August 16 2012, Chad Holloway

The European Poker Tour kicks off its ninth season this week in Spain with the EPT Barcelona at the Casino Barcelona. The EPT has partnered with the Estrellas Poker Tour from Aug. 15 through 25, 2012, to create Spain’s largest poker festival, the Barcelona Poker Festival.

After the Estrellas Poker Tour, which will take place from Aug. 15 through 19 and feature a “1,000 + “100 Main Event to end Season 3, the EPT Barcelona will feature a “50,000 Super High Roller, “10,000 High Roller, and the banner “5,000 + “300 Main Event.

EPT Barcelona, which has been on the EPT schedule since Season 1, continues to prove itself one of the most popular stops year after year. Over the years, the event has made many transitions, each to the satisfaction of the players. For instance, the buy-in, which started at “1,000 and went as high as “8,000, is now “5,300, which resulted in a record-setting 811-player field in Season 8.

Last year’s Main Event, which featured a “850,000 first-place prize, was won by Martin Schleich of Germany. Schleich emerged victorious and joined Kent Lundmark (Season 7), Carter Phillips (Season 6), Sebastian Ruthenberg (Season 5), Sander Lylloff (Season 4), Bjørn-Erik Glenne (Season 3), Jan Boubli (Season 2) and Alexander Stevic (Season 1) as former winners.

Here’s a look back at the Season 8 final table:

EPT Barcelona Season 8 Final Table

Last year, Dragan Kostic came close to becoming the first Spaniard to win the EPT Barcelona title but was stopped one spot shy, matching the runner-up finish of Spain’s Jesus Cortes Lizano from the previous year. Here are a few other interesting facts about EPT Barcelona:

• No player has ever made the final table twice.
• Many Americans have made the final table over the years including Phil Ivey (2nd place in Season 3), Jason Mercier (6th in Season 5) and Adam Junglen (6th in Season 4), but Carter Phillips is the only American to win the event to date, doing so in Season 6 after conquering a field of 479 players for “850,000.
• There have been two winners from Sweden (Season 1 & 7) and two from Germany (Seasons 5 & 8); while the other winners have hailed from France (Season 2), Norway (Season 3), Denmark (Season 4) and United States (Season 6).

Be sure to follow live updates from the EPT Barcelona all week long right here on PokerNews. Visit our Live Reporting Section for more details.

The “50,000 Super High Roller Tournament

Season 9 of the EPT will kick of in Barcelona with Spain’s largest buy-in poker event: the EPT Barcelona “50,000 Super High Roller tournament on Friday, August 17. It is just one of four high-roller events to take place during the 11-day Spanish poker festival and features unlimited reloads on Day 1.

Thus far nearly 40 players are confirmed, including Phillip Gruissem, who took home “1.4 million in high-roller tournaments in Season 8 after making five final tables, and winning the £20,000 tournament in EPT London and the “10,000 event in EPT Barcelona.

In addition, Team PokerStars Pros Daniel Negreanu and Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier are both confirmed to play. “I’m really excited to play in another High Roller event at my favorite EPT stop in Barcelona,” Negreanu said. “I’ve had great success in high roller events and this season there will be an award for High Roller player of the year. I’ll be shooting for that.”

Here’s a look at the confirmed participants so far:

Confirmed EPT Barcelona Super High Roller Confirmations

As Negreanu mentioned, the tournament will count toward PokerStars’ recently announced High Roller of the Year award for the EPT Season 9, which will go to the player who accumulates the most points in Season 9 events with a 10K “/$/£) buy-in or higher.

“High Stakes poker action is as exciting as any sport in the world and features the best players competing against each other and others with enough confidence and cash to take on poker’s elite players,” said Edgar Stuchly, President of EPT. “These high-stakes tournaments provide high-drama, deep strategy and potentially life-changing rewards.”

The “50,000 Super High Roller in Barcelona is the first of 16 “High Roller” events including three Super High Rollers (Barcelona, PCA and Monaco), two 25K events (PCA and Monaco), 10K Reload tournaments at every EPT stop, and the new 10K Championship events.

PokerNews will be live reporting the “50,000 Super High Roller tournament, which will also be broadcast online with a one-hour delay exclusively on PokerStars.tv on Sunday, Aug. 19 from 13:00 CET (0400 PDT) (1-hour delay).

EPT LIVE WEBCASTS

If you want to follow live updates from both the EPT “50,000 Super High Roller and “10,000 High Roller, visit our Live Reporting Section for more details.

The European Players Council

On Thursday, Aug. 9, the PokerStars Blog announced the formation of the European Players Council (EPC), which will meet for the first time prior to the EPT Barcelona and “will work with PokerStars going forward to make any necessary changes or improvements. Then, at the end of the end of Season 9 of the EPT, the council will meet again in Monte Carlo at the Grand Final.”

Here’s a look at the inaugural members of the EPC:

EPC Members

In addition to focusing on the EPT, the council is also expected to play a hand in improving structures, payouts, rules, etc.

*Picture courtesy of the PokerStars Blog.

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Play moved at an astonishingly fast rate Wednesday with eliminations right from the start. When play began, Level 23 still had 36 minutes on the clock and by the time the level had come to a close Benjamin Juhasz and Xavier Carruggi had departed in 24th and 23rd respectively. The pace sped up in Level 24 and six players made their way to the rail in 75 minutes. The highest profile elimination was Miikka Anttonen, who was very unlucky to see his cracked by Isabel Baltazar holding .

Level 25 only saw two players booted out but a lot of movement in chips. First to go, Russian Evgeny Zaytsev who lost a race with to Martin Schleich’s that found a third queen in the door. Javier Contreras also lost a race and was eliminated by Eugene Katchalov. Apart from that, no other players exited but that didn’t stop Tomeu Gomila, Saar Wilf and Raul Mestre using their privileged position to extend the poverty gap between them and the rest.

Level 26 saw the eliminations build up to a frantic rate once more. Marcos Fernandez, Massimilano Martinez, Marton Czuczor and Team PokerStars Pro Belgium’s Matthias De Meulder all departed in that order and in quick succession. The Team PokerStars Pro from Belgium ran into the unstoppable force that is Gomila. The Spaniard has had cards and situations fall in his favor over the last couple of days, and everybody watching felt his was going to come from behind to beat De Meulder’s . The chips went in preflop and the Spanish crowd cheered when the dropped on the river.

The only time play really slowed down was when the final nine players reconvened on one, the TV, table. Fueled by confidence and a big stack Gomila started to bully and bluff anybody who dared enter a pot with him. His lead grew as he took advantage of the fact that no one wanted to bust in ninth and they had all seen him very willing to call light, as was shown with the De Meulder exit.

If the worst place to finish in a poker tournament is the money bubble, then the second worst must be the final table bubble. To experience sitting at the TV table with the other eight remaining players and then to know that they are going on to experience the prestige and adulation of an EPT final table the next day without you, must be hard to take.

We felt for Jose Miguel Esteban who busted when he moved his last 650,000 (13 big blinds) over the line with . Martin Schleich re-shoved with . No one else was interested and the board bricked out to bust Esteban in ninth place, ending play at around 1830 CEST (0900 PDT).

Play is due to begin at 1200 CEST (0300 PDT) on Thursday when the final eight players will be dreaming of following in the footsteps of Kent Lundmark, Carter Phillips, Sebastian Ruthenberg, Sander Lylloff, Bjorn-Erik Glenne, Jan Boubli and Alexander Stevic as EPT Barcelona champions. As always, you will be able to follow all the exciting action right here with the PokerNews Live Reporting Team.

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