Eric Zhang outlasted a field of 1,738 in the $500 event to take home $102,465. The player casually wrote his first live cash ever with a win, and a bracelet!
“I always loved poker but I only started playing a couple years ago, mainly cash games, not really tournaments.”, Zhang said. “But the WSOP is always a very special occasion and I took some time off work because I really wanted to come here. This is the very one event I planned of playing. It’s an affordable event, plus a great cause, and I’m going on vacation to Morocco and Europe right after.”
Eric Zhang
Elsewhere in the Rio
In the $1,000 event #65: MINI Main Event No-Limit Hold’em, five players remain from the original 3,821. Georgios Sotiropoulos leads the pack and will try to put his hands on the $432,575 top prize.
Twelve players will return for the end of the $10k Event #66: Pot-Limit Omaha Hi-Lo 8 or Better Championship. Danny Chang leads the debates with a decent advance on his opponents. Two players with a 2021 bracelet will have their chance to make a double: Anatolii Zyrin (4th) and Josh Arieh (5th) but all will battle fiercely for the $484,791 victory.
Doyle Brunson, Main event winner in 1976 and 1977
Mustapha Kanit took the chip lead in the $10k 2021 WSOP Main Event day 1A. Doyle Brunson also made a new appearance this year, his first in the Main Event since 2013, and he will move on to Day 2 with 151,000 in chips! Doyle last bracelet was in 2005 when he won a $5,000 No-Limit Hold’em 6-Handed.
The $50k is closely approaching its end as five players have their chance for the title but the final table will only resume on Friday. Elezra took the lead yesterday, and is followed by Paul Volpe, Chris Brewer and Dan Cates, all with a similar stack. Ryan Leng is 5th with a significantly shorter stack. All five have secured $211,235 but they will of course try to put their hands on the top $954,020 prize.
Two weeks ago, 22-year old Cole Ferraro finished in second place to Dalibor Dula in Event #22: $1,000 Freezeout No-Limit Hold’em, and today he closed the deal and beat a 3,916 entries field in the $600 event for $252,491.
Some words from Ferraro after his win: “I moved out to Las Vegas in May, after I graduated college I got a part-time job and played about four to five times a week. This trip to the World Series was a trial of sorts, but given everything that has happened over these two weeks I think it will supersede my other job.”
Cole “Peaking” Ferraro
Event #62: Pot-Limit Omaha Hi-Lo 8 or Better (8-Handed)
Kevin Gerhart makes the second double this year, after Anthony Zinno, by winning the $1,500 event #62! If you remember, Gerhart won the $10k H.O.R.S.E. Championship some days ago, totaling now four WSOP bracelets and putting him 52nd in the bracelet race. 725 entries were recorded and Kevin will add $186,789 to his account.
“It’s absolutely amazing,” Gerhart told PokerNews. “It’s unreal and more than I ever could have expected. All these different mixed disciplines are so much more fun than playing No-Limit Hold’em.”
Gerhart added some tips for PLO8 lovers: “PLO8 is hugely about just applying maximum pressure on your opponents and making them fold. Equities run so close in that game that even if you get the smallest edge by being more aggressive than your opponent, you have to take it.”
There were 579 entries in this $5,000 tournament, and in the end it’s the Finnish pro Eelis “EEE27” Parssinen, an elite online cash game player, who came on top of the event for $545,616.
“I don’t play these live tournaments too often. I wouldn’t consider myself as a live player,” Parssinen said. “I like to play live, but, I mean, this is my fifth WSOP tournament ever and there is so much luck involved.”
After making his first WSOP cash in the Seniors event #52, Frenchman Jean-Luc Adam wrote a second line in his book to claim his first bracelet and $255,623. The player has live results since 2010 but never cashed for more than $21k.
“I’m dreaming. It’s very strange, a strange sensation,” said Adam. “I felt good for all of the tournament and I felt very relaxed…I never think about first place, but only play every hand. It’s a very nice moment…I like to play for pleasure. I like to have emotion. It’s a very strange sensation for me because I don’t realize that it’s a world championship. It’s very unbelievable, I don’t understand now. It’s too soon, I just finished the tournament. I can’t realize exactly everything now.”
Jean-Luc Adam
Event #59: TAG TEAM No-Limit Hold’em
The team composed of Mike Ruter and Samy Dighlawi took down the $1,000 duo event for a combined prize of $113k. 641 teams took the start of the event for a total prizepool of $590,490. Both players cumuled more than $300k since their beginnings, Mike Ruter playing since 20 years, his buddy SamyDighlawi being pretty active since 2013.
Online Event #6: WSOP.com Online Bracelet
John Ripnick defeated an online field of 720 unique entries, plus 309 rebuys, to earn the online bracelet and the $114,898 winning prize. John is more used to the online field as he has 25 WSOP online cashes as his live total earnings stands at $25k.
Event #60: Poker Players Championship 6-Handed
Only ten remain in one of the biggest event of the year. Ryan Leng, winner this year of the $1,500 Event #23: Eight Game Mix, is in the chip lead, followed by Josh Arieh, who also won a bracelet this year, the $1,500 Event #39: Pot-Limit Omaha. Here are the other players sorted by stack size: Nick Schulman, Eli Elezra, Matt Glantz, Dan Cates, Paul Volpe, Chris Brewer, Daniel Negreanu and Mike Wattel. They will return today to put their hands on the $954,020 top prize.
Anatolii Zyrin succeeded in taking over the largest field this year to grab his second bracelet. He won his first bracelet two years ago in the $1,500 Omaha Mix for nearly $200k. The player has just crossed the $2M in live earnings, mainly by playing in Russia, Cyprus and Czech Republic.
By winning the $10k championship event, Brian Yoon pocketed $240,341 and his fourth bracelet! His previous wins were $1M in the 2017 Monster Stack, $600k in a $5,000 No-Limit Hold’em in 2014 and another $600k in 2013’s Little One for One Drop. The player now has more than $5M in total live earnings.
Brian Yoon
Still in progress
In the $1,000 event #58: SUPER SENIORS we unfortunately lost Sammy Farha, who busted in 66th place for $3,678, and also Dan Shak in 97th for $2,583. David Slaughter will return with the chip lead at 65 left.
36 players remain in the prestigious $50k event #60: Poker Players Championship 6-Handed. George Alexander has the lead, and is notably followed by Paul Volpe (5th), Brian Rast (6th), Dan Cates (8th) and Anthony Zinno (9th) in the top 10. Many more big names follows but will they be able to take their chance?
Timofey “Trueteller” Kuznetsov
To end this recap, let’s have a look at the cashes leaderboard!
After 5,404 entries and 5 days of play, the $1,000 event came to an end with Robert McMillan taking the bracelet and $561k. This win is pretty huge for him as it nearly doubles his total live earnings, but the player is no stranger of live tournaments as the Robert has more than 100 cashes on his profile.
Robert McMillan
Event #56: 6-Handed No-Limit Hold’em Championship
A fourth bracelet is now in the hands of Ben Yu who came on top of a shark filled event, with 329 entries were registered and a $3M prizepool. The player now cumulates $7,3M in live earnings and passes Mike Matusow in the bracelet rankings.
Unfortunately for them, Matt Berkey (8th), JJ Liu (13th) and Sam Grafton (16th) were close but could not reach the top.
Ben Yu
Elsewhere in the Rio
Many events are in progress at the moment, especially the massive $400 COLOSSUS No-Limit Hold’em and its 9,399 entries now has 49 players left. A few bracelet winners will return to get some more: Anatolii Zyrin, Vincas Tamasauskas, Brett Apter and Carlos Chang. All will try to put their hands on the $314,705 top prize.
Eleven players battle for the win in the $10k Event #57: Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw Championship, including chip leader Danny Wong, Joao Vieira (4th) and Dan Smith (11th).
The legend
Also, the now 88-years-old Doyle Brunson returned for a quick appareance at the world series in the $1,000 SUPER SENIORS No-Limit Hold’em, but unfortunately he did not make it to day 2, contrary to the High Stakes Poker mythical character Sammy Farha who bagged a large stack for day 2.
We will return with more updates, including news from the $50k Poker Players Championship 6-Handed who just started!
