First Short Deck Champion To Be Crowned Today at Triton Super High Roller Series Jeju
Only 16 players remain in contention for the title in the opening event at 2018 Triton Super High Roller Series Jeju. They will come back Wednesday, July 25 at 2 p.m. local time to battle it out in the final day of the HKD 100,000 Short Deck Ante-Only with over $270,000 lying at the top (HKD 2,135,000).
This marks the second time the short deck has been featured at Triton Series, with the first two editions played two months ago in Montenegro where Phil Ivey and Jason Koon emerged victorious. They both joined the 61-entry field in Jeju but neither was be able to advance through Day 1b.
So there will be a new player joining the ranks of the short deck champs today. It's hard to predict favorites in the field with the high variance of the game and very little studying material available. While the final 16 feature some of the most accomplished high stakes players who regularly rub their shoulders in no-limit tournaments all around the world, the transition to short deck might be tougher than it seems.
The likes of Ben Lamb and Stephen Chidwick paid tolls during their first rounds of short deck hands, having busted on Day 1a. Both Lamb and Chidwick returned for Day 1b and finally survived.
Lamb was getting particularly unlucky runouts in the opening flight but he got some better boards yesterday and managed to make it through with 1,030,000. That puts him in sixth place on the leaderboard. That is a solid base ahead of the final day with the top seven positions paid.
Payout structure:
| Place | Payout HK$ | Payout Approximate USD |
|---|---|---|
| 1st | 2,135,000 | $272,084 |
| 2nd | 1,319,369 | $168,140 |
| 3rd | 874,801 | $111,484 |
| 4th | 619,272 | $78,920 |
| 5th | 466,223 | $59,415 |
| 6th | 371,917 | $47,403 |
| 7th | 313,418 | $39,941 |
However, Lamb is still below the virtual average line, mainly due to a huge surge of Wai Kin Yong who destroyed Day 1b to amass an overwhelming 3,380,000, in other words, almost one-fifth of all chips in play. Yong utilized some vast aggression and never slowed down. Yong will start directly to the left of Day 1a chip leader Chow Hing Yaung who bagged 1,953,000. Chow rounds out the overall top three, following Ivan Leow with 2,320,000.
Yong and Leow already met on a short deck final table in the HKD 250k event in Montenegro. Alan Sass (1,879,000) and Gabe Patgorski (962,000) joined them back then so these four players already have some experience with the specifics of ICM situations in short deck. Rui Cao is another player who can benefit from his previous experience as he finished fifth in the HK$1 million event.
Come back to PokerNews to find out who will take down the first event in Jeju as the coverage from the final day starts at approximately 2:30 p.m. local time just when the cards-up live stream kicks off (subject to a 30-minute security delay).
Final day seating order:
| Table | Seat | Player | Country | Chip Count |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | Ivan Leow | Malaysia | 2,320,000 |
| 1 | 3 | Ben Lamb | United States | 1,030,000 |
| 1 | 4 | Siow Choon Tong | Malaysia | 695,000 |
| 1 | 5 | Stephen Chidwick | United Kingdom | 480,000 |
| 1 | 6 | Ying Jinghui | China | 265,000 |
| 2 | 1 | Foo Sze Ming | Malaysia | 1,595,000 |
| 2 | 2 | Chio Lin Ern | Singapore | 395,000 |
| 2 | 3 | Kenneth Kee | Singapore | 904,000 |
| 2 | 5 | Romain Arnaud | France | 635,000 |
| 2 | 6 | Chow Hing Yaung | Malaysia | 1,953,000 |
| 2 | 7 | Wai Kin Yong | Malaysia | 3,380,000 |
| 3 | 1 | Alan Sass | United States | 1,879,000 |
| 3 | 2 | Rui Cao | France | 610,000 |
| 3 | 3 | Nick Schulman | United States | 685,000 |
| 3 | 4 | Lim Chin Wei | Malaysia | 510,000 |
| 3 | 7 | Gabe Patgorski | United States | 962,000 |