Down to 20
by Court on 04.23.09, 5:53 pm
With 21 players left the tournament was put into hand for hand play since the pay jump from 21st to 20th was a difference in $65,370 and $49,025 and the three remaining tables were all playing short handed with 7 players each. Hand for hand play lasted for about 25 minutes until Matt Hyman ended up being eliminated in the 21st place for the $49,025 payout when his pocket fives couldn’t outrun the K8 of Andrew Lichtenberger.
Bertrand “Elky” Grospellier (right) was able to outrun pocket fives in a hand where he was all in against Yevgeniy “Atimos” Timoshenko and on the verge of being eliminated in 21st place when he was all in preflop with AT against Timoshenko’s pocket fives. Elky was able to hit a nine on the river to make a ten high straight and double through Timoshenko to get up to almost a million chips while Yevgeniy dropped to 1.2 million in chips.
Shannon Shorr and Justin Young boomed in the first 90 minutes of play, both winning large pots with pocket kings. Shorr was all in preflop with kings against the A
Q of Andy Miller. Miller picked up a wheel draw on the turn but the river bricked out and Shorr was able to rake in a 2.3 million chip pot. Shorr finished off Miller a few hands later when his A
J held against the T2 that the short stacked Miller had moved in with. Andy finished in 22nd place while Shorr’s stack jumped up to almost 2.5 million.
For Young the pot was against Timoshenko who opened the pot for 75k. Young raised to 245k and Timoshenko put in another raising making it 585k. Young put out the stack of 25k chips to make the call and both players checked the flop and turn to end up with a board reading J72
23. On the river Yevgeniy put out a bet of 675k that Young called immediately. Timoshenko started to turn his hand over, saying what sounded like “queens” but Young tabled his pocket kings and Timoshenko tossed his hand in the muck face down before exposing them. After the pot Young was back atop the chip counts with around 3.5 million in chips and has since built his stack to over 4 million.
The day started with a couple quick bustouts including Brian “tsarrast” Rast busting a short stacked David Grey in 23rd place when his pocket aces held up against the K5 suited that Grey had moved all in with. Nick Binger was the first elimination of the day, falling in 24th place to Scotty Nguyen.
