Laurence Houghton is on a real heater at the moment and is now up to 171,000 chips to keep him near the very top of the leaderboard.
In a hand that has just gone down, the button open raised to 2,200 and only Houghton, in the big blind, made the call. Both players checked on the flop but when the fell on the turn, completing a possible flush, Houghton came out betting to the tune of 3,600. His opponent quickly called, allowing the dealer to put the out on the river. Houghton quickly bet 9,300, enough to force a fold and send Houghton's chip count to 171,000.
Most poker players go into a tournament planning to win the thing outright but it looks like Sweden's Kristoffer Thorsson has taken the planning stage that one step further.
Under Thorsson's seat is a book entitled The Intelligent Investor so maybe he is looking for new ways to spend his money and his potential prize here.
Thorsson has won $1,253,239 from live tournaments in his career, helped by his win at the 2009 Amsterdam Master Classics, worth €636,120 ($944,948)
We are now enjoying our final 15 minute break of Day 1b. A color-up is removing the 25 chips from play and quite a few stacks will cast shorter shadows at the end of it.
The board read and there was over 30,000 in the pot when we arrived. It looked as though the chap in the hijack had checked; either way there was a bet/raise of 13,575 in front of Melanie Weisner in the cutoff. Eventually her opponent called.
At this point tablemate Ran Azor got up from his seat and told us, and several other railers - in fact, anyone who would listen - that he had folded pocket tens in the big blind. We thus discovered that the hijack had raised and Weisner reraised preflop, pushing Azor off there. "F***," he said, with feeling.
The river was the and the hijack checked again. Weisner now bet 20,800, leaving herself just 12,000 behind. The hijack tanked long into the break, but eventually folded. Weisner showed him .
Roberto Romanello has just lost a large pot on the flop but may have gained some information from his silent opponent.
I joined the hand just as the flop was about to be dealt, with 26,000 chips already in the middle of the felt. Romanello asked for a count of his opponent's remaining chips, 29,850 was the answer.
"Let's play a big pot," said the talkative Welshman as the dealer put out the flop.
Rather quickly, the under the gun player moved all in for 29,850 sending Romanello into the tank and by tank I really mean into questioning mode.
"You have a big pair but which one?"
"Do I give you respect or not?"
"Will you show if I pass?"
"Do you have ace-king?"
With that last question Romanello mucked his hand and is now down to a not-too-shabby 138,000
We found Simeon Naydenov and Jeffrey Hakim involved in one of those very tense hands which are mostly characterized by a lot of tanking, very little actual action, and absolute silence.
Mercifully we only really got interested on the river, the board reading , when Naydenov checked. Hakim bet 6,000 but Naydenov snap-called, turning over . Hakim mucked and dropped to 41,000' Naydenov moved up to 48,000.
Dag Palovic, newly platinum-blond (with of course the red PokerStars logo sprayed on the back of his head) has been eliminated, but took his exit with a smile even though it did involve a fairly frosty deck.
Palovic initially flat called a raise to 2,000, then found the small blind (with under 30k himself) moving all in. The initial raiser folded, but Palovic instantly committed the rest of his chips - turning over . The small blind, however, had picked up and all Palovic's sneaky flat-calling had done was make it more painful for him to be 'squeezed' by Aces.
Peter Hedlund had his coat on and was singing when we arrived on the turn of the board. He was all in already for a very small main pot; the side pot, however, was massive and David Sonelin was betting big - big enough to eventually push his opponent off the hand. Sonelin turned over a modest and Hedlund briefly got terribly excited when he found that his was live. The on the river did not comprise one of his outs, though, and Hedlund hit the rail after several hours of counting his stack in multiples of antes rather than blinds.
Hedlund's 5% is looking pretty good, though - Sonelin has extended his chip lead to 190,000.
Konstantin Puchkov, who reached the final table at EPT Barcelona, has a couple of pots to see him slide down the leaderboard.
In the latest hand the player under the gun limped, Puchkov limped behind as did Francisco Torres in the small blind. The big blind was not liking this limping malarky and made it 3,800 to play, a bet that only Puchkov called.
Flop: - The big blind continued his aggression and made it 6,000 to play but Puchkov was going nowhere and quickly made the call.
Turn: - The jack of hearts on the turn saw the big blind check-call Puchkov's bet of 8,000
River: - Both players checked what appeared to be a relative blank.
WSOP bracelet winner Puchkov turned over but he was beaten by the big blind's , leaving him with 47,200
flop but when the 
fell on the turn, completing a possible flush, Houghton came out betting to the tune of 3,600. His opponent quickly called, allowing the dealer to put the 
out on the river. Houghton quickly bet 9,300, enough to force a fold and send Houghton's chip count to 171,000.![[user46298]](/img/avatars/avatar.svg){kind=avatar}
and there was over 30,000 in the pot when we arrived. It looked as though the chap in the hijack had checked; either way there was a bet/raise of 13,575 in front of Melanie Weisner in the cutoff. Eventually her opponent called.
and the hijack checked again. Weisner now bet 20,800, leaving herself just 12,000 behind. The hijack tanked long into the break, but eventually folded. Weisner showed him 
.
flop.
. Hakim mucked and dropped to 41,000' Naydenov moved up to 48,000.
. The small blind, however, had picked up 
was live. The 
on the river did not comprise one of his outs, though, and Hedlund hit the rail after several hours of counting his stack in multiples of antes rather than blinds.
- The big blind continued his aggression and made it 6,000 to play but Puchkov was going nowhere and quickly made the call.
, leaving him with 47,200