Mestre's Monster Level
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Raul Mestre was doing quite well when this level began less than an hour ago, perched in third place with more than 1.1 million chips. Mark him down for about double that now.
We joined the last pot as Manuel Bevand opened to 26,000 under the gun. Mestre defended his big blind, and the flop brought them 
. Mestre check-called 29,000 there, and he check-called another 77,000 after the 
turned. The 
river paired the board, and now Bevand gave up and checked it back. He had to show first as the last aggressor, and it was an airball 
. Mestre tabled 
, and top pair was good enough to take that pot, leaving Bevand with 305,000.
Those chips wouldn't stay with him for long. On the very next hand, the table folded around to the blinds where Mestre open-shoved first into the pot. Bevand made the call with a very similar 
, and Mestre had a hand similar to his last one also, 
. The board once again favored Mestre as it came 
to earn him the knockout.
That series of hands moves Mestre into a very comfortable chip lead, and we eyeball him at about 2.16 million.
| Player | Chips | Progress |
|---|---|---|
|
2,160,000 | 1,040,000 |
|
Busted |
for Marton Czuczor. The board ran out 
and Firestone was eliminated.
but he couldn't control what came behind him.
fell. Nieto hit top pair with top kicker, but was still well behind the middle set for Nebezhev.
to pair the board and that gave Nieto trips. He was still behind Nebezhev's full house and needed an ace, queen or three on the river to send the Russian out the door.
and sent an uproar through the onlooking spectators. Nieto had come from well behind on the flop in amazing runner-runner fashion to make a better full house than Nebezhev and win the hand.
