The PokerStars European Poker Tour (EPT) is in full swing at the Casino San Remo in Italy, the next-to-last stop on its seventh season. With the cards in the air on Saturday, the money bubble had burst and players are taking their share of the €4,786,950 prize pool.
At the start of play on Saturday, Greece’s Georgios Manousos was the chip leader, but a strong contingent of players was in hot pursuit. Carter Phillips, 2009 World Series of Poker Main Event champion Joe Cada, recent North American Poker Tour Mohegan Sun winner Vanessa Selbst, and Victor Ramdin all were within striking distance of Manousos.
Only 144 players took away at least the minimum payday of €7,500 from the €5,000 buy-in tournament, but it took only approximately 45 minutes to work down to the money bubble. The unfortunate “Bubble Boy” turned out to be 2010 EPT Grand Final champion Nicolas Chouity, who got pocket tens – and his chips – to the center of the table against Italy’s Alessandro Fasolis’ pocket queens and failed to hit his two-outer.
Following the elimination of Chouity, players began to drop like flies. Selbst could not continue her excellent run from her Mohegan Sun win earlier this month and was eliminated in 136th place. Sweden’s Ramzi Jelassi, who was among the chip leaders in the early stages of the tournament, was eliminated in 115th place. As the day wore on, such top players as 2010 EPT Prague champion Roberto Romanello (110th place), Ramdin (90th), Casey Kastle (83rd), and Ted Forrest (82nd) joined Jelassi and Selbst as observers from the rail.
As play wound into the late afternoon in Italy, several players began to make their moves into the upper echelons of the leaderboard. Max Heinzelman and Luca Rigano battled to the river over a 550,000-chip pot, with Heinzelman’s flopped top pair of kings run down by the rivered flush of Rigano. Once the pot was pushed towards him, Rigano became the new top dog with over 1.17 million in chips.
Heinzelman would make a recovery in the tournament, and that came at the expense of Manousos. The duo got into a raising war, which was finally capped by the all-in move of Heinzelman as a five-bet. Rather than take on the German, the Greek decided to wait for another opportunity and folded. Heinzelman has been able to use those chips to remain in the middle of the pack of the remaining players.
Perhaps the most impressive mover of the day has been Russia’s Max Lykov. After slowly working his way through the early action on Day 3, Lykov assumed the chip lead after eliminating Canada’s Joe Coraci. Holding an offsuit 6-4, Lykov turned a straight against Coraci, who had been among the top 20 players before this penultimate hand. By eliminating Coraci, Lykov surged into the lead with 1.8 million in chips.
As the remaining 72 players work their way through the final level of Day 3, Lykov and Rigano are at the helm with a host of talented players behind them. Cada remains in the top 15 in 13th place. Heinzelman and Soulier continue to lurk in the background, with 584,000 and 550,000 chips, respectively, and are poised to strike if any of the leaders falter.
EPT San Remo will crown a champion on May 3rd, with the victor taking down a €930,000 first place prize. Following the completion of EPT San Remo, players and EPT officials will have little turnaround time before heading to the Casino Gran Madrid in Spain for the season ending EPT Grand Final from May 7th to 12th.
