Oscar Lima Leads From Gun to Tape at EPT Tallin Day 1B
Day 1B of EPT Tallinn has come to an end with Oscar Lima bagging up 132,000 chips to claim the end of day and overall lead going into Day 2. The Spaniard is playing his first ever major live tournament and built up a 139,000 stack within the early levels and managed to keep hold of most of that throughout the rest of the day.
Today saw (as expected) a much larger number of players (190) descend on the Swiss Hotel, Tallinn. The hopes of all were to build a stack that might eventually see them crowned the first EPT champion of Season 8.
Those who came close to Lima included Jani Sointla (123,950), Anatolii Ozhenilok (108,125) and Sergy Pilugin (101,650). Notables who will be joining these players tomorrow are Team PokerStars Pros JP Kelly (52,450), Dario Minieri (34,625) and Ville Wahlbeck (32,675), along with Team PokerStars SportStar Fatima Moreira de Melo (58,325). Also worth noting are defending champion Kevin Stani (19,750), John Eames (56,300), Sami Kelopuro (38,525), Chris Brammer (35,750) and John O’Shea (26,575).
Today had a very different feel to yesterday. Caution was replaced with gamble and aggression. The fact that it took more than two levels to lose a player yesterday, compared to two players busting within thirty minutes today, tells you every thing you need to know.
Those who won’t be back from today include Toby Lewis, Michael Tureniec, Ivan Freitez, Per Linde and Team PokerStars Pro Sebastian Ruthenberg.
A total of 130 players made it trough, meaning the combined starting field for tomorrow is 198. They will be fighting it out for their share of the total prize pool of €1,071,600. All will be gunning for the first prize €275,000 and only 40 players will earn anything for their efforts.
Play resumes at 12 midday tomorrow when 75-minute levels come in to play and likely five or six of them. Until then it’s goodnight from us in Tallinn. We’re off to watch the very late sunset here in Northern Europe.