February 03 2012, Marty Derbyshire

The PokerStars.fr European Poker Tour Deauville Main Event played down from 178 players to the final 54 on Friday night.

EPT London finalist Martins Adeniya came into play as the clear chip leader and a steady day kept him near the top of the counts throughout. A massive 1.5 million chip pot nearing the end of the night however, handed France’s Samphane Phomveha the overnight lead.

The 128-player money bubble was reached midway through the day’s third level and the only thing building faster than the line-up at the cash out cage following the bubble appeared to be Ondrej Vinklarek’s stack. The Czech national, who crushed the side events at EPT Prague in October, quickly became the first player over the one-million chip mark using an aggressive style of play and a little run-good. In the closing moments, he shoved king-five off-suit preflop into Phomveha’s pocket kings to hand him 1.471 million chips and the overnight chip lead.

Vinklarek wasn’t the only one with an up and down day. Frenchman Ludovic Lacay seemed to take the same line. At one point, he shot up to 950,000 and the top of the leaderboard by picking up aces against two shorter stacks with jacks and tens. But after Adeniya was moved to his table and took a chunk out of his stack, pushing him off a 200,000 pot on a four-flush board, Lacay seemed to spend the rest of the day hovering around the half million mark. That is until the late stages when Christopher Brammer rivered an ace against his pocket jacks to send him home.

Notables joining Lacay in cashing, but busting throughout the day included 2010 EPT Vilamoura winner Toby Lewis, WPT and WSOP title holder James Dempsey, French rap mogul Bruno “Kool Shen” Lopes, and Lucille Cailly.

Making the money certainly meant something to that group, and to the handful of PokerStars qualifiers still in when the bubble burst, but it also marked another big occasion for the final Team PokerStars Pro left standing. Luca Pagano guaranteed a record 20th EPT cash by making the money here, but picked up aces to double up soon after the bubble burst to stay alive and ended with a 344,000 stack heading into Saturday’s Day 4.

Big stacks also still in contention for the “875,000 first-place prize include Brammer, France’s Olivier Rogez, and 2011 EPT San Remo sixth-place finisher Yorane Kerignard.

Top 10 Stacks Heading into Day 4

Play will resume at 1200 CET (0300 PST) Saturday with plans to play down to 24.

To follow all the action live, tune into PokerNews’ EPT Live Updates from start to finish. Follow PokerNews on Twitter for up-to-the-minute news.

April 10 2011, Eric Ramsey

On Sunday, the surviving players returned to the felt to continue thinning the field at the PokerStars.net North American Poker Tour Mohegan Sun. A smaller-than-expected 387 players started the event on Saturday, and Chris Tryba had done the most work in the room to set the pace after the first day. There were 229 others still in contention heading into Day 2, though, including a swarm of sharks with familiar names like Victor Ramdin, Matt Glantz, and Jason Mercier.

Another recognizable shark, Vanessa Rousso rode a late-day charge into the top ten of the overnight chip counts, and her Day 2 began much as her Day 1 ended – with her dragging pots. She moved up close to 150,000 early on when her rivered Broadway against a player holding . A few orbits later, she was cresting 200,000 and very much in charge of her table. Her momentum began to fade as the day progressed, however. She dropped a chunk on a board when, after calling a check-raise on the turn, her opponent showed down . We never saw Rousso’s cards, a trend that would continue a bit later in a confrontation with Aaron Overton. Rousso raised on a flop, and she and Overton checked through the turn. When Rousso called his half-pot bet on the river, he turned over , and Rousso mucked her hand. Overton got the rest of her chips during the penultimate level of the day when Rousso shoved the river on a board. Her nemesis snapped with , and once more Rousso’s cards remained a mystery as she gathered her things and shuffled out the door briskly. Overton took over the chip lead with that knockout, and he did not relinquish that top spot for the rest of the day.

Rousso wasn’t the only Team PokerStars Pro to run into some difficulties on Day 2, though. At the start of play, Table 2 included three Pros, among them the a former WSOP Main Event champion, as well as the current WSOP Main Event champion. Jonathan Duhamel was eliminated very early on when his fell in a three-way pot that fellow Team Pro Joe Cada won a piece of. Those chips didn’t stay with Cada long, either. He was eliminated just a short while later, follwed out by Canadian Pat Pezzin, American Jason Mercier, and Team Online member George Lind III.

While players continued to fall by the wayside, a few of the Team Pros were finding themselves on very much the better side of the chip exchange. Ramdin and defending champion Vanessa Selbst both habitually enjoy playing more pots than your average player, and both were able to add to their stacks significantly over the course of the six-level day. Ramdin had a mostly steady climb despite his volatile style. He did manage to win one particularly noteworthy pot during the final level when his cracked the pocket aces of Steve Happas, drawing the loudest expletive we’ve heard in quite some time. The money got in on a flop, and Ramdin found his out card as the river boosted him up toward his finishing count of 296,100.

Selbst’s chip trend was more of a mixed bag than Ramdin’s, but she came out unscathed, clawing her stack up to an impressive 339,200 by night’s end. In fairness to the player she eliminated, we should disclose that Selbst’s biggest pot came right at the end of the night when she five-bet shoved with the monster that is . She ran her rags right into an unfortunate soul with , and the board is the reason Selbst is still alive and kicking. Greg DeBora (the other Pro from Table 2) and Andrew Brokos round out the field of surviving PokerStars-sponsored players.

A few of the other familiar figures also managed to scarf up big stacks of chips as the field was whittled all the way down to just 74 players. Adam Geyer faded Bill Jennings’ flush draw very early in the day to knock him out and move close to 200,000, and it was good foreshadowing of things to come. Geyer claimed the tournament life of Jim “Mr_BigQueso” Collopy on a coin flip a few hours later, and he moved over 300,000 when his took care of Mike Trelski and his as well. Geyer five-bet shoved in a pot against Nick Binger late in the day, boosting his stack even further. He lost a big chunk back to Binger who managed a late double-up, but Geyer still has 267,300 chips to return to for Day 3.

In the not-so-flush-with-chips category, however, are about 175 people who failed to survive the rigors of the day. Cliff “JohnnyBax” Josephy, Tyson Marks, David Paredes, and Tony Cousineau were out within the first couple levels, followed to the door by Craig Bergeron, Allie Prescott, Faraz Jaka, John D’Agostino, and former November Niner Eric Buchman. In the final level of the evening, Matthew Waxman dropped as well, while Eric Froehlich and Binger survived their late all-ins to double back into contention.

That leaves 74 players still in the mix, and the bubble is near. The final 56 will get paid, and that means 18 have made Day 3 in vain only to leave empty-handed Monday. Play will recommence at high noon (1600 GMT), and the field will be reduced further down to the final three tables of eight. It’s a pair of Aarons in the lead, but Overton is in front of Mermelstein and the rest of the chase pack by more than 200,000 chips. Olivier Busquet and Taylor von Kriegenbergh round out the top ten.

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