As the field has shrunk the tables have gotten tougher. As a result some tables have gotten pretty tough.
Silver 26 has Marcel Luske, Kevin Saul and Jame Dempsey seated. Silver 29 has Eugene Katchalov, Jason Somerville and Tony Cousineau. Gold 17 has David Bach, Will Failla and Jonathan Duhamel.
Earlier today Scott Fischman tweeted that he was dealt four aces as his down cards, which would seem to be quite the rare feat. Now it appears another pro, Jason Somerville, had the same experience. What's even more impressive, he won with it:
JasonSomerville Jason SomervilleLol just stole the blinds w AAAA #blockersJune 26 2012
Lee Watkinson was short stacked with about 1,500 and got involved in a three-way pot. Watkinson and Rob Whittenburge were both all in with Watkinson having Whittenburge covered. The unknown player had both covered by a large margin.
Watkinson
Unknown
Whittenburge
The board ran and Whittenburge took the main pot with his full house. The dealer shipped the side pot to the unknown player and Watkinson left.
He returned several moments later when it hit him that he should have chopped the side pot since both players had made a Broadway straight. A floorman was summoned, Watkinson received his half of the side pot (900) and was back in the tournament.
We missed the action but Dwyte Pilgrim has been eliminated by his friend Gary Boden. Boden made sure to point out that they are buddies and would have preferred not to have dealt Pilgrim his last beat of the tournament.
Right now, the $50,000 Poker Players Championship is on a one-hour dinner break; as such, Roland Israelashvili, who is one of the 32 players alive in that event, has returned to our tournament to try and build up his stack.
In a recent hand, Israelashvili raised to 1,000 from middle position and found two called, Dario Alioto and an unknown player in the hijack. Israelashvili proceeded to fire out a bet of 1,000 on the flop, Alioto raised to 2,500, and the hijack got out of the way. Israelashvili's time is short, so it wasn't too surprising to see him put out a pot-sized bet.
Alioto gave it a little thought, but ultimately released his hand.
Mark Provensano was just eliminated from the tournament. Judging by Ray Hansen's stack he did not bust Provensano. Hansen is under 3,000 at the moment.