Svetlana Gromenkova will lead the way as the nine surviving women from an original field of 1,190 players return on Tuesday for the final of Event #15, $1,000 Ladies No-Limit Hold'em World Championship. The seating assignments, home towns, and starting chip counts are as follows:
Seat 4: Svetlana Gromenkova (New York , New York) 553,000
Seat 7: Christine Priday (Denver, Colorado) 448,000
Seat 1: Patty Till (Avon, Indiana) 312,000
Seat 6: Debbie Mitchell (Miramar, Florida) 224,000
Seat 5: Sue Porter (Houston, Texas) 211,000
Seat 8: Yesenia Garcia (Modesto, California) 210,000
Seat 9: Anh Le (San Jose, California) 191,000
Seat 3: Marla Crumpler (Fort Lauderdale, Florida) 163,000
Seat 2: Roslyn Quarto (Edison, New Jersey) 73,000
Action gets underway at 2pm PDT from the Amazon Room.
Patty Till is no stranger to the final table of a ladies tournament. She finished 2nd at the WSOP-Circuit Ladies Event at Caesars Indiana just two months ago, besting her 17th-place finish in the same event two years prior. A medical device sales rep, Till hails from Avon, IN, where she lives with her husband Rob and her three children. Like last year's champion Sally Anne Boyer, Till is a recent graduate of the WSOP Women’s Academy, led by Annie Duke, and those lessons are surely paying dividends for her right about now. This is her third year playing in the WSOP and her first cash.
Roz Quarto has her work cut out for her, arriving at today’s final table as the short stack. An attorney from Edison, NJ, Quarto has made five final tables in live events, her biggest finish coming in second at the 2006 WSOP-Circuit Ladies event in Atlantic City. Notably, Quarto ran the 1994 Gay Games sports festival in New York City, which was attended by over 15,000 athletes from 50 countries. This is her third year playing in the WSOP and her first cash.
Marla Crumpler is a financial planner from Ft. Lauderdale , FL. Though this is her first recorded cash in a major live tournament, she can often be found playing $5-$10 no-limit cash games at the Hard Rock Seminole Casino in nearby Hollywood, FL. A mother of twins, this is Crumpler’s second year at the WSOP.
Born in Russia, Svetlana Gromenkova now calls New York City home. Undoubtedly the most experienced player at the table, Gromenkova has nearly $140,000 in career tournament earnings. Most recently, she finished seventh in the U.S. Poker Championships main event at the Taj in Atlantic City and cashed in the $10K buy-in main event of the 2008 L.A. Poker Classic. Gromenkova has also made four final tables in limit hold’em events at the Bicycle Casino’s Legends of Poker and at the Borgata Winter Open. She also cashed in this event last year, finishing 27th. This is her fourth WSOP cash and her first final table.
54-year old Sue Porter has played poker for 22 years, primarily in a league in her native Houston, TX. This is her second year playing in the WSOP and her first recorded tournament cash. She wanted to make sure to thank Harrah’s and all the wonderful tournament staffers and definitely plans to play more events should she win here today.
Debbie Mitchell is a business owner and sports fanatic from Miramar, FL. She has numerous online tournament wins in a variety of poker disciplines including Omaha 8/b, pot-limit Omaha, H.O.R.S.E., and no-limit hold’em. Last year she played on a traveling softball team that came in second in their league nationals. This is her third year playing in the WSOP and her first cash.
Chris Priday is an accountant from Denver and has won a number of small tournaments at her local casino in Black Hawk, CO. Fascinated with numbers and mathematics, poker was a natural choice for her. This is her third year in the WSOP and her first cash. In her spare time, she plays roller hockey.
26-year-old Yesenia Garcia is a single mother of three from Modesto, CA. She is also a full-time student and plans to pursue a career working with children once she gets her degree. This is her second year in the WSOP and her first cash.
Anh Le is the only woman at this table who has been here before. Le finished runner-up to Jennifer Tilly in the 2005 WSOP Ladies Event, banking over $83,000. After the disappointment of coming so close to a bracelet, she definitely wants this monkey off her back and is gunning for first today. Le is also an avid online player, having made three final tables on Full Tilt and eight on PokerStars. Prior to becoming a poker pro, she owned a chain of nail salons. She lives in San Jose, CA, and is the mother of a five-year-old daughter.