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$10,000 Championship Main Event
Day 1 Completed
2009 Lebanese Poker Championship
$10,000 Championship Main Event
Day: 1
Event Info
2009 Lebanese Poker Championship
Final Results
Event Info
Level Info
Buy-in
$10,000
Prize Pool
$1,925,100
Total Entries
207
Level
29
Blinds
50,000 / 100,000
Ante
10,000
Players Left 1 / 207
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We didn't expect to see too many familiar faces here, and indeed there weren't a lot of them. Of course, we did have Lebanese native Joe Hachem with us, though his tournament lasted just a couple short hours before he ran his short-stacked
into pocket kings. Good game, Champ. Despite that most notable exit, we do still have three very familiar names who'll be joining us again tomorrow. Nenad Medic has had trouble getting things going today, and he'll be on a short stack when he returns tomorrow. It looks like a full night's sleep will do the pro well; he's been yawning and nodding off since the dinner break ended. Another short-stacked notable is Raymond Rahme, part of a strong South African contingent here at the LPC.Our last truely familiar face is not at all short stacked. Chris Karagulleyan jumped out of the gate today with an early double up, and his stack has been moving in the right direction since then. He's been in and out of the chip lead all day, and he'll bag up 139,200 chips to finish the day, putting him within arm's length of the chip lead.
That's a decent stack, but everyone is chasing another man. When Karagulleyan hasn't been in the lead today, Nicolas Zakem has been. Zakem has been steamrolling his competition for most of the late evening, becoming the first player to crest 150,000 shortly after the dinner break. At the end of play tonight, he's stuffed his tiny little chip bag with a whopping 157,000 chips, good enough to earn himself the title of overnight chip leader. A few players began to close the gap as the night pressed on though, and Mark Demirijian, Adham Homsi, and Sherif Zacca are among those within striking distance of Zakem.
Play will resume at 4:00pm tomorrow, and we expect to be in for a long day. The tentative plan is to play down to our final table of nine, but the staff has hinted at the fact that we may only make it down to the last two tables before we run out of moonlight. In any event, that's all she wrote for Day 1. Thanks for joining us here; we'll see you tomorrow!
The flop fell down
and Kerzhapkin fired 3,000 at the pot. One opponent opted to fold while Nassar made the call.Both players checked the
on the turn and when the river landed the 
Kerzhapkin fired 5,000 at the pot."I see your cards? . . . I want to see your cards" stated Nassar.
Kerzhapkin say there emotionless for a while before nodding left to right indicating an answer of no.
"I will fold if I can see your hand" continued Nassar.
More banter continued before Kerzhapkin eventually gave in to Nassar's wishes as Nasser mucked a
face up.To the surprise of the table, Kerzhapkin showed his
to be behind Nassar; but the winner of the pot as he moved back to 44,000 and change.
Nicolas Zakem - 152,500
Chris Karagulleyan - 125,000
Adham Homsi - 123,000
Sherif Zacca - 118,000
Some of the bottom dwellers:
Raymond Rahme - 24,000
Carlos Keirouz - 22,000
Nenad Medic - 12,000
. Saba Hachem (no relation to the already-departed World Champion) checked with the first action, and his foe next door fired a bet of 5,000. Without much delay, Hachem put in a check-raise to 14,000, sending his opponent deep into the tank. After several minutes of thought, someone called the clock. The player double-checked his hole cards and took one last long stare at Hachem.Perhaps he noticed that Hachem was all too comfortable in his chair, taking casual sips of water and chatting merrily with the rest of the table. In any event, the player finally let his hand go, unintentionally flashing the
as his cards slid into the muck.
Najjar:
Opponent:
In a typical race situation, the flop of
would thrust Najjar's opponent into the lead.The turn would land the
to see Najjar now drawing to only a chop, but when the river fell the 
, Najjar headed to the rail.
With original intentions to play eight full levels today, it seems as though the tournament may need to push through to the end of level nine so as to make sure that the final table is reached before day three.
Another issue is that there is a small side tournament tomorrow and the number of available tables may not be sufficient if play concludes as expected.
Level: 8
Blinds: 300/600
Ante: 75
Most recently, Medic fired 5,200 into a pot of around 9,500 with the bored reading
."Did you really fill up?" asked his opponent, and in a typical Medic response, he sat there emotionless and still.
Finally his opponent relinquished his hand to see Medic pushed the pot to climb back to 32,000 in chips.
