€5,300 Main Event
Day 1b Started
€5,300 Main Event
Day 1b Started
The second and final starting day for the 2016 PokerStars and Monte-Carlo® Casino EPT Grand Final €5,300 Main Event will go off on the grounds of the Monte-Carlo Bay Hotel & Resort beginning at 12 p.m. local time today.
Yesterday's first flight drew 286 entries, and with a bumper crop of online qualifiers and top pros expected, organizers are readying themselves for an even bigger field today. They plan to play eight 75-minute levels, and all who survive through them will join the 167 who bagged up chips on Day 1a for Day 2 Monday.
Adrian Mateos beat a field of 564 to earn €1,082,000 and the title here last year. The Spaniard is expected to show up and defend the prestigious title today, and will surely be joined by some of the biggest names in the game hunting European Poker Tour glory.
Plans are to take a 20-minute break every two levels and a dinner break after the end of level six, with tons of poker action in between. The day should wrap up around midnight local time and the PokerNews live reporting team will be here from now, until a winner is crowned on May 6th.
Just sit back and take it all in as Day 1b of the 2016 PokerStars and Monte-Carlo® Casino EPT Grand Final €5,300 Main Event should be legendary.
Previous EPT Grand Final stops at a glance
Season | Year | Place | Players | Champion | Country | Prize |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 2005 | Monaco | 211 | Rob Hollink | Netherlands | €635,000 |
2 | 2006 | Monaco | 298 | Jeff Williams | United States | €900,000 |
3 | 2007 | Monaco | 706 | Gavin Griffin | United States | €1,825,010 |
4 | 2008 | Monaco | 842 | Glen Chorny | Canada | €2,020,000 |
5 | 2009 | Monaco | 935 | Pieter de Korver | Netherlands | €2,300,000 |
6 | 2010 | Monaco | 848 | Nicolas Chouity | Lebanon | €1,700,000 |
7 | 2011 | Madrid | 686 | Ivan Freitez | Venezuela | €1,500,000 |
8 | 2012 | Monaco | 665 | Mohsin Charania | United States | €1,350,000 |
9 | 2013 | Monaco | 531 | Steve O'Dwyer | Ireland | €1,224,000 |
10 | 2014 | Monaco | 650 | Antonio Buonanno | Italy | €1,240,000 |
11 | 2015 | Monaco | 564 | Adrian Mateos | Spain | €1,082,000 |
Level: 1
Blinds: 50/100
Ante: 0
Chance Kornuth, who continued his blazing hot year by winning the PokerStars and Monte-Carlo® Casino EPT Grand Final €10,300 Single Reentry High Roller for €351,108 earlier this week, is in the field today.
Kornuth has found massive scores on three continents so far in 2016, earning $192,780 with a seventh-place finish in the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure $25,000 High Roller, winning the AU$25,000 Challenge at the Aussie Millions for AU$790,560 and taking second in the EPT Dublin €25,750 High Roller for €360,150.
Today, in just the first few hands, he appears to be getting the respect he's earned, picking up the blinds and antes with an under the gun raise to 300, getting a walk in the big blind, and forcing a fold when he came over the top of a 200-chip button raise, making it 750.
Player | Chips | Progress |
---|---|---|
Chance Kornuth |
30,500
30,500
|
30,500 |
Player | Chips | Progress |
---|---|---|
Ping San Chan | 30,000 | |
Sam Chartier | 30,000 | |
Gabriel Nassif | 30,000 | |
Mikhail Korotkikh | 30,000 | |
Mkihail Shalamov
|
30,000 | |
Louis Salter | 30,000 | |
Sergio Aido | 30,000 | |
Juicy Li | 30,000 | |
[Removed:17] | 30,000 | |
Fabrice Soulier | 30,000 | |
Atanas Kavrakov | 30,000 | |
Naoya Kihara | 30,000 | |
With the €50,000 Single-Day High Roller going off next door, Day 1a running yesterday, and the average poker player's penchant for late registration, the field seems devoid of a lot of superstars here in Level 1.
However, Andreas Hoiviold is here. European Poker Tour fans will no doubt remember that Hoivold captured the €5,000 EPT Main Event at Dortmund, Germany in Season 3 for €672,000.
The Norweigan was one of the early stars of the EPT, has since collected better than $1.7 million in career tournament earnings and even appeared on the popular American cash game TV show High Stakes Poker .
Hoivold's story isn't all champagne and roses, however. It is public knowledge that at 21 years old, the now 40-something Hoivold broke almost every bone in his body in a car accident that killed one of his passengers. He spent months in hospital, was in a wheelchair for almost a year and served five months in prison after being charged and convicted of vehicular manslaughter.
Hoivold, who still suffers from chronic pain, discovered poker years later in 2004, and the rest, as they say, is history.
Player | Chips | Progress |
---|---|---|
Yury Gulyy | 30,000 | |
Bruno Lopes | 30,000 | |
|
||
Salvatore Bonavena | 30,000 | |
|
||
Peter Eichhardt | 30,000 | |
Konstantin Puchkov | 30,000 | |
Julian Thomas | 30,000 |
After a raise to 200 it was Stephan Fajg who three-bet to 625 and EPT Prague Season 5 winner Salvatore Bonavena called from the button. The initial raiser called, and three players saw a [Ksh8s] flop.
Fajg bet 900 on the flop after the first player had checked, and Bonavena was his only caller.
On the turn the hit and Fajg bet another 1,500, and once again Bonavena called.
The river completed the board with the and both players quickly checked. Fajg showed and Bonavena quickly mucked.
Player | Chips | Progress |
---|---|---|
Salvatore Bonavena |
27,000
-3,000
|
-3,000 |
|
Low to mid-stakes legend and Team PokerStars Pro Online member Randy "nanonoko" Lew made a name for himself 24-tabling on PokerStars.
He's playing at just one table today, but success has come early. We caught Lew firing 2,025 at a pot of about 2,500 on a board to the turn, and his heads-up opponent made the call.
That same opponent checked the river and Lew fired out a bet of 3,500, forcing a fold.
For more on the legend of nanonoko, who streams his online play regularly on Twitch, check out the PokerStars short documentary video below:
Player | Chips | Progress |
---|---|---|
Randy Lew | 38,300 | |
Team PokerStars Pros and Online members galore at the EPT Grand Final, and we just spotted four more patched up players.
Team PokerStars Online Lex Veldhuis has been very active on Twitch lately, playing on a regular basis and not without success. Veldhuis - who used to play every EPT - has refocused himself on online poker in the last two years, and now plays mainly Pot Limit Omaha cash games and tournament on his popular Twitch stream. Veldhuis' Twitch schedule can be found right here, but that might get a bit changed up if he were to make a deep run here today.
Day | Time | Game |
---|---|---|
Monday | Noon - 6pm CEST | Poker |
Tuesday | Noon - 6pm CEST | PLO Tuesday |
Wednesday | Noon - 6pm CEST | Poker |
Thursday | Noon - 6pm CEST | Poker |
Friday | Noon - 6pm CEST | Blowup Fridays |
Saturday | Off | |
Sunday | Varied | Occasional stream |
Team PokerStars Pro George Danzer - all decked out with a fresh looking mohawk - is here today as well, and one table over we spotted Yaxi Zhu. Team PokerStars SportsStar Fatima Moreira de Melo was also spotted, and these four players are likely to create some exciting action.
Player | Chips | Progress |
---|---|---|
George Danzer |
30,000
30,000
|
30,000 |
Yaxi Zhu |
30,000
30,000
|
30,000 |
Lex Veldhuis |
30,000
30,000
|
30,000 |
Fatima Moreira de Melo |
30,000
30,000
|
30,000 |