Sunday marked the first day that two major poker tournaments schedules got back into action for their current seasons. In the United States, the World Poker Tour restarted their Season XII schedule at the $3500 buy in Borgata Winter Poker Open and, in France, the European Poker Tour pitched the cards in the air for their stop in Deauville.
WPT Borgata Winter Poker Open – Day 1A
Traditionally one of the largest events on the WPT schedule – the stop in Atlantic City in 2011 drew in 1313 entries, the largest in the history of the WPT – the Borgata Winter Poker Open for 2014 didn’t fail in drawing a crowd. The Day 1A field for the multi-entry tournament (if a player busts on a Day One or isn’t happy with the size of their chip stack, he/she can reenter on the next Day One) on Sunday drew in a strong field around 430 players. By the end of the day’s action, only 248 of those players were left to move on to Day 2.
In dueling with the EPT event across the pond, the Borgata Winter Poker Open Main Event was able to draw in a strong Day 1A field in its own right. A host of the U. S.’ best players, including Jeff Madsen, Cliff Josephy, Kathy Liebert, Jonathan Little and Allen Kessler were on the tables for the traditional call of “shuffle up and deal” and they wasted little time getting down to business. Josephy, in particular, was able to use pocket Jacks against an opponents’ pocket tens early in the day to nearly double his starting stack and get off on the right foot.
The news wasn’t so good for some of the others around the Borgata tournament room. Little saw his chip stack dwindle down to 7500 within only three hours (he would be eliminated after the dinner break) and David ‘Chino’ Rheem found the rail within four. Vanessa Selbst, Kevin Eyster, Roland Israelashvili and Josephy (who couldn’t sustain his early success) also would be casualties by the end of the night in New Jersey.
According to unofficial counts, Laz Hernandez will be able to sleep well for the next couple of nights after a dominant Day 1A. His 258,175 in chips by far outpaced the field behind him:
1. Laz Hernandez, 258,175
2. John Racener, 186,250
3. Barry Ostad, 185,000
4. Calvin Lee, 169,050
5. Jordan Cristos, 169,000
6. Randy Pfeifer, 150,100
7. George Lambert, 146,000
8. Matt Brady, 145,200
9. Steve Levy, 144,500
10. Robert Panitch, 140,000
Monday should draw out a throng of people that could push the numbers close to the 1000 entry mark. With a $3 million guarantee on the tournament, the WPT Main Event must draw just a few more entries than Sunday – 457, to be exact – to beat the guarantee. That should be easily done as each WPT Borgata tournament since 2009 has cracked the 1000 player mark; the 2014 WPT Borgata Winter Poker Open should join that list after Monday’s play.
EPT Deauville
Before the tournament for the WPT at the Borgata in New Jersey even started, their counterparts on the EPT started a soiree of their own in Deauville, France. The EPT kicked off its second event of 2014 (following the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure earlier this month) and continued on their Season Ten schedule with a host of Team PokerStars Pros ready to fight for the title. Team PokerStars Pros Bertrand ‘ElkY’ Grospellier, Eugene Katchalov and Marcin Horecki were on hand for the Day 1A festivities, as was the champion of the 2014 PCA, Dominik Panka.
By the time the late entry period had ended, 234 players had found their way to the tables in Deauville and it seemed that many of them wanted to stick around for a bit. At the close of the night, there were still 134 of those players remaining with Chris Day holding the slimmest of chip leads:
1. Chris Day, 154,100
2. Jorma Nuutinen, 154,000
3. Tatu Maenpaa, 142,700
4. Alessio Isaia, 131,500
5. Jose Carlos Garcia, 125,900
6. Hugo Felix, 110,800
7. Mikolaj Zawadzki, 110,300
8. Rasmus Agerskov, 108,700
9. Pierre Mace, 108,600
10. Anton Wigg, 105,000
Other notable names that are in the Top 25 include Barny Boatman (102K), Jerome Huge (90K), Eric Sfez (89.5K, even though he served a one round penalty during the heat of battle) and Zimnan Ziyard (89K). Players such as Fabrice Soulier, David Vamplew, Arnaud Mattern and Panka have already headed home after being knocked out of the tournament.
Day 1B will bring another crowd to the felt in Deauville, but it’s going to have to be a large one to beat last year’s numbers. In 2013, 782 players hit the tables in the tournament eventually won by hometown hero Remi Castaignon. To beat that number, nearly 550 players will have to put up the €5000 buy-in on Monday.