In poker, chip stacks can change in the blink of an eye. One second you can be at the top of the field, the next you can be wallowing as the short stack. As such, we often see significant changes at the top of tournament leaderboards day to day. In the penultimate day of the 2013 European Poker Tour (EPT) Prague Main Event, though, that wasn’t so much the case. The top two players going into Day 5 were the same coming out and five of the eight players who made the final table were in the top ten to start the day.
The man with the biggest stack to start final table play on Wednesday will be Julian Track, who was second entering Tuesday’s action. With 7,240,000 chips, he has a steep lead on the former big stack, Max Silver, who has 5,935,000. Stephen Chidwick, who began Day 4 in fourth place, moved up to third with 4,935,000, and Georgios Sotiropoulous is fourth at the final table with 4,320,000. After them, nobody has over 3,000,000. Jorma Nuutinen will have the most work to do at the final table, coming in at the bottom with just 975,000. That said, Nuutinen still has 24 big blinds left, so as far as short stacks go, it could be a lot worse.
Track ascended to the catbird seat during the final level of the day (which doesn’t actually say much, since there were only two levels played) by winning Day 5’s biggest pot. Track raised pre-flop to 86,000, Ori Hasson re-raised to 265,000, and then Track four-bet to 600,000. Hasson then moved all-in and was called by Track. It was a race: Track with Tens and Hasson with A-Q. Nothing higher than a 9 (three of them, in fact) landed on the board and Track had taken his chip stack up over 7,600,000. Hasson was crippled and then eliminated shortly thereafter.
The final table bubble burst on just the second hand of the – see if you can follow this – unofficial final table. On the European Poker Tour, final tables are eight-handed, so when nine players remain and are all seated around one table, that is the “unofficial” final table. On the bubble hand, Georgios Sotiropoulos raised pre-flop to 80,000 and Sigurd Eskeland called. On the flop of J♦-A♠-7♦, Sotiropoulos bet 75,000 and Eskeland once again called. Eskeland checked the K♥ on the turn, but Sotiropoulos put him all-in. Eskelund obliged and made the call, showing K♦-6♦ for a pair and flush draw. Sotiropoulos held pocket 7’s for a set, which remained the strongest hand after the 3♥ was dealt on the river.
Play has gotten underway at the final table in Prague. Check back to see who emerges as the champion.
2013 European Poker Tour Prague Main Event – Final Table Chip Counts
1. Julian Track – 7,240,000
2. Max Silver – 5,935,000
3. Stephen Chidwick – 4,935,000
4. Georgios Sotiropoulos – 4,320,000
5. Ka Kwan Lau – 2,995,000
6. Ole Schemion – 2,400,000
7. Zdravko Duvnjak – 1,225,000
8. Jorma Nuutinen – 975,000