2017 888Live Poker Festival Sao Paulo

It wouldn't be fitting for someone else to bag the chip lead of the High Roller after Day 1. Bruno "Foster" Politano was able to bring in 358,000 chips after the first 12 levels of play, which was good enough for him to be well in the lead, by almost an entire starting stack. Politano has been one of the biggest supporters and touters about this 888Live Festival in São Paulo since it was announced, even saying that this is the best place in Brazil to play poker.

Politano entered the event on Wednesday just after level three and he immediately started building his stack, never looking back. We'll catch up with him later on today and see if he can walk us through his day, some big hands, and some of his strategies coming into Day 2.

Right behind Politano is another name that many will recognize; Felipe Ramos. Ramos is another Brazilian native who came out for the event. Together, Ramos and Politano have over $3,000,000 in live tournament earnings and sit 4th and 5th respectively on the Brazilian all-time money list. They are part of the 43 players who will return later today to play down to a winner in this High Roller Event.

Of course there were some who didn't make it through the day, such as Chris Moorman who went out flush over flush, and Leo Margets who feel to Sofia Lövgren's pocket kings. Lövegren managed to make it through the day, although she finished with just 46,400 chips. Along with Lövegren, Tiffany Michelle also managed to find a bag with 47,600 inside.

Current Chip Leaders in the 888Live São Paulo High Roller:

The 43 survivors will return at 2 p.m. local time where they will play down to a winner. There are still two levels left to register so we may be seeing more players hop in and re-enter still and PokerNews will be here to cover all the action.

Tags: 888LiveBruno PolitanoChris MoormanFelipe RamosLeo MargetsTiffany Michelle

We caught up with Leo Margets in a hand against Sofia Lövgren on the flop with roughly 17,000 chips already in the middle. The board was and Lövgren was first to act from the big blind. She put out a bet of 6,000 and after thinking about it for a bit, Margets moved all in over the top for a bit more than 24,000 chips. The other player in the pot folded, but Lövgren called the shove quickly.

Margets heled for top pair, but Lövgren had her crushed with . The turn was the and the river was the and that was it for Margets. She was eliminated from the High Roller. We caught up with her shortly after and talked a bit about the hand as well as what her plans are for the future.

Margets talked us through the preflop action of the hand. According to her, a player opened under the gun to 1,500. Margets flatted from the button. The small blind came along, before Lövgren made it 4,500 from the big blind.

“She’s not squeezing to 4,500 with ace-king,” Margets explained. “Or squeezing for the sake of squeezing because she thinks it’s a nice spot. She would do it bigger. For sure.”

“The guy folds and I call, which I could have folded but it’s so small that I can call,” She continued. “And the small blind calls as well. So it’s like 17,000, and she bets 6,000. That’s 23,000 and I have like 25,000 behind. And it’s just like, ‘Ughhhhh, I wanna puke!’ and ‘Why am I here?’ I decided to shove because there was so much money in the pot. And I guess I also considered calling, but then so many cards can slow the action. I didn’t want spades, or like you know, if a king came. I mean, I guess I could have called but I thought that it was big enough, the pot."

“I guess she could do the same with jacks, or tens,” she continued. “I don’t think she doesn’t continue, for protection even probably. But then she would’ve raised more probably pre. So yeah. Not super happy with the hand.”

For Margets, she thought her biggest mistake was her preflop call. If she can get away from the hand preflop, she doesn’t end up in such a tricky situation.

“The problem is that I know Sofia is a good player and she wouldn’t be raising that small, squeezing that small unless she had aces, or queens, or kings,” Margets said. “But then sometimes you know, that’s live poker. You need to sometimes say I don’t give a shit about math. Sometimes need to see that, and say ‘she’s only doing that with aces or kings, and I’m done,’ because otherwise, you know I have the odds to call pre and then I call and of course I have top pair, top kicker, and there’s a flush draw, and the stack to pot ratio is almost one to one. But I know she’s got aces or kings, right?”

Despite that, Margets was still happy about the tournament, with both the structure and size.

“You never plan busting, but it happens,” Margets said about her run in the tournament. “Eventually, sometimes. But I liked it. I’m happy that in the end there were quite a few people. I didn’t know what to expect because I know that everyone was coming for the main. There are so many flights for the main that people usually tend to come on the later, and sometimes they will miss the High Roller if it’s at the beginning. It’s not bad because usually, I know buy ins in Brazil, people don’t normally play that many high buy ins.”

And despite busting, Margets managed to have some fun as well.

“At the beginning, I don’t know if you saw it, but we were sitting at the same table as Sofia and Tiffany which was kind of fun,” she said. “It was a very good table. I was playing good, running good which is the best. And then we changed tables and I had a couple of tough spots.”

It might be a while until we see Margets back on the felt as she’s embarking on a new kind of journey.

“The thing is, I’m not sure when I will play again because I’m starting a new project now in Barcelona,” she explained. “I’m starting a new collaboration on T.V. Catalan T.V. on Saturdays. And it’s live.”

But Margets new project isn’t poker related. She’s delving into a new field entirely.

“It’s about political debates,” Margets said with a wide grin on her face. “Yeah and I’m going to be kind of analyzing the behaviors of the main guests and doing questions. It’s a nice challenge. I’ve very excited but I’m kind of being a bit committed to staying in Barcelona on Saturdays, at least for this season.”

Margets thinks the next time she plays may not be until the World Series of Poker Europe, but she plans on having her next few Saturdays booked thanks to her new project. She will be finishing out the week here in Brazil though, playing both the Ladies Event and the Main Event. We’ll be sure to keep an eye on Margets through the rest of the week and we’ll be tracking her progress through the Main Event as well.

This will wrap up coverage for PokerNews today as Day 1 of the High Roller is coming to a close. Day 1a of the Main Event will wrap up late in the morning, and we’ll be back to bring you updates with chip counts, survivors, and leaders from both events in the morning. With two more levels of registration tomorrow afternoon, the High Roller is sure to get at least a few more runners and re-entrants, but has already met its guarantee of R$200,000.

Tags: 888Live888PokerLeo MargetsSofia LövgrenTiffany Michelle

While some spent their first days in Brazil looking for the best place for food, or the best place for drinks, Chris Moorman spent his first day in Brazil looking for the perfect wifi hotspot.

Moorman didn’t have a lot of time to find good food, or awesome nightlife because he was on a different quest; a quest for Wifi. What he wanted, was to play online poker.

“Yeah, it’s my first time in Brazil, even in South America so far. I actually haven’t seen that much because I’ve been playing online a bit,” Moorman explained. “But the first day I had to find internet because I reformatted my Mac. And I was trying to find an internet connection, so I could reload it back on. But the problem was I couldn’t do it in the hotel because I didn’t have an operating system. And it was one of those connections where you have to type in your name and your room number and that.”

It was an itch that Moorman just had to have scratched. So he ventured out into the unknown of São Paulo.

“So I went on a mission to find internet with a password around Brazil. And I found out that not many people speak English around here as well. Because I have quite a few Brazilian friends and they all speak good English, so I didn’t know that at all. So I went to a café and it was no good. Then I went to Starbucks and they sent me to Subway and in the end I was just getting nowhere with all these chains so I just decided to pop into a restaurant and luckily they had a wifi where I could type the password in, connect, download all the Mac operating system for two hours. I had an awesome dinner while I waited, but it was a bit of an adventure.”

And in the end it seemed to pay off for Moorman as well, as he was able to find quick success from hitting the tables online.

“I won a tournament, made a few final tables and had some deep runs,” He said. “It was kind of nice to play a bit online because I’m based in Vegas now so you can’t play online there. When I do get out of the country and go to these different stops and stuff I like to play online on the site, just because that’s where I grew up and where I came from. I still really like and enjoy playing it.”

Moorman is trying to turn that online success into live success here at 888Live São Paulo by playing in the R$2,500 High Roller, and he’s already had quite a bit of luck today, doubling his stack within the first few levels of play.

“I started off and lost a couple of hands but not many chips really,” Moorman explained. “And then I actually had a great situation. This guy raised about four and a half times the big blind from early position, so I kind of knew he had a big hand. He had been limping a lot. And I had in the big blind so obviously just call and try to hit a perfect flop. It came with a flush draw. I check-raised huge and he called. The turn came a . I wasn’t worried about him having an eight but I thought it might kill my action. He called me down on the turn and the river as well. It ended up being a huge pot. I have no idea what he had but yeah. Probably just an overpair or something.”

When it comes to the play, Moorman says the players here in São Paulo are surprisingly tough, solid opponents.

“It’s similar to other places but I’ve been playing online the last three or four days and it’s a lot more sort of reraising and squeezing and stuff like that,” he explained. “And here, quite a few times it’s been like five or six ways to the flop. Like someone opens, and someone calls. Then everyone else is calling behind kind of thing. But I actually was quite impressed with some of the play as well.”

But that hasn’t deterred Moorman. He says making these adjustments and adaptations is just part of the game, and it’s a part of his game that he’s very comfortable with.

“I like the challenge,” he said. “I’m always about adapting. I play online both the higher tournaments and the low ones. I have to adapt my game online anyway. So playing live you have to change it up even more. There’s definitely some situations today where I would’ve completely played them differently if it was online.”

Moorman is most looking forward to something not poker related at all though. While he’s in Brazil, Moorman is looking to meet one of his childhood heroes.

“I’m actually looking forward to meeting Denílson properly at the barbeque tomorrow,” Moorman said. “Like he was kind of a big hero of mine growing up. I’m a huge soccer, football fan. And I remember I used to buy him on the old football manager games. So I have to tell him that. But I haven’t played football for a while so I’m hoping he has a football at his house and we can have a little kick around and he can show me some of his skills. That should be fun.”

For the rest of the day, Moorman plays to play some solid, mistake free poker.

“Just to sort of play pretty steady and capitalize,” he said about his plans. “Hopefully somebody makes a big mistake. It’s quite a deep stacked tournament. We start with 50,000 chips and the blinds are still only 300/600. So there’s plenty of chips and people seem not afraid to put them in.”

Unfortunately for Moorman, he busted shortly after this interview and returning from break, bringing the field of 91 players down to 66. He’ll look to hop in the Main Event later on in the week, as registration for Day 1a has already closed.

Tags: 888LiveChris Moorman888Poker

Tiffany Michelle says she hasn’t been playing much poker internationally lately, but she was really looking forward to the 888Live Festival here in São Paulo. Michelle, who had her start in poker media, is here in Brazil playing and has been off to a good start, making it through the first three levels in the R$2,500 High Roller event.

“I haven’t played internationally in a while and I love playing internationally because I think there’s great value,” Michelle said. “I love the players. They are usually a little more aggressive and in my experience not always super super experienced. They have like one gear, and I feel like I can play an aggressive, single-minded player pretty well. But I’ve never been to Latin America before, and so when I had a chance to come and play with 888 I was very excited.”

Michelle says that being a part of 888Poker and 888Live is a new and fresh experience because they are growing poker in a new way.

“I think 888 right now is kind of growing poker in their own way,” She said. “And so to be a part of that and to come be a part of their tournament series and to bring local players out was really exciting to me. Being from the States I know that once online left the U.S. there’s so many pockets of people who don’t have access to like big tournaments or getting to play with big pros or being on T.V. and I know how exciting that is for a lot of locals in different sects of the world. So to come and hopefully bring some people out from around São Paulo and Brazil is a cool thing and a cool way to expose more people to this level and style of poker.”

Michelle is not only famous for her poker prowess, she’s also been a contestant on The Amazing Race, a reality television show which had her competing and running through different obstacles all over the world. She’s rediscovering that love of adventure in a different way here in Sao Paulo.

“Everyone, of course, is a little bit nervous about me being a female alone in São Paulo,” Michelle said. “So Chris Moorman’s here. So I’m making sure to buddy up with people. But last night I found this amazing little restaurant. Because of the language barrier, there’s a lot of adventure. So I’ll sit down somewhere, and if you can’t communicate what you want then you’re just like ‘Bring me whatever’. So actually last night I had some cocktail that was kind of like a Moscow Mule with ginger beer and vodka, but it had some kind of lemon meringue foam on top that I have never experienced before so when it came out I was like ‘What in the world did I just get myself into.’ But I think it makes you be more adventurous and I love traveling places that are completely new.”

Along with that, Michelle says the venue here at Casa Bossa – Shopping Cidade Jardim is a totally new experience as well.

“I love this venue,” she said. “For those that don’t know we’re in an event space in an outdoor mall and so just walking to and from the tournament area, you are outside, you see all these shops. It feels very lux and sexy. I’ve never played poker basically in a mall. I really love where the tournament’s held.”

As for Poker, Michelle explained that she is having to readjust her play to the different styles of poker here in Brazil, and not only that, she’s found that her status of a female poker player is different as well.

“I was very much reminded that Brazilian men played very aggressively, and so I’m adjusting my game to that,” Michelle said. “I also think that internationally, most of the tables I paly at I get a certain amount of respect, where people are playing me soft because I’m a female. And here I can tell, nobody gives a shit. Which is actually kind of nice because now I feel like, on the same exact level, they don’t care what I look like, so they’re going to play me the same. So I actually kind of enjoy that.”

The language barrier has proven to be a formidable foe for Michelle on the tables as well, not just at the restaurants.

“I also think it’s cool that almost no one at my table speaks English,” she explained. “So now that just makes you have to sit and your reads and your interactions are completely physical based and previous hand based. So playing poker in this setting where I have no English information coming at me, makes me hone into the game in a different way that I can’t really ever recall having done before at the table.

“They are also teaching me to say different chip denominations,” she continued. “Because If I’m throwing a single chip in and I need to announce the amount instead of showing it on my fingers. So I know how to say 600 so far. Which is helpful at a 100 and 200 level. And then helpful at the 300 and 600 level after that. And you know, other than that I only have this one 600 gear that I know how to use.”

Michelle is still alive and fighting currently in the R$2,500 High Roller event which is currently amidst level 5. We’ll be keeping tabs on Michelle as well as several other big name players who have recently joined the field as the day goes on. Currently, 71 players remain of the 79 entrants and Michelle is one of them. Michelle says she plans to play one of the next couple starting days of the Main Event, as well as the ladies event, so we’re sure to be seeing more of her all week long.

Tags: 888Live888PokerChris MoormanTiffany Michelle

Today 888Poker kicks off the 888Live Festival in São Paulo. The tournament itself will take place at the Casa Bossa – Shopping Cidade Jardim and will run from September 6 – 11.

The six day festival will be a host to multiple tournaments, including a R$2,500 (~$800 USD) High Roller with R$200,000 (~$65,000 USD) Guaranteed, a R$500 (~$160 USD) Ladies Event, and of course the R$1,000,000 (~$320,000 USD) Guaranteed Main Event which PokerNews will be providing coverage for throughout the week.

São Paulo has been dubbed my many, including 888Poker’s own Bruno Foster Politano, as the best place in Brazil to play poker. It is the country’s most populated city with over 12 million people living in it and is home to the country’s tallest buildings, as well as over 12,000 different restaurants. São Paulo is also touted for having some of the best nightlife in the country, so, if you’re not playing poker there should be plenty to do and plenty to eat.

A list of poker superstars is slated to attend including Politano, as well Sofia Lövgren, Kara Scott, Chris ‘moorman1’ Moorman, Leo Margets, Tiffany Michelle and Nicolau Villa-Lobos.

Also this week will be two invite only tournaments including a celebrity event and a Flop O Mania – 6 Max event, both taking place on Friday, September 8th. Flop O Mania is 888Poker’s newest innovation in Poker. The game released earlier in mid-August and is very similar to No-Limit Hold’em, albeit one big change; There is no preflop. This creates a faster paced, more action heavy game. You can try your hand at Flop O Mania on 888poker by downloading the client on 888poker.com.

The celebrity invitational tournament is set to feature 888poker ambassador Denílson de Oliveira Araújo will join his friend and former soccer world champion Cafu. The special celebrity charity event hosted by 888poker will make a donation to the “Cafu Foundation.”

The R$1,300 (~$420 USD) Main Event here at 888Live São Paulo will feature six starting flights over the next four days, starting Wednesday, September 6th at 8 p.m. local time all the way up to Saturday, September 9th with two final starting flights at 2 p.m. and 8 p.m. local time.

One of the biggest draws of the 888Live Festivals is not only the prizepools and awesome venues, but the fact that the winners of the Ladies Event, the High Roller, and the Main Event will all receive $13,000 Packages to the WSOP Europe which kicks off on October 19th in the Czech Republic.

Full Schedule For 888Live São Paulo:

Day 1a through 1e will feature 10, 50-minute levels and a starting stack of 25,000 chips, while Day 1f will only play 30-minute levels through the day. Once players reach day 2, things will slow down a bit with 60-minute levels. Players will have a break every two hours.

For the start of the tournament, we at PokerNews will be providing longer, feature updates about the tournament, and will begin a traditional live updates style on the start of day 2. Make sure you stay tuned to catch it all.

Tags: 888Live888PokerBruno PolitanoChris MoormanKara ScottLeo MargetsTiffany Michelle