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Small main event update

lpblog, July 06

Oh damn! I just lost an entire blog post by accidentally pressing backspace outside of the text field! Anyway, the big news of today is obviously the number of players that were unable to register in the Main Event. The problem is that Day 1D reached its maximum capacity (2700), so everyone who tried to register after that was simply turned away by the WSOP organizers. Rumors say that at least 500 players couldn’t register themselves in the tournament, and part of them stood in front of the registration cage despite getting told the registration was officially closed. Ouch.

Some high-caliber players are among these unlucky guys, with Patrik Antonius, TJ Cloutier and Layne Flack being some of the most known.

As of right now, Day 1D is on a 90-minute break and Blair Hinkle is the current chip leader. We hope he can finish the day as well as he started it. GL Blair! Checking the chip counts we can also spot Elky and Daut in the list. They have 66,000 and 32,700 chips respectively.

Once we move on to Days 2 and 3 things will definitely get more interesting. For now we can only hope our friends won’t become part of the huge list of eliminated players.

Raidern

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WSOP Update

lpblog, July 05

Event 54 - $1,500 No Limit Hold’em

When the final day of this tournament started no one sane would name Tom Veckey as one of the favorites to take it down. However, the 30-year old managed to reach the final table holding the 5th biggest stack and took down this NLHE event. Veckey only got to the chip leader position when things were about to finish, in the heads-up. It means he was always “in the conversation”, but never at the top of the chip counts.

Veckey entered the heads-up holding half the chips Jason Wheeler had. Wheeler was the guy trying to prevent him from making his dream come true. Things started to look good for Veckey when he hit a runner-runner straight for a huge pot. Just a few minutes later he hit another straight to collect his first gold bracelet and the $673,276 first place prize. It’s the first major tournament win of his career.

Payouts and Standings:

Event 55 – $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball (Limit)

I gotta say I’m a bit surprised at how many people played this event. The organization itself expected something around 150, 160 players, but instead there were 258 entries! Because it’s a 2-7 lowball game it doesn’t get a lot of love, but it’s an important event just like any other of the World Series. Abe Mosseri had a really smooth run in the final table and picked up his first career bracelet, cashing $165,521. Before this win, he had final tabled the $10,000 stud 8 event which was won by Jeff Lisandro a couple weeks ago.

According to reports, Mosseri found no real problems in the last day of the tournament. He started the final table as the chip leader and things remained the same until the very end. Despite having similar stacks to his heads-up opponent, Masayoshi Tanaka, Mosseri’s win was never in doubt. He just ran over his opponent and took down the event.

Payouts and Standings:

Event 55 - $5,000 No Limit Hold’em (6 handed)

This event had a field of 928 players. That is really, really impressive for a $5,000 WSOP tournament. The field created a prizepool worth of over $4,360,000 and the first place prize was a whooping $1,003,163! The winner of the event was Matt “Hoss_TBF” Hawrilenko, who outlasted the opposition to collect his first gold bracelet. This was also the last event of the WSOP before the highly anticipated Main Event.

The fact that it was a 6-max event opened space for some really aggressive play, so it’s one of the things that make 6handed events one of the best kinds of tournaments. We could also spot some great poker players in the last stages of the event, which was great. Another highlight was definitely Phil Hellmuth’s elimination in 24th place. Nothing really special, it’s just that it’s always great to see him being sent to rail. Blair Hinkle, who set a new record with his brother last year as the first pair of siblings to win WSOP events in the same year, was eliminated right after Phil, in 23rd place.

Hawrilenko, who is one of the instructors at Stoxpoker, actually has a history with the WSOP. He has 14 WSOP cashes in his tournament record, and has final tabled two events in this year’s edition of the World Series. Now didn’t miss the chance and won his first WSOP event.

Payouts and standings:

MAIN EVENT

The most anticipated tournament of the year has started. Day 1a and 1b have finished. You all know there isnt't much to talk about during these days. There are so many people that all we can do is pretty much list the "casualities", since pretty much everyone is playing the event. Some of the top guys who were sent home are Andy Bloch, Isaac Haxton, Freddy Deeb, Mike Sowers and John Phan.

Right now day 1c is being played. You can follow it through WSOP's live updates.

Among the LPers I could spot Raszi in the first page. He has 85k chips and is in good shape for day 2. GL Raszi!

Let us know in case you are playing the Main Event or if you have any news about LPers!

By Raidern

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HORSE and events 52 and 53 results

lpblog, July 03

David Bach wins $50,000 World Championship H.O.R.S.E.

The $50,000 World Championship H.O.R.S.E. always brings out the best and most versatile players to the table. This final table was no different and because it was limit, we got to see many, many hands. In fact, it even broke the record to become the longest WSOP final table ever.

After two hours, two of the shortstacks went out. First Erik Seidel was eliminated in Stud-8 by both Vitaly Lunkin and David Bach, next we saw Chau Giang go out as he lost with 2nd pair vs top 2 pair of Erik Sagstrom. During a 20-minutes break an interesting thing happened. We saw Ville Wahlbeck get eliminated....in the 6-max NLHE event that was playing as well! His multi-tabling skills prove to be not enough. A few hours later he also gets knocked out in the HORSE event by David Bach. From there on we see Huck Seed get eliminated and later Vitaly Lunkin leaves the table.

At around 3AM we see Erik Sagstrom get knocked out. The former chipleader had been losing a lot of chips during the last hour and after getting crippled he gets it in bad during Omaha8. There's no low-holding possible and he can't beat the kings and 8's of John Hanson and he's out in 3rd place. An epic test of stamina follows... 7 hours of heads-up play and a total of 492 hands gets played during this final table! At 10 AM (!), it's all done. John Hanson was still the chipleader half an hour before this, but he loses a few big pots to Bach and he becomes very short in chips. When he loses with his 9-8-6-5-2 low in Razz to Bach's 9-7-6-4-A low, it's done and David Bach wins the HORSE event, the bracelet, the money and the special Chip Reese Memorial trophy!

Final results:

Another German victory in the Triple Chance No-Limit Hold’em event

In event 51 we had a German victory for Joh Carsten, who couldn't even manage to smile at the photo after he won over 600k for his first price. In event 52, the next German victory awaits as Jorg Peisert wins the first prize of over $500k, fortunately with a smile

The final day started with the final 2 tables, amongst which Eric "Rizen" Lynch, Jason "JCarver" Somerville and An "The Boss" Tran are probably the most recognizable names. However, neither of them managed to end heads-up. That privilege was for Jason DeWitt and Jorg Peisert. Starting with a 7:1 chiplead, it looked like an easy game for Peisert, and actually, it was. After DeWitt went all-in with K4o (which is of course a sick holding), Peisert didn't slowroll his pocket 9's and quickly called. No king on the board and Jorg Peisert wins the event, and a nice $506,800 first prize.

Halpern wins the 7 card Stud Hi/Lo event

This event also started with 2 final tables, and "Downtown" Chad Brown and Matt Savage (former tournament director of the WSOP and WPT events) were probably the most notable players left. Both managed to get to the final table, but it was David Halpern who got heads-up with William Kohler.

About even in chips it could go either way, and the chiplead swung back and forth a bit. Both waited patiently for their chance and it took them about 4 hours before the winner was revealed. In the end it was David Halpern who took the victory after he turned over kings and 4's to beat Kohler's tens and missed straightdraw. Halpern earns $159,390 for his performance.

Final results:

By: Pindarots

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HORSE and events 52 and 53 results

lpblog, July 03

By: Pindarots

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German victory in $1500 NLHE event

lpblog, June 30

German victory in $1500 NLHE event

Just a few more WSOP events to go and the majority of them are in No-Limit Hold'em. As is event 51, which ended last night. 2781 players paid $1500 to compete for a first prize of over $650,000. As usual, the final day was a very long one, with a German winning in the end (it's like football).

Starting the day with 30 players divided over 4 tables, it was hard to pick a clear favorite. No really big name was still playing, so we'd have to go for the chipleader, which was Thibaut Durand with 1.65 million in chips (the next in chips had about a million). When the final table started however, he had dropped to 3rd chip position with Jason Helder as the new chipleader. The German Carsten Joh started just in 7th chip position, but did manage to survive throughout the early hours of the final table. A decisive hand for him was when he doubled up with against the from Steven Levy thanks to a runner-runner-flush. Later he doubled up when they were 3-way, with KTo against the A9o of David Walasinski, who he also kncoked out about 20 minutes later, again with KTo, this time facing K7o.

This meant Joh ended heads-up with Andrew Chen about even in chips, but after Joh wins a few big pots, mostly without showdown, he's up 5:1. This leaves Andrew Chen with about 20 big blinds, and after Joh raises preflop he shoves over with . He must have been happy when he sees the hand after Joh makes the call: , a coinflip for Chen's tournament life. There is however no help and with a on the river it's sealed, Carsten Joh wins the tournament and $664,426 , almost enough to make him smile?

Final results:

The following text is a copy from the frontpage:

$50k HORSE event reaches final table

One of the most interesting events of the year is unfortunately not televised by ESPN this year. I'm talking about the $50,000 HORSE event. This event is always filled with only the best or wealthiest pokerpro's and has had some sick final tables before. This year it's no different, but not just because of the names, but also because of the stories behind them. The chipleader is Erik Sagstrom (see picture). Who? Maybe better known as "Erik123", he's a sick online pro. The 26-year old Swede has played in the biggest live tournaments, but his biggest win was during the WCOOP 2003, where he won the $300 NLHE-event.

Second in chips is Vitaly Lunkin, who's been on an amazing run this year. He won the most prestigious event in the WSOP so far, the $40,000 Anniversary event for close to 2 million dollar! After that he also came second in the $10k Pot-Limit Omaha event. Other wins are his Russian Poker Tour win last month and another bracelet in 2008.

David Bach and John Hanson have both been successful in previous HORSE events. Whereas Bach finished 11th last year, Hanson's 3rd place in 2007 is even more impressive! And they're not the only players that ended deep in the HORSE event. Huck Seed managed to finish 7th during this event last year. He also has 4 bracelets, in 3 different variants (the 1996 NLHE Main Event, 2 in Limit Razz and 1 in Pot Limit Omaha).

Another veteran in the WSOP field is Chau Giang. With 50 cashes in numerous types of poker, and 3 bracelets, the former Vietnam-resident is a respected and well-known player in the poker community. While he does have 4 cashes this year on the WSOP, this is his first final table of the year.

The second shortest stack on this table belongs to Erik Seidel. With 8 bracelets and numerous other tournament wins he doesnt need any introduction, but deserves one nonetheless. Ever since his 1988 appearance at the WSOP Main Event, where he finished runner-up to Johnny Chan (the final hand was also featured in the movie Rounders), he's a well known player in the field. He has a total of around 9 million dollar in tournament winnings, a WPT-win and 55-money finishes added to that.

The shortstack is a name we've heard a lot during this WSOP. Ville Wahlbeck might not be on everyones mind when talking about the sickest WSOP performances, but it certainly should. A first place on the $10k Mixed Event, a 2nd place on the $10k NL 2-7 Draw Lowball and a 3rd place on the $10k Seven Card Stud event are just a few of his performances. He also finished 12th in the 7 card Razz just a week ago, which shows that he is on hot form and playing his best poker in the month that matters. He has to win this event to overthrow Jeff Lisandro as WSOP Player of the Year and with the shortest stack at the table, it might be hard, but certainly not impossible.

After tonight we'll know who of these 8 world class pokerplayers will go home with the much coveted bracelet and $1,276,802

The final table chipcounts and seating positions:

Fortunately, there's a live feed of this event on http://wsop.pkr.com/ . Unfortunately, I don't think this can be viewed by USA-residents. The event will start at 2PM PST, so in about one hour from now.

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Bahador Ahmadi wins Mixed Holdem bracelet

lpblog, June 27

So what's on the menu today you might think? Well, the $2,500 Mixed Hold'em event finished last night. Another mixed event, and again with a few familiar faces. Best known is without a doubt Barry Greenstein, who started as one of the shortstacks, and Ylon Schwartz (4th in Main Event last year) started with about an average stack. Bracelet winner and 2 time WPT-final tablist Hasan Habib (gotta love that name), who also got 4th in the Main Event of 2000, is also in there with Karlo "The Wizard" Lopez as chipleader.

Habib however has to leave early as he's knocked out in 8th place by Barry Greenstein. Barry's stack had been on a rollercoaster ride throughout the final table, having to double up a couple of times before losing a large part of his chips not much later, but he still manages to survive up until when we are down to 5 players. After being crippled, he loses in limit hold'em with 86o against QQ. When former chipleader Lopez is knocked out in 4th place, they're down to 3 with Schwartz holding about the same amount of chips as John McGuiness and Bahador Ahmadi hold together.

These final 3 players don't take long to decide who gets the first place. Behador Ahmadi gathers chips all the way and gains the chiplead by exploiting his opponents' aggression while holding the best hand. Ylon later gets allin with against from Ahmadi and there's no help from the board whatsoever, so he gets 3rd place. In the very next hand, it's all over. McGuiness limps on the button and they get all-in on the flop with Ahmadi sporting a huge chiplead and he's relying on his flushdraw now: . McGuiness is ahead with his but he has to dodge a diamond or a jack to survive. The on the turn seals his fate, which means Bahador Ahmadi wins the event and a nice $278,104 to go with his bracelet.

Ahmadi thanks his victory to his above average skill in limit Hold'em he said: “If you’re good at both games you have a huge edge.,” he said. “This game attracts a lot of no limit players who haven’t played much limit. I have a limit background and I was able for most of the tournament to crush the limit and sit back during the no limit.”

Other events

Meanwhile, at the other tables, there isn't much interesting happening. The $50k HORSE started, but since it's limit and it's a 5-day event, progress is still really slow. Only 4 players have been knocked out: Steve Zolotow, Alexander Kostritsyn, David Singer and Dan Shak. For what it's worth, Hasan Habib is currently the chipleader. Still quite a performance, since he arrived late as he had to play the Mixed event as you could have read above. Tomorrow you'll read how the final table of the $1500 PLO Hi/Lo event has finished, with Brandon Cantu as chipleader and Lee Watkinson as nr 3. The Limit Hold'em Shootout is currently down to 8 tables. Winners of those will compete for the bracelet tomorrow.

By Pindarots

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Britain's got talent, Everybody loves Raymond

lpblog, June 26

Event 45 - $10,000 Pot Limit Hold'em World Championship

One more day has passed in Vegas and we have some more new stuff to share with you guys. British John Kabbaj had to overcome some difficulties in his way to his very first bracelet. And I'm not just talking about the tough competition he had to face, with Gerasimov, Isaac Haxton, Jason Lester and Eric Baldwin trying to take down the PLHE championship! The structure of the tournament was kinda sucky. Reports from the WSOP say that when the action was 7handed the average chipstack was just 14 big blinds. Yeah, I don't know about you, but when I read that I imagined something like those SuperTurbo heads-up from CDPoker, in which every minraise meant an all-in move.

Anyway, British John Kabbaj wanted nothing to do with it, so he just picked his spots well and put himself in good position to take the title. Also, luck was definitely on his side whenever he needed it at the final table. On the very final hand, luck smiled to Kabbaj once again, as he found himself in amazing shape against Gerasimov, holding Aces against Kings. Unfortunately for the Russian the board ran dry for him, which meant he finished in 2nd place. Kabbaj earned $633,335 for his victory. Gerasimov cashes $391,369, so I'm sure he is not entirely sad. It's the third time Gerasimov has a runner-up finish at the WSOP. He still chases his first bracelet, so better luck next time!

Payouts and standings:

Event 46 - $2,500 Pot Limit Omaha Hi-Lo

Event 46 was just one of the maaany tournaments that couldn’t keep up with the schedule at this year’s WSOP. American Derek Raymond was 9/23 in chips when the final day started. It took 14 grueling hours for him to finally claim his first gold bracelet. Although before that happened he had to face some strong opposition, with Mike Matusow, Mark Gregorich, John Monnette and others trying to win the $2,500 PLO8 event.

We can say that Raymond’s road to the title was like a rollercoaster. “I was up to 1 million (today), hit a rough patch and was down to 120,000, (but) you can’t give up.” Raymond said about his day. Eventually he managed to climb his way back and defeat Mark Tenner in the heads-up. Raymond won the heads-up match with the perfect PLO8 hand: A2345 for both High and Low pots. Besides winning his first bracelet, Raymond collected nearly $230,000 in prize money.

Payouts and standings:

$50K HORSE EVENT

Yay! One of the most anticipated events of the whole WSOP has just started. If you are looking for a list of active "poker greats", you will come close to it if you check the chip counts of this tournament. Since it's a limit event and the players startout with a huge stack, the tournament will probably last for 5 days.

There will be no LPers in this year's event. If you took a look at the chip counts, you'll notice that our hero Corwin Mackey, aka Mig the Mignator, is not there. He decided to not play this event this year.

The WSOP organization has announced the prizepool and payouts of the tournament:

Prizepool - $4,560,000

Payouts: 1st $1,276,802, 2nd $789,199 3rd $522,394 4th $368,813 5th $276,610 6th $219,655 7th $184,087 8th $162,382 9th $123,895 10th $123,895 11th $99,590 12th $99,590 13th $83,630 14th $83,630 15th $72,914 16th $72,914

Check back tomorrow for more information on the $50k HORSE event!

By: Raidern

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Lisandro wins his 3rd bracelet of 2009!

lpblog, June 25

This is just a copy of the frontpage newspost, just to keep the blog complete

For most people, poker is played with just 2 cards in the hand, and 5 community cards on the table. Jeff Lisandro however, prefers to have 7 of his own. One could call him "The Master of Stud" because yes, he's done it again! His 4th final table of this year, all in 7-card-variants, and his 3rd bracelet is in the pocket.

This time, it was the $2,500 Seven Card Razz that became his prey. Starting the final day with 13 players, Lisandro was already the chipleader. One of his opponents was also able to write history. Ville Wahlbeck could become the 4th player to win 2 bracelets (after Brock Parker, Ivey and of course Lisandro) and he had an impressive WSOP so far. Finishing 3rd in the 10k Seven Card Stud event, 1st in the 10k Mixed Event and 2nd in the 10k 2-7 Draw Lowball, Wahlbeck was destined to make another final table one would say. However, this time, it wasn't meant to be. Being knocked out in 12th place by Kenna James, it was up to Lisandro to write the history. And that was exactly what he did. He dominated the final table, his chiplead was never in danger and he knocked out the final 4 of his 7 opponents at the final table. The heads-up against Michael Craig, who made his 3rd final table, was incredibly short as Lisandro started with a 10:1 chiplead. The T-low hand Lisandro made was enough to beat Craig's K-low and it was more than enough to earn his 3rd bracelet, and one of the most impressive performances we've ever seen on the WSOP! He earns $188,370 for his performance.

With winning this bracelet he became the very first player to win 3 Stud-events in one year, and even more impressive is that he won them in each discipline of stud: Stud high, Stud 8 or better (Hi/Lo) and 7 card Razz (which is the Stud version of Razz). He also became the 4th player to win 3 bracelets in one year, after Ted Forrest and Phil Hellmuth in 1993 and Phil Ivey in 2002. An incredible performance!

Final results:

There was one other event ending today. The Seniors event, for those of you who care (hello grandpa?), was won by Michael Davis.

By Pindarots

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More updates!

lpblog, June 24

Event 41 - $5,000 Shootout No Limit Hold'em

Stupid event! Just kidding, I'll explain. Raszi was destroying his 2nd round table in this event when all of a sudden he loses the chip lead and it's all over. Ok, enough from that. Let's talk about the final table now, which was 5-handed because of the structure of the tournament. Each player started out with a 1.5mi chip stack. If you take a look at the live-updates, you'll see that Nasr El Nasr looked pretty good early on. However, the unexpected happened. He engaged in an all-in battle holding Aces. Unfortunately for him the board decided to favor Lichtenberger, who won the hand with two pairs, Tens and Nines.

From top to bottom, El Nasr was eliminated in 5th place. Danny Wong and Maxim Lykov (Raszi's executor!) were the next to be sent to rail. In the heads-up, Hungarian Peter Traply defeated Andrew Lichtenberger and claimed the gold bracelet. He receives a good looking $348,728 first place prize for his win. I'm quite sure this victory will warm the hearts of many Hungarian poker players, as this is the first ever Hungarian bracelet.

Payouts and standings:

Event 42 - $2,500 Mixed Event

This was one of those events where players needed to take the maximum out of their good games and reduce the losses on their "bad" ones. The tournament would switch games every now and then, obviously following a schedulled structure. The games were: Deuce-to-Seven Triple Draw, Limit Hold'em, Omaha Hi/Lo Eight-or-Better, Razz, Seven-Card Stud, Seven-Card Stud Hi/Lo Eight-or-Better, No-Limit Hold'em, and Pot-Limit Omaha.

Fourteen players remained in the game when the final day started. We could spot some sick players at the tables, such as Jimmy "Gobboboy" Fricke and Jon "Pearljammer" Turner. These two guys finished in 9th and 5th places respectively. The champion is Jerrod Ankenman, who finally collected his first bracelet. He has had good chances of doing it in the past, as he has two runner-up finishes in WSOP events in his tournament record. Ankenman earned $241,637 for his win.

Fun fact: Ankenman is the co-writer of the book The Mathematics of Poker. This win will probably help boost the sells of the book.

Payouts and standings:

By Raidern

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Naalden, Foley and Graham win bracelets

lpblog, June 24

Event 38 - $2000 Limit Hold'em

As usual, around 10% of the players that enter the tournament end in the money, which meant 45 out of the 446 would do that in this event. Amongst those were players like Phil Hellmuth, Alex Kravchenko and Daniel Negreanu. However, neither of them made it to the final table, which was dominated by the Dutch Marc Naalden. He held the chiplead from when it got to 32 players and only abandoned it for a short while heads-up, but nothing could stop the "Needleking". Holding 75% chips when it got to 4-way, and starting the heads-up with Steven Cowley with a 9:1 chiplead it all seemed easy. Cowley however did put up a bit of a struggle, but Naalden managed to regain the lead and win his first bracelet, and the second for The Netherlands.

Event 39 - $1,500 No-Limit Hold'em

Event 39 was one of those low-buyin NLHE-events that always attracts quite a lot of people. Not as much as the 6000 that got to enter the $1000 event earlier in this series, but with 2,715 the field was still very big and there were just no clear favorites for this one. For Ray Foley, it all went according to plan. He was chipleader throughout most of day 2 and he came into the final table 2nd in chips behind Michele Iacovone. Some other familiar faces were also still in, like Nam Le, Raymond "position doesn't matter for floating when you're as good as I am" Davis and Brandon Cantu. That same Cantu later managed to get heads-up with Foley and it looked like he would win his second bracelet. Being allin with the chiplead and K9 vs TT while hitting the on the fop almost sealed it. But with the on the turn, Foley managed to double up and regain the chiplead once more. Not much later they get all-in on the J-9-3 flop with QJo against Cantu's J7o. 2 blanks on the turn and river and the 37-year old Chrisler Financial employee wins the event and $657,969.

Event 40 - $10,000 World Championship Pot-Limit Omaha

It looked like the 4th double-bracelet-winner would come from this event. When Vitaly Lunkin got heads-up in this pro-packed event (players like Barry Greenstein, Nenad Medic, David Williams, Howard Lederer, Josh Arieh and others made it to the final table), he was about dead even in chips against Matt Graham. Some smaller pots follow and after 1 and a half hour, a decisive pot seems to emerge. Lunkin and Graham are both all-in, with AK+rags against QQ+rags but it turned out that those rags would make the difference. Holding A-K-5-3 while flopping A-2-4, Lunkin wins a huge pot which gives him a 8.25mln to 600k chiplead! However, Graham gets all-in again and again, winning all these hands and doubling up a few times to even regain the chiplead! When they later get all-in on the turn of the board, he holds a set of tens against the gutshot and flushdraw of Lunkin. The ace on the river brings no help and Matt Graham wins the event at around 4.30 AM. Lunkin adds a nice second place to his already impressive list of results this year, knowing just missed his second bracelet of this year. For Graham, it was his 2nd bracelet after he won the $1500 Limit Hold'em Shootout last year.

By Pindarots. Coverage of events 41 and 42 will follow later today.

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