The Shaping of a Champion

We've made it to Day 15 of the 2009 Aussie Millions Poker Championships. That means it's Day 4 of the Main Event. For the twenty-eight players remaining in the tournament, there's probably no more important day than this one. Their chances of making the final table will be made or broken during the day.

One player has a leg up on the rest of the field. Swede Michael Tureniec is the only player to start the day with more than a million chips. Will he have the right combination of luck, aggression and skill to make the final table? Two other players of Scandanavian origin also have big stacks. Annica Ivert, a Swedish-born player hailing from Japan, and Norwegian Annette Obrestad were one-two in chips at the start of Day 3. Each is in the top ten at the start of Day 4.

At the start of the Main Event, Joe Hachem threw down the challenge gauntlet to his fellow Aussies. "I think it's about time an Aussie took home the title," said Hachem. "Get your acts together!" Hachem is long departed, but several Aussies still remain in contention. Christopher Chronis leads them all with 862,000 chips, but someone else that you may have heard of is lurking in the middle of the pack: Grant Levy.

Today we play until seven remain, however long that takes. Play starts in twenty minutes.