5pm: End of the level
That’s level 17 done and dusted. Level 18 will be along shortly. — SY
5.00pm: Donev left cold and lonely on the mountain
Ivo Donev open raises to 12,000 from the hijack and is called by David Wintersberger on the button before quickly checking in the dark. The flop brings a paired J♦ 5♣ 5♦ flop. Wintersberger accepts Donev’s invitation and bets 16,000. Donev instantly moves all-in and just as quickly Wintersberger calls. Donev has A♦ Q♦ for the flush draw while the German has a beautiful fast played Aâ™ 5â™ which becomes quads on the turn.
Donev is now down to 65,000 having shipped the 350,000 pot to Wintersberger and then spends the first few minutes of the break trying to berate him. Although I don’t speak German I can tell that Wintersberger is a) telling Donev that he’s ‘playing poker’ and b) that he’s far more interested in stacking his chips than listening to Donev rattle on. — RD
4.55pm: Carson doubles
Allan Baekke raised to 14,000 under the gun, and then Russell Carson moved all in for 135,000 from mid-position. It was folded back around to Baekke… call.
Baekke: 7♠7♦
Carson: A♦ Q♥
It was a race, but it was over very quickly with the flop coming 5♦ Qâ™ 8♣ . It got better for Carson on the turn – Q♣ . The river was 10♦ , and the Canadian doubled up to 280,000. Baekke slips below a million again, to 900,000. — SY
4.50pm: Leo slayer
Leo Spielmann was all-in pre-flop for not a lot. Konstantinos Alexiou called, as did Team PokerStars Pro Lex Veldhuis. On the 5â™ A♥ 2♥ flop Veldhuis bet 16,000 and Alexiou called. On the 8â™ turn Alexiou folded when the Dutchman made it 23,500. Veldhuis showed Aâ™ 2â™ , and all-in Speilmann only had 7♣ 4♣ and that was that. Veldhuis is back up to 144,000. — SY
4.45pm: The unstoppable El Nasr
The Nasr El Nasr show continues apace, with the German tyrant now accounting for Vladislav Shuravin in a monster. Brent Wheeler began it, raising to 13,500 from under-the-gun. Shuravin raised to 36,000 from his left and it was folded to El Nasr in the big blind.
El Nasr re-raised to 81,500 and after Wheeler got out the way, Shuravin shoved for about 300,000 total. El Nasr insta-called and for good reason. He showed A♥ A♣ and Shuravin was in trouble with his Q♥ Q♣ .
The board came Aâ™ 5♥ 4♥ 7♥ 8â™ and Shuravin was eliminated. El Nasr is pushing seven figures. — HS
4.40pm: Clock grinding
There have been a couple of awesome examples of running the clock down and this is one of them. Allan Baekke raises under the gun to 14,000 and is called in three spots by Aaron Lerner (button), Johann Fest (small blind) and Fedor Los (big blind). Baekke bets 30,000 on the J♠5♥ 9♥ flop and Fest takes an age to fold. Baekke takes the pot adding to his massive 1m+ stack.
Some of the most recent KO’s are:
64 – Ara Melikian, USA, €5,900
65 – Alex Kravchenko, Russia, €5,500
66 – Nicolo Caramatti, Italy, €5,500
67 – Jochum Weenink, Netherlands, €5,500
68 – Bryan Paris, USA, €5,500
— RD
4.30pm: Emptying the clip for Convey
We all have our favourite poker expressions. Mine is: “That’s the end of the day, let’s all go home.” However, my colleague Marc Convey, currently reporting in Manila, is a big fan of the phrase “emptying the clip” meaning betting (or firing) through all three streets to empty the metaphorical gun clip. Don’t judge him. He doesn’t have much else in his life.
This next post is in honour of Convey as Nasr El Nasr (one of Convey’s favourite players, incidentally, and mine too) has just emptied the clip to win a decent pot from Brent Wheeler. It went like this.
It was folded to El Nasr’s small blind and he raised to 15,500. Wheeler defended his big blind with a call and the flop came 6â™ 6♥ 4â™ . El Nasr bet 18,500 at that and Wheeler called.
The turn was 6♣ and El Nasr lined up bullet No 2, betting 33,500. Call. Bullet three came on the 5♠river, this time a bet of 44,500. Wheeler called again.
With his clip now empty – hello Marc! – El Nasr showed K♦ 4♥ and Wheeler mucked.
“What that a value bet or a bluff?” asked Sven Mol, sitting in the four seat.
El Nasr was emphatic: “A value bet,” he said. El Nasr now has 410,000. — HS
4.20pm: The million dollar chip man
Danish PokerStars player Allan Baekke is the first at EPT Snowfest to break through the one million chip mark, courtesy of this big pot against Jesper Hougaard. We picked up the action with the board showing 10♥ 2♦ A♣ 9♦ . Baekke bet 40,000 – call. On the J♦ river Baekke, with Hougaard giving him the close stare down from the seat on his left, made it 118,000.
“I have a huge hand. A monster hand,” Hougaard sighed. “Some people might event raise here. I call.”
Baekke: K♦ 10♦ for the rivered nut flush
Hougaard: J♥ J♣ for the rivered set
That put Baekke on close to 1.1 million, and set Hougaard back to 315,000. – SY
4.15pm: Kravchenko hits the rail
Alex Kravchenko is no more. He moved all in from the cut off for his last 74,000 but was picked off on the button by Konstantinos Alexiou. Kravchenko had outs with his A♣ 9♠but Alexious started ahead with his K♣ K♦ and stayed there all the way through flop, turn and river.
Kravchenko joins Luis Medina on the sidelines, who did not cash. But Team PokerStars Pro is still exceptionally well represented with Christophe De Meulder, Johannes Steindl, Johannes Strassmann, Lex Veldhuis and the chip-leading Richard Toth. — HS
4.10pm: Bigoni’s big dream evaporates
Giovanni Bigoni’s EPT dream has come to an end. The damage was done when he raise-called all-in from the small blind into Dan Murariu’s big blind. The Italian showed A♣ 7â™ and Muraniu showed K♥ J♣ .
Board: 10♠5♣ 8♠J♠J♥ = a double up for Murariu and a tiny 16,000 for Bigoni.
The Italian leaves it four hands before getting it in with J♥ 10♦ against Marcel Burger’s A♣ K♦ and with no help for either Bigoni has to walk away disappointed – albeit with €5,500. — RD
4.05pm: Waterman doubles up
Dennis Waterman gets his short stack in against Lykov’s A♣ Q♣ . Fortunately for Waterman he’s holding the bullets and doubles up to a mite over 60,000. He’s still alive and with some fantastic results in the past (including a win in a $1,000 event at this year’s PCA) he can’t be written off yet. — RD
4pm: Chips
The full counts from the end of the last level are now available on the chip count page. It’s slow going at the moment, mainly because of a few technical issues here. But expect the speed to pick up again soon.
As you’ll notice, Richard Toth is actually the man who prospered most in the first level of the day.
3.35pm: Level up
Well that’s one level out the way, and the first priority sorted: we burst the bubble and opened the floodgates on the short-stack eliminations. There are about 72 players left and we press on.
Don’t forget, details of the prizewinners can be found on the prizewinners’ page, and chip counts are on the chip count page. A full count from the last break should be with us soon-ish. It’s likely to show Johannes Strassmann and Allan Baekke jostling for the lead, the former consolidating his overnight stack, the latter having put in a massive surge today.
PokerStars Blog reporting team on the piste: Simon Young, Howard Swains, Rick Dacey
Back to Top
