Thursday, 28th March 2024 13:15
Home / Uncategorized / Eureka3 Prague, Day 1B: Initials not the only thing this tour has in common with the EPT

When you think of the EPT, now in it’s tenth season, you think of big names, big fields and big prize pools. Well you can put a tick in all three boxes for the Eureka Poker Tour Main Event here in Prague.

A mammoth 792 players are already in their seats for Day 1B, that’s more than the entire field from last years event when Menikos Panagiotou outlasted 644 players to bag the title. He took home €137,100 for the win, but whomever wins the 2013 edition is going to take home much more. As to how much, well we’ll have to wait until after late registration has closed at the end of level four, but with 1,056 players (and counting) already in then it could be as much as €200,000.

But it’s going to far from easy to take the lion’s share of the prize pool as this field has a distinctly EPT feel to it with plenty of big names and plenty of interesting tables dotted around the room. Let’s take a look at a couple of interesting tables and a few of the big names in the field today:

In every World Cup there’s a group of death and in every poker tournament there’s a table of death. The honours today go to this particularly gruesome line-up:

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Ludovich Geilich

Hana Soljan – The Full Tilt Poker Ambassador for the Eureka Poker Tour is in her final year at the University of Applied Sciences in Zagreb, studying Entrepreneurial Management.She won the EPT Ladies event in Prague in 2010, a side event at the PCA in 2011, and an Omaha side event at the 2012 Eureka Poker Tour Zagreb. Hana, is also a former Big Brother Croatia contestant.
Torsten Brinkmann – The German is best known for his runner-up finish at the 2011 EPT Grand Final which earned him over $1.3M dollars.
Juan Manuel-Pastor – The Spanish Team PokerStars Pro has over $750,000 in lifetime earnings with his biggest cash coming when he finished fourth at EPT London in 2011.
Ludovich Geilich – The Scot/German won UKIPT4 Marbella back in June and followed that up with a fourth place finish at EPT London in London.
Yury Gulyy – The Russian has a slew of cashes including a deep run at EPT Deauville this year, an outright win in a £2,000 turbo bounty event at EPT London in March 2013 and another outright win in a turbo side event at EPT Copenhagen in February 2012.

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Hana Soljan pictured at Eureka3 Croatia

Elsewhere Max Silver and David Lappin are side by side and EPT Commentator Marc Convey is sharing a table with Mick Graydon. Other big names I’ve spotted so far include: Team PokerStars Pros Marcin Horecki, Martin Hruby, Christophe De Meulder and Richard Toth, EPT5 Prague champion Salvatore Bonavena, Simeon Naydenov, Sofia Lovgren, Joe Kuether, Robbie Bull, Thomas Ward, Thomas Hall, Dara Davey, EPT7 winner David Vamplew, Steve Watts and Alain Medesan.

Tournament Update:
The tournament is reaching the end of level two
– There are over 80 tables in use
– There’s a waiting list for players to get in.
– They’ll be thankful then to Bernard Lattouf, Tran Duc Hanh, Gokhan Onal, Jesper Brodin, Vlad Lache and Calum Murphy who’ve all busted out of the tournament.

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