Thomas Miller opened for 39,000 and Lars Bonding moved in behind him. Miller called and tabled and Bonding held . The board ran and Miller's small pair held sending Bonding to the cashier's cage.
Alexis Bouchiouane opened to 32,000 from the cutoff seat, and Mikhail Lakhitov three-bet to 72,000 on the button. When it passed back around to Bouchiouane, he made another raise to 156,000. Lakhitov looked like he really didn't want to, but he waved the white flag of surrender and slid his cards into the muck.
Thanks to an ally in the french media, we gleaned a little bit of information about Bouchiouane while the hand was playing out. He's "lesuperpanda" online, and he's beginning to make quite a name for himself as a member of the young French elite players. He intended to play only the Main Event, entering this tournament on a whim. It's his first-ever WSOP event, and he's putting his buy-in to good use, working his stack up over 800,000 with that four-bet pot.
Matthew Berkey raised to 36,000 from middle position, and Conrad Monica three-bet to 106,000 from the big blind. Berkey eyeballed the chips behind before splashing in the call.
The flop came , and Monica continued out with a bet of 133,000. Berkey called quickly once again, and the turn and river came and with the two men checking it down.
Berkey tabled , and it was the winner. Dragging that pot moves him up to 1.15 million now, while Monica takes a step back to 510,000.
Alessio Fratti only had about 55,000 chips left when he took his stand with . In a case of unfortunate timing, he only had one live card as Thomas Miller called with the dominating . The board came down , and that's all she wrote for Fratti.
Just a few hands after his aces went under, Fratti goes under as well. He's out in 18th place, and he'll take home a pay bump up to almost $27,000.
From the cutoff seat, Matthew Berkey opened the pot with a raise. We don't know how much it was, because it was already pulled in by the time we walked up. The reason? Yun Fan had three-bet shoved for an additional 411,000 from the big blind. Berkey would spend the next several minutes toying with the decision with an amused look on his face. After a long while, he plunked the calling chips into the pot, committing about 40% of his own chips. Cards up, gents:
Showdown
Berkey:
Fan:
The flop was no fun for Fan, and he needed to catch up in a hurry to stay alive. The turn was a blank, though, and so was the that filled out the board on fifth street. Fan can't win with the ace-jack, and this loss has cost him the rest of his chips. He's out in 17th place, and Berkey appears to have crept into the chip lead.
Hassan Babajane raised under the gun, and Michael Michnik three-bet shoved for 259,000 from the big blind. Babajane called pretty quickly with , but Michnik's were well ahead.
The board ran clean: , and Michnik has found his double. He's up to 562,000 now, now just about dead even with Babajane.