Familiar faces and less so, heated competition, and an award-winning-comedian-turned-poker-enthusiast cracking jokes on every occasion available – a quick summary of the first two days of the PokerStars Championship Monte Carlo €100,000 Super High Roller.
Although poker pros from around the world may have felt tempted to bask into the French Riviera sun, they have chosen the premises of Monte Carlo Casino instead. The €100,000 buy-in high roller tournament, one of the highlights on the schedule of the inaugural PokerStars Championship Monte Carlo, kicked off on April 27.
As one may expect, the tournament drew some of poker’s best and most prominent high rollers, players that have won multiple titles and millions of dollars over the course of their careers. But aside from the familiar poker faces, there was one other participant who also deserves to be paid attention to – American actor and comedian Kevin Hart.
Hart has recently announced his crusade to change the face of poker and he may well be doing this already. The showman-turned-poker-enthusiast was seen at the tables of the PokerStars Championship Bahamas $100,000 Super High Roller this January and has now returned to high stakes poker to participate in the Monte Carlo equivalent of the prestigious tournament. Unfortunately, he was eliminated during Day 2 and will not return for final day play later today.
Speaking of the event’s final day, there are nine players left to contend for the title and the first-place prize of €1,784,500. The nine survivors will have to set the official final table and to determine the champion today.
Here it is important to note that the €100,000 Super High Roller attracted a total of 61 entries, including 14 re-entries. Eight players will end up with a payout, minimum cash totaling €237,950.
The pack of nine is led by none other but US poker pro and absolute high roller smasher Bryn Kenney. The player will start Day 3 with 3,370,000 in chips, followed by Russia’s Viacheslav Buldygin with 2,975,000.
Kenney comes fresh from a victory at Aria Resort & Casino, where he won a $25,000 High Roller a few days ago. And we should not forget that the player had an excellent start to 2017 by winning not one but two high roller tournaments at the inaugural PokerStars Championship Bahamas – the $50,000 No-Limit Hold’em and the $25,500 No-Limit Hold’em Shot Clock. It is yet to be seen whether Kenney has retained his momentum over the past three months and whether he would be able to add a PokerStars Championship Super High Roller title today.
Big poker names like Daniel Negreanu, Igor Kurganov, Dietrich Fast, and Bertrand ‘ElkY’ Grospellier entered the tournament and performed quite well, but busted before the bubble was burst.
And here are the nine finalists who will compete for the important title today:
Bryn Kenney – 3,370,000
Viacheslav Buldygin – 2,965,000
Steffen Sontheimer – 1,910,000
Martin Kabrhel – 1,630,000
Isaac Haxton – 1,260,000
Ole Schemion – 1,250,000
Sam Greenwood – 1,150,000
Daniel Dvoress – 950,000
David Peters – 800,000
