Day 1a of the partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Russia Main Event kicked off at Noon local time at the outstanding surroundings of the Sochi Casino and Resort and over the course of the eight hours of play 201 entrants took part in the opening live flight, of which 106 survived.
The RUB300,000+18,000 (~$4,900) buy-in event, which comes with a 300 Million Russian Rubles guarantee, gave players a starting stack worth 1,000,000 chips and with the first three levels of blinds all set at 5,000/10,000 with an increasing button ante, there was plenty of room for maneuver in the early play.
Players such as Natalia Panchenko, Ionut-Flavius Voinea, Pavel Kovalenko, Vitaliy Li and last year's MILLIONS Russia third-place finisher Aleksandr Merzhvinskiy were all in action from the start, with familiar faces such as former tennis star Yevgeny Kafelnikov and partypoker LIVE MILLIONS winner Maria Lampropulos also joining the fray.
However, of those names only Pavel Kovalenko (3,570,000) and Natalia Panchenko (985,000) lasted all eight levels, with the rest all able to try again on Wednesday, August 8 or Thursday, August 9 for Day 1b and 1c respectively.
Ukrainian Oleksii Kravchuk will go into Friday's Day 2 as the Day 1a chip leader after he was the only player to bag a stack worth over 5m after he finished with 5,055,000. Kravchuk's most important hand of the day occurred during the final level when he saw his opponent move all in for 1,000,000 on the turn after Kravchuk had hit a set of jacks on the flop. His hand held on the river and propelled Kravchuk up the chip counts.
Other players to bag healthy stacks included Alexey Melnikov (4,660,000), Egor Evsin (4,340,000), Aleksandr Mikhalev (4,250,000) and Malaysia's Chin Wei Lim (4,100,000), who needed a second bullet to build his stack after he had earlier seen his pocket kings cracked by Alexey Melnikov's seven-five suited.
Day 1b will kick-off tomorrow at noon local time with another group of players coming together to play eight levels with the aim of making Day 2.
PokerNews will once again be bringing you all the action, so be sure to join us on Wednesday, August 8 at Noon.
Maria Lampropulos - 2017 partypokerLIVE Millions Dusk Till DawnMain Event Winner
Shortly after play began following the second break of the day, a few more faces have joined the field, and one of most familiar is Maria Lampropulos.
The Argentinian won the partypoker LIVE MILLIONS at Dusk Till Dawn Poker Room and Casino back in April 2017 for £1,000,000 after she came through the 1,204 player field.
Since then, she has added well over another million dollars worth to her name including cashes in both the partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Germany Main Event and partypoker LIVE UK Poker Championships, which took place in February of this year.
Can she become a two-time MILLIONS champion over the course of the next six days? Only time will tell.
Sergey Ananev and Chin Wei Lim re-entered after busting on their first bullet for Day 1A and got seated on the same table along with Leonid Logunov, while Oleg Titov has entered for the first time one table over.
Logunov had been down to nine big blinds before scoring a quadruple up, however, the second time he tried to run up his short stack was not crowned by success. The cutoff raised to 35,000 and Ananev called on the button, Logunov then three-bet all in for his last 298,000. While the initial raiser folded after some consideration, Ananev quickly called and Logunov was in dire need of help.
Leonid Logunov:
Sergey Ananev:
The board ran out and Logunov was sent to the rail.
Former Tennis professional Yevgeny Kafelnikov was sat with just 150,000 when he returned from the break but has been able to find a quick double up courtesy of Konstantin Nikulin.
Kafelnikov had pocket tens in front of him, and the pot was moved towards him after the dealer had put down a board that read . Nikulin's hand was in the muck and Kafelnikov secured the 350,000 pot.
A big pot was brewing over on table five and there were more than 750,000 already in the middle. The completed board showed . Igor Sodel had checked over to Dmitry Gromov, who bet 300,000.
Sodel was sent deep into the think tank and eventually called for most of his remaining chips. Gromov rolled over the for a flush and that won the pot. Sodel had very few chips left and busted shortly after.
The RUB60,000+6,000 Open Side Event drew a field of 1,000 entries throughout five starting days and 239 players returned to the tables of the Sochi Casino and Resort for Day 2, which kicked off just after 3 p.m. on Monday, August 6th, 2018.
It would take until late in the day for the bubble to burst and the 30-second shot clock was introduced one table off the money. From there on out, no player busted for 45 minutes and the bubble period itself lasted some one and a half hours before all remaining hopefuls were guaranteed at least RUB162,000 for their efforts. The last player to leave empty-handed was Denis Koprov, who lost his last 1.5 big blinds out of the big blind with king-nine against the ace-four suited of Maksim Reshetov.
Denis Koprov bubbles the Open
Among those to cash and bust before bagging and tagging were such notables as Andrey Pateychuk (116th, RUB162,000), Andrey Kotelnikov (114th, RUB162,000), Maxim Lykov (110th, RUB162,000), Asker Aloev (101st, RUB162,000), Gleb Kovtunov (98th, RUB162,000), Mikhail Galitskiy (87th, RUB180,000) and Nikolay Fal (78th, RUB180,000). All remaining 73 contenders have RUB210,000 locked up for their efforts, while the winner can look forward to a payday of RUB10,800,000 (~$169,395).
Leading the field into Day 2 is Mikhail Aleksandrov with 47,100,000 in chips. Other notables still in contention include Denis Kushnerov (29,650,000), Anatolii Zyrin (21,825,000), Tatiana Barausova (21,400,000), Roman Tutoyan (20,025,000), Oleksii Kravchuk (15,450,000), Dragos Trofimov (14,725,000), Vitaly Lunkin (10,875,000), defending MILLIONS Russia Main Event champion Aleksandr Gofman (7,625,000) and partypoker ambassador Dzmitry Urbanovich (6,575,00).
The action will recommence at 12 p.m. local time in the Triton Poker room with blinds of 200,000/400,000 and a button ante of 400,000. Updates in Russian can be found on the Russian mypartypokerlive website.
The partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Russia Main Event will see the first of its three starting flights get underway today at Noon local time as players descend on the glamorous surroundings of the Sochi Casino and Resort.
The Main Event comes with a RUB300,000+18,000 (~$4,900) buy-in and features a massive guarantee of 300 Million Russian Rubles (approximately $4.7 Million).
When the action begins, all players will be sat with a 1million starting stack, with blinds in level one set at 5,000/10,000 with a 5,000 button ante. Today will see eight one-hour levels be played out with breaks coming after every two levels, including a dinner break after level six. All players with chips at the end of the day will return for Day 2 on Friday, August 10, with the crowning of the winner scheduled for Monday, August 13.
In addition to the three live starting flights, there has been a single online flight completed on Sunday, August 5 with the surviving players advancing to the live Day 2.
Day 1 Blind Structure
Level
Small Blind
Big Blind
Button Ante
1
5,000
10,000
5,000
2
5,000
10,000
7,000
3
5,000
10,000
10,000
4
6,000
12,000
12,000
5
7,000
14,000
14,000
6
8,000
16,000
16,000
7
9,000
18,000
18,000
8
10,000
20,000
20,000
Last year, Aleksandr Gofman came through a 999 strong player field to take the MILLIONS Russia Main Event glory along with the first-place prize worth nearly $1,000,000.
The Main Event will also see a last longer competition for the first 100 players to enter the tournament with PP Live Dollars, and the last player standing will receive $100,000 in cash. Several online satellites on partypoker now award the new multi-functional currency that can be used to buy into any partypoker LIVE sponsored events.
The PokerNews team will be bringing you all the action from the Main Event from start to finish, along with coverage of the two Triton High Roller events, so stay tuned for all the action at the partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Russia.
For the second year in a row, the partypoker LIVE brand is heading to Russia for the MILLIONS Russia festival at the Sochi Casino and Resort in the Krasnaya Polyana region. The exclusive venue opened the doors one year ago and has quickly become a vital host for all bigger poker festivals in Russia, thus it was just a logical choice to partner up with the quickly rising partypoker LIVE brand.
The 12-day festival in Sochi will feature a total of 15 events and six of them have a guaranteed prize pool. The highlight of the schedule is RUB300,000+18,000 Main Event (~$4,900) that comes with a massive guarantee of 300 Million Russian Rubles (approximately $4.7 Million). The Main Event kicks off on Tuesday, August 7, and is certain to attract the biggest names of the local poker scene along with plenty of well-known poker aficionados of the international circuit.
2018 partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Sochi schedule
Event
Buy-In (RUB)
~ Buy-in (USD)
Guaranteed Prize Pool (RUB)
~ Guaranteed Prize Pool (USD)
Open
60,000+6,000
$946+95
60,000,000
$946,100
Main Event
300,000+18,000
$4,731+284
300,000,000
$4,700,000
Triton Poker High Roller
3,000,000
$47,305
120,000,000
$1,900,000
Triton Poker Super High Roller
6,000,000
$94,611
120,000,000
$1,900,000
Finale
300,000+3,000
$473+47
30,000,000
$473,100
High Roller
600,000+18,000
$9,461+284
60,000,000
$946,100
On top of the regular event schedule, the 2018 partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Russia will also include two Triton High Roller events that will bring some of poker's superstars to Sochi with the Triton founders Richard Yong and Paul Phua, Phil Ivey, Patrik Antonius, Mustapha Kanit and Triple Crown winner Niall Farrell. A host of German High Roller regulars are also expected to join the action such as Manig Loeser, Dietrich Fast, Aymon Hata, Johannes Becker and Koray Aldemir.
Triton High Roller Feature Tables at Casino Sochi
The Triton Super High Roller series comes fresh off a very successful festival at the Landing Casino in Jeju a few days ago and the entire feature table set was moved from South Korea to Russia in order to provide high-stakes live stream action in the upcoming days and until the end of the festival in Sochi. You can check out a summary of all the action and videos from Jeju right here on PokerNews.
Several partypoker LIVE ambassadors will be taking part in the tournaments in Anatoly Filatov, Dzmitry Urbanovich, Bertrand "ElkY" Grospellier, latest addition Ludovic Geilich, and Sam Trickett. With several promotions leading to the festival, two of them, in particular, will catch the eyes of poker pros from near and far.
The Main Event has a last longer competition for the first 100 players to enter the tournament with PP Live Dollars and the last man standing will receive $100,000 in cash. Several online satellites on partypoker now award the new multi-functional currency that can be used to buy into any partypoker LIVE sponsored events.
Filatov, Trickett and Grospellier will be part of the "From Russia to the Caribbean" final in Sochi. Nine online Freeroll winners will play against each other and the three partypoker ambassadors in a six-may 12 player Sit And Go. The winner takes home a $12,000 package for the upcoming Caribbean Poker Party in November.
Open Side Event Draws 1,000 Entries
The first of six tournaments with a guaranteed prize pool at the 2018 partypoker LIVE MILLIONS Russia poker festival at the Sochi Casino and Resort was the "Open" with a buy-in of RUB60,000+6,000 (~$946+95) and the event featured a total of five starting days. The strongest turnout of the four days with regular structure was Day 1C with 267 entries, of which 91 advanced to Day 2.
Among the big stacks of the four regular flights were Evgeniy Charkasov (10,575,000), Aleksandr Denisov (10,445,000), Viktor Kudinov (9,420,000), Eduards Kudrjavecs (8,295,000), Vitaly Lunkin (7,650,000), Oleksii Kravchuk (7,170,000), Anton Yakuba (6,680,000), Daniil Kiselev (6,465,000) and partypoker ambassador Dzmitry Urbanovich (5,495,000).
2018 partypoker MILLIONS LIVE Russia Open Starting Days at a Glance
Starting Day
Entries
Survivors
Day 1A
206
56
Day 1B
167
45
Day 1C
267
91
Day 1D
210
62
Day 1E
150
76
With 850 entries after the first four flights, the Turbo Heat 1E that kicked off at 10 a.m. local time on Monday, August 6th, 2018, required another 150 entries to hit the magic 1,000 and sure enough as many entries were generated when the registration officially closed. Dusk Till Dawn's Simon Trumper was among the last to jump in and bagged up more than four times the starting stack among the 76 survivors, not far away from Mikhail Galitskiy's 4,715,000.
A total of 239 hopefuls returned just after 3 p.m. local time into the new main tournament room at Casino Sochi and half of the field would leave empty-handed as just the top 119 spots were guaranteed at least RUB162,000 (~$2,540) for their efforts. The winner will walk home with a top prize of RUB10,800,000 (~$169,395) and the partypoker LIVE trophy.
No luck yet in Sochi for new partypoker ambassador Ludovic Geilich
Several big names were among those to return to their seats only to run out of chips early on Day 2. Vladimir Troyanovskiy had been all in for five big blinds with pocket eights, Ludovic Geilich reshoved for 20 big blinds with pocket aces and Ming Juen Teoh looked both up with the superior stack and pocket tens. Geilich's first live event as partypoker ambassador ultimately ended with a cruel ten on the board and he joined fellow Scotsman Niall Farrell, who fired several bullets without finding a bag.
Farrell's penultimate attempt on Day 1d the previous evening saw him run out of chips after the registration had closed. He first turned a flush with nine-five suited only for defending MILLIONS Russia champion Aleksandr Gofman to river the nut flush with ace-nine off suit and Farrell pushed blind the next hand with ten-deuce. Daniil Kiselev called on the button with the dreadful ace-nine to flop top two pair and leave his opponent drawing dead on the turn already.
Others that were ousted well before the money were Ivan Soshnikov, Dmitry Vitkind, David Urban, Arseniy Karmatskiy, Matous Houzvicek, Oleg Titov, Dmitry Gromov, Daria Feshchenko, Sergey Rybachenko, Roman Korenev, Vadim Lipovka, Gleb Tremzin, Ionut-Flavius Voinea, Andrey Zaichenko, as well as partypoker's Philipp Gruissem and Anatoly Filatov.
Anatoly Filatov represents partypoker on home soil
The PokerNews team will be on the floor to provide live updates of the Main Event and the Triton Super High Roller tournaments, along with some highlight pieces throughout the entire festival.
and Logunov was sent to the rail.
. Nikulin's hand was in the muck and Kafelnikov secured the 350,000 pot.
. Igor Sodel had checked over to Dmitry Gromov, who bet 300,000.
for a flush and that won the pot. Sodel had very few chips left and busted shortly after.
