Question asked: Would you like to be all in?
Asked of: Arkadi Kilman
On a flop of:
Button Kilman had just raised James Akenhead to 10,000 after he led for 2,700 on the flop. Back to Akenhead, who asked for a count of the other player's chips. It turned out he had less than 25,000 behind, so when Akenhead announced, "Make it twenty thousand," I was poised to see some hole cards and possibly some exiting. But the answer to the question proved to be 'No' and Akenhead keeps building his stack tirelessly.
Neighbor Oystein Stai asks the floorman, "Is this the next table to break?"
They're dropping like free-falling flies at the moment, Oskar Silow the latest departure as he ran A-K into Jason Gray's A-A. A clinical ace on the flop diminished any hopes, and Silow was done.
Having been short-stacked for pretty much all of the early stages of Day 2, Soheil Zamanian is mounting something of a comeback. Alessandro Dal Bello moved his short stack all in and Zamanian moved all in also. Brandon Cantu, who had just been moved to this table made the call as everyone else was sent scurrying for the hills.
Alessandro Dal Bello:
Soheil Zamanian:
Brandon Cantu:
The dealer put out a board that Zamanian scooped and from having just over 5,000 earlier, he's now up to around 28,000.
It's oh so quiet on table two as seat four's Jan Arne Bjerke leaves his post. It took two hands to cement his demise, but it was the former that really did the damage. Shoving his stack over the line with on an flop, Bjerke was in desperate need of a fifth and flush-filling diamond when his opponent revealed , but the girl's best friend failed to sparkle as the turn and river both blanked out.
Down to a paltry 700, Bjerke managed to unearth under-the-gun, but was unable to stand firm in the face of which rivered an unlikely pair on a cruel board.
Dahe Liu raises from the cut-off to 3,700. Neil Channing moves his remaining chips into the middle from the small blind and the count when it comes back to Liu is 12,200 more. Despite his set-over-set beat earlier, Channing is still fairly upbeat and begins to talk to his opponent.
"Come on, give us a spin," and "You're never too far behind," says Channing. But Liu decides not to risk the rest of his stack on the call and opts to fold instead. Channing then turns to this reporter and says with a wry grin on his face, "I had a big hand there..."
Amazingly, mini double-ups and blinds and antes built Tony Mackay back to 12,600 in the intervening minutes, and a comeback looked in the cards. He got it all in preflop once more with the , but this time Warren Woodall called him with . The board came with an ace on the flop and a jack on the river, cementing what looked like his last defeat. But somehow Woodall had a shorter stack than Mackay - by just 100 chips.
"Come back from that!" challenged Brian Johnson from the neighboring table, "It would be impressive!"
Indeed it would, but Mackay was actually all in with the ante next hand and busted holding .
"Yes!" screamed a crazed Carl Hostrup as his river demands were met. "I've trebled up!" he bragged to the neighboring table who mimicked his celebrations with a unison of "yes" chants.
And indeed the Dane had trebled through, his managing to uncoil the of Jason Gray and the of Jim Buckley on a dramatic board.
Whilst Gray lost the battle, he won the war, perhaps taking a slightly larger pot from the departing Buckley. As a result, Hostrup is on 30,000 and Gray is still doing swimmingly with 80,000.
Gary Pearce is alive after winning a coin-flip against early pace-setter Thomas Marchese. Pearce was all in for his tournament life with verus , but managed to spike a second lady on a board to remain in tact, much to the delight of Linda Lee who had folded face-up.
Marchese was left with just the odd chip after that, and a hand or two later he was gone.
Phil Laak has just been knocked out of the tournament and will have to find someone else to discuss musical tastes with for now. Sid Harris raised from late position and Laak moved all-in over the top with but Harris called very quickly, given as he would since he was holding .
The board ran out , there was brief countdown but Laak was easily covered by Harris and was sent to the rail.