Ludovic Geilich Takes the Chip Lead After partypoker LIVE UK Poker Championship Main Event Day 1B Concludes
Day 1b of the partypoker LIVE UK Poker Championships £1,100 Main Event concluded with 119 entries and at the end of 12 levels of play 32 have survived the action and move forward to Friday's Day 2.
Ludovic Geilich is the only player to have built a chip stack of more than a million after finishing proceedings with an impressive 1,028,000.
The later start time of 5 pm attracted a field that included partypoker sponsored pro Natalia Breviglieri and fellow well-known British players Tom Middleton and WSOP bracelet winner Chris Brammer, but they all fell before the end of the day's play. Hannah Swales, Karol Radomski and Nathan Webb all started well in the early play but they had all exited the tables before the end of level eight.
Big names to enter the fray and bag chips include Steven Warburton (154,000), Sylvia Hewitt (785,000) and Billy Chattaway (285,000).
The big battle of the day was between Ireland's Thomas Fitzgerald and Germany's Patrice Brandt. There were two significant pots between the two of them with Brandt claiming the first by winning pocket kings against ace-queen. Fitzgerald then moved Brandt off a big hand where the German spent eight minutes in the tank on the river.
Fitzgerald's activeness eventually became his demise against Geilich, when the Scotsman picked off a bluff that was pivotal to his end-of-day chip lead. On a ten-ten-eight-four-six board, Fitzgerald shoved for 250,000 and Geilich called with just a mere pair of fives. Fitzgerald knew he was beaten and stood up from the table as the dealer turned over his queen-five hand.
Tomorrow sees the final two Main Event Day 1's when play gets underway at Noon for Day 1c and 5 pm once again for Day 1d. Be sure to check back to PokerNews as we cover the partypoker UK Poker Championship Main Event start-to-finish.