Pokerstars.com Barcelona EPT - Day 1a - Interactive

[JungleCat03]

Hello and welcome from myself and Jen to the exciting initiation of this year's EPT season here in Barcelona.

I doubt there is a finer city to host the opening event - Barcelona is a stunning locale, from its beautiful coastal views to its mouth watering range of foods to its feisty yet friendly inhabitants. I love it here as you may be able to tell and we are bound to be in for a hell of an EPT.

Pokerstars kicked off proceedings last night in their usual glitzy fashion with an impressive opening party from Club Opium Mar. Small appetizing plates of snacks were handed round whilst an award ceremony hosted by none other than Daniel Negreanu took place.

The champagne, wine and vodka red bull flowed whilst the players had a chance to relax, let their hair down and mingle with each other before picking up arms and doing battle at the felt over the next five days.

Some of the big star celebs seen amongst the throng were the lovely Isabelle Mercier, diminutive recent WSOP bracelet winner Dario Minieri, Scotty Nguyen, the controversial but accomplished winner of the 2008 50k WSOP HORSE bracelet, the laid back and immensely tall consistent EPT performer Danny Ryan and perennial Dana favourite Trond Eidsvig, all of whom looked to be having a great time.

If there's any lull in the likely frenetic action, we'll fill you in on the awards that were handed out but for now we wait with bated breath for the action to kick off where as usual we will bring you a full and complete account of all the action.

As per usual, feel free to throw requests for chip counts or other information at us and we'll do our utmost to bring the EPT to your doorstep.

Good luck to all the players. It should be a cracker!

[Linux]

Danny Ryan FTW

[Djinn]

Initial Impression Scores:

Weather compared to the UK: 10/10
Popularity of Pokerstars EPT tournament, beautiful wide-eyed optimism that THIS season YOU are going to win:  10/10
Starting on time: 3/10
Organisation of human sea of gamblers thronging the cash game desk already:  1/10
Quality of foods (and party):  9/10
Tables with at least one 18-year-old American:  6/10
Level of wishing I were visiting the Gaudi garden in the sunshine instead of holed up in the baccarat room press haven: 9/10

[Djinn]

Danny Ryan FTW

You win the get-in-there-first prize (a dedicated following of the consistent Mr. Ryan), and we salute you for tipping him before the first start day even settles into some semblance of starting.  Should he actually win, that makes blonde's record of quickest accurate tip, and we will photoshop you in your honour.

[Laxie]

Initial Impression Scores:

Weather compared to the UK: 10/10
Popularity of Pokerstars EPT tournament, beautiful wide-eyed optimism that THIS season YOU are going to win:  10/10
Starting on time: 3/10
Organisation of human sea of gamblers thronging the cash game desk already:  1/10
Quality of foods (and party):  9/10
Tables with at least one 18-year-old American:  6/10
Level of wishing I were visiting the Gaudi garden in the sunshine instead of holed up in the baccarat room press haven: 9/10

The hardships of it.  You lot have the life, but no need to rub it in! 

Pouring rain and cold here.  Cheers.

[moveras1]

Cards in the air yet?

[JungleCat03]

And we're off!

An early perusal of the card room revealed a number of names and faces lurking in the sea of EPT hopefuls.

Dutch star Noah Boeken is here, although he appears to have spurned his normal eye-wateringly luminescent hoody for something altogether more subdued today. I hope the pokerstars sponsored Dutchman is not on the slippery slope to wearing grey cardigans and flannel trousers!

Another Dutchman spotted was Rolf Slotboom, sporting his trademarked mirrored shades. I hope Rolf runs deep, if only so we can see another of the magnificently intricate chip constructions he is so adept at making.

There is a reasonable English contingent in attendance today as well. One of the most recognisable faces is that of Mickey Wernick, his bearded visage poking out from a blanket of spiky haired scandies and wearing a broad grin that seems to signal he is feeling confident of doing well.

One interesting face-off sees the highly respected young internet and now live sensation Annette Obrestad pitted against the magnate of all things honey-related Albert Sapiano. Annette no doubt spent much of the summer jealously watching the world series pass her by, being too young to play poker in the states.

She must have been itching to get stuck in to a big tournament and with the advent of the EPT season, she can do just that! However, nothing will have prepared her for some of the incredible plays she will witness coming from Albert today.

Can she cope with his relentless brand of calling-any-preflop-raise-with-any-cards poker?

We'll just have to wait and see...

[Djinn]

The hardships of it.  You lot have the life, but no need to rub it in! 

Pouring rain and cold here.  Cheers.

Well, this is as close to natural light as we're getting - Pokerstars have, as usual, done a bang up job branding the poker room and the larger-than-life faces of Greg Raymer, Marcel Luske and the others (now too many to list), and the Emergency Fire Doors weren't excepted... You can just see the tempting gleam of light from the glorious summer taking place at the marina - and I snapped it as best I could through the cracks.

[kinboshi]

Danny Ryan FTW

You win the get-in-there-first prize (a dedicated following of the consistent Mr. Ryan), and we salute you for tipping him before the first start day even settles into some semblance of starting.  Should he actually win, that makes blonde's record of quickest accurate tip, and we will photoshop you in your honour.

Or the fastest ever bok.

[Djinn]

I have to admit having arrived into a fabulous bottleneck as IDs are repeatedly checked, player and press passes swiped, and they filter down the stairs into the casino - so I was expecting every square inch of baize to be instantly filled by players.  However, the playing area, divided into two, isn't seething too much, and I didn't step on anyone's toes/knock their side tables over/get into a Twister-style contest to snap them with other press.  While one half of the room is already clicking with riffling chips, the other sort of has yet to get going, and the soothing voice of TD Thomas Kremser oozes from the mic every now and then calling a new keen hopeful to their place at one of the tables. 

[JungleCat03]

Another big name spotted at the felt is that of David "Chino" Rheem, one of the November Nine who are destined to return to the Rio Casino in Vegas in November to battle it out on the WSOP Main Event final table.

As I haven't spotted any interesting hands of note just yet, I will continue the sartorial focus of my previous posts by telling you he is wearing a sporty leather jacket emblazoned with dollar symbols. Apt, given that he is guaranteed to be a dollar millionaire in less than 2 months time...

Reportedly both Greg Raymer (who Jen has snapped) and Annette Obrestad have had flying starts, winning reasonably sized pots to boost them to 14k and 13k respectively...

[Djinn]

Not True But Could Have, Possibly Should Have Been Story of the Day (so far):

Greg Raymer refused Entry to Tournament for not wearing Pants

A story was circulating, in all seriousness, through the press room, that the dress codes of the Casino had put paid to none other than the Fossilman's dreams of EPT glory.  While they've definitely loosened up their rules (trainers and hoodies abound, thank goodness), Noah Boeken was earlier refused entry because of his ripped jeans and shorts are definitely frowned upon.  So the trademark beige shorts, socks'n'sandals combo of Raymer was apparently, nearly going to miss out on Day 1a.  Someone somewhere relented, and here he is, chatting cheerily with his table already.



Incidentally, Danny Ryan is one of his current conversational sparring partners, pictured here from the side in case you didn't recognise his hair in the top photo. 

[Royal Flush]

The hardships of it.  You lot have the life, but no need to rub it in! 

Pouring rain and cold here.  Cheers.

Well, this is as close to natural light as we're getting - Pokerstars have, as usual, done a bang up job branding the poker room and the larger-than-life faces of Greg Raymer, Marcel Luske and the others (now too many to list), and the Emergency Fire Doors weren't excepted... You can just see the tempting gleam of light from the glorious summer taking place at the marina - and I snapped it as best I could through the cracks.

I got robbed just the other side of those doors...

[Jim R]

The hardships of it.  You lot have the life, but no need to rub it in! 

Pouring rain and cold here.  Cheers.

Well, this is as close to natural light as we're getting - Pokerstars have, as usual, done a bang up job branding the poker room and the larger-than-life faces of Greg Raymer, Marcel Luske and the others (now too many to list), and the Emergency Fire Doors weren't excepted... You can just see the tempting gleam of light from the glorious summer taking place at the marina - and I snapped it as best I could through the cracks.

I got robbed just the other side of those doors...

I got robbed on this side of the doors.

[JungleCat03]

The hardships of it.  You lot have the life, but no need to rub it in! 

Pouring rain and cold here.  Cheers.

Well, this is as close to natural light as we're getting - Pokerstars have, as usual, done a bang up job branding the poker room and the larger-than-life faces of Greg Raymer, Marcel Luske and the others (now too many to list), and the Emergency Fire Doors weren't excepted... You can just see the tempting gleam of light from the glorious summer taking place at the marina - and I snapped it as best I could through the cracks.

I got robbed just the other side of those doors...

Blatant "I once walked out of a casino with money still on me" brag post imo...