Vassilios Lazarou showing called down the bets of Fu Wong on all streets who tabled () for aces and tens. Lazarou tapped the table and mucked his cards, seemingly in anger at himself for making the call.
Lazarou is now under pressure with only about 120,000 chips
Eric Brooks has taken down a nice pot off Alexander Kostritsyn after Kostritsyn called down with a board of but mucked when Brooks turned over (-X) for queens and nines.
After Minh Ly had earlier folded a queen, Kostritsyn stated his dismay that Brooks had caught the case queen to make a bigger two pair than his own.
Vassilios Lazarou was involved in a hand to the river with Alexander Kostritsyn that was bet on all streets to the river. On the river, Kostritsyn bet into Lazarou showing a board of . Lazarou called showing a board of . After making the call Lazarou only had 3,000 chips behind.
Kostritsyn rolled over ( ) for eights full. Lazarou was clearly upset stating, "Sick!. So sick!" He then threw his cards into the muck forcefully.
The very next hand Lazarou was all in for the ante of 3,000 and won the hand when he hit a straight on 6th and David Oppenheim missed his flush on the river. After the ante hand, Lazarou is left with on 18,000 in chips.
Vassilios Lazarou committed the last of his chips in on 3rd street against both Alexander Kostritsyn and David Oppenheim. Both live players checked 4th street before Oppenheim bet on 5th street to force Kostritsyn out of the pot. The boards ran out as follows:
Lazarou: () ()
Oppenheim: () ()
Oppenheim had rolled up deuces which held to send Lazarou to the rail in 8th place after a fine tournament for $48,269 in prize money.
After the first two levels of play Alexander Kostritsyn has jumped out to a healthy chip lead with 880,000 chips, with overnight leader David Oppenheim still the short stack with about 225,000.
Players are just coloring up some of the orange 1,000 denomination chips to make life easier with betting (and chip counts!). Play will recommence momentarily.
During the break, I had a chance to speak with Eric Brooks about his background in poker and about his decision to play in this event. “I used to play a lot more stud in the past. I played some out here in Vegas and in Atlantic City, but I don’t play much anymore. Once in a while I will go out and play a tournament or something.” He proceeded to tell me that he entered this $10,000 Stud World Championship on a whim. He plans to donate all of his tournament earnings to the Decision Education Foundation.
According to Brooks, the purpose of the Decision Education Foundation is to “teach the science of decision making to students in grades K through 12. Teaching proper decision making is important and very applicable to poker.” Brooks also told me that he has been able to convince Annie Duke to join him on the board for the DEF to help further their cause.
“I hope to get lucky for them and win them some money” was the last thing he told me before returning to play. He has a tough field ahead of him, but regardless of where he finishes, the real winners at the end of the day will be the children and young adults that his organization will be able to help as a result of his winnings.
Erik Seidel has shifted gears since the break, but things haven't gone his way. After losing two medium pots to David Oppenheim and Alexander Kostritsyn, Seidel found himself involved in another clash with the chip leader.
Seidel had completed with the and Kostritsyn raised with the . Seidel called.
On 4th street, Kostritsyn led out with the and Seidel called with the .
Kostritsyn and Seidel both checked 5th street.
On 6th street Seidel led out after he paired the and Kostritsyn called with the .
On the river Seidel check-called the bet of Kostritsyn who revealed his board as () to show trip fives on the river as Seidel gave a wry smile at the beat which sends his stack plummeting to only about 40,000 chips.