As expected, it was a quick Day 3 at the 2013 World Poker Tour (WPT) Montreal Main Event Tuesday as it took just six hours to narrow the field from 59 to 18. Today those dozen and a half players will be further whittled to the final table of six.
Leading the pack in a tight race is Ontario’s Sylvain Siebert with 2,947,000 chips. He is quite familiar with this event even though it is in just its second year on the Tour schedule, as he finished fifth last year, earning more than $146,000. Just twelve eliminations remain for him to make the final table once again. Right behind Siebert with 2,875,000 chips is Floridian Derrick Rosenbarger, who has virtually no live tournament cashes to his credit. After the two of them, there is a substantial drop-off – their closest competitors are Alexandre Lavigne (2,197,000), Marco Cannizzaro (2,156,000), Antoine Berube (2,156,000), and Mukul Pahuja (2,003,000).
Siebert could have been an overwhelming favorite heading into Wednesday’s action were it not for a late slump. A series of eliminations about two-thirds of the way through the day shot his stack all the way up to 4,000,000. It started when he took more than 400,000 from Andy Hwang, knocking him out with pocket Sevens against Hwang’s A-K. A short time later, Marc-Olivier Carpentier was all-in pre-flop for a quarter million chips with pocket Eights and Siebert picked him off with A-Q when an Ace flopped. Then, to grow his chip stack to its apex, he turned a flush while hold K-8 of clubs against George Biliouras, who had flopped top pair with A-Q.
He did seem to get a little overconfident late, putting Amir Babakhani to the test for all his chips with just A-T and ended up losing almost a million chips when Babakhani flipped over Queens. Nevertheless, Siebert is still in great shape to make the final table.
Everyone remaining in the tournament will receive about $25,000 at a minimum, though most players’ goals are set much higher. Play resumes just a few minutes from now at noon ET as the battle to make the final table begins in earnest.
2013 WPT Montreal Main Event – Day 3 Chip Counts
1. Sylvain Siebert – 2,947,000
2. Derrick Rosenbarger – 2,875,000
3. Alexandre Lavigne – 2,197,000
4. Marco Cannizzaro – 2,156,000
5. Antoine Berube – 2,156,000
6. Mukul Pahuja – 2,003,000
7. Lily Kiletto – 1,800,000
8. Amir Babakhani – 1,656,000
9. David Paredes – 1,519,000
10. Patrick Eskandar – 1,325,000
11. Zennawi Petros – 1,232,000
12. Thomas Giorgi – 758,000
13. Serge Cantin – 656,000
14. Griffin Benger – 586,000
15. Ludovic Lacay – 543,000
16. Jonathan Little – 388,000
17. Hauke Gerde – 242,000
18. Patrik St. Onge – 176,000
