After a week of excitement from its preliminary events, the 2013 World Series of Poker Europe kicked off its €10,000 Championship Event on Saturday, drawing in a decent starting field for what should be a highly competitive tournament.
Players began drifting into the Casino Barriere in Enghien-les-Bains, France, around noon on Saturday (early morning U. S. time) due to the rules of the tournament. Players are allowed to enter the tournament up until the start of Day Two on Monday and several players took up the Saturday option so they could grind the Sunday online tournaments. To start off the day, such players as Shannon Shorr, Jonathan Little, Sam Holden and James Dempsey were on the floor for action and the chips started flying.
Little was one player who was a little annoyed with one of the idiosyncrasies of the French poker rules. A full table of chips was laid out and cards were dealt, but Little and only one other player was on the felt. After playing a few hands heads up, Little would ask French officials what would happen to the stacks that were unattended. Once he was informed that they would not have chips taken out until a player showed up (unlike in the U. S., where blinds would be pulled as the button moved around the table), Little crossly said, “So you’re saying that I’m getting penalized for showing up on time?”
As the afternoon wore on, other professionals began their quest for the WSOP-E Championship Event title. Jason Mercier, Mark Radoja, former WSOP-E Championship Event winner Barry Shulman, Dan Shak and David “Devilfish” Ulliott were on the floor and making some moves on their opponents.
Night began to fall on the French coast and, with it, the players began to drop out also. Mike ‘SirWatts’ Watson was one of those who had a difficult time, running his pocket Kings into an opponent’s pocket Aces to chop his stack down to only 3000 chips, and he would depart soon after that. He had plenty of company on the rail as the night wore on, including Mercier, Little, Shak, Kevin MacPhee, Marvin Rettenmaier and Team 888 Poker’s Shane Warne.
One particular hand would catapult a player to the top of the leaderboard while eliminating two other pros. Five players would see a 10♥ 9♣ 7♣ flop and Andrey Gulyy bet out. Sean Jazayeri and another player called, but Martin Hanowski would push the action up to 4500 chips. Gulyy moved all in and Jazayeri made the call, but Hanowski would push over Jazayeri, who called Hanowski’s all in for his final chips. With a straight potentially on the board, the cards were turned up.
Hanowski showed the second best straight with his 8-6 and both Jazayeri (J♣ 10♣) and Gulyy (A♣ 4♣) could only muster club flush draws as they headed to the turn. A J♦ didn’t help either Gulyy or Jazayeri (who now could only win outright with the 8♣ for a straight flush) and the Q♥ missed them both on the river. Both Gulyy and Jazayeri hit the rail and Hanowski rocketed up the standings with his 108,000 in chips.
Hanowski might have finished off the day in the lead except for some action on the last hand of the night. Sorel Mizzi and Paul Kuzmich would each put in 9525 in seeing a 6-9-4 flop and Kuzmich bet out a strong 16K in chips. Mizzi made the call and, after another six on the turn, decided to lay his hand down to another 25K bet out of Kuzmich. That pot allowed Kuzmich to eclipse Hanowski as play came to a close for the day.
1. Paul Kuzmich, 145,825
2. Martin Hanowski, 142,150
3. Jerome Huge, 118,800
4. Scott Clements, 91,650
5. Xavier Sitruk, 90,000
6. Shannon Shorr, 87,500
7. James Dempsey, 85,000
(tie) Daniel Weinman, 85,000
9. Sorel Mizzi, 82,050
10. Philipp Gruissem, 75,000
With Day 1B underway at this time, there should be a horde of players heading to the tables. Defending champion Phil Hellmuth is expected to be on the felt (as are a host of other pros) but, even after play concludes for this evening, the final numbers won’t be known. Players can register for the tournament up until the start of Day 2 on Monday, at which point the final player numbers and the prize pool will be announced for the 2013 World Series of Poker Europe Championship Event.
