book of the guy next to you, before that leaf or nettle blows off.

Nice run Tal, wp. Good luck in any other tournies you play.

Very nice run, Tal, and good luck with the rest of your schedule.

(At least your chips went to Sam, one of poker’s truly good guys)

Well done Simon.

 ;applause; Tal!

Just for you Ralph

Omaha on my table was very enjoyable
There was a massive queue of alternates
Who having bought in were waiting for a seat just before - as in 5 pm
closing reg time 7 pm
It was the most enjoyable 600$ I’ve spent this trip
Old Japanese lady from Sydney flew in for a month to play wsop was a comedy genius she amassed a good stack muffin n duffin me n her n a lady between us from Colorado really got some banter going
I can’t remember Omaha hands
I had suited aces cracked 3-4 x and was soon down to 20 k from 30 k stack
It was a real grind
Once mrs Colorado bust
A youngish guy came in
He knocked 3-4 people out and 4 x his stack in 3 hands boom 1-2-3 of his first hands after sitting
I thought you big headed c* nt
But as I sat n observed he was just a very very good player
He always knew what the pot was what the winning had should have chip wise
He was all inwith a guy and the dealer said 56 k as he lost
No it’s 52 k he said
He was right every time
Very clever
Very observant
Very good player
I bust out n left
I’m booked in to play super seniors Monday 17 ththat will be my last time at the Rio
Toilet queues are ridiculous
Couple times when needing a shit I nearly never made it - all them lobster tails reappearing outta my tailpipe !
It’s so busy there honestly bring some food like cereal bars n be self sufficient
I was right in a corner such a trek for the toilet so I didn’t drink anything all afternoon
My mate paul Fowler 5 th at aria Omaha for $3500 I got 20% of him 1400 so paid him 700 yesterday over breakfast so nearly freerolling there
He’s in the $1 k weds
At 60 it’s a struggle joint as in hip n knee joint wise to sit there that long

Thanks, folks. Was great fun.

Constipation sorted; lobster tails did the trick ;0)

:D

Lurv your updates Tony, real classy

Keep em coming daily please

ps At Rio I always leave for rest rooms 3 to 5 minutes before break and leg it down to casino...no queues then

Fabulous stuff Tal, made up for you. And if you had to donate to anyone, I'm glad it was Sam. (He eventually busted 25th). 

What are you playing next?

That’s alright for you skinny fit people
Us old fat knackers don’t like to walk that far 😂😂

We both woke up this morning- so that’s a bonus!
Looked at each other n admitted the encore is not as nice as the nugget so after some phone calls we are moving !

Yes, Sam def came across as a decent egg.

No plans for a biggun today. Might play the O8 comp at Orleans later, or could just be a steak dinner. Decisions...

I'll be playing that, along with a few friends who have won the Sky Poker package, who I promised I'd take to an O8 affair whilst in Vegas.

6pm start, reg opens at 5, but seats will be capped & it WILL sell out, so arrive early if you plan to play it. (You'll need a "Ruby" Players Card too).

PS - Jen is staying at Orleans, so you never know.

Is it expected that next year's series will be in the new Caesars conference facility currently being built?

Very good question Tighty.

I know a few Caesars/WSOP senior Suits quite well - Seth, Ty etc - & my questions to them in the last few days have been deflected & dodged. 

That had been the rumour for some time, & it recently gained strength. Certainly, The Rio building seems to be existing on a "care & maintenance" basis only, with no new spend in evidence, & the place is creaking, with elevators, escalators & all sorts out of commission.

But a few days ago, this news emerged;


https://www.investors.com/news/caesars-entertainment-stock-soars-merger-rival-eldorado-resorts/


So that may - or may not - change everything.

Caesars "as is" needs cash, so finding a buyer for the Rio solved a lot of problems.

Whether that remains the case if a buyer comes along I've no idea.

What normally happens in these spots, as you well know, & I know from recent events Next Door, is that all current plans are paused whilst they sort themselves out & re-assess everything.  

We shall see.

oioi, Pete Linton news incoming.....

Event 19 - $1500 Millionaire Maker, Day 3 of 5, 8809 entries


Just 34 players survive, and they are led by Josh Reichard, a very familiar face on the WSOP circuit, but hasn't shone so much at the WSOP proper. He leapt up the standings on the last level as he busted three players in quick succession.

Andrew Hinrichsen and Cory Albertson are second and third.

As you would expect given the attrition rate, most of the bigger name players departed the scene, but Keith Lehr is having an excellent week and has a playable stack, while Calvin Anderson is now down to less than 10 BB.

Last GB player standing was Klas Lafberg, knocked out in 47th for $25K.



Event 20 - $1500 Seven Card Stud, Day 4 of 4, 285 entries


The three short stacks were dispatched pretty quickly, and then Valentin Vornicu followed them, leaving the expected heads-up between the two big stacks of Anthony Zinno and Eli Elezra.

In the end it was Elezra who got the job done for his 4th bracelet, the third in a stud game, and his second in this exact event.

The 58-year old former Israeli army commando took his career WSOP earnings to over $2m with this win which added almost $94K to his balance.


Event 21 - $10K No Limit 2-7 Lowball Draw, Day 3 of 4, 91 entries


Easy to write up this one - it was a day off. The 7 players will resume on Tuesday night to play for the title and the bracelet.


Event 22 - $1000 Double Stack NLH, Day 2 of 2, 3253 entries


This one didn't finish on time, 11 players will come back for an unscheduled Day 3 with Jorden Fox the top dog (Well at least a Fox is a canid so it's close enough). If only 39th placed finisher Tomer Wolf had also made Day 3!

Fox has 26m chips ahead of Jeffrey Smith's nearly 22m and Scott Vener's 17.6m

Two Europeans (but no Brits) are still involved, Christopher Andler (Sweden) & Simon Legat (France)

Eliminations thick and fast saw the UK contingent disappear at regular intervals throughout the day, Sam Razavi being the last to fall in 25th spot for $14149, but an honourable mention to Audley Harrison who must have exceeded even his most optimistic expectations when lasting until 32nd for $11397. Other GB players who made the top 100 were David Winter, Yiannis Liperis and Simon Williams.

Event 23 - $1500 Eight Game Mix, Day 2 of 3, 612 entries

I'm going to start with the player in 4th place overnight as that player is Philip Long. The Londoner won this event last year and is still in with a chance of a very rare repeat performance.

First though he has to get through the rest of the 28 strong Day 3 field, led by Alexander Livingston (had a deep run to 13th in the 2013 ME)

Several other bracelet holders are also through including Chris Vitch who lies 2nd overnight, Chris Klodnicki, Chris Bjorin, Vladimir Shchemelev and winner of Event 14 a few days ago, Muril Souza.

There's also a second string to the GB bow, so to speak as Toby Lewis is also through, albeit with a smallish stack.


Event 25 - $600 PLO Deepstack, Day 1 of 2, 2577 entries


Yes it's a Deepstack but with a very fast structure as the plan remains to go from 2577 to 1 in just two days. We'll see if they manage that, with 215 players having made Day 2.

10 of those 215 are British, with 6 inside the top 100 and 2 in the top 15 - Peter Linton (4th) and Usman Siddique (13th)

The top 3 are Corey Wright, Robert Valden and Ryan Bambrick with three former November Niners (Cliff Josephy, JC Tran and William Tonking) in the field and Layne Flack, Guiseppe Panataleo, Brandon Shack-Harris and Upeshka De Silva a few more names spotted when perusing the chip listings.

The other GB players who bagged and tagged are Jaspreet Panchhi, Chris Moorman, Barny Boatman, Paresh Doshi, Jerome Bradpiece, Mohammed Ladak, Thomas Cazayous and Andrew Teng.


Event 26 - $2520 NLH Marathon, Day 1 of 6, 941 entries so far


After an event that has a breakneck pace, there's the opposite, a 6-day grind but still almost exactly half of the field bowed out on Day 1 and we have 467 through, but still oodles of late reg to boost that field.

Of the 467 it is Peter Hong who has the Day 1 chip lead, marginally ahead of Christopher Godfrey and Scott Menard. Godfrey is from Fremont, California. I wonder if that is where Vegas' Fremont Street downtown got it's name?

It's too early to concentrate too much on who's still left in, but I'm going to do it anyway as we've got three well known GB players (Sam Grafton, Niall Farrell and Patrick Leonard) through together with 2006 ME winner Jamie Gold, Marvin Rettenmaier, Matt Stout, Adrian Mateos, Taylor Paur, Neil Blumenfield and the very short-stacked Kristin Bicknell.


Event 27 - $1500 Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo 8 or better, Day 1 of 4, 460 entries


Eli Elezra won't be adding another stud bracelet to his collection, he jumped into this after winning the bracelet earlier in the day but wasn't able to make Day 2.

195 did though, and there is an Alpha Male at the top in the shape of Dave Alfa. Second place belongs to Andrew Kelsall, and in third place is Barbara Enright, still the only female player to make the WSOP ME FT, 24 years on.

Another veteran name can be found in 10th spot, Norman Chad, best known for being the WSOP TV coverage co-commentator, but he is a pretty well regarded Stud player in his own right.

Players from Reading and Manchester lie 7th and 8th, but thats Reading, Pennsylvania and Manchester, New Hampshire and you also have to pass players from American versions of Portland, Birmingham and Mansfield before reaching the first British representative, Paul Sokoloff in 85th. Also through from these shores are Ben Dobson, Adam Owen and Mel Judah along with Andy Bloch, Allen Cunningham, Daniel Negreanu, Steve Zolotow, John Racener etc.


To start today

Event 28 - $1000 NLH, 3 Day Event

Event 29 - $10K HORSE, 4 Day Event

Early show is

4/7 Steak
6/4 Orleans
Anything else a push

(https://i.ytimg.com/vi/IWaXtlV2nbc/hqdefault.jpg)

Thanks for the heads up, though.

Event 19 - $1500 Millionaire Maker, Day 4 of 5, 8809 entries


We're well into the FT at the end of Day 4, with just 6 players remaining and I don't think any of them have won a bracleet before.

Japanese player Kazuki Ikeuchi is the chip leader, followed by four Americans (Cory Albertson, Lokesh Garg, Joshua Thibodaux and Josh Gorsush) with Lithuania's Vincas Tamasauskas bringing up the rear. The top 2 have about 55BB each, but the other 4 all have re-shoving stacks so action could start quite soon.

The winner will take $1.345m while everyone left will get at least $266K, with some serious laddering to be done (next pay jump is $94K).


Event 21 - $10K No Limit 2-7 Lowball Draw, Day 4 of 4, 91 entries


There's a story here. For 13 years, the record gap between bracelets was the late David "Chip" Reese won the 2006 $50K HORSE event, 24 years after winning a Stud braclet back in 1982.

That 50K HORSE of course now is the "Poker Player's Championship" and the trophy bears Reese's name. In 4th place on that 2006 FT was Jim Bechtel, the 1993 ME winner (2nd was Andy Bloch and 3rd Phil Ivey so you can see the quality of the field).

On Tuesday, Bechtel, now 69, took Reese's record after winning the $10K 2-7 Draw, beating Vince Musso heads-up with Darren Elias departing in third.

Bechtel won a round million for his 1993 ME win, but will get just over a quarter of that for this win.


Event 22 - $1000 Double Stack NLH, Day 3 of 2, 3253 entries

The Fox finished the job off, as Jorden Fox saw off all those who where hunting him up and claimed his maiden bracelet. His rail included his father, brother and a cousin, but not his partner, as she is eight months pregnant and had to be satisfied with watching the coup de grace via smartphone.

Jayachandra Gangaiah was the runner-up and Jeffrey Smith finished third.


Event 23 - $1500 Eight Game Mix, Day 3 of 3, 612 entries

It wasn't to be a repeat for Philip Long, as despite having a big stack most of the day, suffered a run of bad hands on the FT and went out in 4th spot.

When Chris Klodnicki went out very late on Day 3, we were left with a a heads-up match between Rami Boukai and John Evans and they'll need to come back for an unscheduled 4th day to decide the winner.

Saudi-born Boukai won a bracelet back in 2009, while Evans has the one WSOP cash to his name. Boukai holds a 3:1 advantage, but with relatively few chips in play compared to the blinds/big bets, this one may not last much longer.

Allen Kessler's bid for a first bracelet after over 70 WSOP cashes ended in 5th while Toby Lewis went out in 18th.


Event 25 - $600 PLO Deepstack, Day 2 of 2, 2577 entries

I sort of predicted yesterday that this wouldn't finish within the 2 days and I was right, as 12 players remained alive at the end of the day's play.

No British challengers unfortunately, as Day 1 chip leader Corey Wright became Day 2 chip leader Corey Wright.

Austrian Florian Fuchs is second and in third place is the only former bracelet winner left, "Captain" Tom Franklin. Franklin has two cashes already this Series, but his big day was 20 years ago (so not quite as long ago as Jim Bechtel) when he won a $2500 Limit Omaha event (he also made the FT ME in both 1995 and 2000)


Event 26 - $2520 NLH Marathon, Day 2 of 6, 1083 entries

The Marathon field has been thinned down to 188 players after two days.

The Day 1 leader is David Coleman. No not that David Coleman, he died in 2013 but a poker player from New Jersey.

There's a meaty European presence in the top end of the leader board, Morten Mortensen from Denmark is second, and players from Greece, Bulgaria and Austria are all inside the top 10.

The British presence is a little more under-stated, Paul Hizer in 54th and Steven Warburton in 106th are the highest ahead of Joel Isla the only other survivor.

Not many "big names" (I don't suppose they want to tie up 6 days) but there are some November Niners there in Joseph Cheong, Cliff Josephy, Burno Politano, Amir Lehavot and Neil Blumenfield while lurking in 157th spot is Bertrand "Elky" Grospellier.


Event 27 - $1500 Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo 8 or better, Day 1 of 4, 460 entries

The Day 2 chip leader is "The Grinder", Michael Mizrachi aiming to win his 4th WSOP bracelet and break a tie with brother Robert.

A late run, doubling his stack in the final level brought him to the chip lead, where he is followed by Robert Gray and Jason Day.

It's another disappointing tournament for the Brits, but then we didn't have too many in there to start with, as the only cash went to Paul Sokoloff (49th spot for $2475).

Among the 22 players making Day 3 is Event 13 winner Yuhal Bronshtein and a couple of female players, Anna Wroblewski and Patricia Yannuzzzi.


Event 28 - $1000 NLH, Day 1 of 3, 2477 entries

The German with a very Italian name, Giuseppe Pantaleo is the chip leader after Day 1 of Event 28 with local player Steven McNally and China's Yang Zhang second and third.

Two GB players lie 6th & 7th, Iaron Lightbourne who has featured a number of times in these reports over the years, and Wayne Blodwell who's only recorded WSOP cash was in Event 19 last week. There are a number of other GB players in the field too, Samuel Simister, Daniel Watson, Louis Salter and Ben Dobson amongst them.

Daniel Strelitz who won event 11, winner of event 6 are both trying to win a second bracelet this summer, while Phil Hellmuth is trying to extend his record number too.


Event 29 - $10K HORSE, Day 1 of 4, 161 entries so far

The opening exchanges of the big HORSE events saw 161 entries, just 5 below last year's figure and with late reg still open we may well beat last year's total.

The only Colombian bracelet winner, Daniel Ospina, is the big stack after Day 1, with Randy Ohel and Brian Hastings the only 2 others over 200K in chips (starting stack was 60K).

A lot of well known players among the 83 through - Greg Mueller, Mike Sexton, defending champion John Henningan, Daniel Negreanu, Jen Harman, Brian Rast etc. Oh yeah, and Phil Ivey. Just the one Brit in Adam Owen.


To start today

Event 30 - $1000 PLO, 3 Day Event

Event 31 - $3K NLH 6-max, 4 Day Event

Fk me I’m spending more time on me I pad than playing poker writin* these up!
What a night last night
We had a right result
Went n unpacked about 4 pm lay on the bed by 5 pm scratching me balls 🎱
Fell asleep
Woke at 1130
Right old racket going on outside in Fremont st
A u2 concert
Or some twat who thought he was bono
Mrs was snoring gently
Shall we go go downstairs I enquired
No no not muff diving
Down to the casino
Next thing I know it’s 3 am
Bono’s gone n it’s quiet
Shall we go down I enquire ?
Snore grunt grunt
Next thing it’s 730 am
One night in Vegas we never spent a dime
Now that is a result and we are more on Vegas time then ever
Weds am coffee at Starbucks
$5 pool admission at the downtown grand means it’s quieter up there
It hits 98 degrees by 11 am according to binions date temperature
Lovely of lunch pitta n hunnus for Denise chicken giblets n chips for me coleslaw on the side
A bucket -6 tins of barefoot ballsdangle wine
Angry orchard cider n we are cooking on gas
By 230/3 pm it’s roasting
So we make our way to the Fremont for $2 coronas now gone up to $3 couple vodka n cokes
It’s shower n nap time
With an alarm set for 7 pm
A steak at binions is the plan
Then some casino donk age

Paul Fowler reports ridic queues at the Rio in the run up to the seniors which I’m swerving
Super seniors will be my last foray to the Rio
It’s just too busy n I hate it

Attempts to win the trumping contest led me to eat a few prunes from California but they leave a poo 💩 like mark on the bed sheets !
So I will have to bribe the maid tomorrow

If heading to downtown Vegas here’s some advice from the Scottish arm of the kk forum


Tony the chart house in the nugget do lovely cocktails (happy hour between 4pm and 6pm) only about $5 to $7 each, we pop in most days when we are there.they also do lovely snacks .
Breakfast, the californian is good (nothing fancy) but great value,its always busy,but you get a table no prob. They also do a great white tuna sandwich.
T.bone steak dinner costs about $15.
Buffet best value is main street buffet costs about $12 and they have a great selection, (its been voted best downtown value for money buffet,a couple of times in the last few years)
If you get fed up with the pool being to busy at the nugget,the downtown grand has pool on top of the hotel,costs $5 for non residents,plenty of space and and drinks a fraction of the cost you pay at nugget pool.
If you like ribs and chicken binnions do them in the bar at the back,we got one ribs and chicken order beteen 2 ,couldnt eat one each,they give you that much.

Another classic report from Tony

Your night of not losing reminds me of my night of not losing with Kempton being abandoned....result result

These reports are fantastic

More good stuff Tony.

The steak restaurant at the back of The Nugget something and Anthony's I think it's called, very nice steaks but has huge portions.

Even the starters are enormous and I'm sure would be plenty for two above average appetites as I barely made a dent in my Caesar's salad last time I visited.

Hahahaha Great unorthadox writeups Tony.. keep em coming..although some details are not for the feint of heart :)

Yeah, keep em coming please, balancing out Tikays more sedate ramblings.

sedate ramblings


My writing has been called far far worse. I'll happily settle for sedate I think. I should add, of course, that the Updates I am posting are simply C & P from a lovely chap next door, so I can't even claim credit for being sedate.

Incred scenes :D

Vic and Anthony’s  karabiner - pretty pricey in there though but v v good .
Last night was binions steakhouse - one of the few I’ve not visited over the years .
Looking at the menu I remembered why it’s 20% more than most
But it’s Denises birthday celebrations so $15 more per person is cheaper than 21 n the neighbours by $10 .- a bet they don’t do in the USA by the way .
Couple of drinks at the nugget n off we went to the 24 th floor -1 more is the pool deck we really want to visit but it’s for 4 queens guests though
Either a bribe or one night next Tuesday in the 4 queens when it’s cheap .
Binions is tidy smart n very old school type decor maitre d and waiters in full get up
Champagne $299 Dom perignon - nope
Perrier jouet $249 one of my favourites but not at that price
Moët the bargain price of $65 result
No starter
Just some bread n v nice ice cream sorry butter salt infused to keep my blood pressure up
Spectacular views though well worth that bit of extra money
8 ounce fillet mignon $52.99
Plus a fully loaded jacket
Plus mushrooms sautéed in sherry and port
Was very tasty
A chocolate cake with a candle was a gift for Denise with a lovely card
All in all a very nice touch
Back to the nugget via the Betty Crocker slot in binions one of Denise’s favourite s
I think I won a bit
Then I did $300 at $5 a spin for sweet fanny Adams in the nugget except comps towards the presidential suite we always joke about
Passing a roulette wheel with o golden nugget and oo all next to each other and the rest of the wheel is like an English layout
He’s in 19-2-4-21 area so I load up $200 in 5s he stays in that area 30$ on 17 hits as he repeated and I doubled 15 up get it up to 1700 down to 1500 n cash out
200 on blackjack which I hate - but always have to have one go at every trip .
Then bedtime

No fancy bowel movements  for adz 😂💩
Or jiggy jiggy as we fall asleep as our heads hit the pillow
Nugget pool today with loud music screaming kids and the shark tank it’s v v hot out there btw even for us lizards 🦎
Denise goes off for a trip to Walgreens n Starbucks as I get the sun beds and guard them .as after 0930 it’s a free for all .
She’s been gone that long I think she’s been kidnapped by a Vegas granny sex ring then I remember her favourite Vegas thing after me of course ? Is slots
She’s reappears with coffee and granola and ibuprofen as my hip sockets a bit tender .
I went to the D she says saw a slot turned $25 into 25 cents left in on the machine - her idea of donating to the homeless Got 4 yards further saw another slot she liked so returned and snatched her voucher from a starving hobos hand ,not really he hadn’t found it yet .
Put $20.25. In cashed out $170
Heads off to Walgreens turns a request from a tramp for change down
Gets in the walgreen q a black guy in front of her opens his Afro comb purchase n starts raking his hair
There’s an old black lady hobo at the till buying some food items ,the black guy shouts I’ll buy them I’ll buy them and promptly did so
So Denise felt guilty about turning the tramp down
In Starbucks back at the nugget she’s in the queue and spies the tramp about to get his coffee / whatever so she was about to shout I’ll get that I’ll get that when the tramp lookalike pulls out a credit card and a regular customer card and she realises the tramp has a wealthy lookalike clone who can afford to drink n eat in Starbucks ,which is almost more than we can do soon lol 😂
So she kept quiet
Pool day today
Opium the ‘ new’ show at the Cosmo by the director of absinthe is our plans tonight
Followed by dinner at batistas hole in the wall Italian restaurant like school diners only with wine venue

If up early in the morning a trip to Walmart for dog poo bags ,underpants for me ,fruit for the room ,styrofoam cool box ,fizzy pop n water n bungees n a couple of other luxury items unavailable in the uk ,
Followed by attempts to blag our way into binions pool on the 25 th floor

Really enjoying the updates. Thanks :-)

Opium v v good very ‘ alternative ‘
Can’t say too much to give it away but worth seeing
Dinner in batistas
Italian school dinners with wine enjoyable though $60 inc tip
200 to 650 cashed out 500 at roulette - 2 lots of bets all missed so I stopped whilst up .
Rebuilding slowly
Super seniors at the Rio Monday

Proper updates these Tony

Bullet point blogging. Top banana!

Excellent updates tt.

I've been waylaid fir a few days, so here's the catch-up.


Tikay10 said:

A lot of stuff to report on there Barny, must take an age, but it's appreciated.

Thanks Tikay. Most days it takes between an hour and a half and two hours. Here's today's ramblings with three tournaments reaching their denouement




Event 19 - $1500 Millionaire Maker, Day 5 of 5, 8809 entries


After five days, the winner of the Millionaire Maker proved to be 42-year-old John Gorsuch who, while has plenty of cashes on Hendon Mob, was actually winning his first recorded event with a $1.3m boost to his bank balance.

For a long while, it looked like the bracelet was going to Japan and Kazuki Ikeuchi - four handed he had 112BB while the other three players had less than 10BB each. But Gorsuch kept at it, got a little lucky in places, played well in others and benefitted by other players errors in others. Ikeuchi finished second in a WSOP event for the second year running, as he was part of the second placed team in the Tag Team event last year.

Third place went to Lokesh Garg.


Event 23 - $1500 Eight Game Mix, Day 4 of 3, 612 entries

Coming back for an unscheduled Day 4, it only took half an hour for Rami Boukai to see off John Evans in a hand of Limit Hold'em

Boukal takes $177K and his second bracelet while Evans settles for a career best of nearly $110K.


Event 25 - $600 PLO Deepstack, Day 3 of 2, 2577 entries


The third bracelet of the day went to Andrew Donabedian a regular placed player on the WSOP circuit, but only tends to win one event a year (always in PLO). He saved 2019's win for the big stage and collected $205K for his three days of work.

Todd Dreyer finished second ($127K) and Robert Valden ($92K) was third.

Of the others who I mentioned yesterday, Day 1 & 2 chip leader Corey Wright was 4th and Tom Franklin departed in 7th.


Event 26 - $2520 NLH Marathon, Day 3 of 6, 1083 entries


Three days down, three days to go with the lead now belonging to Matt Russell ahead of 51 other survivors.

Peter Hong and Johan Guilbert make up the top three, both of whom have recorded cashes dating back to 2010, but are still awaiting the really big one.

Joseph Cheong came close to getting one of the biggest of all the big ones, the 2010 ME but he finished third to Jonathan Duhamel when he won over $4m but he's still involved here but with an unspecified stack.

Previous bracelet winners Preston Lee, Mohsin Chanaria, Daniel Park and Ryan Leng are all still in, with a sole British challenger in Paul Hizer.

The current pay level is just over $8K, but the ladders will start to get substantial fairly soon with the eventual winner bagging $477K.


Event 27 - $1500 Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo 8 or better, Day 3 of 4, 460 entries


Six players remain in Event 27, and for the second day running the chip lead is in the formidable hands of Michael Mizrachi.

He only has 23 Big Bets heading into the final day, but that is more than nearest challengers Michael Sopko (20) and Robert Gray (17)

There is a rare Bolivian presence on a FT in the shape of Jose Paz-Guttierez, while the short stack Jan Stein has been playing WSOP events for 19 years without making a FT and he's ridden his luck making this one - he's been all-in and doubled up four times on Day 3.


Event 28 - $1000 NLH, Day 2 of 3, 2477 entries


Six left in this one also, and we have a big gap between first and second. Stephen Song hit all the right notes and has over 24m chips with second placed Sevak Mikaiel having about a quarter of that.

The only bracelet holder remaining is Ryan Laplante who sits in 4th place, but with not much 2nd and 6th it's really Song against the field at this point.

Phil Hellmuth had a deep run in this, making the last two tables but eventually falling in 16th.

The German with a very Italian name, Giuseppe Pantaleo is the chip leader after Day 1 of Event 28 with local player Steven McNally and China's Yang Zhang second and third.

The biggest British cashes went to Andrew Hills and Nathan Watson (42nd & 43rd respectively for $7356), Louis Salter, Iaron Lightbourne, Samuel Simister, David Marshall, Yudhishter Jaswal and Wayne Blodwell


Event 29 - $10K HORSE, Day 2 of 4, 172 entries so far


Brian Hastings has, to put it mildly, a chequered past but is undeniably a very succesful player. He was third on Day 1 and moved in the lead on Day 2, pushing the Day 1 leader Daniel Ospina down into second. Together with Dario Sammartino, they are the only ones with over a million chips at this point.

11 of the 20 remaining players are bracelet winners, including Scott Clements who bagged his 2nd in Event 11 a week ago.

The opening exchanges of the big HORSE events saw 161 entries, just 5 below last year's figure and with late reg still open we may well beat last year's total.

No Brits even managed to cash, and a few of the Day 2 casualties were Daniel Negreanu, Phil Ivey, Brian Rast and defending champion John Hennigan.


Event 30 - $1000 PLO, Day 1 of 3, 1526 entries


A long day of PLO with over 13 hours at the tables has ended with Stefan Ivanov coming through late to claim the chip lead with just 309 players making Day 2.

The Bulgarian leads Luis Zedan and Joseph Sabe in the top 3, with 229 to be paid and the eventual winner taking home $236K.

The two top Brits sit side-by-side overnight, Jerome Bradpiece 1000 chips better off than Peter Linton in 58th & 59th. Chris Moorman, Philip Long, Jan Collado, Dimitri Holdeew, Sam Razavi, Adam Owen, Gasam Alaaldin, Jaspreet Panchhi, Usman Siddique, Joe Beevers, Lloyd Muir, Warren Colman, Paresh Doshi and Mohammad Ladak make up a strong British challenge, both in terms of numbers and quality.

After winning the PLO Deepstack, Andrew Donabedian jumped into this and is still technically in with a shout of a quick fire double, but he'll have to do a double of a different sort pretty sharpish on Day 2 as he has one of the smallest stacks in the entire field.

Some familiar names still in include Anton Morgenstern, JC Tran, Dan Shak, Eoghan O'Dea and Vitali Lunkin.


Event 31 - $3K NLH 6-max, Day 1 of 4, 754 entries


754 players started but only 140 finished Day 1 with the leader being 2016 November Niner Griff Benger

Syvlain Loosli has made the FT of both the Main in the main Vegas WSOP and the WSOP Europe and he's still in, as is another who had a big run in the main, last years runner up Tony Miles.

Eight different nationalities in the top 8 places, with the British representative the 8th-placed Robert Bickley with Daniel Tang and Thomas Cazayous both inside the top 20 and Raul Martinez, Jonathan Proudfoot and Michael Kane inside the top 50.


To start today


Event 32 - Seniors NLH, 4 Day Event

Event 33 - $1500, Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw, 3 Day Event

Event 26 - $2520 NLH Marathon, Day 5 of 6, 1083 entries


Down to two tables (and 16 players) in the Marathon, with Russian Romanev ahead of two Chinese players Yicheng Xu and Dong Sheng Peng.

They play down to 6 today with an average stack on the table of 44BB so plenty of play still left yet.

I think there's two previous bracelet winners still left in Preston Lee and Daniel Park, but they're both among the shorties.

The last British challenger Paul Hizer bit the dust midway through the day and finished 30th for $11K.

Everyone left has earned at least $16K, but survive just one more elimination and that jumps to $21K and the ladders just get better from there.


Event 27 - $1500 Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo 8 or better, Day 4 of 4, 460 entries


It's a fifth bracelet (breaking the tie with his brother) for Michael "The Grinder" Mizrachi, making him the most successful (in terms of bracelets at least) player of the 2010s.

After the Bolivian challenge was removed early, the 5 Americans were left to fight it out, Jan Stein was knocked out quickly after and Elias Hourani followed after the first break.

3-handed play was very swingy but eventually Michael Sopko swung down and out, leaving Mizrachi against Robert Gray. That started more or less even but it didn't take long for Mizrachi to establish an advantage which he drove home for that fifth bracelet and $142K.


Event 28 - $1000 NLH, Day 3 of 3, 2477 entries


In 2008, Peter Kay in an alter-ego as Geraldine McQueen had a number two hit called "The Winner's Song". His prescience came good 11 years later as in Event 28 was indeed Song. Stephen Song.

Song started the day with a big chip lead, but it took him nearly four hours to beat his five rivals after losing a couple of big pots midway through the day temporarily dropped him to third. He was all-in against Ryan Laplante but managed to hit a flush draw on the river to double up three-handed, and twenty hands later he bust Laplante in 3rd, and after ten more Scot Masters became his final victim.

He's had some success on the WSOP domestic circuit, but this is far and away his biggest win and the $341K he got more than doubles his biggest payday.


Event 29 - $10K HORSE, Day 3 of 4, 172 entries


Seven left jockeying for position on the final table of the $10K horse with Dario Sammartino at the head of the field, with three times as many chips as second placed Craig Chait.

The next three on the chip listings all have at least one bracelet, Scott Clements (who remember won his earlier this month), Greg Mueller and Daniel Ospina.

That leaves Mikhail Semin from Russia in 6th and Matthew Gonzales whipping them in with just 1 Big Bet in his stack.


Event 30 - $1000 PLO, Day 2 of 3, 1526 entries

Just 58 planers remain heading into Day 3 and amazingly 57 of them are looking for their first bracelet. The one that isn't is David Halpern who won a Stud Hi/Lo event ten years ago (but has only two cashes since, including 4th in this year's Event 4)

The chip leader is Gary Bolden ahead of Gregory Donatelli and Anton Morgenstern not far behind.

Two Brits, both familiar names who most people would love to see break their bracelet duck, Sam Razavi in 23rd and Joe Beevers among the short stacks in 54th. Two from Ireland too - Aidan Hynes & Zeik Tuit.

Finally 12th placed player Matthew Maggard is from a town called Floyds Knobs, Indiana. Make your own jokes here.


Event 31 - $3K NLH 6-max, Day 3 of 4, 754 entries


Exactly 20 players bagged and tagged at the end of Day 3 with a player who seems to specalise in odd-numbered years, Upeshka Da Silva in the chip lead. He has won bracelets in 2015 & 2017 and is looking to add 2019 to that list.

Along with Nicholas Howard and Thomas Cazayous, the top three have pulled away from the field a little but of course its NLH so one big double up from someone else could upset that order fairly quickly.

A couple of bracelet holders remain, Angel Guillen and Kyle Cartwright but the likes of Negreanu, Ferguson & Cada all went out on Day 3.

Cazayous is a French player resident in London and we have another EU national/London resident in for the ride in Raul Martinez while a 100% Brit survives in Jonathan Proudfoot, who already has a cash in the series back in the Shootout Event.

It was a big day for Toronto yesterday with the Raptors claiming the NBA Championship and there are two Torontonians (I think that's the correct word) inside the final 20, both great names that it's safer to cut and paste rather than risk getting them wrong: Veerab Zakarian and Demosthenes Kiriopoulos


Event 32 - Seniors NLH, Day 1 of 4, 5916 entrants

A tantalising two short of last year's record field, with 1778 of them making Day 2.

888 poker is one of the event's sponsors, but it may well be co-incidence that 888 players will make the money. Then again, it may not.

Dominick Scarola is the Day 1 chip leader with Adilson Moraes in second and Albert Halfon third. Halfon will have a story to tell his mates back home - Phil Hellmuth entered late and came to Halfon's table, and Halfon promptly busted him and added Hellmuth's chips to his already decent stack.

Mark Kroon is a long-time mate of Hellmuth's and as such was heavily featured in the TV coverage of the 2015 ME, making the Top 50 and lies 6th here after Day 1 while the top Brit is Keith Littlewood in 20th.

Some other well-known names making day 2 include Victor Ramdin, Barry Greenstein, Barbara Enright and Joe Hachem while amongst the UK challenge are Richard Chamberlain, Robert Parkin, Gary Solomons, Alain Bauer and Peter Costa all inside the top 300 with Paul Jackson is lurking a little (well quite a bit really) further down.


Event 33 - $1500, Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw, Day 1 of 3, 467 entries


It's a British chip leader at the end of Day 1 of Event 33. Benny Glaser leads the 139 who are playing for 71 places in the cash and eventually the bracelet and $144K first prize.

Early days of course, but good to see Ben Dobson, Nicholas Marchington also there with the Union Jack beside their names.

Other survivors include defending bracelet holder Hanh Tran, Phil Hellmuth who has lasted longer in this than the Seniors, Daniel Negreanu and Nick Schulman.


To start today

Event 34 - $1000 Double Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, 2 starting flights Fri/Sat

Event 35 - $10K Dealers Choice 6 Max, 4 Day Event

Report from 2p2, looks like Keith's idol is involved in some shenanigans :)

This is getting feisty. Matt Glantz just walked over to the table and him and Negreanu were really going at one another.

MG “You probably didn’t realise you were angleshooting”.
DN “I should probably break one of your teeth”
MG “What the **** for? You want me to expose what you did?”
DN “You stupid mother ****er. What the **** are you even doing here? **** off”.

Voices were loud, floor rushed over, Glantz escorted back to his table and things have calmed down a bit now.

Surely not.

Sunny Chattha big chip leader of #36 $1k Double chance after day 1

Mr Pie?

No.

In a fit of unexplainable optimism I wondered, and checked a couple of days ago

He is a Yank

When in Vegas Mr Pie does not play poker

Was going to say - hyper-turbo and it might be believable. Almost.

I am reliably informed that
1) nelly is playing downtown tomorrow
2) who the fk is nelly ?
Nelly furtado
Nelly the elephant
Nelly the 3 legged donkey who can sing ?
Who knows .?
Who even cares ?
Lazy day today
Binions for breakfast
WAL mart shopping n nails for Denise
Inthe fremont 3 till 830 pm drinking coronas
Made friends with some big ass black guys now it’s tats  n the hood
I’m kool you’re not ha ha
We depart to binions
Binions bar b q ribs chicken etc
One drink I’m nodding off after it
It’s bedtime at 1045pm in Vegas
Tats n the hood iz in bed in his pants with a kit kat
High rolling daring stuff of leg ends

For all you what’s the weather like merchants it’s cloudy with occ meatballs n lasagna
Night

Incred :D :D


YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GeZZr_p6vB8

Top quality update as per unusual Mr Tats.

Event 26 - $2520 NLH Marathon, Day 5 of 6, 1083 entries


The WSOP event that seems like it has been going on longer than the Cricket World Cup has at last reached its final table of 6.

Jared Koppel has the chip lead with 11.7 chips, almost double the stack of Dong Sheng Peng in 2nd (5.8m).

Behind that come Francis Anderson (3.7m), Roman Korenev (3.3m) , Joseph Liberta (2.5m) and Joe Curcio (1.5m)


Event 29 - $10K HORSE, Day 4 of 4, 172 entries

It's a third bracelet for Canadian Greg Mueller as he defeated Colombia's Daniel Ospina heads-up for the bracelet and over $425K. Mueller's first two bracelets came just a fortnight apart back in 2009, both in Limit Hold'em.

Dario Sammartino finished third and Event 10 winner Scott Clements was fourth.


Event 30 - $1000 PLO, Day 3 of 3, 1526 entries


Extra time will be needed here as 5 players are still involved at the end of the scheduled three days play.

There is still a British interest as Sam Razavi is the short stack of the table. Sam lost a hand to Thida Lin when her Aces made a flush while Sam's Aces didn't

The chip leader is Luis Zedan who went on a wrecking run and now has about 50% of the chips in play.

The other two players left are both Ryans, Robinson (USA) and Goindoo (Trinidad & Tobago) who also had a deep run in this same tournament last year when finishing 18th.

The only previous bracelet winner left on Day 3, David Halpert went out in 34th and Joe Beevers was knocked out in 46th for a little over $4K.


Event 31 - $3K NLH 6-max, Day 4 of 4, 754 entries


Can we claim this as a part-British bracelet? 24 year old Gallic pro Thomas Cazayous is resident in London and was shown as being from GB for most of the duration of the event, but is now showing (properly) as French.

It is his first bracelet on his first FT and only his 5th ever cash (for $414K) after being Nicholas Howard heads-up with Upeshka De Silva in third.

Raul Martinez finished 6th and Jonathan Proudfoot 10th ($31595)


Event 32 - Seniors NLH, Day 2 of 4, 5916 entrants


Two days down in the Over 50s event and 252 players remaining. It's Howard Mash who has been the most successful over the first two days being the only player to bag over 2 million chips.

Two local players, Anthony Martin and Victor Ramdin have over 1.5m in second and third.

The British challenge has been reduced to 5 - David Stonehouse, Keith Littlewood, Ali Zihni, Peter Costa and Julian Mann.

Edit - Add Antony Ringe to that list, although he's shown as Estonian.

Barry Greenstein and Layne Flack are two of the better known players remaining,

All the players are guaranteed a minimum of $3279 with the winner taking home over $662K.


Event 33 - $1500, Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw, Day 2 of 3, 467 entries

2018 winner Hanh Tran has moved to the top of the chip listings after the penultimate day of this, the Austrian one of just 17 survivors.

Jared Bleznick sits second while Frankie O'Dell is third. O'Dell together with 13th placed Daniel Strelitz are both looking for their second bracelet of 2019.

The only British player among the 17 is 3-time bracelet winner and Day 1 chip leader Benny Glaser, lying in the middle of the pack.


Event 34 - $1000 Double Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, Day 1A

It's always nice to see a familiar British name near the top of the overnight chip listings, and we have just that in Day 1A of Event 34. Sunny Chatha is the man in question. Preliminary reports actually had him at the top, but when all the stacks (of the 1096 survivors) were compared, he lies second to Juan Esirviez from Argentina but ahead of Imran Mukati in third.

There's some well known names giving this a whirl - Phil Hellmuth being the biggest one but there's also Ari Engel, Ben Yu, Dan Shak & Phil Laak.

From the UK, second Brit is Jack Sinclair while others in the upper to mid echelons include Usman Siddique, Timothy Chung, Gasam Alaaldin, Tsz Ho and Matthew Hunt. Barny Boatman, James Rann, Iaron Lightbourne and Ben Dobson have progressively smaller stacks, the last named precariously short.


Event 35 - $10K Dealers Choice 6 Max, Day 1 of 4, 114 or 115 entrants


The WSOP are showing 114 players in one place and 115 in another, either way it's marginally up on last year's 111 with still some late reg to come.

Jeffrey Lisandro has started off the best and holds the Day 1 chip lead with Shaun Deeb only a few chips behind and Phillip **** in third.

Xunen Zheng is the first GB player listed, with Adam Owen, Luke Schwartz and Patrick Leonard all also inside the top 24.

Last year's winner Adam Friedman (remember he beat Stu Rutter heads-up) has made it through Day 1 as have several other bracelet winners including Frank Kassela, Phil Galfont, another Friedman (Prahlad Friedman) and fresh from his 5th bracelet yesterday, Michael Mizrachi.



To start today

Event 36 - $3K NLH Shootout, 3 Day Event

Plus Day 1B of the Double Stack.

Lol. 6 f**king days!!! Not exactly my cup of tea I have to admit.

Yeah, that's a no thanks from me as well.

Any plinlop news ?

Think he's having very fun.

Event 26 - $2520 NLH Marathon, Day 6 of 6, 1083 entries


A Marathon event deserved a marathon heads-up match and that's just what we got. It took over 200 hands, five hours and 12 double-ups for the short stack before Roman Koronev got the better of Jared Kopel to take his first bracelet and $477K.

By way of contrast the FT took just 90 minutes from the start of play to go from 6 players to 2, Dong Sheng Peng (who missed the first 10 hands of the day by arriving late) finishing in third place.


Event 30 - $1000 PLO, Day 4 of 3, 1526 entries


Luis Zedan managed to convert the chip lead at the end of Day 3 into the win, the bracelet and $236K without being headed.

He beat Thida Lin heads-up, her performance being the best by a female player so far this year, with the last British hope Sam Razavi bowing out in third.



Event 32 - Seniors NLH, Day 3 of 4, 5916 entrants


The plan was to play down to 6 on Day 3, but that wasn't possible as after the scheduled 10 levels no fewer than 19 players remained, and without any likelihood of getting to even a single table anytime soon looking slim (more than half the players had over 40BB), the sensible decision to pack up for the night was taken.

None of the 19 have bracelets to their name and it's anyone's guess who will win their first here.

Day 2 chip leader Howard Mash repeated the feat as Day 3 chip leader ahead of French player Jean-René Fontaine and Farhad Jamasi from Ocoee, Florida. I still have nightmares about Ocoee as a bus I was in broke down there back in the last 80s and left a group of us stranded for hours.

The good news is there is a British player among the 19 in Ali Zihni. Looking at his Hendon Mob profile he has been playing for a decade or so with his best result winning the "Mini Main" at the GUKPT Grand Final last November for £18K. Converting that into dollars gives about $23.5K, so he needs to survive just one more elimination to record a career best score.

The small stack of the 19 belongs to Peter Mullin whose stickability has been remarkable. He had less than 1BB on the final hand of the night and managed to hit trip twos (I hate calling them "deuces") and apparently increased the number of all-ins he has survived over the three days to "the mid twenties"! A barnacle to beat all other barnacles!

The eventual winner will take home nearly two thirds of a million dollars.


Event 33 - $1500, Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw, Day 3 of 3, 467 entries


The WSOP have deleted all updates to Day 3 so I can't give you much other than the basic facts here.

The title and the bracelet went to 35 year old Robert Campbell, born in Australia but now resident in Ararat, Turkey. It's his first bracelet on his 7th FT.

David Bach was second, Jared Bleznick 3rd and defending champion Hanh Tran 7th.

Benny Glaser was the last British challenger, falling in 10th spot for a little over $10K.


Event 34 - $1000 Double Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, Day 1B, 6214 entries across the two flights.


1229 players made it through from Day 1B to join the 1111 from Day 1A, with Sean Getzwiller having the biggest stack from 1B.

It's another pleasingly international leader board, with Yasheel Doddanavar (India) 2nd, Andres Jeckeln (Argentina) 3rd and players from Lativa, Taiwan, Switzerland and Hong Kong all in the top 10.

We can't manage a Brit in the top 10, but 14th isn't too shabby, the position being occupied by Guilio Mascolo who cashed in Event 28 a couple of days ago.

Someone who did better than just cash a couple of days ago was Thomas Cazayous, and he invested a little of his winnings here and has managed to take a stack through to day 2 along with 3 former ME champions Jamie Gold, Scotty Nguyen and Chris Ferguson.

A few of the large number of Brits through - Lynne Beaumont, Craig McCorkell, Aaron Woodcock, Kenneth Broad, Paul Sokoloff, Katie Swift, Sam Razavi, Scott Margereson, Luke Schwartz, Paul Jackson and Simon Deadman


Event 35 - $10K Dealers Choice 6 Max, Day 2 of 4, 122 entrants


A few late entrants added to the prize pool, making the first prize worth over $312K, a little up on the figure Adam Friedman took for last year's win.

A back-to-back win is still a possibility, as he's not only among the 11 players who made Day 3, he's the chip leader.

What there isn't is any British players, although we did get three into the 19 who cashed, they all departed post-bubble. First was Luke Schwartz (18th), quickly followed by Xunen Zhang (17th) and a little while later Adam Owen (14th) joined then on the sidelines. All collected $14818.

Plenty of formidable opponents, as you would expect in a $10K mixed-games event including Shaun Deeb, Matt Glantz and Jeffrey Lisandro.


Event 36 - $3K NLH Shootout, Day 1 of 3, 313 entries


The 313 were split between 40 tables, all of which played down to a winner who will progress to Day 2.

Ryan Leng was the first player through after beating Phil Ivey heads-up, and he was joined by a number of other bracelet holders such as Justin Bonomo, Taylor Paur, James Obst and Kristin Bicknell.

Two Brits were successful, Harry Lodge and Ben Farrell. They've guarenteed doubling their $3K stake but to ladder up it will take winning their table as the next second, third and fourth on the day 2 tables all pay the same. The eventual winner will be over $200K richer.

The last 40 will play short-handed poker on Day 2, 10 tables of 4 to come up with a FT of 10.


To start today

Event 37 - $800 NLH Deepstack, 3 Day Event, $750K guaranteed

Event 38 - $600 WSOP.com Online NLH Knockout Bounty, 1 Day Event

Event 32 - Seniors NLH, Day 4 of 4, 5916 entrants


The top two players after Day 3 ended as the top two players after Day 4, as Howard Mash defeated Jean-René Fontaine heads-up to win his first bracelet and $662K.

Playing his first Seniors event (he's not long turned 50), Mash did lose the chip lead he's held since Day 2 briefly on the final day (Jim McNurlan had the lead at the start of the FT), but soon reasserted his position and although the stacks were pretty even for much of the heads-up match, 80 or so hands later Mash had done the job.

Frenchman Fontaine took $409K and McNurlan $303K for third.


Event 34 - $1000 Double Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, Day 3 of 5, 6214 entries


The players from Day 1A merged with those from Day 1B and at the end of Level 21, there were 359 players remaining with Arianna Son having moved into the chip lead. Her 2.3m is about 15% more than her nearest challenger Radoslav Stoyanov with Ignacio Molina a few chips further back.

Jack Sinclair, the 2018 WSOP Europe Main Event winner is one of a number of previous bracelet holders still active is the top Brit with James Millman, Guilio Mascolo, Neil McFayden, Angelo Milioto, Simon Deadman, Philip Ford, Andrew Hawksby and Nikolay Ponomarev the other Brits through to Day 3.

Not too many other recognisable names left in - Faraz Jaka and Marcel Vonk maybe the two best known so I'm reduced to looking for funny names or funny hometowns and I can't see many. Whoops yes I can. Many, Louisiana is the hometown of 169th placed Clay Henry.


Event 35 - $14K Dealers Choice 6 Max, Day 3 of 4, 122 entrants


A quietish day, playing down from 11 to 5 with the most noise about the end of play.

Philip **** was knocked out in 7th and in the next hand Nick Schulman went out too, leaving 5. There was a break soon after, and then discussions ensued about whether to play on or end, as scheduled, when they were down to 6 (or in this case a couple of hands later due to the imminent break). The decision was made to stop unless the 5 players were unanimous to carry on, and they weren't so the chip bags came out leaving Shaun Deeb and Matt Glantz to protest

Anyway, what have the following got in common - Johnny Moss, Doyle Brunson, Stu Ungar, Johnny Chan & Phil Hellmuth? Not just they're all ME winners, but they've won the same tournament two years running. Adam Friedman is still in the running to add his name to that illustrious list as he was second in chips overnight, behind only Deeb.

Glantz is third, Michael McKenna fourth and David Moskowitz is the short stack in an all-American final five.

With Deeb at least wanting to play the $10K Stud Championship on Monday, the dynamic will be interesting as the others might want to slow him up.


Event 36 - $3K NLH Shootout, Day 1 of 3, 313 entries


The winners of the 10 Day 2 tables are all set and will meet to play it out for a bracelet and over $200K, and we have a British challenger who will sit in Seat 1 on the FT in the shape of Ben Farrell.

Andrew Lichtenberger has already finished second to one British Ben this series when losing heads-up to Ben Heath in Event 5, perhaps lightning will strike twice.

He's one of three bracelet winners still left, alongside Alexandru Papazian of Romania and Justin Bonomo (3 bracelets)

Everyone at the FT is guaranteed a minimum of $12937.


Event 37 - $800 NLH Deepstack, Day 1 of 3, $750K guaranteed, 2808 entries


An unusual price point saw a massive entry, with 671 through to Day 2.

With 422 to cash, the plan is to play all the way down to a FT of 6 but I wouldn't be surprised if the number of players left at the end of the day is nearer 20.

The two big named Phils are the main attraction - both Ivey and Hellmuth have enough chips to be going on with, but will have to watch out as blinds are rising every 40 minutes.

Some others in include Elio Fox, Kelly Minkin, Manig Loeser, Ismael Bojang, Kenny Hallaert & Jeremy Ausmus, while the top three are Jose Brito, Danny Ghobrial and Ben Gilbert.

For the UK, we have Miranda at 29th. Miranda who? I have no idea. It might even be a surname, but it's just listed as Miranda.

Joshua Boulton is 44th, Leo Worthington-Leese 49th and Dragos Trofimov 55th. Chris Moorman and our very own Adam Bromley are also still in the tournament. Moorman and Ivey will be sat in adjacent seats for the start of Day 2


Event 38 - $600 WSOP.com Online NLH Knockout Bounty, 1 Day Event, 1224 entries


I mentioned a few days ago that Upeshka De Silva wins bracelets in odd-numbered years. Well he's added 2019 to 2015 & 2017 by winning the online bounty Event 38.

He won just over $98K from the main prize pool, plus $1800 for 18 bounties at $100 a pop, taking his earnings fractionally over the $100K mark for 11 hours work.

David Nodes was the defeated heads-up player with David Fhima continuing a good week or so for France by taking third.


To start today

Event 39 - $1000 Super Seniors NLH, 3 Day Event

Event 40 - $1500 PLO, 3 Day Event

Event 41 - $10K Seven Card Stud, 4 Day Event

Event 34 - $1000 Double Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, Day 4 of 5, 6214 entries


40 players remain in the quest for the $678K first prize and the bracelet, already having ensured a payout of at least $15K.

There's only one previous bracelet winner among the 40, and he is Jack Sinclair, half of a two-pronged British challenge (the other prong being Andrew Hawksby) Neither hold one of the larger stacks in the room, but with 13 & 23BB respectively they've still got some play left in them.

The chip leader is one of an ever increasing number of Chinese players at the WSOP - Zinan Xu, with a reasonable lead over Ida Ashkenazi and Matthew Wantman.

There is also an Irish rep in the last 40 - Patrick Clarke.


Event 35 - $10K Dealers Choice 6 Max, Day 3 of 4, 122 entrants

A historic day for Adam Friedman as he joined the list of notable players I typed up yesterday, winning the same WSOP event in back-to-back years.

Michael McKenna was eliminated in 5th place playing pot-limit 2-7 Triple Draw, followed by David Moskowitz in his game of choice, PLO.

While Matt Glantz sat still as the short stack, Friedman was able to attack Shaun Deeb in NLH and managed to take the lead before Glantz was busted, also in 2-7 Triple Draw.

During heads-up, Deeb snatched the lead a couple of times but never for very long, and while Friedman swapped his choice of games up, Deeb went back to what he knows best, NLH for the last few hands which ironically cost him the tournament.


Event 36 - $3K NLH Shootout, Day 1 of 3, 313 entries


The event that plays like three single table Sit & Gos is done and dusted and the bracelet is on the wrist of first-time winner David Lambard.

The 44-year old, whose father was a poker pro, beat the 9 other survivors including 3 previous braclet holders to win the title and over $200K.

He beat French player Johan Guilbert heads-up, a major hand coming when Lambard ran a bluff with 5-3 with another of those Chinese players, Weiyi Zhang 3rd.

The British challenger on the FT, Ben Farrell, ended up in 6th for $37K.


Event 37 - $800 NLH Deepstack, Day 1 of 3, $750K guaranteed, 2808 entries


As I thought, the likelihood of playing down to just 6 on Day 2 was low, but even I under-estimated the number of players who would be left.

In fact it was 26 who made Day 3 headed by Hamid Feiz, ahead of one of the two previous bracelet winners in the field, Nick Jivkov from Bulgaria and the only British player left, Joshua Boulton.

The other bracelet holder left? Kevin Song. I don't he's related to Stephen Song who won an event a week or so ago!

Still no update on who the mysterious "Miranda" was, but she (I presume it's a she) just missed the top 100, finishing 102nd for $2018.



Event 39 - $1000 Super Seniors NLH, Day 1 of 3, 2650 entries


You've got to be 60 years of age to play the Super Seniors, and there are plenty of eligible players in the card rooms of Vegas this time of year - the 2650 is a record for this event.

The day 1 chip leader is Charles Bailey from Alaska, with 836 others accompanying him through to Day 2 ahead of Ken Gurley and Dennis Owen.

No sign of tikay, perhaps he isn't old enough, but we do have some GB players through led by Tony Bedford, Linda Iwaniak, Michael Davis, Murray Henderson and Mark McCluskey.

Some well known names left in - TJ Cloutier, Barry Greenstein and the two Toms, Franklin & McEvoy.


Event 40 - $1500 PLO, Day 1 of 3, 1216 entries


Exactly 200 remain after Day 1 of Event 40, with an Israeli at the top in the shape of Shahar Levi, with Sajal Gupta and one of the players of the series so far, Keith Lehr in third.

It looks like there is a Brit inside the top 5, but Dimitri Holdeew is an Austrian shown as being resident in Brighton. That means we have to look down to 50th spot for Adam Monaghan, and further down we see Gary Solomons, Barny Boatman and Jan Collado

Matt Glantz jumped into this after finishing 3rd in the Dealers Choice and that looks a good decision so far with him lying 8th overnight, while also in are Erik Seidel, meerkat Alexandr Orlov and Kenny Hallaert, and Pittsburgh Penguins ice hockey player Phil Kessel.


Event 41 - $10K Seven Card Stud, 4 Day Event


Early stages in a star-studded (sorry) field with less than 80 players entered on Day 1 with some late reg still available.

Almost half survive, 36 to be exact led by Scott Siever, with two of 2019's bracelet winners Scott Clements and Greg Mueller close behind and another, Michael Mizrachi in 5th.

No prizes for guessing the only Brit to make Day 2, Benny Glaser very rarely gets knocked out early in these $10K events, but he's on fumes after Day 1, with only about 10% of the stack of the leader.


To start today

Event 42 - $600 Mixed NLH/PLO deepstack, 8-max, 2 Day Event, $500K Guaranteed prize pool

Event 43 - $2500 Mixed Big Bet, 3 Day Event

aka tonytats, top blogger

Hand for hand goes so we are in the money
I get aces black
He has kings red
All in I raise he Re raise I rere raise etc
Flop 678 all clubs
Queen diamonds turn
King spades river
A one outer
Marv

Hope you're still in Tony, good luck.

So at the weekend we deceided it’s a pool day
What’s a pool day in Vegas ?
A quiet day sat there sipping cocktails n listening to mellow magic tunes ?
Nope if you’re not by the pool before 0915 am all of the beds are gone
At the nugget the pool is surrounded by people sitting on the edge or standing drinking buckets of beer ,not getting out to toilet so you can only presume they all pee in the pool unless they’ve got bladders like flood storage tankers .

So now it’s $10 admission fee to the downtown grand- pools warm like piss - which is 80% of its active ingredients
There’s almost no shade there too
a very loud DJ playing rap music - no mellow magic
We look at binions on the 25 th floor ,a tiny pool , glass screening prevents much breeze circulating
So we try the plaza pool on the 5 th floor
Success it’s not mobbed
There’s sunbeds
Pools warmish
But there’s the nigga rap music blasting out
Oh well gg mellow magic
So we get sunbeds I’m partially in the shade ,Denise’s is in the sun perfect
We are the only people at the pool not smoking weed too
A good day is had by all
A cabana is booked for weds $50 plus $100 spend is required
Anybody around pop up 5 th floor south tower.

Pizza slice on the way out
Goodfellas pinball
$80 win on slots
$3 coronas in the Fremont casino bar know $7 in the nugget a binions burger for dinner and it’s a good day

Poker’s on pause and we had a good weekend

I try n eat healthily - says the fat bloke currently scoffing Morrison’s shortbread biscuits at 9 am
So I also bought some dates ,prunes and small bags of cranberries n raisins ,of which I’ve eaten a few in the last few days - I’m still not healthy or thin ?
Fk knows why ?
With the resulting effects on my bowels that heavy doses of fruit has .
The Rio is the nut worst place to get a mild dose of the shits / griping stomach pains as it’s a 200 yard walk with bum cheeks clenched to discover a 60 person queue at the bog
So my advice ?
Lay off the fruit 😂😂😂💩💩💩

No mate he had me covered - just
I was pretty disappointed as I’d played well and fancied myself to go deeper than that
A nights sleep and it’s history now

Well done on the WSOP flag Tony.

Will you be dipping your toe in any others?

Not in the pools by sounds of it!

WP TT

😂😂

When I last visited The Nugget which I have always been a big fan of for overall value for money there was no resort-fee.

I never used the pool despite admiring the sharks in the adjoining tanks but are you saying that the resort-fee does not cover using the pool?

NIGGA rap music
Damn

Event 34 - $1000 Double Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, Day 4 of 5, 6214 entries


We're down to a Final Table of 6, and the chip leader is a familiar name, although he hasn't bagged himself a bracelet yet. Joseph Cheong has over $13m in live cashes, headlined by the over $4m he got for finishing 3rd to Jonathan Duhamel in the 2010 ME (the year Redmond got to 21st). He is aiming to add over $687K to that total but is of course mainly in pursuit of that elusive first bracelet.

Cheong has 100.3m chips and as they'll come back to blinds of 500K/1m, it's easy to work out he has 100BB, a long way clear of nearest rival David Ivers (60BB) and Zinan Xu is third with 54BB

There is still a female challenger - Arianna Son who has been up among the chip leaders most of the tournament has now dropped to the back, with just 5BB but like everyone else left in, she has earned at least $134K.

The last two British challengers both fell on Day 4 - Jack Sinclair went out in 27th for $27K, ten places earlier than Andrew Hawskby whose payout slip bore the amount $29666.


Event 37 - $800 NLH Deepstack, Day 3 of 3, $750K guaranteed, 2808 entries


A long day of poker saw them play all the way from 26 to just 1, and that 1 was Robert Mitchell who took nearly $300K and a gold bracelet and will return home to Utah a WSOP Champion.

Holding pockets aces and have the opponent go all-in on you pre-flop when heads-up for a bracelet must be a very surreal experience, and then to see the board run out dry must make it even more so. Marco Bognanni got no help for his pocket threes and Mitchell was the champion.

France's Axel Halley finished third with players from Switzerland, Canada and Ukraine 4th 5th & 6th.

The only Briton through to the final day was Joshua Boulton who ended up 10th with a very nice cash of $19601 more than doubling his entire career recorded cashes, most of which have come in Torquay.


Event 39 - $1000 Super Seniors NLH, Day 2 of 3, 2650 entries


Day 2 of the Super Seniors reduced the field to 120 which I expect to mean that an extra days play will be needed

Jay Hong is the chip leader, but the player in second is bound to extract some interest - double bracelet winner (including a WSOP Europe Main Event) Barry Shulman. And he's not the only Shulman in the 120, his wife, Allyn is also through.

Humberto Brenes and Tom Franklin are a couple more former bracelet winners qualifying (does Brenes still have that annoying toy shark shtick?) along with three from these shores - in descending stack order Michael Davis, Peter Costa (2 cashes already this WSOP) and Edwin Bibes.

We lost plenty of British players over the day, those who cashed included Tony Bedford (almost immediately after the bursting of the bubble), Linda Iwaniak (who finalled this event last year) and Mark McCluskey.


Event 40 - $1500 PLO, Day 2 of 3, 1216 entries


Twenty one players remain in the chase for Event 40, all now sure of at least $8807 but with $298K up top there's going to be some ups and downs yet.

Barny Boatman suffered one of the downs, getting knocked out on the bubble by Mike "The Mouth" Matusow

It is Denis Bagsadarov who tucked away the biggest stack of Day 2 ahead of Glen Cressman and Johannes Toebbe, with double bracelet holder Ben Zamani in 4th. Even lying 4th, he's not the highest player from Boca Raton, Florida as Crossman is also from that hometown.

It looks like we have one British challenger still involved, Adam Monaghan, but the only player of that name in the Hendon Mob Database is an Aussie.


Event 41 - $10K Seven Card Stud, Day 2 of 4, 88 entries


A few late registrants took the field to 88 and just seven of them are left.

Daniel Negreanu spent the day almost relentlessly chipping up, first taking out a number of smaller stacks and finally busting Michael Mizrachi to establish a chip lead.

In contrast to some of the other events, this one will probably end up finishing a day early as they're already down to the FT which will free up the players for the next $10K event, the 2-7 Triple Draw.

Six of the seven left already have bracelets to their credit, Negreanu, David "ODB" Baker, Frank Kassela, John Hennigan, Chris Tryba & David Singer. The odd one out is Russia's Mikhail Semin


Event 42 - $600 Mixed NLH/PLO deepstack, 8-max, Day 1 of 2, $500K Guaranteed prize pool, 2403 entries


The field for this has already been depleted from 2403 to just 195, and while it should finish inside the planned two days, the expected early finish of Event 41 has meant that arrangements have been made for a Day 3 here if necessary.

Adam Lamphere is the Day 2 chip leader from Caleb Hershey and Dustin Goldklang a respectable distance back in second and third.

Scanning down the list of qualifiers I can see some who had Final Table runs in the main - Ylon Schwartz, Jesse Sylvia, Eoghan O'Dea and Tony Miles, and one who had the dream to Main Event glory, Jamie Gold, who won $12m for that win back in 2006, and has yet to reach $13m in career earnings.

A decent British challenge with Robert Cowen, James Dempsey, Barny Boatman, Sam Razavi aand Jeff Kimber amongst them.


Event 43 - $2500 Mixed Big Bet, Day 1 of 3, 218 entries


This one is rocking along at a furious pace, only 52 players still chasing 33 spots in the money and a first prize of $127K.

Jonathan Depa moved into the lead late on, overtaking Jared Bleznick who had been among the bigger stacks all day.

Phil Hellmuth by contrast was down almost to a chip and a chair before getting two late double ups to least give him something to work with on Day 2, even if he is still among the smaller stacks.

Somewhere in between we can find David Baker, not "ODB" who is on the FT of Event 41, but "Bakes", Brandon Shack-Harris, Mike Sexton, Chris Ferguson, David Benyamine, Eli Elezra and German footballer and regular WSOP participant Max Kruse.

The only British name I can find is Usman Siddique.


To start today, marking the halfway point of the 89 bracelet events

Event 44 - $1500 NLH Bounty, 3 Day Event

Event 45 - $25K PLO High Roller, 4 Day Event

Really enjoying these.

Props for nicking them from next door, and making them available to nick from here :)

Thanks to the gent putting in the time to make them all.

Thanks Marky, appreciated, I'll pass that on.

He has a Football Club Historical Database that may interest a few, so if anyone fancies giving this a click or two it'd be appreciated. Some incred stuff on there, though it's a bit geeky for most.


http://fchd.info/

There’s a $200 buy in at the nugget I think it starts tomorrow 3 flights for 3 days 11am-3pm -7pm with a day two Sunday
No more wsop hips n knees ache after sitting that long

Your pool admission is free at the nugget Ralph and obv covered in the resort fee but it’s v busy esp at weekends u need to be there between 8-845 or prime spots are gone .

I also do your trick which I think it was you who advised ?
tip the maid a bit of money every day - $10 in our case as she can’t look after you when you are gone home ?
We write her notes saying “ please can we have some pens n notepads / soap ?”
Thank you xx

We got quite a few by now

Tourney report tomorrow

Never a bad thing to tip a maid. And you can never have enough bottles of water.

Nip in the ladies, we do the opposite when there's a big queue!

WP getting a flag too.

When I was there courtesy of next door, I swam every morning, it was bliss having a pool with a view that was in the sun as opposed to my local freezing indoor pool with no view at home.

Get a call 1230 last night
Bad news mums just died
Weird day today
We go home Monday
Don’t feel like writing much

Terrible news, Tony.

So sorry for your loss.

Sorry to hear that Tony.

Thoughts are with you mate.

She isn't suffering any more Tony.

Condolences mate.

Thoughts and prayers with you Tony

Condolences Tony.

Sad news Tony.   Condolences to your family.

Terrible news Tony ... Thoughts with you mate

Thoughts are with you Tony.

Condolences to you and your family TonyT

Condolences to you and your family Tony.

My condolences Tony.

Ghastly news, so sorry to hear this Tony.

Event 34 - $1000 Double Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, Day 5 of 5, 6214 entries


Joseph Cheong had two runner-up finishes, a third (in the Main Event) and a fourth, and has now added a WSOP bracelet to his poker CV.

He managed to use his big stack to his advantage and by the time heads-up play with David Ivers started, he had a 3:1 advantage and although Ivers came back at one point, Cheong was never to be headed and won the bracelet and over $687K

The day started 6-handed, but within 8 hands they were down to 3 as first Ido Ashkenazi bust, quickly followed by Arianna Son and then in the very next hand we said "Arrividerci" to Andrea Bunonocore.

Zinan Xu was the short stack throughout three-handed play and never managed to improve on that.



Event 39 - $1000 Super Seniors NLH, Day 3 of 3, 2650 entries


Extra time required here as there are still 10 players involved. Michael Blake has been like a wrecking ball on Day 3, eliminating player after player and earning himself the chip lead.

He'll be sat next to two-time bracelet winner Barry Shulman as they reconvene for Day 4, on two five-handed tables rather than combining for an unofficial FT of 10.

Second place belongs to Kanajett Hathaitham and third to Rick Austin in an all-American final 10.


Event 40 - $1500 PLO, Day 3 of 3, 1216 entries


Ismael Bojang has won his first bracelet in his 75th WSOP cash (and 10th this series) by beating James Little heads-up. Little entered heads-up 2.4:1 down and Bojang never left him off the hook, winning all the big hands and eventually finishing tbe job off with a 7-high straight.

Ben Zamani won the battle to be best of Boca Raton in third, with Day 2 chip leader Denis Bagdasarov finishing 4th.

A quick mention for 18th placed Carson Wieland, who was playing his first ever WSOP event and made it to the final day.


Event 41 - $10K Seven Card Stud, Day 3 of 4, 88 entries


As expected, done and dusted within three days. With 6 of the 7 remaining players having already won WSOP bracelets, a star-studded heads-up match was likely, and we got what Lance Bradley tweeted was the first ever heads-up match for a bracelet between two Poker Hall of Fame members.

The final was between Daniel Negreanu (6 bracelets) and John Hennigan (5 bracelets) with the Canadian having the early lead, but 4 hours or so of up & down stud poker later, it was Hennigan who got the better of it and equalised the bracelet count between the two at 6-each.

Hennigan won $245K, Negreanu (who hasn't won a bracelet in Vegas since 2008) $151K and third-placed David "ODB" Baker $104K.

I mentioned a few days ago that Upeshka Da Silva wins his bracelets in odd-numbered years, well this breaks the opposite sequence for Hennigan, who won his first five in 02/04/14/16 & 18


Event 42 - $600 Mixed NLH/PLO deepstack, 8-max, Day 2 of 2, $500K Guaranteed prize pool, 2403 entries


As expected, a Day 3 will be necessary as eight players bagged chips at the end of Day 2.

It's no change at the top as Day 1 chip leader Adam Lamphere is back at the top of the listings on Day 2, with only Dan Matsuzki anywhere near his chip total.

It's four Americans against four international players, 2 of which come from India with third placed Raghav Bansal one of the duo from the subcontinent.

Sam Razavi put in a gallant effort to make his second FT of the series, but fell short when eliminated in 10th ($16603) after being chip leader for a part of the day.

Other British cashes included $2473 for Robert Cowen, $2097 for Gilad Tiefenbrun and $1796 for James Dempsey.


Event 43 - $2500 Mixed Big Bet, Day 2 of 3, 218 entries


With some tournaments finishing early and others requiring extra time, it's a bit of normality to see an event that should finish in its normal compliment of 3 days.

7 remain, headed up by last years runner-up Ryan Hughes who has already eliminated the player who outlasted him last year, Scott Bohlman in the last bustout of the day.

5 of the seven have bracelets already in their trophy cabinet, Loren Klein having three and Hughes two. One of the others who has one previous bracelet is WPT commentator Mike Sexton who appears to be playing better now he's in his seventies than he has for years.

Usman Siddique was the only British player to cash, squeaking in to the money and being the first player eliminated post-bubble for $3767.


Event 44 - $1500 NLH Bounty, Day 1 of 3, 1807 entries


With good timing, the bubble burst on the last hand of the day meaning all 272 players who return for day 2 are in the money (a min cash is $1414)

I'm not sure I've referenced anyone from Andorra in these updates before now but there's a first time for most things, and that time is now. Ignacio Molina picked up his first WSOP cash earlier in the week in Event 34, and he's now got a second and is in good shape as the Day 1 chip leader.

Geographic neighbour Kevin Naegelen from France is second and Baitai Li from New York state is third.

A decent amount of GB players made the money headed by Tom Hall in 7th spot with Scott Margereson 24th and Andrew Hills 55th the best of them.

Looking at a few other names, Sam Grizzle is a real blast from the past, with Hendon Mob cashes dating back to 1988, Barry Greenstein can't match that, only going back to 1992 but does have 3 bracelets, and the looming spectre of Phil Ivey who is still looking for a really deep run to possibly add to his 10 bracelets is through too, but will need a double-up pretty soon on Day 2.


Event 45 - $25K PLO High Roller, Day 1 of 4, 222 entries so far

One of the big boy events, which will have a significant effect on the Player of the Year standings and needs just 8 late registrations to match last year's record field.

128 of the 222 remain, with Keith Lehr a smidgin ahead of Paul Volpe at the top of the standings, and Firas Sadou a little further back in third.

Ludovic Geilich is the highest placed of the British challenge in 5th, with another LG, Lautaro Guerra just outside the top 10 and Gavin Cochrane in 18th.

Next placed with a Union Jack against their name is Jorryt Van Hoff, showing as from London, but the 2014 ME third-placed is from the Netherlands and is presumably a resident of our capital.

Plenty of bracelet winners left, including Robert Mizrachi now on a mission to get back level with his brother, last year's winner Shaun Deeb and the 2015 winner Anthony Zinno.


Event 46 - $500 WSOP.com Online NLH Turbo Deepstack, 1 Day Event, 1181 entries


A long event title, but for an online bracelet it was more of a sprint than a marathon and was done and dusted in just over seven hours.

The player who ended up as last man standing was Dan Lupo who had been prominent throughout the day, and saw off David Clarke to take the bracelet and $145K.

Third place went to someone who is still only listed by his on-line alias, "johnsonck".


To start today

Event 47 - $1000/$10K Ladies NLH, 4 Day Event

Event 48 - $2500 NLH, 4 Day Event

Event 49 - $10K Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw, 4 Day Event

Event 39 - $1000 Super Seniors NLH, Day 4 of 3, 2650 entries


Michael Blake comes to the WSOP just to play this one event, he's played it for the last three years and cashed in it each time. Now he's gone all the way and taken first WSOP title and over $369K.

He led going into the extra Day 4, and despite losing it at one point to Cary Marshall who started the day like a house on fire, but lost a big hand to Barry Shulman and went out in 3rd.

Stacks were pretty even for a while, but inexorably Blake drew ahead and after about 50 hands of heads-up Shulman shoved with both a flush draw and an open ended-straight draw, but Blake had two pair and all Shulman's draws missed, his hopes for a third bracelet disppeared and Blake could start the celebrations.


Event 42 - $600 Mixed NLH/PLO deepstack, 8-max, Day 3 of 2, $500K Guaranteed prize pool, 2403 entries


Early in the event, Aristeidis Moschonas was down to half a big blind, but over 48 hours later he converted a chip and a chair into a WSOP gold bracelet and $194K after beating 2018 bracelet winner Dan Matsuzuki heads-up.

The two Indian players at the FT finished 5th (Ashish Ahuja) and 3rd (Raghav Bansal) with Germany's Rainer Kempe in between them in 4th.


Event 43 - $2500 Mixed Big Bet, Day 3 of 3, 218 entries


In the 1970s, Bill Boyd and Doyle Brunson both won four bracelets in consecutive years. There are a lot more bracelets now, but the fields are much bigger too so it's still a very impressive achievement matched today by Loren Klein

Klein won a mixed NLH/PLO event in 2016, a $1500 PLO the next year and last year a $10K Championship bracelet in PLO 8-handed. Now he's made it four in a bracelet event that encompasses 7 variants (Big O, No-Limit Hold’em, No-Limit 2-7 Lowball Draw, Pot-Limit Omaha Hi-Lo 8 or Better,No-Limit 5-Card Draw High, Pot-Limit Omaha & Pot-Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw)

He was the short stack when the day started, but together with Ryan Hughes and Phil **** gradually drew away from the rest of the contenders.

**** bust in third and then Klein had a good set of Big O and NLH hands to propel him into a chip lead, and after the game changed to PLO Hi-Lo, a flush condemned Hughes to be the runner-up in this event for the second consecutive year.

Mike Sexton was the first bustout of the day and collected $12K, third placed **** $51K, Hughes nearly $79K and Klein a very nice $127K.



Event 44 - $1500 NLH Bounty, Day 2 of 3, 1807 entries


Only two bracelet holders are among the 23 who will play for the Event 44 title on Friday, including second-placed Asi Moshe who has 2 to his credit while Harrison Gimbel in 4th place has just the one.

Everyone else is looking for their maiden victory, including chip leader Damjan Radanov and fifth place Andrew Hills who hails from Preston.

It would not only be the first bracelet for Vitaljis Zavorotnijs but the first ever for a player from Lativa, while Martijn Gerrits has already made the FT of one bounty event here and is in the top half of the Day 3 field.

Of the other British players, David Tovar in 31st and Dragos Trofimov (36th) both collected $6434 while Scott Margereson (80th) pocketed $2752 the same as a certain Mr Phil Ivey.


Event 45 - $25K PLO High Roller, Day 2 of 4, 278 entries


We're down to 39 halfway through the PLO High Roller, with two Asian players way out in front. Anson Tsang from Hong Kong and James Chen from Taiwan both have over 4m chips in their bags with nearest challenger Alex Epstein (winner of 8) just under 2.5m in third.

Three British challengers are still in with a shout, Ludovic Geilich, Stephen Chidwick and Lautaro Guerra are clustered between 13th and 18th in the overnight standings.

Former ME winner Joe Hachem has survived (albeit with a short stack) as has Erik Seidel, Robert Mizrachi, Paul Volpe and Justin Bonomo.


Event 47 - $1000/$10K Ladies NLH, Day 1 of 4, 968 entries


It may not be "Jenny From The Block" but it is Jennifer Lopez who is the Day 1 leader in the Ladies Event, ahead of Katie Lindsay and Diane Cooley.

Two of last years FT are still involved, Jill Pike and Molly Mossey, and some former bracelet winners like Allyn Shulman, Jackie Glazier and Kathy Liebert.

From the UK, Daiva Barauskaite, Natalia Brevigliere and Deborah Worley-Roberts all have long names and are all inside the top 17, but they're the only ones who have made the 261 who will re-start on Day 2.

146 will get a min-cash of just under $1500 with the winner collecting $167K.

Thankfully, I have seen no evidence of any men trying to enter the ladies event again this year.


Event 48 - $2500 NLH, Day 1 of 4, 996 entries


So close to some nice round numbers, with just 4 shy of 1000 entries and 1 more than 200 who will be back for Day 2.

Baitai Li holds the chip lead, but it is the player in 2nd most of us in the UK will be interested in as that is the Hendon Mob's very own Barny Boatman.

Canada, Austria, Denmark, Spain and Bulgaria are all represented inside the Top 10 (in fact there's three Austrians inside the Top 11)

A sprinkling of other British names can be found in the reporting, Robert Heidorn, Niall Farrell and Ben Dobson amongst them while there's a first sighting (for me at least) of the 2014 ME winner Martin Jacobson who will come back inside top quartile of the field.


Event 49 - $10K Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw, Day 1 of 4, 92 entries so far


32 players advance with Johannes Becker from Germany the chip leader, but with a couple of Brits hard on his heels in the shapes of Benny Glaser and Luke Schwartz.

I could run through most of the rest of the 32 players as "well known names" but I'll just pick out a few - Calvin Anderson, Max Kruse, Brian Hastings, David Benyamine, Event 33 (also in 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw) winner Robert Campbell and Mike Matusow.

Expect a couple more players to jump in before late reg expires early on Day 2.


To start today

Event 50 - $1500 Monster Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, 2 starting flights Fri/Sat

Event 51 - $2500 Mixed Omaha Hi-Lo/Stud Hi-Lo, 3 Day Event

Event 44 - $1500 NLH Bounty, Day 3 of 3, 1807 entries

Second place entering the final day, Asi Moshe came to the fore and collected his third bracelet, with the Israeli also picking up a very nice $253K, plus I think another $12K in bounties.

He entrered heads-up play against Damjan Radanov with almost an 8:1 lead and not surprising it didn't take long for him to finish the American off, although there was one double-up which delayed the inevitable.

Germany's Tonio Roder ran a three barrel bluff with his last 7m chips at just the wrong time, Moshe holding pocket aces to knock Roder out in third.

The last Brit standing was Andrew Hills who made the FT, finishing 6th for $45K,


Event 45 - $25K PLO High Roller, Day 3 of 4, 278 entries


A select field of 7 remain with a British presence at the very top of the leaderboard. Stephen Chidwick has almost 13m chips and only Alex Epstein with 10.8m is anywhere close.

Robert Mizrachi lies 3rd, with 8-time bracelet holder Erik Seidel in 6th.

Two other GB players were busted on Day 3, Ludovic Geilich in 23th and Lautaro Guerrain 17th, both for over $50K,


Event 47 - $1000/$10K Ladies NLH, Day 2 of 4, 968 entries


I mentioned yesterday that the 3 remaining GB players were all ones with compartively long names, well the chip leader today is the polar opposite as it is the Canadian Tu Dao.

She has just one WSOP cash, from back in 2005 which is one less than second placed Nancy Matson (although she has a WSOP Circuit ring to her name).

Day 1 chip leader Jennifer Lopez has progressed through to Day 2 together with two former bracelet winners in Jackie Glazier and Kathy Leibert, plus some who have had deep runs in this very event, Jill Pike, Lisa Fong and Deborah Worley-Roberts

Worley-Roberts is accompanied by another player with the Union Jack beside her name, Natalia Brevigliere, while third player I had listed in that category yesterday (Daiva Barauskaite) is now showing as Daiva Byrne from Lithuania


Event 48 - $2500 NLH, Day 2 of 4, 996 entries


Just 26 players are left, with Baitai Le the chip leader for a second day running. Two more Americans come next (Michael Finstein and Ryan Olisar) before we come to a rare player from Uruguay (Pablo Melongo)

After that, the better known players appear with Josh Arieh 5th, Ari Engel 6th and in 7th place no other than Barny Boatman.

Robert Heidorn and Michael Stephenson make up a three-strong UK challenge, nicely split one on each of the 3 tables, and all guarenteed at least $12244 with the eventual winner picking up $427K.


Event 49 - $10K Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw, Day 1 of 4, 100 entries


9% of the runners have made Day 3, and despite losing Benny Glaser as the last elimination of the Day there is still a chance of a British winner with Luke Schwartz in second place.

He marginally trails just George Wolff, each of the top with more than 50% more chips than third placed Mark Gregorich.

Brian Hastings, Calvin Anderson, Daniel Ospina, Johannes Becker, Mike Gorodinsky & Yueqi Zhu make up the rest of a very talented final 9.


Event 50 - $1500 Monster Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, Day 1A, 2428 entries


Two Brits in the top 6, with Conor Beresford holding the chiplead (almost half the Day 1A field moving on) and Dean Hutchison in 6th spot.

Iaron Lightbourne, Sunny Chattha, Usman Siddique, Simon Deadman and Adam Owen are also among about 30 British players who have made Day 2.

Amnon Filippi doesn't have a bracelet to his credit, but seems like he's been prominent for years with his best WSOP result being 4th in the Poker Players Championship in 2007 and lies second here with Mark Johnson third.

In fourth spot is Alisson Piekazewicz who I initially assumed was a) female and b) Polish. I was wrong on both counts, he's a young Brazilian male player.

Some other names through - Pierre Neuville, Matt Stout, Neil Blumenfield and Ali Imsirovic


Event 51 - $2500 Mixed Omaha Hi-Lo/Stud Hi-Lo, Day 1 of 3, 401 entries


It's Russia to the fore with Andrey Zaichenko the leader after the opening day of action, one of 128 players still in with a shout.

The American challenge starts at No. 2, with last year's Player of the Year Shaun Deeb trying to notch up points in a bid to retain that award, and Tom Schneider in third.

אלי אלעזרא (Eli Elezra) and Michael Mizrachi have already padded their bracelet totals this year and are still in this one too, and Phil Ivey was one of the latest of the late reggers and hasn't done much more than protect his opening stack yet while Phil Hellmuth similarly joined the show late on and has at least had one double up.

From these shores, it's a first shout-out of the 2019 WSOP for Stuart Rutter, plus Xunen Zheng, Philip Long, Ben Dobson and Aussie-in-residence Mel Judah bagging chips at close of play.

There son't be a repeat winner here as 2018 bracelet hero David Brookshire was one of the Day 1 casualties.


To start today

Event 52 - $10K PLO 8-max, 4 Day Event

plus Day 1B of the Monster Stack

DOUBLE BRITISH BRACELET ALERT!

I'll repeat that - DOUBLE BRITISH BRACELET ALERT!


Event 45 - $25K PLO High Roller, Day 4 of 4, 278 entries


The first British bracelet of the day goes to Stephen Chidwick. After so many near misses (13 Final Tables) the man from Kent finally got his hands on the jewellry (and a huge pile of cash - $1.6m worth).

It was Chidwick's first event of the WSOP, he arrived in Vegas just in time to late reg.

James Chen was aiming to get the first ever bracelet for Taiwan, but came up one position short as Chidwick won the heads-up match in just short of a hour. Chen also bagged a 7-figure payday to ease his pain of losing out.

Third place went to Matthew Gonzales and fourth to Robert Mizrachi.


Event 47 - $1000/$10K Ladies NLH, Day 3 of 4, 968 entries


Tu Dao had a roller-coaster of a day, but in the end she finished it exactly where she started it, top of the chip listings.

Just six remain, with Jiyoung Kim of Korea in second place in what will be her first ever WSOP cash, and Nancy Matson is third. Nobody still in contention has a bracelet to their credit so it will be a brand new experience for someone.

Deborah Worley-Roberts went out in 21st spot ($4767) and Natalia Breviglieri 15th for $7311.


Event 48 - $2500 NLH, Day 3 of 4, 996 entries


Another player with heaps of WSOP experience has also broken his duck as Ari Engel took down Event 48.

Heads-up with Pablo Melogno didn't last long, the Uruguayan entering the final with about an 11:4 lead but a huge hand when Engle shoved in the flop aith AQ on a K-10-4 board (and a back door flush draw) while Melongo called with top pair. A Jack on the river won it for the American with nearly all the chips in play shifting his way, and one hand later it was all over.

William Hoffman was third on a FT that lasted just 68 hands.

Of the three British challengers, Barny Boatman did best (18th for a little over $15K) while both Robert Heidorn and Michael Stephenson busted on the previous payout level for $12K.


Event 49 - $10K Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw, Day 3 of 4, 100 entries


No need for a Day 4 as Luke Schwartz made it two bracelets on the day for the British contingent.

He seems to have grown up a lot since the days of "Sandwichgate" and numerous other petulant outbursts, and perhaps he will deservedly now be known for his poker exploits.

Three handed play went on for hours with the trio of Schwartz, George Wolff and Johannes Becker going back and forth until Becker finally dropped.

After that, Wolff still wouldn't go away but a battle between two 8-high hands saw the Londoner emerge victorious and cue huge celebrations on the rail.


Event 50 - $1500 Monster Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, Day 1B, 6035 entries in total


Over 3600 players played the second flight, with the fact this was a pure freezeout catching several players out who thought they'd be able to re-enter 1B after busting on 1A.

James Hundt, Kapila Garner and Rick Alvarado are the top three stacks but with nearly 1800 making it through from today's field to add to the 1A qualifiers, there's still a very long way to go.

Looking for British names, Ben Farrell is the highest place while I assume "Duthie John" with no location listed is British legend John Duthie. Martins Adeniya, Michael Kane, Katie Swift, Louis Salter, Jeff Kimber, James Rann are among those also making Day 2, along Natalia Breviglieri after busting the Ladies event.

The WSOP have helpfully picked out a few names to save me searching through a huge list, so I can say that Taylor Paur, Greg Raymer, Barry Greenstein and a couple of others from the ladies event Allyn Shulman and Jackie Glazier.


Event 51 - $2500 Mixed Omaha Hi-Lo/Stud Hi-Lo, Day 2 of 3, 401 entries


A dozen left, Michael Thompson having the biggest stack of the 12 ahead of Daniel Ratigan and continuing a very good day for British players, Philip Long is 3rd.

Stuart Rutter bust out in 49th place, earning $3882, the only other British player in the money.


Event 52 - $10K PLO 8-max, Day 1 of 4, 494 players so far


The latest $10K Championship event has seen almost 500 players already entered, meaning a decent increase on last year's 476.

No fewer than 253 players were still standing at the end of Day 1, with the concise name of Yi Li at the top of the chip listings, immediately followed by Mohsin Virani and Timothy Batow.

2011 winner Ben Lamb is the first of the better known players, with Daniel Negreanu, David Benyamine, Robert Mizrachi, Eoghan O'Dea and fresh from losing heads up in Event xx, James Chen.

Brits? Yes of course. Jan Collado is inside the Top 20, and next is Armin Ghojevand whose only recorded cashes on Hendon Mob amount to less than £2000 all in Didsbury from 2014-15. Further down we can pick out Toby Lewis, Peter Costa, Fraser MacIntyre, Stuart Rutter and Barny Boatman.


To start today

Event 53 - $800 NLH Deepstack 8-max, 2 Day Event. $750K guaranteed prize pool

Event 54 - $1500 Razz, 4 Day Event

Event 55 - $1000 WSOP.com Online NLH double stack, 1 Day Event

Thanks for the kind words

What a nightmare day after chopping the binions evening tourney for 1250
We went to the pool early 0815 to get our spot
Very luckily I had taken $1500 out of my bag and put it the safe
So I had 3 x 100 bills I’d just changed 200 into 20s 10sn 5s as I was getting low on small Bills
We fell asleep 9 am woke at 10 am my bag gone phone passport money
Got security fking useless as ever Rudy
Rudy what I asked ?
Can’t give surnames out for security reasons - wanker
Been ages on phone
Been police to file a report
Airport to check with virgin I can’t fly without it
I can’t
On way back old guy in an Uber
Says I’ll drive you 450$
A flight is 125 each
As I’ve got no I’d or c card both of us got to go
So I’m booked in for Tuesday 11am at consulate at LA
Need a passport photo
Virgin kindly waived change of date fee
What a nightmare

And I thought I was running bad. That's a shocker Tony, very unlucky mate.

Looks like it has happened;

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-caesars-m-a-eldorado-idUSKCN1TO0VF?utm_campaign=trueAnthem:+Trending+Content&utm_content=5d0fdf17704ea70001907bba&utm_medium=trueAnthem&utm_source=twitter
 

Sorry to hear your news Tony. Safe flight back to Yaxley.

Really sorry Tony. Hope you get home safe and as soon as you can.

After the double glory for British players yesterday, today was a little more low key.

Event 47 - $1000/$10K Ladies NLH, Day 4 of 4, 968 entries


The ladies event is over and the last survivor of nearly 100 players was Korea's Jiyoung Kim making her first WSOP cash a mammoth one. She wins $167K, far surpassing her previous $22K from an event in the Philippines.

It was just the second ever Korean bracelet (Sean Yu won one two years ago)

Heads-up against Nancy Matson started with Kim having about a 3:2 chip lead, a lead she never relinquished and after about 40 hands the tournament was over.

Third place went to France's Sandrine Phan, while Day 2 & 3 chip leader Tu Dao went out in fourth.


Event 50 - $1500 Monster Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, Day 2 of 5, 6035 entries in total


While 2052 players started the day after getting through the two Day 1s, three quarters of them had the long walk away from the tables after losing their last chips.

Of the 457 who did make Day 3, the player they're all chasing is Kainalu McCue-Unciano. Try saying that 10 times really fast. In second is another Las Vegas local, Andrew Moreno with Oklahoman Brady Bullard very close behind.

The bubble burst in the middle of the day and everyone still in will take at least $3534 with the winner collecting just over a million dollars.

You've got to look pretty hard to find too many well known names amongst the field, former ME winner Joe Cada perhaps the biggest name along with Pierre Neuville but the British challenge is still in decent in both quality and quantity - Juan Sanchez, Elliott Peterman, Iaron Lightbourne, Louis Salter, Sunny Chattha, Adam Daniel, Christopher Poulton, Andrew Fields, Robert Tinnion, John Duthie (correctly ordered today), Raul Martinez, Robert Sherwood,
James Rann, Guy Taylor, Phillippe Souki, Graham Hiew, Kevin Wibberley, Dean Hutchison and Jeff Kimber being the players in question.


Event 51 - $2500 Mixed Omaha Hi-Lo/Stud Hi-Lo, Day 3 of 3, 401 entries


A very late night, with Yuri Dzivielevksi and Michael Thompson agreeing to play an extra hour when they were heads-up at what would have normally been the end of Day 3.

The extra hour was barely scratched, a couple of hands was all that needed as Dzivielevski got a full house on the turn of an Omaha Hi-Lo hand with no low draw and Thmpson was drawing dead.

The big hand happened maybe half an hour earlier on a hand of Stud Hi-Lo Dzivielevski hit a K-Q high flush on seventh street while Thompson could only manage a K-9 flush. This saw Dzivielevski take a dominating lead after stacks had been pretty even beforehand.

Third and fourth places went to Russians (Stebkov & Zaichenko) while Philip Long had another deep run bowing out in 6th for $31K.


Event 52 - $10K PLO 8-max, Day 2 of 4, 518 players so far


Far and away the biggest of the $10K events outside the Main, with a record field for this event.

Both yesterday's British bracelet winners entered this at the last minute, with very different results. Stephen Chidwick lasted all of one hand (!) while Luke Schwartz was hot all day and ended Day 2 second in chips behind only Daniel Alaei. Another former bracelet winner, Shaun Deeb lies third.

Hand-for-hand play on the bubble lasted 9 hands before Ray Henson was the last to leave without at least a $15K min cash and from then to close of play we lost two British players, Jan Collado (for that min-cash) and Peter Costa ($16K). That leaves Schwartz, James Park (8th) and Matthew Perry (28th) to battle on towards possible future glory.

Shout out to David Halpern. Last heard of here I think back in Event 4 when he finished 4th, he is through to tomorrow's play in both this and the Monster Stack, and could frequently be seen running between the two events during the day.


Event 53 - $800 NLH Deepstack 8-max, Day 1 of 2, $750K guaranteed prize pool, 3759 entries


440 players through to Day 2, with one of the bigger stacks belonging to the No. 1 ranked player in the Global Poker Index, Alex Foxen. He lies in seventh place in a list headed by Kenneth Johnson, Shmuel Hada and 2013 November Niner Amir Lehavot.

Lehavot finished third that year, but there are still 3 ME winners left here, as well as recent bracelet winner Asi Moshe.

From this country, Adrian State leads the way in 18th, ahead of Harry Lodge , Timothy Chung, Aaron Fisher and Simon Deadman all inside the Top 100 and there are plenty of others further down still in play.

Let's see if they can manage to play down from 440 to 1 inside one day's play.


Event 54 - $1500 Razz, Day 1 of 4, 363 entries


You'd think Eric Rodawig would be favoured in another variant of poker, he is from Omaha after all, but it's Razz in which he leads the Day 1 field.

Mr Burns is second, not Montgomery Burns but Stephen Burns from Michigan and Doug Lorgeree about whom I know nothing is third.

Adam Owen is one of a handful of Brits through along with Vamshi Vandanapu, Jason Gray and the micro-stacked Joe Brindle.

Loren Klein, fresh from his fourth bracelet in consecutive years bagged chips as did Ryan Reiss, Gavin Griffin, Jennifer Tilly and for the second time today Chris Ferguson.

55 will get paid a minimum of $2247 with the winner getting $119K.


Event 55 - $1000 WSOP.com Online NLH double stack, 1 Day Event, xxx entries

Another online event so not much to write about, except to note that the winner Jason Gooch was the runner-up in an earlier on-line bracelet event and this time he went one better, he's also cashed in a couple of the live PLO events in Vegas.

Three Italians made the final table, Max Pescatori (9th), Gianluca Speranza (7th) and Dario Sammartino (4tH), with, for the record, Anthony Augostino 3rd and Brian Wood the runner-up#


To start today

Event 56 - $1500 NLH Super Turbo Bounty, 1 Day Event

Event 57 - $1000 NLH Tag Team, 4 Day Event

Event 58 - $50K Poker Players Championship (mixed games), 5 Day Event

We deceided at 4 am to get up n hire a car n drive to LA
Rather than rely on the really old Uber driver who offered to drive me there n back Tuesday for $400
It just seemed too last minute to me !
Even though he planned to leave at 4 am
We left at ten am only Denise can drive as my licence was stolen even though I had a screen shot of mine it’s not good enough !
She’s never driven abroad or a left hander
But did a cracking job
We got here at 455 pm consulate was just closing but I spoke to barbra who I’ve e mailed my details too and she has said it will be sorted within 30 mins in the morning 9 am start !
Phew what a relief
So we drove down to Santa Monica pier n Venice beach ,but on a grey overcast day it seemed like skeggy or Yarmouth ,a bit run down n dilapidated
Hotels in that area are $250-$400 !
We found a 180 $ motel that seems fine
Laying on bed knackered ,both of us a bit tired with v tired eyes 👀
Early night then another long day tomorrow

Please guard your stuff folks
Our guard was down briefly n somebody took advantage

Apparently there’s a consulate subsidiary office in Vegas that can help in the same situation - but it takes time ?
How much I don’t know
I will try n obtain more details in case something similar happens to others

Event 50 - $1500 Monster Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, Day 3 of 5, 6035 entries in total

The field has been reduced to 49 and the overnight leader Vincent Chauve does indeed have a Monster Stack of 22m chips.

Bryan Kim is second before another Frenchman, Anthony Kazgandjian rounds out the top 3.

The long list of British players mentioned yesteday has been whittled down to three - Elliot Peterman, Juan Sanchez and Guy Taylor. Taylor has a good record in massive field WSOP events, cashing in the 2017 Colossus and Main Event and the 2018 Colossus and Goliath

Ryan Hughes is the only double bracelet winner left, while also through are Bart Hanson, Igor Yaroshevskyy and a player whose story would rival any the WSOP have brought us over the years.

Former poker pro Kevin Roster was diagnosed with a rare cancer called Sarcoma, unfortunately too late to treat it (he's already lost his left leg). He has a very little time left and has moved to California because of the "right to die" legislation existing in that state. Before he has to make that horrible decision, he came to Vegas for one last WSOP and to spread awareness of his condition and has made Day 4 earning at least $18K so far which we can only hope goes to make his last few days/weeks/months more comfortable.

I don't know if links to external sites are permitted (and I'm not going to make a habit of it), so mods if necessary please remove it, but I'm going to link this one anyway https://www.pokernews.com/news/2019/06/kevin-roster-sarcoma-awareness-34408.htm


Event 52 - $10K PLO 8-max, Day 3 of 4, 518 entries


Bubbling up nicely with a FT of 8 players ready to fight it out for the bracelet after 5-time bracelet winner (including winning this event) Daniel Alaei went out in 9th.

Dash Dudley leads fellow Mid-Westener Kyle Montgomery with back in third place Eoghan O'Dea. O'Dea has final tabled both this and the Main Event but has yet to get his hands on an elusive bracelet (to go with the one his father won in 1998)

O'Dea is not the only former November Niner still active, as Jeremy Ausmus is also a member of that club.

There is one British player among the 8 - James Park is nicely in the midle of the pack with 25BB so a playable stack for a Final Table.

Luke Schwartz's attempt on a second bracelet ended when he lost a set over set battle in 21st for $30K, while we'd earlier also lost Matthew Perry in 45th for almsot $20K.


Event 53 - $800 NLH Deepstack 8-max, Day 2 of 2, $750K guaranteed prize pool, 3759 entries


I thought it would be that most American of cliches, a "Big Ask" to get all the way from 440 players to a champion inside a day, and so it proved as an extra day will be needed to sort out the final 10.

No British representation though, with the two Europeans being the pleasingly alliterative Santaigo Soriano (Spain) and Daniele D'Angelo (Deutschland) in the top two places.

Third goes to the only former bracelet winner left, Amir Lehavot adding to what has been a good series for that country although he is now resident in California. If he doesn't count, Israel still has a representative in Ori Hasson.

The biggest GB cashes went to Nicholas Marchington (19th for $12.4K), Richard King (58th for $4.6K) and four players who each took $2853, Steve Jelinek, Min Ji, Florian Duta & Lewis Higham



Event 54 - $1500 Razz, Day 2 of 4, 363 entries

Another event where the British challenge has been dismissed, with Argentina showing at the top of the board in the shape of Andres Korn. There's a player from the Seychelles in second (Jean Said). Doesn't the Seychelles have one of the best national flags? In third place is the first of 8 Americans, Christopher Kusha.

Noah Bronstein, Jennifer Tilly & Scott Clements are among that American challenge, with the last British player bowing out in 21st (Adam Owen, $3325) and the only other on to cash being Vamshi Vandanapu (32nd for $2895)


Event 56 - $1500 NLH Super Turbo Bounty, 1 Day Event, 1867 entries

With happenings in other events ending up out of schedule, it turned out that the only bracelet to be won was in an event that started and finished on the same day.

And it was so close to yet another British bracelet, with Robert Bickley coming up just one spot short against Jonas Lauck of Germany.

It took over 15 hours from start to finish meaning a long day for all concerned, but the heads-up match didn't contribute too much to that as it was all over within two hands. Bickley three-bet all in on a flop of 5-4-3 with pocket kings, Lauck had 10-6 and a flush draw and called with several million outs which missed on the turn but hit on the river. The heads-up difference was $100K as Lauck took $260K and Bickley $160K.

Another British player, Arron Woodcock made the FT finishing 7th for $35K, Idris Drief took $2819 and their were progressively smaller cashes for Tom Hall, Sean Rogozzini, James Clarke, Sam Razavi, Seun Oluwole, Brandon Sheils and Joel Isla


Event 57 - $1000 NLH Tag Team, Day 1 of 4, 976 entries


278 teams have progressed to Day 2 but with the WSOP only showing the team "leader" on the reports, who's left in is a little uncertain.

What is known is that the top team is that headed by Jared Jaffee with the team of Martijn Gerrits in 2nd and that of Michael Wang in 3rd.

Jaffee's team is made up by two brothers, Ralph and Aaros Massey. Gerrits has Preston Lee & Kane Kalas for company, while Wang can tag in recent bracelet winner Dan Zack and Ajay Chabra

Plenty of teams headed by British players left in, including that of Elliott Peterman, James George, Stefan Fabian, Dragos Trofimov, Calin Trif, Fraser MacIntyre, Gary Blackwood, Harry Lodge and Alex Whitenstall but there are doubtless other Brits hiding in those or other combos.

147 of the teams will cash for at least $1498 but the winners will split over $168K.

The team that attracted most of the attention before the event was the pairing of veteran Mike Sexton and recent star of the TV show "Jeopardy", James Holzhauer. In the end, Sexton played possibly all the hands as Holzhauer played (and eventually busted) the Super Turbo, but lost two flips in a row and the team were knocked out.



Event 58 - $50K Poker Players Championship (mixed games), Day 1 of 5, 64 players so far


The most prestigious event of the Series for the pros, we were so close to having all 64 players who entered day 1 making it through, but Mike Gorodinsky played a set strong on a PLO hand and lived to regret it when Josh Arieh hit his draw on the river.

That pushed Arieh to the top of the Day 1 chip listings ahead of Justin Bonomo and Joshn Esposito

Three 2019 bracelet winners have turned their starting stack of 300K chips into over 400K, Adam Friedman, John Hennigan and Stephen Chidwick while Eli Elezra has boosted his stack by just 10% and Luke Schwartz by under 1%

Some other British names entered include former winners Matthew Ashton and Elior Sion, plus Talal Shakerchi, Benny Glaser and Matthew Wood.

Three time winner Michael Mizrachi has made it to Day 2 with just over half his starting stack, which least is better than Daniel Negreanu has done, but Phil Ivey, Jason Mercier, Shaun Deed, Scott Siever and Isaac Haxton will all return for Day 2 with more chips than they were given to start with.


To start today

Event 59 - $600 NLH Deepstack Championship, 3 Day Event, $500K guaranteed prize pool

Event 60 - $1500 PLO High/Lo 8 or better, 3 Day Event

Some info from Tony Bedford if you lose your passport in Vegas.

 

Event 50 - $1500 Monster Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, Day 4 of 5, 6035 entries in total


We're down to a FT of 6 with a new name at the top - Benjamin Ector. He's had a couple of 4 figure scores this summer, but this is going to dwarf that with a minimum of $195,000 already locked up.

In second place is Day 2 (I think) leader Kainaiu McCue-Unciano and Canadian Gregory Katayama is third.

Bart Hanson is a respected commentator and strategist but he to is going to be earning his biggest cash (at least in proper poker, he once won $200K on a video poker machine in Vegas), Day 3 leader Vincent Chauve is 5th and bringing up the rear is Ukranian Igor Yaroshevskyy who was runner-up in a bracelet event in 2015 brings up the rear.

I mentioned Kevin Roster yesterday, his dream ended lost a flip against British player Elliott Peterman to go out in 39th spot, but there's already been offers from, among others, Greg Merson to put him in the Main Event so hopefully we'll see Roster one more time at this WSOP.

Peterman lasted until they were down to 2 tables, busting 16th for $43K while the other two British players were also knocked out - Guy Taylor $27K for 30th and Juan Sanchez 11th for $69K.


Event 52 - $14K PLO 8-max, Day 4 of 4, 518 entries


Done and dusted due to Dash Dudley dominating heads-up play (sorry I ran out of D words) with British PLO specialist James Park. With chips almost exactly even when third placed Joel Feldman was eliminated, a couple of big hands in a row saw the American take a clear lead and a final hand where Dudley bet with an overpair to a J62 board, Park called with top pair and got no help.

Jeremy Ausmus finished 4th while Eoghan O'Dea, railed by father Donancha, went out in 6th.


Event 53 - $800 NLH Deepstack 8-max, Day 3 of 2, $750K guaranteed prize pool, 3759 entries


I've mentioned in passing alliteratively named players several times, and now after DD wins Event 52, Event 53 goes to SS in the form of Santiago Soriano.

Spanish pro Soriano, who made Day 5 of the Main last year took the lead with 10 players left, and while he was passed when play was 4-handed, he knocked out several of his opponents but by the time heads-up play was reached, it was more-or-less even with former Bracelet holder and November Niner Amir Lehavot.

That situation didn't last long. Soriano made a full house on the first hand two-handed, and all the chips went in on the flop on the second hand. The board was a rainbow 3-10-8, Soriano had J-10 for top pair and 3-bet shoved only to come up against a slowly played pair of black aces from Lehavot. A third ten on the flop cracked the aces and won Soriano the bracelet and $371K with the Israeli having to settle for $229K.

Earlier, Ben Underwood was the 3rd placed finisher, completing an impressive trilogy. There has been three live NLH events branded as "deepstacks" so far, Events 9, 37 & 53. Underwood has finished 4th, 5th & 3rd in them. Odds on a 4-peat in Event 59?


Event 54 - $1500 Razz, Day 3 of 4, 363 entries


No need for Day 4 here where the plaudits went to Kevin Gerhart who was playing his first WSOP Razz event.

Three countries seem to have been doing very well at this series, the UK, Israel and Brazil with players from the South American country having taken 2 bracelets and a record 10 FTs, with Sergio Braga adding to the latter figure here when finishing second. He put up a valiant effort, three times doubling up as the short stack before falling at the 4th time of asking.

Third went to Joseph Hoffman, while two 2019 bracelet winners Robert Campbell and Scott Clements saw their dreams of a second bracelet end in 7th & 6th spots respectively, while I mentioned yesterday there was a player from the Seychelles involved, well that was a WSOP coding error, Jean Said actually represents Senegal. Still a rare country to see at a FT (he finished 5th) but not such a good flag.


Event 57 - $1000 NLH Tag Team, Day 2 of 4, 976 entries


35 teams remain in contention for the Tag Team bracelet, three of which are captained by British players - James George and Elliott Peterman (Dragos Trofimov is also showing as UK but is a Moldovan resident in a village in Northern Ireland) but they're all chasing the Ohad Geiger/Daniel Dayan/Barak Wisbrod trio who top the chip listings.

2016 Main Event Final Tabler Kenny Hallert has secured his 50th WSOP cash as the leader of the second paced team, while the Day 1 leaders of Jared Jaffee and the Massey brothers squeaked into Day 3 as the short stack.


Event 58 - $50K Poker Players Championship (mixed games), Day 2 of 5, 74 entries


Ten more players ponied up the $50K at the start of Day 2 which means we have a record low field for the PPC, but two very big names were among them - Phil Ivey and Tom Dwan.

Ivey has cashed in this event three times and has put himself in a good position to do so again as he can be found at the very top of the overnight chip listings ahead of 2014 winner John Hannigan and Chris Vitch.

Dwan who hasn't been seem much (if at all) at the WSOP for the last 7 years isn't among the 38 survivors as he bust during the last level of the day.

One more former PPC winner, Liverpool's Matthew Ashton sits nicely in 7th spot, recent bracelet winner Luke Schwartz is 13th and high-roller specialist Talal Shakerchi will need some help from the cards to move up from 30th spot.

Only 12 players will cash, but the winner will get a payout slip for almost $1.1m



Event 59 - $600 NLH Deepstack Championship, Day 1 of 3, $500K guaranteed prize pool, 6140 entries


The WSOP have previously reserved the "Championship" tag for $10K events so it was a bit of a surprise to see it attached to a $600 tournament.

919 players successfully navigated the Day 1 play, with an end to proceedings called when the bubble burst so everyone left is guaranteed at least $875.

With such a huge number of players left in I can't do much more than scratch the surface of the players list, but 2004 ME winner Greg Raymer is one of those through as is Kathy Liebert, Humberto Brenes and Alex Foxen.

The best known of the GB challengers are problaly Chris Moorman, Jack Salter and Ben Dobson, but Mohammed Suhail had a great day and ended up in 4th place, with Waikiat Lee, Bradley Viner, Phillipe Souki, Katie Swift and Joshua Curry are all inside the top 300.

What am I missing? The actual chip leaders. Dan Matsuzuki who had a near miss in Event 42 a week or so, finishing as runner-up, is the Day 1 top dog ahead of China's Dianlei Zhang and Bobby Oboodi from New Jersey is third.


Event 60 - $1500 PLO High/Lo 8 or better, Day 1 of 3, 1117 entries


This is where we wanted, nay expected, the name of Tony Kendall to appear prominently in this update, but alas it was not to be as despite being a regular in the updates of illustrious players on the PokerNews updates, our hero fell towards the end of the day.

More than 200 entries up on last year, which is undoubtedly a good sign with exactly 700 bustouts on the day, 417 move on.

The chip leader is Ray Medlin, with Richard Bai and Danny Woolard in the top 3 but the first of the big named players is Ari Engel in fourth. Engel already has a first and a second in the 2019 WSOP and is inside the top 10 on the Player of the Year table and more points here won't do him any harm at all.

Scott Clements also has a a win and a FT (earlier today in Event 54) and he too made Day 2 with a well above average stack and some other players in the top half include Jeremy Ausmus, James Obst, Ben Yu, Hall-of-Fame candidate Chris Bjorin, Frank Kassela, Mike Sexton and Joseph Cheong.

A very strong British challenge is headed by Patrick Leonard in 24th, not far ahead of Grant Sharp and Paul Sokoloff, with Jeffrey Duvall, Rishi Amin, Warren Colman, Paresh Doshi, David Barraclough, Tony Bloom, Peter Linton, Bjorn Verbakel and Lee Horton all inside the top 200.


To start today

Event 61 - $400 Colossus, 3 Day event, 2 starting flights Wed/Thu

Event 62 - $10K Razz, 4 Day Event

 

Vital Vegas
@VitalVegas

25 Jun

Uncannily reliable source relays WSOP stays at Rio in 2020

A little bit shorter than yesterday's report. But does contain reference to Venn Diagrams.

Event 50 - $1500 Monster Stack NLH, 5 Day Event, Day 5 of 5, 6035 entries in total


All over, and it was a retun to the top for the Day 2 leader, Hawaiian Kainaiu McCue-Unciano. It's his first WSOP gold bracelet, and he also takes the small matter of $1,008,850, double the sum of his previous career recorded cashes.

It took three hours for him to finish off his heads up rival, Vincent Chauve, despite having a large lead at the start. The Frenchman won most of the bigger pots in the first half of the match and even took the lead briefly before McCue-Unciano came back and won the lot.

Third place went to Canadian Gregory Katayama.


Event 57 - $1000 NLH Tag Team, Day 2 of 4, 976 entries


No need for a Day 4 here as it was done and dusted within 3 days of play.

I mentioned in passing yesterday that Israeli players were having a good series, make that a great series now as the trio of Barak Wisbrod, Ohad Geiger and Daniel Dayan won the event and a shared $168K.

Just a dozen hands of heads-up were necessary for the Israelis to beat another threesome, this time Jerod Smith, Matthew Moreno and Lawrence Chan with the John Hinds/Anthony Zinno pairing finishing 3rd.


Event 58 - $50K Poker Players Championship (mixed games), Day 3 of 5, 74 entries


As always, this event proceeds at a glacial pace with the result that we have taken three days to go from 74 players to 12.

For the second day running, Phil Ivey is in the chip leader's shoes, aiming for his 11th bracelet.

Play continued until the bubble burst, with at least four short stacks hanging on when there were 14 left (12 getting paid) as a min-cash was a very worthwhile $72K, but eventually Timofey Kuznetsov and Chris Klodnicki could manage their couple of BB any longer and were KO'd.

That leaves 12, with bracelet winners a-plenty still left, Josh Arieh, Shaun Deeb and Bryce Yockey for instance in the second, third and fourth slots. In fact the 12 players have 22 bracelets between them.

One who doesn't have any (yet) is the only GB player left, Talal Shakerchi who sits in 9th spot out of the final dozen.

The intention is to play from 12 down to 6 and then play the FT on Friday. Perhaps calling it glacial pace is too kind.


Event 59 - $600 NLH Deepstack Championship, Day 2 of 3, $500K guaranteed prize pool, 6140 entries


919 Day 2 qualifiers have become just 83 who move on to Day 3 to play for the bracelet with a 1-2-3 of Lang Lee, Will Givens and Steffen Logen.

Givens won a bracelet back in 2014, and there are two other former bracelet winners in the field, Dan Matsuzuki and Kathy Liebert.

Disappointingly there isn't a single GB player among the field, Andrei Moldovan in 94th, Philippe Souki in 121st and Jack Salter in 142nd were the last three survivors.


Event 60 - $1500 PLO High/Lo 8 or better, Day 2 of 3, 1117 entries


AKA the event which were were expecting to see Tikay win his bracelet.

58 remain, all having wrapped up at least $4000 with Matt O'Donnell the big stack.

James Chen was runner up in the PLO High Roller a few days ago, and is in that second position again after Day 2 of this one, and Michael Mizrachi (3rd), Ari Engel (8th) and Scott Clements (12th) have all gone one better than Chen already and are looking for their second win of the series.

Plenty of other well known names left including Erik Seidel, Mike Matusow, Chris Bjorin and Phil Laak, plus two British representatives in David Barraclough and Paul Johnson. Both will return with between 10 & 20 BB so aren't in immediate danger, but an early double-up would do wonders.

We lost a few other GB Names "in the money", Bjorn Verbakel, Grant Sharp, Paresh Doshi, Rishi Amin, Patrick Leonard, Lee Horton and Peter Linton all earned between $2200 & $2900.


Event 61 - $400 Colossus, Day 1A, 2 starting flights Wed/Thu, 5238 entrants


18 levels rather than the scheduled 16 were played to reduce the field to 786 players as the bubble bursts. Not all of them will return for Day, as qualifiers have the option to surrender their 1A stacks and play Day 1B to try and make the later stages with a better chance of winning.

The Day 1A leaders are Amador Trinidad, Joseph Torres and Marc Kornter, with the familiar figure of "Fossilman" Greg Raymer, the 2004 Main Event winner, inside the top 10.

Too may names to really trawl through them looking for prominent players, helpfully the WSOP have highlighted Ylon Schwartz and Loni Harwood, to which I can add Amir Lehavot, Bruno Politano and Tom Franklin.

Plenty of British qualifiers, even if few of them are among the most well-known names in the GB scene. Ronan Nally is 59th, Calin Trif 66th, and Andrew Christoforou 75th and they are the three highest places Britons.


Event 62 - $10K Razz, Day 1 of 4, 96 entries so far


Again themes of the series. The Venn diagram of alliteratively-named players and Brazilians contains Andre Akkari, and it is him who holds the Day 1 Razz lead.

42 players move on (with the possibility of a few more by way of late reg I suppose) and the top three is completed by David Bach & Marco Johnson.

Player of the Year leader Dan Zack is 6th and there's well known players and bracelet winners wherever you look. John Monnette, Daniel Negreanu, James Obst, Todd Brunson, Brian Hastings, Donnacha O'Dea and Ben Yu are there, together with just one man who satisfies both those conditions and one more, that he is British, and that is Benny Glaser.



To start today

Event 63 - $1500 Omaha Mix, 4 Day Event


Plus Day 1B of the Colossus.

For the next three days the update with be a) patchy and b) possibly late. Then on Monday I haven't got a clue how I'm going to do anything because I'm doing stuff from 4:30am to about 9:00pm or later

Anyway, here we go with Part 1 of today's report:


Event 58 - $50K Poker Players Championship (mixed games), Day 4 of 5, 74 entries


With just two tables in operation and only 6 bustouts to occur before close of play, we lost in order

12. Andrew Brown
11. Talal Shakerchi - last Brit standing, picks up $72K
10. Chris Vitch
9. Dario Sammartino
8. Phil Ivey - the Day 3 chip leader found the cards against him on Day 4, losing almost every hand recorded in the PokerNews updates
7. David Oppenheim


This leaves a 6-handed final headed by Josh Arieh, ahead of Bryce Yockey, Phillip ****, John Esposito and Dan Cates. None of the final six have reached this stage of the PPC before.


Event 59 - $600 NLH Deepstack Championship, Day 3 of 3, $500K guaranteed prize pool, 6140 entries


An extra day will be needed as five players are still involved. The leader is Joe Foresman who moved to the top of the listings following a hand early on the FT when Linda Huard 5-bet shoved with Kings, Foresman called with Queens and hit a queen on the flop.

Will Givens is second in chips for the second day running, with Steffen Logen, Jeff Hakim and Gleb Kovtunov the other players who will return for Day 4.


Event 60 - $1500 PLO High/Lo 8 or better, Day 2 of 3, 1117 entries


Extra time needed here too, with 9 players this time still left at the end of the scheduled three days.

There are 5 reasonable stacks headed by Scott Abrams from Rodney Burt and Jordan Spurlin, and 4 stacks of 9BB or less which include 8-time bracelet winner Erik Seidel and Connor Drinan.

The last two British challengers both went out at the $6687 pay level, first Paul Johnson bust in 35th followed three places later by David Barraclough.



More later, including some good news on the Tikay front.

Event 61 - $400 Colossus, Day 1A, 2 starting flights Wed/Thu, total 13109 entries


Another massive day of action in the Colossus, making the total number of entries well into 5 figures.

The top 6 from Day 1B all beat the best of the Day 1A stacks, with Romik Vartzar, John Goyette and Hien Tran making it an all-California top three.

Paul Nugent is top Brit in 35th spot and is accompanied by Kfir Ivgi, Sunil Mistri, Robert Bickley, Robert Ellesmore, Andrew Teng, Stuart Guthrie, Daniel Corbett and Thomas Ward all inside the top 250. Looking forward down there is a James Williams from Swindon listed, is that the same player who was Sky Poker sponsored at one point?

Some of the better known players through from 1B include Maurice Hawkins, Kathy Liebert and former ME winner Chris Moneymaker.



Event 62 - $10K Razz, Day 2 of 4, 116 entries


Twenty players registering on Day 2 took the field to 116, merely a smidgen down on last year's 119.

Another former ME winner (among other things) Chris Ferguson has the biggest of the 12 stacks moving on to Day 3, with 3-time winner (and Event 33 runner-up) David Bach in second with Andrey Zhigalov.

Many of the other 9 players are famous names, Dan Zack (adding more Player of the Year points), Scott Siever, Daniel Negreanu, Mike Gorodinsky etc.

No Brits cashed, Benny Glaser must have been eliminated at some point on Day 2.


Event 63 - $1500 Omaha Mix, Day 1 of 4, 717 entrants


Look at the Day 2 starting table Miranda 619
1   Scott Eskenazi   United States   46,300
2   Roland Israelashvili   United States   9,800
3   Timothy Kennedy   United States   28,000
4   Ziya Rahim   United States   35,200
5   Anthony Kendall   United Kingdom   18,900
6   Paul Sokoloff   United Kingdom   48,200
7   Marc Perlman   United States   39,300
Yep, our Tikay has made it through to Day 2 but has still quite a way to go to get a cash, of the 228 survivors, less than half will get a min-cash of $2249 with as near as makes no difference $200K up top.

He's not the only Brit through, in fact there is quite a cabal as other than Sokoloff on Tikay's table, we can find Nicholas Seager, Barny Boatman, John Kabbaj, Lee Horton, Patrick Leonard, Tony Bloom, Stuart Rutter, Nicholas Marchington and Paul Rigg. Some very nice company to be part of.

The overall chip leader Aaron Henderson ahead of John Evans and Anatoli Zyrin, with Leonard the best off the GB contingent in 7th.

Yet another ME winner has made it to Day 2 here, 2013 winner Ryan Riess, and also through are Jeffrey Lisandro, Barry Grenstein, Loren Klein, ELi Elezra and Barbara Enright.

Good luck Tikay.


To start today

Event 64 - $888 Crazy Eights NLH, 4 Day Event, 4 starting flights, Fri/Sat/Sun/Mon

Event 65 - $10K PLO Hi/Lo 8 or better, 4 Day Event

Apologies that today's update is so late and so brief

Event 58 - $50K Poker Players Championship (mixed games), Day 4 of 5, 74 entries


Phil **** realised what he said has been "his dream" that he'd "rather thin than the Main Event" as he beat Josh Arieh heads-up. **** takes just under $1.1m, Arieh $679K and third placed John Esposito $466K.

The other three at the final table were 4. Bryce Yockey, 5. Shaun Deeb & 6. Dan Cates


Event 59 - $600 NLH Deepstack Championship, Day 4 of 3, $500K guaranteed prize pool, 6140 entries


Joe Forseman earned not only his first WSOP bracelet, but his fiest ever cash. In fact, he hasn't played a WSOP event since it used to be held at Binion's

Will Givens briefly held the lead but basically everybody played second fiddle to Forseman all day.

Germany's Steffen Logen finished third.


Event 60 - $1500 PLO High/Lo 8 or better, Day 4 of 3, 1117 entries


It's a second bracelet for Anthony Zinno in an event that not just needed some extra time to sort it out, but almost a full extra day.

With 9 players left, most of the short stacks went out early, but as the day went on, the time between eliminations got longer ang longer.

Eventually Germany took another third place in the shape of Thomas Schropfer and second went to Canadian Rodney Burt.

Zinno has already a second and a third this series so perhaps he was due.



Event 61 - $400 Colossus, Day 2 of 3, total 13109 entries


The chip lead is in the hands of Chicago Cubs fan William Davila with almost 18m chips in his bag in the end of the night, nearly four million more than his nearest challangers, Neil Ho and Alex Miles.

In all, 107 players are left in with Robert Sherwood having had a good Day 2 leaving him 5th, with Andrew Teng, Daniel Corbett & Tiansheng Qi making up a 4-strong UK challenge.

A lot of lesser-known names, but I can at least recognise Jeremy Ausmus, Tom McEvoy and Eddy Sabat.



Event 62 - $10K Razz, Day 3 of 4, 116 entries


Day 3 has seen the 12 contenders narrowed down to just two, both previous bracelet winners. Two-time jewellry winner Scott Siever has two to his name and just under 4m chips, single bracelet wearer Andrey Zhigalov just over 3m with over $115 difference between the first and second prizes.

The final table was pretty stacked, and I'm sure a lot of those watching were quite pleased to see Chris Ferguson knocked out in 3rd. Dan Zack, Daniel Negreanu, Andre Akkari and David Bach all finished in the top 7 highlighting the quality of the field.


Event 63 - $1500 Omaha Mix, Day 2 of 4, 717 entrants


First the bad news. There's no Tikay making Day 3, nor no Pompeynic either. Both were eliminated before the bubble burst so they won't even be bringing back any winnings with them, just hopefully a million stories.

There are three GB players left, and a formidable trio they are too. Patrick Leonard, Tony Bloom and Stuart Rutter are part of a 38-man (and I do believe they are all men left) field who will try to make the final six who will move on to Day 4.

The best placed player at the moment is Blake Schwartzbach with Joe Tehan and Sean Yu considerably easier to spell in second and third.

Former ME winner Ryan Riess is still in along with Phil Laak and the short-stacked pair of Bart Hanson and Barry Greenstein.



Event 64 - $888 Crazy Eights NLH, Day 1A, 4 starting flights


Actually I misread the schedule for this and they're playing two flights a day so the opening day is spread out over 2 days, not 4.

Very early days and of course loads of players through, so just it was going to be a resume of the Top 3 in each flight and some of the Brits near the top of the leaderboards.

1A was lead by Arsenii Karmatckii with the unusual double i at the end of both names, from Aleksa Paviceic and Dennis Brand

What made me stop a take a little more time over the 1B list was the fact that we have a name well known to Sky Poker at the top - Michael Kane from Scotland. He has a decent lead over Dara Teherpour and Emile Schiff.

Brits from 1A - Alexander Clark is in the top 5, followed by Aleem Kanji, Atanas Pavlov, Alex Jennings, Stephen Leigh and Ben Dobson

Other than Kane, 1B saw Andrew Wilson finish 7th, with Joshua Bolton, Alan Gold, Arron Woodcock, James Dempsey, Henry Strudwick, Joshua Curry all bag chips at close of play.


Event 65 - $14K PLO Hi/Lo 8 or better, Day 1 of 4, 175 entries so far


$10K events coming thick and fast (there's one more on Tuesday before the Main Starts on Wednesday) with 115 players making it through to Day 2.

Michael McKenna is the chip leader, with Randy Ohel and Kate Hoang second and third. Hoang is perhaps better known for her, let's say distracting dress sense at the table, but from the photos on the WSOP site she looks to have been a little more conservative today.

You don't have to look too far down to find the top Brit, Robert Cowen and he's accompanied by Timothy Flanders and Talal Shakerchi through to Day 2.

Scott Clements and Michael Mizrachi are having another go to get that second bracelet of the year, and along with them moving on we have Joe Hachem, John Racener, Jason Mercier, Dan Zack and fresh from his success earlier Anthony Zinno.


To start today

Event 66 - $1500 NLH, 3 Day Event


Plus flights C & D of the Crazy Eights.

For the second day running apologies that today's update is so late and so brief. And tomorrow's could be even worse. Back to normal on Tuesday.




Event 61 - $400 Colossus, Day 3 of 3, total 13109 entries


An extra day will be needed (that seems to have been a familiar refrain as 8 players still had chips at the end of the night.

The leader is Greek player Georgios Kaplas, the only player with over 100m chips. In second place is the only previous bracelet winner, Andrew Barber and third is Maksim Kalman

Robert Sherwood so nearly made it a British prescence at the FT, departing in 10th for $32K (not bad for a $400 entry fee), Daniel Corbett went out in 38th, Andrew Teng 53rd and Tiansheng Qi was an early Day 3 casualty in 101st.


Event 62 - $10K Razz, Day 3 of 4, 116 entries


Scott Siever has won his third bracelet and $301K. His presence in so many high rollers and the biggest cash games mean this is only his 17th biggest tournament score, but the bracelet will make it mean so much more.

It took about one full level on the 4th day for Siever to dispose of Andrey Zhigalov in a real roller-coaster of a battle, both players had a 20:1 chip lead at one point.


Event 63 - $1500 Omaha Mix, Day 3 of 4, 717 entrants


If I said someone had made the FT of the same event three years in a row, you'd assume I meant something like one of the $10K events in a niche game with about 100 starters, wouldn't you?

But no. It's in this event which attracts over 700 entries, and what's more it's the only three years this event has run. Yueqi Zhu was 6th in 2017, won the bracelet in 2018 and has made the final 4 this time around.

He is second to Anatolii Zyrin, with Mesbah Guerfi and James Van Alstyne the only others standing between Zhu and a succesful defence of the bracelet.

The first of the three British challengers bounced in 30th, Tony Bloom taking just under $5K. Stu Rutter was 24th for nearly $6K while the last British survivor was Patrick Leonard who just missed the top 10 taking $12K for 11th spot.


Event 64 - $888 Crazy Eights NLH, Day 1C/D, 4 starting flights


And I was wrong in this for the second day in a row. Flights A & B were on the same day but C & D were not so it's only 1C I'm concerned with here. I must learn to read WSOP schedules better.

2830 started and 333 survived and for the second flight running we have a British player, no stranger to Sky Poker, at the top and that is Ian Simpson who I'm sure was a guest a couple of times on the old Sky Poker TV.

The Geordie leads France's Alexander Fradin in second and there's another Brit in third, Adam Daniel, and yet another in 5th Sam Razavi.

Florian Duta, Pablo Fernandez Campo, Frank Bastow, Scott Franklin, Peter Akery, Klas Lofberg and Dragos Trofimov are all listed as "GB" in the listings but I think about half of those are merely GB resident.


Event 65 - $10K PLO Hi/Lo 8 or better, Day 2 of 4, 193 entries


43 players move on to Day 3 with only 29 of them getting paid, and it is Chris Vitch who leads overnight.

Timothy Flanders is the only UK player remaining, amongst names such as Joe Hachem, Nick Schulman, Brian Hastings, Leif Force, Michael Mizrachi and Chris Ferguson.


Event 66 - $1500 Limit Hold'em, Day 1 of 3, 541 entries


It's Limit Hold'em. No one in Britain really plays that do they? So we shouldn't expect to find too many GB names in the 184 survivors. Except Benny Glaser seems to be able to turn his hand to anything, and Max Silver has made it through with 3BB.

Shirley Rosario is the chip leader, ahead of the strangley named "Z Stein" and Timothy Su.

Kevin Roster (the Cancer sufferer I mentioned a few days back) is in this and has made it through Day 1 with a decent stack, and other survivors (in a difference sense) are Joe McKeehen, Rep Porter, Chip Jett, David ODB Baker, Daniel Negreanu, Anthony Zinno. Pleaseingly a number of female players also join Rosario in the Day 2 field.


To start today

Event 67 - S10K Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo 8 or better, 4 Day Event

Event 68 - $1000 WSOP.com Online NLH Championship, 1 Day Event

Plus flight D of the Crazy Eights.

I have a quick question on these.

Why is Phil Hui's surname starred out?

Trying to hide his success from Loni??

Russian for cock I would guess  rotflmfao

Hi Adam,

No idea as such, but these Updates are C & P from Next Door, as explained at the start of the thread, & the profanity filter over there is somewhat sensitive, not to say eccentric. 

James Dempsey made day 2 of #69 Mini Main - is this Royal Flush?

Yes, that's him.

He has a Staking Thread here, this is his mini Live Update of how he got his 950,000 stack, having spun it up from just 7.5 Bigs;


 http://blondepoker.com/forum/index.php?topic=68477.15

OK, so I let you all down yesterday. I knew it was going to be a problem, but in the end I bailed. I'm sorry. It won't happen again (unless I go back for another day at Wimbledon!)

Anyway, there's now a lot to cram in


Event 61 - $400 Colossus, Day 4 of 3, total 13109 entries


The extra day needed to separate the final 8 players turned out to be 5 hands and 125 hands before Sejiin Park won the second bracelet for Korea at this year's WSOP (after Jiyoung Kim had won the ladies event)

Park, who is a cash game regular in Macau and plays very few tournaments, easily beat his previous best recorded cash when claiming the first prize of over $450K.

Greece's Georgios Kapalas was second and the top American player Ryan Depaulo was third.


Event 63 - $1500 Omaha Mix, Day 4 of 4, 717 entrants


I mentioned before about Yueqi Zhu's record in this event, well he went so close to recording back-to-back wins in the event, making it all the way to heads up before falling to Russian Anatolii Zyrin.

Zyrin himself lost a heads-up match in the final of the Shootout event a few weeks ago despite holding a large lead at one point, and needed to hit a one-outer on day 1, almost going out on Day 2 when he asked the dealer to show his cards for a photo of a bustout hand and then realising he'd won the high part to keep him alive, and was dead last on the FT at one point with under 1 Big Bet left. Call him King of the Comebacks.

Zyrin wins just under $200K, Zhu $123K and third place James van Alstyne $84K.


Event 64 - $888 Crazy Eights NLH, Day 2 of 4, 10185 entries


I'm just going to pick this up at the end of Day 2 except to mention that the Day 1D chip leader was Luis Pinho of Portugal with the top Brit being Timothy Chung in 58th.

Day 2 started with 1223 players and they were thinned out so fast that only 670 of them were left at the first break, and less than 100 made Day 3.

Three players each have over 11m chips, Natalia Panchekno, Scott Davies and Ryan Leng with the latter two both being previous bracelet winners.

You would think that with still 91 players left, we'd have at least a handful of strong British challengers, well we don't. Not one. The last Union Jack disappeared off the board when Joshua Curry bust out in 101st place for $6957, the same cash for Ben Dobson in 107th with Peter Avery, Martins Adeniya and Michael Kane going out at the $5938 pay level.


Event 65 - $10K PLO Hi/Lo 8 or better, Days 3 and 4 of 4, 193 entries


Nick Schulman has seen action on a lot of final tables over the last couple of years. Unfortunately for him, it's been as a commentator on the PokerGo service than as a player, but he's now put that right by winning his third WSOP bracelet event, his first in seven years and also collected $463K.

Four of the final seven were bracelet holders, plus there was also last year's runner-up in the corresponding event, Michael McKenna but he didn't last long, one hand in fact as former ME winner Joe Hachem forced a double elimination of both McKenna and Corey Hochman. Two hands later it was down to 4-handed as Chris Vitch also went out, and shortly thereafter Denis Strebkov fell too.

When Hachem also went out before the first break, we were left with a deep heads-up match between Schulman and Brian Hastings (aiming for his fifth braclet) and it took several hours to split them despite Schulman having the lead for the majority of the time. Eventually he wore Hastings down and claimed his prize.


Event 66 - $1500 Limit Hold'em, Days 2 & 3 of 3, 541 entries


Three days haven't been enough and we still have 6 players fighting it out with the chip lead (100BB) held by David "ODB" Baker, Japan's Ruiko Mamiya is third with 62BB and Brian Kim third with 44BB. One of the other three players at the FT is Chris Ferguson.

No British players cashed (it is Limit Hold'em after all).

Another mention for Kevin Roster, he cashed again in 24th spot for $4360.


Event 67 - S10K Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo 8 or better, Days 1 & 2 of 4, 151 entries


The bubble was burst late on Day 2 as 23 players were in the money, but there was still time for 7 of them to go to pick up their min-cash of just over $15K leaving 16 players through to Day 3.

A host of names very familiar to readers of these reports fill the top of the leader board. Recent bracelet winner (his 4th) Eli Elezra is the big stack, another 4-timer Mike Matusow is 2nd, third placer is also the player who finished third in the 10K Razz a few days ago (Andrey Zhigalov) and Anthony Zinno who won his second bracelet in the $1500 PLO Hi-Lo last week is fourth.

For the second event in a row, no Brits cashed.


Event 68 - $1000 WSOP.com Online NLH Championship, 1 Day Event, 1750 entries


Nicholas Baris has won his first bracelet event and over $303K in the $1000 online tournament. For a long time, Tara Cain looked like she was going to win this for the first open event win by a female player this year, holding half the chips in play at the start of the FT and almost a 3:1 lead when starting the heads-up match, but after a double up and a few more small hands, it was ironically the ladies which led to the downfall of Cain as Baris' Pocket Queens held up against her Pocket Nines.

Third place went to William Harding, while Chris Ferguson was multi-tabling this online event with the physical event 66, doing very well in both finishing 7th here.

At least we did have a Brit cash in this one, Jack Maskill finishing 6th for $51K.

Event 69 - $1000 Mini Main Event, Day 1 of 2, 5521 players


The chip lead in this fast and furious event is held by Lula Taylor ahead by Liran Betito with a second female player Heidi Alexander third. Perhaps the ladies are coming good towards the end of the WSOP?

You've got to look down to 84th spot to find the first British player, Daniel Samson just ahead of James Dempsey in 87th. Also through are Joel Isla, Jonathan Somekh, William Young, Georgios Karakousis, Sunny Chatha, Nill Murray, Robert Sherwood, Jose Gonzalez, Barrie Gotch, Simon Bailey, Graham Wheldon, Nicos Ioannou and Alex Jennings.

546 players are scheduled to become just one today, with this structure it could well happen but don't be too surprised if there's still half a dozen left but I think they'll do all they can to finish this event off.


Event 70 - $5K NLH 6-max, Day 1 of 4, 751 entries so far


212 of the field won their way through to Day 2, and they may well be joined by a few more as late reg is still open until the first hand of Day 2.

The chip leader is Barry Hutter, ahead of Eder Murata and Faisal Shihabi, and there's a ton of bracelet winners (along with Hutter) who have made Day 2 - such as ME winners Greg Merson and Joe Cada, Brian Yoon, Brock Parker, Taylor Paur & Upeshka Da Silva. Include Niall Farrell in that list too, but he's below halfway and there's a load of Brits better off including three in the top 11 Tamer Kame, Alberton Morales and Roberto Romanello.

Add to that quartet Jamie O'Connor, Craig McCorkell, Jules Dickerson, Brandon Shiels, Jiushuang Wang, Nicholas Marchington, Javier Fernandes, Arron Woodcock, Richard Sheils, Robert Heidorn, Ben Heath, Adrien Dalmas, Tony Bloom and Chris Brammer so it's a good GB challenge in both terms of numbers and experience.


To start today


Event 71 - $500 Salute to Warriors NLH, 3 Day Event


Event 72 - $10K Limit Hold'em Championship, 3 Day Event

And you know what's coming tomorrow...

The main event starts today

given last year's figure of 7,874, numbers this series and the poker economy what is your over/under on runners this time?

Based on the ridic queues at the Rio
More than 8000
Say 8150
Economy doing good
Seemingly plenty of money about
No one seems to care about costs
Except moaning me ?
Maybe I’m the only one drinking ?

Agree with Tatsy. Defo take over at 8000. Probably would still go high at 8500.

Managed to get this finished just 10 minutes before the start of the Main Event.


Event 64 - $888 Crazy Eights NLH, Day 3 of 4, 10185 entries


Ten players remain in the Crazy Eights, a minimum of over $82K wrapped up but with eyes in the first prize of $888,888.

The chip leader is the Lithuanian Aleksandras Rusinovas who still has almost 100BB in his stack, almost double his nearest challenger Thomas Drivas of the US and then another gap to Vivian Saliba and Uselis Gediminas who are hair's breadth apart in third and fourth.

As I mentioned yesterday, no GB cashes but there is still Irish interest in this, with Patrick Clarke in 6th spot.

Mark Radoja is I think the only previous bracelet winner still left in, while Vlad Darie is aiming to make the FT of this massive field for the second time (6th place in 2017)


Event 66 - $1500 Limit Hold'em, Day 4 of 3, 541 entries


David "ODB" Baker led at the end of Day 2, led at the end of Day 3 and never relinquished that lead throughout Day 4. He won a bracelet back in 2012 and now seven years later he's collected his second, and over $151K.

It was an all-American top three with Brian Kim and Dominzo Love filling the places.

Fourth place went to the best female player in this event, Japan's Ruiko Mamiya, Chris Ferguson went out in 5th and Greg Mueller in 9th.



Event 67 - S10K Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo 8 or better, Day 3 of 4, 151 entries


No need for a Day 4, as Aussie Robert Campbell finished off the field within 3 days, collecting his second bracelet of the summer, the first being in Event 33, the $1500 Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw. This one was worth $385K which if he takes it home it will convert to over half a million Australian Dollars.

If it was double glory for Campbell, it has been double agony for Yueqi Zhu as he was the heads-up loser for the second time in just a few days. Mike Wattel was third and Mike "The Mouth" Matusow fourth.


Event 69 - $1000 Mini Main Event, Day 2 of 2, 5521 players


When one event finishes early, another compensates by finishing late. Eight players fought through the bag and tag at the end of the day that was supposed to crown a winner.

Two Americans are joined plyers from six different nationalities with the lead being held by Andres Korn (Argentina), ahead of Jeremy Sanderne (France) and Yi Ma (China). These are the only three players with over 30BB so there isn't going to be a lot of time for finesse play on the FT.

For the second time today, Ireland have a player at the FT (Philip Gildea) and the Day 1 chip leader Lula Taylor is still there doing it for the ladies.

The last British challenge fizzled out when William Young bust in 19th spot ($21K), with a deep run also for James Dempsey (29th, $17K)


Event 70 - $5K NLH 6-max, Day 2 of 4, 751 entries so far


At last an event where it looks like the number of days allocated will be the number of days used.

28 players are left in, with the chip leader being Portuguese player Joao Vieira, the only player who will return to a stack of over 100BB. Israel (yes Israel again) have the second place in the shape of Shahar Levi and third is Olivier Busquet of France. Former ME winner Joe Cada has also built a healthy stack to lie in fourth place overnight.

Richard Sheils is the top Brit lying in the middle of the pack, and we were so close to having two brothers through to Day 3 as Brandon was the last elimination of the night in 29th spot ($21K). Two other GB players did make Day 3, though they both have short stacks - Chris Brammer and Jamie O'Connor with 17 & 16 BB respectively. On a weird table draw, they are part of a 6-strong grouping that includes all five of the shortest stacks plus Ryan Jones.


Event 71 - $500 Salute to Warriors NLH, Day 1 of 3, 1723 entries


$40 of each buyin was held for the United Services Organisation and other military charities.

With the low buyin, a lot of the 287 remaining players are barely household names in their own households, but Ben Yu and Mike Sexton have both made it through with decent stacks.

France have the chip leader. Dominique Terzian who has two small WSOP cashes this year, but has been playing well in the Rio's Daily Deepstacks, cashing on the 4th, 5th, 6th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th, 14th, 19th, 20th, 21st, 23rd, 24th, 27th, 28th and 29th June with the highlight being the event in the 9th where he won nearly $13K for winning a $400 tournament.

Garry Stevens-Smith is the highest place British player in second, looking for his first ever WSOP cash as they're just a few players away from the bubble. Other UK names through include Robert Ludwig, Andrew Fields and Jonathan Walker

In 40th place is Ryan Dodson, 41st is Robert Dodson. Listed as coming from adjacent states, I don't know if they are related.


Event 72 - $10K Limit Hold'em Championship, Day 1 of 3, 110 entries


With late reg still open to the start of Day 2, the field size is just 4 down on last year's figure so matching that field size is still a possibility.

The lead is held by Andrew Brown ahead of Anthony Marsico and the evergreen Eli Elezra.

Three British players are among the 51 survivors, two of whom we are all pretty familiar - Benny Glaser and Stuart Rutter and Jason Gray. Gray may be the less familiar name of the three, he is now resident in Sydney, Australia but he did make the FT of a $10K WSOP event last year and has other FTs to his credit dating back to 1997.

To start today

Event 73 - $10K MAIN EVENT WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP NLH, 10 Day Event, 3 starting flights Wed/Thu/Fri

Event 74 - $3200 WSOP.com Online NLH High Roller, 1 Day Event

Watch live coverage of the Main Event almost all night from 1:30am on BT Sport/ESPN (Sky Channel 423)

In case you missed this, note;


Watch live coverage of the Main Event almost all night from 1:30am on BT Sport/ESPN (Sky Channel 423)

1a

1335 this year, 925 last

Event 64 - $888 Crazy Eights NLH, Day 3 of 4, 10185 entries

If at first you don't succeed, try try again. That's the maxim used by Rick Alvarado who needed to re-enter six times (this was an unlimited re-entry until late reg closed event) before building a stack which he built throughout the four days which saw him take the bracelet and the $888,888 first prize.

It was a FT where comparitively few starting hands held up as flops, turns and rivers all led to weaker hands overtaking stronger starting ones, including the final hand where Alvarado's A4 found a four on the river to beat Mark Radoja's A10. Alvarado's mother had literally just arrived in the arena from California to see the final hand.

Third place went to Thomas Drivas, while the sponsors (the poker site that has all the 8's in the name) were no doubt rooting for fourth placed Vivian Saliba because she is one of their sponsored players and was sporting the relevant patches.

Vlad Darie did make the FT of this for the second time


Event 69 - $1000 Mini Main Event, Day 2 of 2, 5521 players


With a large part of a raucous rail behind him, Jeremy Saderne who lives in London but hails from France (like previous bracelet winner Thomas Cazayous) took down the Mini Main (I wonder where I've seen that one before...) and earned himself over $628K.

There was so much love for the runner-up, Lula Taylor, that even Saderne's rail was chanting "Lula, Lula" over and over again after their man had beaten her heads-up. She had been the life and soul of the FT, laughing and joking here way through it and hugging other players after showdowns, win or lose.

The dénouement (he is French after all) came after Saderne picked up pocket aces to knock out Anders Kern in third place ($287K) and then five hands later, found the aces again to finish off Taylor ($388K)

Ireland's Philip Gadea ended up in 7th spot for $92K.


Event 70 - $5K NLH 6-max, Day 3 of 4, 751 entries so far


On schedule with the FT settled and a very interesting line-up it is too.

Joao Vieira is the chip leader for the second day running, with a British player, Jamie O'Connor not too far behind. Olivier Busquet has several WSOP top five positions but no bracelets (but does have a 7-figure cash from an EPT High Roller back in 2014).

Fourth is former ME winner Joe Cada, fifth is Barry Hutter who won a bracelet back in 2015, and making up the numbers (for now at least) is Pierre Calamusa who is a French player who actually appears to be resident in France and has cashes on four continents.

Of the other two Brits who entered Day 3, Chris Brammer went out in 20th ($26K) while Richard Shields laddered one rung higher to the $32K level, fininshing 16th


Event 71 - $500 Salute to Warriors NLH, Day 1 of 3, 1723 entries


Eight left, and fittingly for this event is a former aircraft maintenance engineer at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana, Tyler Carroll.

Susan Faber and Dean Yoon complete an all-American top 3, in fact top 6 with the two other contenders being the short stacks of Jordan Knackstedt (Canada) and Jose Annaloro (Venezuela), but my favourite name among the FT is Uriah Grossglauser.

All 4 British players who entered Day 2 lasted long enough to cash but we lost them at pretty regular intervals during the day - Andrew Fields went out in 224th ($722), Robert Ludwig was 175th for $803, Jonathan Walker took home just over a grand in 93rd and the departure Garry Stevens-Smith in 50th for $2111 saw the end of the British challenge.



Event 72 - $10K Limit Hold'em Championship, Day 2 of 3, 118 entries


Eight late entries made the field size just tip over last year's total and meant that the first prize would be $306K.

Fifteen players are still looking towards that $306K (and of course the bracelet) with envious eyes, with Mike Lancaster the only player with over a million chips in his bag.

Second place belongs to Juha Helppi who according to Wikipedia was part of the Finnish national paintball champions on four occasions, and third is Josh Arieh whose paintball expertise is unknown but has exhibited enough poker skills over the years to win 2 bracelets (but none for the last 14 years).

Eli Elezra is still in with a chance of winning his fifth bracelet (and second this series) but none of Messrs Glaser, Rutter or Gray made the cash for GB.

With late reg still open to the start of Day 2, the field size is just 4 down on last year's figure so matching that field size is still a possibility.

With the kafuffle over the opening of the new session of the European Parliament, we note that the first player out after the bubble burst was former MEP Tony G. He'll have more time on his hands to play poker now his party failed to get enough votes in the Lithuanian European Elections in May.


Event 73 - $10K MAIN EVENT WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP NLH, Day 1A of 10,


The biggest tournament not in terms of numbers or buyin but definitely in prestige kicked off in traditional fashion with the previous years winner John Cynn getting the dealers to "Shuffle Up And Deal".

The Day 1A Chip leader is Bryan Campanello, with Timothy Su and Quentin Roussey in the second and third places.

I can't see a figure for Day 1A entries, but it must be way up on last year's 915 as we have more than that (960) through to Day 2.

Two former ME winners, Chris Moneymaker (2003) and Qui Nugyen (2016) both progressed, as did Billy Baxter, Alex Foxen, Jeffrey Lisandro, Erik Seidel and Brian Hastings.

From a British perspective, Craig McCorkell, Matthew Moss and Stephen Chidwick got plenty of coverage on the feature tables and are all in Day 2. Ben Philipps is the best placed of the GB contingent in 28th, with plenty of others through led by Jack Sinclair, Michael Kane, Martins Adeniya, Barny Boatman, Dennis Rubba, Andrew Hulme, Arron Woodcock all in the top 300, and among the middle stacks Simon Deadman, and with below starting stacks Tony Bloom, James Dempsey and Toby Lewis.

One British player who isn't through is Liv Boeree, she was knocked out of the Main Event by her boyfriend Igor Kurganov. Cue some awkward moments in that household I guess. Kurganov has at least put those chips to good use as he ended the day with over double the 60K starting stack.

TV coverage tonight is only from 2am to 4am, then they switch to covering the Hot Dog Eating Contest.


Event 74 - $3200 WSOP.com Online NLH High Roller, 1 Day Event


Brandon Adams has been making WSOP cashes since 2005, is a lecture and graduate of Harvard and has had a number of six-figure cashes over the last couple of years so it was a little bit of a surpise to me that he hadn't previously won a bracelet.

He put that right by winning the penultimate online event of the 2019 WSOP.

Playing under the alias "DrOctagaon" he beat Nabil Cardoso heads-up and Vladimir Alexandrov in third, but the big hand of the FT was 5-handed when Adams' pocket aces eliminated Michael Vanier and virtually eliminated 2-time bracelet winner Calvin Anderson and from that point the result was rarely in doubt.


To start today
None, but it is Day 1B of the main event.

Only in America (part 957).


TV coverage tonight is only from 2am to 4am, then they switch to covering the Hot Dog Eating Contest.

GL Joey Chesnut!!

Smashed it.

71 HDBs.

12 titles now for the Chestnut.

Spoiler

He should be massive by now.

In the days i used to do Wsop he was doing it then. Me and the now wife would sit on the bed watching in amazement and it's gotta be ten years since we were there this time of year.

Good lad.

Have a guess what the record is for eating a 72oz steak.

Got a figure? Now google it.

Just FYI

https://twitter.com/rob_yong_/status/1146905662322106371

Rob offering $10k of WSOP buy ins next year to whoever guesses main entries closest

closes around 11pm tonight

only condition is you follow his new account and RT

There were 1,915 entries recorded today, bringing the total number to 3,250 through the opening two flights.

1915 is lower than last year (2378)

1d last year had 4571

a longer term look

The combination of a day off and some early finishes to tournaments has meant a bonus early update. The WSOP haven't yet published full chip counts from the Main so there will be an extra post about that later.


Event 70 - $5K NLH 6-max, Day 4 of 4, 751 entries so far


It's the first bracelet for Joao Vieira (together with $785K) and a fourth ever Portuguese bracelet.

Holding the chip lead at the end of both Day 2 & Day 3, he lost the lead at points in the day but as the field of 6 got thinned out, he was back at the top and managed to convert that chip lead in to the win.

2009 ME winner (and 4-time bracelet holder) Joe Cada had a small lead as heads-up play commenced, but and up-and-down straight draw got there on the river for Vieira on the fourth hand saw lots of chips change hands and five hands later it was all over when Vieira picked up AK and Cada AQ and the board ran out Jack high.

Jamie O'Connor was the only British player left, managing third place and his best ever live cash (nearly $318K) but he was another victim of Vieria, who this time only needed to get as far as the turn card to come from behind.


Event 71 - $500 Salute to Warriors NLH, Day 2 of 3, 1723 entries


No action on Thursday, it was a "rest day". They resume on Friday.


Event 72 - $10K Limit Hold'em Championship, Day 2 of 3, 118 entries


"Suomi, Suomi" chanted the rail as Juha Helppi won an extended heads-up match with Mike Lancaster to take his first ever bracelet (and the small matter of $306K).

Over four hours earlier, Tommy Hang was busted when both him and Helppi made a flush, Hang's the 10-high flush but unfortunately for him, Helppi had the nut flush.

Josh Arieh finished 6th, John Racener 11th and Eli Elezra 12th. Elezra has been showing all month with a USA flag against his name to reflect his residence I guess but now has the Israeli flag to properly represent his nationality.


Event 73 - $10K MAIN EVENT WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP NLH, Day 1B of 10, 3250 entries so far


1915 entries on Day 1B so that makes the total with 1C and late reg (to the start of Day 2 for the first time) still to come.

A full report to come but early indications are that we have a British leader - Adam Owen.

Five former winners played 1B and all made it through - Chris Ferguson, Joe Hachem, Greg Merson, Greg Raymer and Ryan Riess. Hachem's son Daniel also progressed, with more than double the chips of his more famous father.

Looks like the TV coverage tonight is from 1:00am to 5:30, no Hot Dog Eating Contest to get in the way tonight though I see this is getting a repeat during the day but the poker isn't. Priorities BT Sport/ESPN, priorities!


To start today
None, but it is Day 1C of the main event and the Salute to Warriors resumes.

I wish I hadn’t done that.

Utterly bewildering, isn't it?

What's worse, there's a video of it. I'm not posting it here. YouTube is the friend of those who are stern of stomach.

I've now had time to look over the full list of those who've made it through from Day 1B

Event 73 - $10K MAIN EVENT WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP NLH, Day 1B of 10, 3250 entries so far


I mentioned before that Adam Owen was the Day 1B chip leader, in fact it's a British 1-2 as Gary Blackwood has bagged the second biggest stack.

Several other GB players with very healthy stacks - Carsten Hansen lies 11th, Thomas Drinkwater is 16th, Yudhishter Jaswal lies 34th and Jan Eric Schiwppert is 39th.

Furthern down, some GB names I've picked out include David Maudlin, Ben Dobson, Joel Isla, Harry Lodge, Alex Goulder, Nicholas Marchington, Conor Beresford, Leo Worthington-Leese, Sam Razavi, Roberto Romanello, Fraser McIntyre and John Duthie and there's plenty of others among the 1416 qualifiers.

From outside the UK, the winner of Event 44, Ash Moshe sits in third spot with Allen Kessler just two spots further back. Barry Hutter, fresh from his FT earlier on today bags more than three times his starting stack while final tablemate Olivier Busquet is also just over that mark.

Former Main Event FT'er John Hesp won't be repeating that feat, as the colourfully attired player from Bridlington was eliminated, as were recent bracelet winner Anthony Zinno, both the Ott twins, Mike Sexton, Pierre Neuville, Ben Dobson and Sam Grafton.

I think you might have missed one Charidimos Demetriou who finished day 1a with 252,000

I believe this is none other than one time near Blondepoker investor Harry.

GL to him if it is!

Be amazing if it was. Not seen or heard of him for a good few years.

Using the name Charidimos Demetriou there's no recent activity on THM, though that could mean anything due to GDPR;


https://pokerdb.thehendonmob.com/player.php?a=r&n=240458

If we use the name most of us know him by though, there's some recent activity, including in Australia, which would make sense;

 
https://pokerdb.thehendonmob.com/player.php?a=r&n=463

Confirmed it is definitely Harry.

https://www.pokernews.com/tours/wsop/2019-wsop/main-event/chips.293864.htm

Player disqualified :)

Excellent news.

https://twitter.com/sdaviespoker/status/1147254092755943429

some strange goings on at the Main Event

Seems harsh.

Probably just mucking around.

Effel later spoke with PokerNews and weighed in on the decision:
“Here’s the thing, you’re playing the Main Event you can’t touch other player’s chips. The chips that you have in front of you are the ones that belong to you, you shouldn’t be touching chips that don’t belong to you. Plain and simple. Discussing beyond what was seen at the table, everybody saw the exact same thing – he took the chips that were next to him, they didn’t belong to him and you can’t do that when you’re playing the Main Event.”

But it would be ok in other games?

Play briefly suspended due to another earthquake which affected SoCal & Nevada, 7.1 magnitude this time.

Will Kassouf busted, his KK no good v AA.


 
‏
 
@WilliamKassouf
 
OMFG! Just busted in the sickest cooler AGAIN end of Day 1 in the WSOP Main Event!
KK v AA obviously! No other hand I’m busting with on Day 1 ffs! FML lol.
Thanks for all the love and support. On to the next one. Oh and pic or didn’t happen obv lol..




(http://i.imgur.com/9U9FU50.jpg) (https://imgur.com/9U9FU50)




https://twitter.com/WilliamKassouf/status/1147428792224243715

The single-day attendance record for the WSOP Main Event was broken on Friday with almost 5,000 players registering for the Day 1c flight.

That number brings the total attendance for the 2019 Main Event over the 8,000 mark, making it the second-highest ever.

With late registration still available until the start of the Day 2 flights (Saturday and Sunday), there’s still a chance that this year’s tournament could break the all-time record for Main Event entries.

The current record of 8,773 players has stood since the 2006 Main Event.

The fella has apologized on Twitter now;

 

Hello
I really want to apologize to all players, staff, mr. Effel and the whole poker community for my unprofessionalism and misbehavior in WSOP main event. I take full responsibility for my behavior that I really got drunk and could not control myself.

I was up all night playing and drinking in cash games in Rio. By the time I realized what time it is, I decided to go register into main event. I don’t remember much, I really did not want to cheat nobody, just a stupid drunk joke which landed me a night in jail for trespass.

I hope that you all will understand and believe me if I say that it’s first time in my life that I involved in such a bad story. A lot of people in poker community can confirm that before this accident I’ve never been involved in any suspicious activities.

I really care about my reputation and life values and I promise you all that this will never ever happen again.
Georgii Belianin




Here;

https://twitter.com/GBelianin/status/1147716761292177408

I can see why you don't drink now Tony.

Would have been quite a turnup for the staking thread, mind.

Event 71 - $500 Salute to Warriors NLH, Day 3 of 3, 1723 entries


The WSOP didn't quite get the fairy story they wanted from this event; that a US Military Veteran would win it, but I suppose they got the next best story, the first female win in an Open Event this year.

71-year old Susan Faber has really only been playing the game for about 10 years, and regularly plays events when the WSOP circuit visits her nearest events in North Carolina and had one earlier WSOP proper cash (earlier this summer). The $121K is by far the biggest cash of her career.

She only took five hands heads-up to finish off Rob Stark, with Dean Yoon having departed in third. Faber eliminated her final four tablemates, including Day 2 chip leader (and the last Vet standing), Taylor Carroll who ended up in 5th spot


Event 73 - $10K MAIN EVENT WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP NLH, Day 1C of 10, 8127 entries so far


Nearly 5000 players decided to play Day 1C, taking the total figure so far to over 8000, the second highest figure and with late reg open until the start of play today for Day 2AB and tomorrow for 2C, there's a slight chance that the all-time record of 8773 which dates back to 2006 could be broken.

So what happened on Day 1C? Not one but two players were disqualified (one for stealing someone else's chips, one for dropping his trousers and throwing a shoe at the table hitting one of the other players). Play was suspended for a while due to the effects of the earthquake in California, and Phil Ivey was bust within the first half of Level 1. Just your regular day in the Main Event.

3647 players made it through the five levels of play with James Henson from Tiki Island which sounds like something from Disneyland but is actually a village off the coast of Texas. The big names start at Position 2 with Mike "Timex" McDonald, and in third place is Joshua Ray.

The highest placed GB player is Barry Donovan who sits with 280K chips (starting stack was 60K) in 6th spot. Andrew Pantling, Jack Salter, Kenneth Broad, Carl Shaw, Andrew Fields, Juan Sanchez, Charles Combes, Sean Mills, Chris Brammer, Raul Manzanares, Gilad Gutkin, Thomas Ward and Stuart McNally all line inside the top 300.

Lower down a quick search through those with "GB" against their names adds the likes of Peter Linton, Jason Gray, Philip Long, Alexander Zeligman, Guy Taylor (I mentioned a week or two ago about his record in massive field tourneys), Sam Trickett (playing his first event of the year), Max Silver, Ben Heath, Jake Cody, Sunny Chattha and Louis Salter. Niall Farrell and Stuart Rutter both have barely over half their starting stack, with Talal Shakerchi and Michael Kane just under that mark.

Some former winners battled through - reigning title holder John Cynn, Joe McKeehan (who was at the table when the first disqualification happened), Scotty Nguyen, Jim Bechtel, Johnny Chan and 2002 winner Robert Varkonyi. We did lose our first former winners though - Jamie Gold, Joe Cada and Martin Jacobson

A decent amount of coverage on TV tonight, and starting at not too bad of a time - midnight to 4:30 if I'm reading the programme guide correctly.

We still haven't seen the entrance of the Poker Brat Phil Hellmuth yet, he's been off on vacation to Macchu Pichu and the Galapagos Islands, along with actor Rob Lowe and owner of the Golden State Warriors and LA Dodgers Peter Guber. He hasn't indicated yet whether he'll be back in time from South America to play the Main.


To start today

Event 75 - $1111 Little One for One Drop, 4 Day Event, 3 starting flights Sat/Sun/Mon

Event 73 - $10K MAIN EVENT WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP NLH, Day 2AB of 10, 8225 entries so far


A man named Su!

Not as many distractions as the previous day, so the poker could take centre stage. The day ended after the regulation 5 2-hour levels with Boston, Massachusetts native Timothy Su bagging the biggest stack ahead of Tony Blanchandin of France and Germany's Anton Morgenstern in third. Morgenstern has 4 6-figure cashes in his career, including a run to 22nd in the 2015 ME but has yet to win big NLH live event.

That doesn't apply to Qui Nguyen of course. He won the 2016 Main and after delivering today's "shuffle up and deal" he proceeded to win pot after pot and ends Day 2 with a very tidy 602K in chips.

Florian Duta is the first player listed with "GB" against his name, but in reality he's a Romanian who lives in Birmingham so the honour of top Brit (out of about 50 who've qualified) goes to Gary Blackwood who has two previous WSOP Cashes, neither for more than $2000.

Other GB names inside the top 400 are Marc Foggin, Day 1 chip leader Adam Owen, Barny Boatman, Fraser MacIntyre, Nicholas Marchington, Joshua Boulton, Yudhishter Jaswal, Michael Kane, Craig McCorkell, Timothy Flanders, Jack Maskill, Leo Worthington-Leese, Andrew Martin, Arron Woodcock, Cyril Andre, Armin Ghojevand, Thomas Drinkwater, Mitchell Johnson, Philip Clarke, Robert Heidorn, Alex Goulder, Ben Dobson, Charlotte Godwin and Conor Beresford

While Nguyen moved on, four former winners didn't. Chris Ferguson, Greg Raymer, Greg Merson and Ryan Reiss all will have to wait until next year to try and get a second win.

Picking a few more players who are still in leads me to Shaun Deeb, Allen Kessler, Jeffrey Lisandro, Asi Moshe, Neil Blumenfield, Todd Brunson and Brian Hastings. Doubtless there are plenty more well known names lurking as well.

About a hundred players took advantage of the late reg being extended to the start of today, the WSOP are expecting slightly more than that for the start of Day 2C, and then we'll know the exact size of the field, the prizepool, and the massive first prize.

Phil Hellmuth has tweeted a video of a Giant Galapagos Tortoise with the logic that a tortoise (implying not the hare) always wins in NLH and that he is back and ready to enter Day 2C.

The TV coverage starts right from the start of play tonight - 7:30 UK time to 11:00pm, of course that's with cards on a 30-minute delay, cards are actually in the air at 11am Vegas time, 7pm BST.


Event 75 - $1111 Little One for One Drop, 4 Day Event, Day 1A, 702 entries so far


With considerably lower media spotlight, the first post-Main Event tournament started with the first of three starting flights attracting just over 700 players, of whom 240 made Day 2.

France have been coming on strong during the second half of the WSOP, including here where Leandry Ainonkpo has a massive lead, his 726K well ahead of Mark Eddleman's 464K and Schahin Ghiai with 409K in third.

John Hesp will be disappointed that he busted out of the Main Event (as will ESPN) but he's having a go here and lies 47th and top Brit. Shola Akindele, Daniel Myers, Irene Albarran, Gareth James, Barry Grime, Damien Le Goff, Graeme Ladd, Simon Higgins and Niall Murray all made Day 2 and now have a couple of days off.

I can't see many names that I recognise, Valentin Vornicu, David "ODB" Baker and Victor Ramdin are about it.


To start today
Event 76 - $800 WSOP.com Online NLH 6-max, 1 Day Event

WSOP Main Event official #'s:

8,569 entries (up 9% y-o-y)
$80,548,600 prize pool
1,286 places paid
Winner: $10,000,000
Min-Cash: $15,000
344 late registered for Day 2C
Entries by day: 1,334/1,914/4,877/100/344

Event 73 - $10K MAIN EVENT WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP NLH, Day 2C of 10, 8569 entries


A milliard reasons to dream

344 players bought in just in time to start Day 2C, making the final number of players 8569, the second most in Main Event history, and bringing the first prize to a round $10 Million. The min-cash remains at $15000 for the players who finish 1063-1268 inclusive as to raise this by so much as a single dollar would have tax implications.

Does anyone remember when there was a difference between different versions of a billion? In some countries a billion was a million million, in others it was a thousand million (and that latter usage has now become standard). Well in some countries where the former usage was common, the word for a thousand million was a "milliard". We've got about half a milliard chips in play but a Milliard in the chip lead at the end of Day 2C - Julien Milliard from Sunny Isles Beach, Florida. He has almost a million chips, ahead of Czech player Vlastimil Pustina and another American Andrew Brokos.

We have to look all the way down to 44th to find the best British player, Mark Teltscher who has about half Milliard's chips. The next group of Brits includes Barry Donovan, Philip Long, Daniel Charlton, Andrew Pantling, Luke Brereton, Kenneth Broad, Sean Mills, Jack Salter, Chris Determeyer, Christopher Sly, Jonathan McCann, Alexander Zeligman, Laurids Nielsen, Richard Kellett, Christopher Gatley, Louis Salter, Thomas MacDonald, Samuel Goodman, Oliver Price, Carl Shaw and Thomas Seaman all of whom like in the top 500 with a few names from further back in Jake Cody, Usman Siddique, Tom Hall, Jason Gray, Peter Linton, Paul Ephremesen and Max Silver.

Phil Hellmuth late registered, turned up about 45 minutes late and then proceeded to bluff of three-quarters of his chips pretty quickly and didn't stop mumbling to himself and anyone else who'd listen until he finally got eliminated.

He wasn't alone in former winners getting busted. Robert Varkonyi, Jerry Yang and Scott Blumstein also found themselves on the rail, leaving by my reckoning eight ME winners still in (Chan, Bechtel, Nguyen, Moneymaker, Hackem, McKeehen, Nguyen and Cynn). The first Nguyen is of Scotty Nguyen who delivered the "shuffle up and deal baby!" at the start of play.

Among those who did make it through, former final tabler Tom Cannuli lies inside the top 10, Kathy Liebert is 20th just ahead of Adam Friedman and Jeff Madsen is 41st. Also with decent stacks are Calvin Anderson, Bertrand Grospelier, David "ODB" Baker and another who has been all the way to the FT, Cliff Josephy.

After the 2 Day 2s, 2880 players are still involved and will all combine now for Day 3 where the TV coverage isn't at as kind of time for UK viewers, action on BT Sport/ESPN from 3am-7am.


Event 75 - $1111 Little One for One Drop, 4 Day Event, Day 1B, 702 entries so far


The chip lead changed in the last level of Day 1B, Stefan Ivanov winning a huge hand to vault himself into the number one position. The Bulgarian has the lead from Hophuong Loy and Joris Ruijs.

With a lot of players still involved in ME action, there was still a number of better-known casualties from the Big One who decided to play the Little One, Vlaidimir Geshkenbein, Daniel Ott, Mike Sexton, both Barry and Allyn Shulman, Michael Mizrachi and Chris Ferguson.

505 players made it through of whom Tamer Kamel appears to be Top Brit, with William Overmire, Brian Leddy, Mohammed Suhail and Waikiat Lee the next best placed.


Event 76 - $800 WSOP.com Online NLH 6-max, 1 Day Event, 1560 entries

This one has gone to Shawn Buchanan ahead of David "Bakes" Baker and Hunter Gebron. The Canadian is a very familiar pro player, having over $6m in live earnings, but this is his first bracelet.

This was the final online event of the 2019 WSOP.


To start today
Event 77 - $3K Limit Hold'em 6-max, 4 Day Event
08/07/19 Event 90 - $50K High Roller NLH, 3 Day Event. This event was a late addition to the schedule, hence why it is out of sequence in terms of event numbers.

I'm reading these numbers in disbelief.

I read a day or two earlier about the decline of poker, rake issues etc and here we are with the biggest Main Event ever. I don't get it.

On which note, here are some stats from this year's WSOP;


Through 75 events (of 90) at this year’s WSOP at the Rio, here is where some of the key metrics stand:

•   168,135 entries – 36% above last year’s pace through 75 events (123,356). (All-time record)
•   $250,231,945 in prize money awarded  – More than any WSOP between 1970-2017 and up 6.5% y-o-y
•   25,236 places paid – Breaks record of 18,105 established last year
•   52 -- $1 million+ prize pools
•   25 -- $2 million+ prize pools
•   8 -- $5 million+ prize pools
•   3 -- $10 million+ prize pools
•   1 -- $80 million + prize pool
•   11 – Events with 5,000 or more entrants (Event 3, 9, 19, 32, 34, 50, 59, 61, 64, 69 & 73) – New record
•   4 – Events reaching Top 10 field sizes all-time (Event 3 (1st); Event 61 (4th), Event 64 (7th) & Event 19 (10th)
•   1 – Largest $500 buy-in event in history (Event #3, Big 50, 28,371 entries)
•   1 – Largest $400 buy-in event in history (Event 61, Colossus No-Limit Hold’em, 13,109 entries)
•   1 – Largest $1,500 buy-in event (Event #19, Millionaire Maker, 8,809 entries)
•   1 – Largest $600 buy-in event in history (Event #9, Deepstack No-Limit Hold’em, 6,150 entries)
•   1 – Largest $800 buy-in event in history (Event 53, 8-Handed Deepstack No-Limit Hold’em, 3,759 entries)
•   1 – Largest $888 buy-in event in history (Event 64, Crazy Eights No-Limit Hold’em, 10,185 entries)
•   1 – Largest $1,000 buy-in tournament in history (Event #34, Double Stack, 6,214 entries)

Day 3 has ended, everyone is in the money.

Just seen this on Twitter;


(http://i.imgur.com/QheoYEq.jpg) (https://imgur.com/QheoYEq)

Event 73 - $10K MAIN EVENT WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP NLH, Day 3 of 10, 8569 entries


From a chip and a chair to chip leader inside a day

Preben Stokkan had a pretty good start to Day 3, doubling his stack from 93K to 180K or so inside the first level. Then he tried a bluff with all but 5K of his stack, was over-shoved and had to fold, thanking his lucky stars he hadn't shoved that last 5K chip in too, and was left with the proverbial "chip and a chair" at the first break of the day. It wasn't the lowest denomination chip, but it was just a single chip.

From then on, he didn't look back, and a huge hand just before the end of the night brought him to a total of 2.184 million, the biggest stack in the room and the only player over 2 million in chips.

Hand for hand play wasn't needed; while they were getting all the hands paused to start hand-for-hand, on one of the last tables to get ready, Ryan Pochedly (who had been on the feature table a couple of days ago) lost all his chips when Julien Pineda rivered trip sevens. As has become traditiona, Pochedly was given a free entry to next year's ME as a consolation, but Jack Effel was able to say "with 1286 players left in the 50th World Series Of Poker Main Event, you are all IN THE MONEY" leading to no doubt the cheering and mutual back-slapping that has become the norm when the bubble bursts in the Main Event. Play was then immediately called off for the night with just over 6 minutes in the level.

Behind Stokkan, Andrew Brokos and Ryan Dodge lie second and third with Galen Hall the first former bracelet winner in 4th.

We lost former winners Scotty Nguyen, Joe Hachem and John Cynn during the day (though Hachem's son is still in), and Jim Bechtel too although I believe the player in question was Jim Bechtel jr not the former ME winner. That leaves just two trying to win their second Main, Chris Moneymaker and Qui Nguyen, plus Johnny Chan still alive with the possibility of his third.

There are a number of GB players with serious stacks - Daniel Charlton and Alexander Zeligman lie virtually neck-and-neck with 1.4m chips, Robert Heidorn has 1.2m and Oliver Bithell just over a million. I'm going to list all the players marked as GB from here on, for today I haven't the time to sift out any psuedo-Brits but I'll try and get that on from tomorrow.

So, in chip order:

Max Silver
Marc Foggin
Christopher Sly
Thomas Drinkwater
Yudhishter Jaswal
Stuart McNally
Luke Brereton
Nicholas Marchington
Nikolay Ponomarev
Jack Maskill
Andrew Martin
Timothy Flanders
Philip Long
Carl Shaw
Laurids Neilsen
Pierre Joubert
Craig McCorkell
Steven Morris
Adam Owen
Jonathan McCann
Sean Mills
Simon Deadman
Jan Eric Schwippert
Alexander Clark
Gary Blackwood
Thomas Seaman
Louis Salter
Mitchell Johnson
Robert Warburton
Thomas MacDonald
Scott Franklin
Oliver Price
Christian Christner
Philip Clarke
Thomas Waters
Michael Kane
Peter Linton
Armand Matti
Samuel Goodman
Mark Teltscher
Barny Boatman
Robert McAdam
Chris Determeyer
Florian Duta
Conor Beresford
Joshua Boulton
Alex Goulder
Charles COmbes
Daiva Byrne Barauskaite
Guillermo Sanchez
Paul Ephremesen
Gilad Gutkin
Stephen Hay
Leo Worthington-Leese
Mauro Suriano
Raul Martinez
Adam Daniel
Cyril Andre
William White
Ben Dobson
Igor Dursel

Phew. All of the above have now guaranteed a min-cash of $15K.

A few other names still in - Jean-Robert Ballande, Joseph Cheong, Eoghan O'Dea, Ertic Baldwin, Tom Cannuli, Jay Farber and Gus Hansen.


TV coverage is scheduled to run from 12 midnight to 4am, note yesterday's show as delayed because ESPN in the US were carrying the overrunning MLB All-Star Home Run Derby, so their coverage started about an hour later (and also ran until an hour later than the scheduled finish time).



Event 75 - $1111 Little One for One Drop, 4 Day Event, Day 1C, 5463 entries


A huge Day 1C took the starting field for the Little One for One Drop over the 5000 mark, with the chip lead for the day (but still well behind the Day 1A leader) in the hands of Nikolay Fay from Russia, with Darren Attebery and Kenneth Golden second and third.

The Moldovan resident in Northern Ireland, Dragos Trofimov, is the first player with "GB" against his name, but if you want a full Brit you've got to look down to 33rd where Sunny Chattha is listed. Several other British players survive, including Tsz Ho inside the top 100, George Demetriou and Calin Trif inside the top 200 and John Wright, Usman Siddique, Iaron Lightbourne, Sam Razavi and Will Kassouf and Ian Simpson among approximately 50 players from over here making it through Day 1C in total.

Two former ME winners are there - Jamie Gold and Greg Raymer, as are Shaun Deeb, seniors bracelet winner Howard Mash and Pierre Bounahara (son of former November Niner Bob Bounahara)

From the three starting flights, a little over 2000 players will return for the combined Day 2.


Event 77 - $3K Limit Hold'em 6-max, Day 1 of 4, x entries


More Limit Hold'em. Just what we need. Maybe not, with only 193 entries and only 57 making it through to Day 2.

Ron Carmona finished 17th in the $1500 version a few days ago, and he's in a position to do better here by being the Day 1 chip leader with Joshua Turner and Zachary Gruneberg second and third.

I know I often make the point that GB players historically do comparitively badly at Limit Hold'em but perhaps things are changing here as we have two inside the Top 8 overnight - Stuart Rutter is 4th and Patrick Leonard is 8th.

Dual bracelet winner Robert Campbell is one of the others through as are Dan Zack, Jeff Shulman, Greg Mueller, Chris Vitch and Joao Vieira.

29 will get paid (a min cash is $4571 and the first prize is $133K).


08/07/19 Event 90 - $50K Final Fifty High Roller NLH, Day 1 of 3, 109 entries so far. This event was a late addition to the schedule, hence why it is out of sequence in terms of event numbers.

A late and in some places controversial addition to the structure, 70 players have made 109 entries so far, just one below the similar event at the start of the series with late reg and re-entry open until the start of Day 2 that number should be surpassed.

Seth Davies has the early lead ahead of Dan Smith and first British name Elior Sion. The British challenge is very strong here, as Daniel Tang, Ben Heath, Ben Rolle, Chi Zhang, Talal Shakerchi, Canay Ekmen and Orpen Kisacikoglu make it 8 players listed as GB from the 44 qualifiers.

Of course at this buyin level plenty of the big hitters are present, Brian Rast, Ben Yu, Fedor Holz, Dan Shak and Daniel Negreanu amongst them.


To start today
Event 78 - $1500 PLO Bounty, 3 Day Event
Event 79 - $3K NLH, 4 Day Event