Today, 3,389 poker players came to the Rio with $1,500 and a dream. That resulted in a massive prizepool worth $4,575,150.
Of those entrants, only 342 competitors will get paid but a cash will be good for no less than $2,882. One lucky man or woman, however, will walk a way with a whopping $777,928! Even just making the official final table will net you a cool $59,705.
There are still 830 players left though which means less than half of the remaining field will get paid. With only a level and a half left to play tonight, we will likely reach the money tomorrow afternoon. But every player knows that now is the time to accumulate those crucial chips that they will need for the bubble which makes staking focused now as important as ever.
There are 11 tables left still playing in the Amazon Room, but according to tournament personnel they should all be broken and sent to the Pavilion Room before the end of the this level.
We often crown a "Table of Death" during these early stages of tournaments when it is uncommon to find more than one notable at a table. Right now, Tom Dwan, Andrew Lichtenberger, and Sorel Mizzi are all at the same table and all have healthy stacks. We think that easily qualifies as the current "Table of Death".
Recently, they began playing everyone's favorite game, Lodden Thinks. Among the questions they were gambling on included how much it would take for a certain poker professional to walk or run naked from corner to corner of the Pavilion Room butt-naked. After a couple rounds of bidding, Mizzi hit $108,000 and both Dwan and Lichtenberger bought the under. The "Lodden" of the group guessed... $800! Mizzi was a little off. They also took guesses on the biggest bar tab run up by a poker player at a club this summer and how much a gentleman would sell his dog shaped card protector for.
It clearly hasn't destracted the players though. Lichtenberger has over 25,000, Dwan over 45,000 and Mizzi has nearly 60,000 chips. All of those numbers are well over the current average.
Every once in a while, you're going to get cold-decked. Just one of those days at the tables where you don't get anything, then when you get your money in good, someone always has something better.
Then there's the tale Frederik Jensen's demise. You can't call this cold. You can't even call this freezing. This could only be comparative to the climate of Pluto, the outermost planet of the solar system.
As Jensen recalled to us on the rail, he was sitting on about 20,000 coming back from the break, but then ran his pocket tens into pocket jacks. A few hands later, he got it in with , but lost the flip against another opponent's .
Down to his last 5,300 in chips, he shipped them in after a pre-flop raise of 700 with . The other guy snap-called with pocket aces.
I said, "Brrrr, it's cold in here, there must be some Jensens in the atmosphere ..."
Jennifer Leigh is certainly living up to her nickname, coming back from a very short stack at the dinner break to get back up to more than 25,000.
As a little birdie told us, she managed to score a triple-KO holding pocket kings, but she's also managed to pick a few more chips in this recent hand over in the White section.
The action folded around to the player in the cutoff who raised to 1,000 straight; Leigh flat-called from the cutoff, then both players checked the flop of before she fired out 1,300 on the turn of the . The cutoff called, then both players checked down the river .
Leigh showed , which out-kicked the opponent's to scoop the pot.
Maria Ho -- future actress in low buy-in tournaments.
We caught this hand as Maria Ho was calling a 1,225 bet on the flop of . The turn came and both players checked. The river came , the original bettor checked and Ho bet 1,850.
Her opponent tanked and was unsure of his decision. After a few long moments and in a very thick accent said, "You're so good at acting," and mucked his hand.
Ho dragged the pot with a perturbed expression on her face. "What was it about my actions that made you think I was acting?"
With no response from her opponent Ho said, "I'm actually taking acting lessons specifically for $1,500 tournaments." The rest of her table laughed along with her.
, but lost the flip against another opponent's 
. The other guy snap-called with pocket aces.
before she fired out 1,300 on the turn of the 
. The cutoff called, then both players checked down the river 
.
, which out-kicked the opponent's 
to scoop the pot.
. The turn came 
and both players checked. The river came 
, the original bettor checked and Ho bet 1,850.