LIVE EVENTS

Literally moments after posting our last post – the one referencing the fact that there were only three eliminations to go – three players were eliminated in rapid succession, ending today’s Day 1D flight. Congratulations to those that outlasted their peers! Well done.

More good news: The $100 + $10 Playground 100 has officially surpassed the guaranteed minimum prize pool of $50,000. While the final number will not be available until tomorrow, with another two flights taking place tonight a fair guess would place the prize pool up above $70,000. Who knows, it might go as high as $90,000 or $100,000! Stay tuned to find out.

The player to collect the most chips in today’s action was James Belanger, who managed to amass a whopping 435,000 chips. That will place him in 2nd on the overall Playground 100 leaderboard. Along with Ali Awada (268,000), Jay Srinivasan (248,000) and Richard Drolet (244,000), James will be very well-positioned for Day 2, which will begin tomorrow, Sunday, November 24th at 3:00PM.

Good luck to everyone on Day 2 tomorrow!

We’re about ready to reach the sweet seventeen, the last remaining ten percent of the PG 100’s Day 1D field. However, the crowd has remained locked at 20 players for some time now. Here are some photos of our chip leaders as the group makes the final push. It appears, for the moment at least, that Ali Awada (wearing the Canadiens tuque) leads the field.

On table 45 just now we witnessed a classic showdown, as Aris-Sero Sevahirciyan faced off against Paul Mohorea (pictured below) with only a dozen or so eliminations to go before the bubble. In the end, Paul ended up taking down the hand, and he took virtually all of Aris’s chips in the process, fatally crippling him.

The hand began with a raise to 12,000 from Paul under the gun. It was called by Jay Srinivasan at the cut-off as well as by Caley Michaud on the button. But Aris, sitting in the small blind, shoved for his tournament life with, as we found out later, a pocket pair of jacks. Paul insta-shoved right after (holding aces), and Jay and Caley wisely got out of the way. It was classic versus showdown, and the result was predictable.

The board came down and Paul doubled up. His stack was just a little bit smaller than Aris’s, so there was no elimination during this play, but he was ultimately eliminated a few hands later. Sometimes jacks can pull it off, but not this time.

With just 32 players remaining, this tournament is moving towards its conclusion at lightning speed. And for the first time today, we actually have more than one player with a chip stack equal to more than double the chip average at the break!

At the moment, the player with the most chips is James Belanger, holding steady with a quarter million chips. If he were to finish the day with that amount, he would find himself in 15th place out of the 47 players that have qualified for Day 2 so far – not bad! Hopefully he’ll be able to run up his tally a little higher in the remaining time, putting himself into an even better position. We’ll see!

We recently noticed a multiple all-in situation at table 41 and decided to take a closer look.

Locked into a life-or-death battle were former chip leader Simon Belair-Grondin, Murielle Viau and Christian Brousseau. The hand had started with a mid-position raise to 2,400 that was called by Christian from the cut-off. Simon shoved from the small blind with a small stack, and Murielle shoved overtop to try to force the other two players out. The original raiser folded, but Christian decided to stay, and so it was a battle of three. The players flipped over their cards to await the flop.

Simon:

Murielle:

Christian:

A quick look at the table suggested Murielle’s sailboats would allow her float her way to victory, but a flop gave Christian an open-ended straight. Things did not look so great for Simon however, as only one of two remaining nines in the deck would save him. The turn and river were dealt , and Murielle took down the pot.

Simon, the chip leader from the first break, said goodbye, and he won’t be the last to bow out from the tournament. Indeed, it’s that time of the night. The blinds are creeping steadily upwards and the short-stacks are feeling the heat. Case in point, as we left the table to write up the hand, we heard the dealer utter those fateful words once again: “Player is all-in!”

Play continues…

Just before the break, Patrick M. found himself with only 6,375 chips left in his stack. He decided to shove from under the gun. Although they weren’t exactly blockbuster stakes, the table folded around to Michael Talbot in the big blind. He decided to call, and holding a pair of threes and a larger stack, it was theoretically the correct play.

When Patrick flipped over his cards, it still looked good for Michael. His pair of threes was likely to take down Patrick’s two over-cards, especially with the flop showing an . Patrick would have to pair his nine or his ten, or he would need to get a runner-runner combination of cards to complete a straight. And wouldn’t you know it, that’s exactly what happened, as a came down and helped him scoop the pot!

Patrick was happy to double up, but in the time between this hand and our posting, not only has Patrick been eliminated, but so has Michael! That’s poker!

Play continues…

At the second break, Hani Sawaf finds himself the king of the castle – for now!

In another strange turn of events, Hani happens to be the only player to have accumulated more than double the chip average, sitting pretty with 119,000 chips. The same situation played out at the first break, where Simon Belair-Grondin was the only player from the entire flight to stand out.  With only 65 players remaining, Hani still has a long way to go, but we’re getting closer!

Good luck to all the players as we make our way down to the final 17….

The crowd has officially begun to thin here at Day 1D of the Playground 100. While we still undoubtedly have several hours of play remaining before we reach the final 10%, the 100-player milestone has been passed. With 90 players still at their seats and the blinds steadily rising, the action will no doubt continue to heat up, and the chip stacks will begin to consolidate.

Here are some more pics of the players still in the hunt as we move our way into level 10.

Here at Day 1D of the Playground 100, we’ve seen over 160 entries so far (including 24 re-entries), and the players have now just gone on break. After a quick tour of the tables, an early leader has emerged: Simon Belair-Grondin. In fact, Simon is the only player to have accumulated more than double the chip average of 27,068 chips. You heard that correctly: not a single player has more than 50,000 chips, other than Simon.

This kind of chip spread is very unusual, and we doubt that this configuration will last very long. While it may indicate that the poker talent at this tournament is spread relatively evenly, what it definitely shows is that any player has a chance to rocket their way up the leaderboard to join (or even dethrone) Simon in the near future.

Simon’s 80,000 chips will serve him well now that late registration is about to close. With the end of unlimited rebuys, the action will undoubtedly tighten up as the group is slowly reduced to its final size of 10% of the total number of entries. Our remaining players will battle it out over the course of the afternoon, all of them hoping to become one of the day’s final 17 players. Each of those 17 players will be “in the money,” and will gain a guaranteed spot in the Playground 100’s Day 2.

Day 2 is the final day of the tournament and will kick off tomorrow, Sunday, November 23 at 3:00PM.

Until then, good luck to all of our remaining players!

Here we are barely one hour into play, and the number of entries has already surged from 49 up to 110! Because of the unlimited rebuy structure of this tournament, players have been approaching the game with a slightly looser style of play, as evidenced by the fact that we’ve already seen twelve bust-outs, with six of those players buying back in.

Here are some photos of our competitors in the early levels. If you’re not here already, come on down – there is only an hour left until the registration period closes!

Welcome back to the Playground 100!

Today is Day 1D, the fourth live flight of this event. As it was in the other three live Day 1’s, players will begin with 20,000 chips and a pocket full of dreams. They’ll be playing 10-handed through 20-minute levels, and will continue until the field has been reduced to 10% of its size at the end of late registration. This means that everyone still left with a chip and a chair at the end of the day will have both A) automatically qualified for Day 2, and B) made it “into the money.”

This event permits unlimited rebuys until the end of the registration period, which will close at the beginning of level seven. That means that if you’re reading this right now and are wondering when the last possible moment is that you can register, you’ll need to be here by about 1:00PM at the latest.

So far we have 49 players registered, and we expect to have north of 150 entries by the end of late registration. The first cards have just been dealt and the action is underway. Come on down, now’s your chance to join the fray and battle it out for a piece of the $50,000 prize pool.

Good luck!