The final European Poker Tour (EPT) stop of the year and the second-to-last of the EPT season is underway. Day 1A of the EPT Prague Main Event took place on Wednesday and it was Pierre Calamusa who lorded over the field, finishing the night with 457,000 chips. His closest competitor, Stefan Egermann, has just 285,600.
Day 1A had a told of 391 entries, with 127 players advancing to Day 2. Keep in mind that we are talking about entries, not players. Everyone is allowed a single re-entry if they go bust. Re-entries can be made on either starting flights (there are two of them) or before the opening of Day 2. But it is just one re-entry per person total, not one re-entry per day.
The big blind ante is in effect from the get-go and the shot clock will begin on Day 3. Everybody will receive five time extension cards that will rollover if not used.
EPT Prague is one of the longest tenured live tournaments around, having started in 2003. In five of the last six years, the tournament has seen more than 1,000 entries. The most entries came in 2016: 1,192. Last year’s event came just 19 entries away from beating that mark.
The 2018 EPT Prague Main Event champion was Paul Michaelis, who won €840,000.
Calamusa has over $1.2 million in lifetime live tournament earnings. His best cash came at the 2016 EPT Grand Final, where he finished in fifth place for €233,800 ($266,560). He is still looking for his first major title.
While there re-entry events have plenty of detractors, Calamusa is fortunate the EPT Prague Main Event is such a tournament. He bombed out early with his first buy-in, but immediately took off with his second. He wasn’t the chip leader the entire time, but it was pretty darn close. Of course, had this been a freezeout, he might have played differently and not lost his stack.
Another crop of players will take to the felts on Thursday for Day 1B, as well as possibly some who were eliminated after firing just one bullet on Wednesday. As was the case for the first flight, there will be ten 60-minute levels and a 75-minute dinner break after Level 6. If this tournament is like virtually every other multi-flight event, Day 1B should be much larger than Day 1A. It will need to be if the EPT Prague Main Event record is to be broken.
2019 European Poker Tour Prague Main Event – Day 1A Chip Leaders
- Pierre Calamusa – 457,000
- Stefan Egermann – 285,600
- Roland Chassing – 248,600
- Yehuda Cohen – 213,700
- Steve O’Dwyer – 206,400
- Bhavin Khatri – 199,600
- Yehia Said – 195,000
- Przemyslaw Glaner – 194,700
- Mikalai Pobal – 192,600
- Mustafa Jukovic – 189,900
