Despite a hefty 50k buy-in, a handful of online kids are making a run at perhaps the most prestigious bracelet in the WSOP in the 50k HORSE Championship WSOP Event #45.

Although the majority of online players in this tournament are those with a high stakes cash game background, a few players more known for their NL tournament games are playing like James “mig.com” Mackey, Justin “zeejustin” Bonomo and Dario Minieri.

The 148 player field is stacked with incredible tables as expected. No table featured a better lineup of elite players than the one that included two of the biggest winners online in Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond (pictured left) and Tom “durrrr” Dwan with two of the biggest live game winners in Daniel Negreanu and Phil Ivey. Dwan, Galfond, and Ivey play each other often in nosebleed NL and PLO game online as well.

Mackey has faired very well at his table that includes a tough cast of characters in David Oppenheim, Andy Bloch, Lyle Berman, Jennifer Harman, David Singer, and online cash game player Brian “tsarrast” Rast. Mackey’s stack has been over the average for most of the tournament and is at 209k as play nears to an end.

Here’s a list of notable online players chip stacks with the average at 105k.

Phil Galfond - 185k

Patrik Antonius - 180k

Dario Minieri - 140k

Brian “tsarrast” Rast - 100k

Justin “zeejustin” Bonomo - 81k

Nick Schulman - 70k

Matt “Hoss_TBF” Hawrilenko - 55k

• June 26, 2008 -- Top of the Chip Counts or Bust!
• June 26, 2008 -- Mackey Riding High
• June 27, 2008 -- A Player Makes a “FatalError”
• June 27, 2008 -- Stud Players Wanting Tang

Several notable online players returned for Day 2 of the $1.5K NLHE event only to make an early exit shortly after play began.  One such player was Phil “USCPhildo” Collins (pictured at right) who found himself in a race situation pre-flop with pocket jacks versus another player’s A-Q.  The A-Q ended up victorious and Phil busted in 131st place.  Here is a list of notable players who were recently eliminated:

Aaron “NDGrinder59″ Steury - 163rd for $3,340
Kevin “ImaLuckSac” Macphee - 140th for $3,340
Phil “USCPhildo” COllins - 131st for $3,340
Daniel “voff” Deveau - 130th for $3,340
Dag Martin “dmikkel” Mikkelson - 128th for $3,340
Justin “jurollo” Rollo - 117th for $4,008
Gary “GB2005″ Bogdanski - 114th for $4,008
Jordan “scarface79″ Smith - 112th for $4,008

While those players are now free to roam the halls, as we saw Annette “Annette_15″ Obrestad doing earlier today, several other players remain in contention for the bracelet and are continuing to build their already large chip stacks.  Owen “ocrowe” Crowe is still the chip leader with 170K, but Chris “SLOPPYKLOD” Klodniki (100K) and Cody “thugmoneymkr” Slaughbaugh (95K) are towards the top of the leaderboard as well.

Over in the Amazon Room, Kevin “BeL0WaB0Ve” Saul (pictured at left) was among the casualties in Level 3 of today’s $2,000 Pot-Limit Hold’em event.  First, Saul lost the majority of his stack to Dario Minieri.  With the blinds at 75/150, Minieri raised to 700 in a limped pot from middle position and Saul re-raised to 2200 on the button. Action folded around to Minieri, who asked Saul, “You always think I have nothing?,” before moving in for his last 4000.  Saul made the call with JJ, which was way behind the QQ of Dario. The board ran out AK66A and Minieri added “This is the same hand I won my bracelet with” as he raked in a pot worth over 9K.
 
Saul was left with close to 800 chips following the hand and got the rest of it in two hands later. He raised to 450 preflop and got calls from Eli Elezra and another player.  Saul pushed in his last 350 on a flop of 983 and both players called.  By the river, he was holding his cards directly above the muck, waiting for Elezra to turn over his straight, and Saul was eliminated.
 
Others exiting Event #38 during the past level were Jon “FieryJustice” Little, Chris “moorman1″ Moorman and Justin Bonomo.

• June 21, 2008 -- Back from the Break
• June 20, 2008 -- Gary vs. Gray
• June 19, 2008 -- Bowker Goes Busto
• July 10, 2008 -- Levy’s Ruthless Pursuit of Chips

Event #31 came to a close when heads-up opponents Dario Minieri (pictured at right)and Seth “grtwhitehoop” Fischer both got it all in preflop after seeing nearly 200 hands at the final table. Fischer flipped KT to Minieri’s QQ and the board came AA523, which was no help to Fischer. Minieri won the bracelet, the bragging rights, and a cool $528,418. Fischer goes home with $330,519 - not bad for the 25-year-old Emory grad’s first year at the WSOP.

As the Event #32 $1.5K No-Limit Hold’em tournament reduced down to three tables, Scott “ssitron” Sitron sat with 175K and was aggressively playing position from the hijack. The next hand, Sitron raised 27K and took down a limped pot with no show. Shortly afterwards, Sitron raised 30K preflop under the gun, which was quickly called by the hijack and both of the players in the blinds. The flop came 629 and Sitron moved all in. The player in the hijack position called and both of the blinds folded. Sitron couldn’t conceal his disappointment when he showed KQ to his opponent’s pocket nines; when the turn and river came A8, he was eliminated in 20th place. Sitron takes home $15,095 for his efforts.

PocketFivesLive’s own Court Harrington (pictured at left) remained in the bracelet running shortly after Sitron’s elimination; after two subsequent eliminations, players redrew for seats at the two final tables. With about 140K in chips and the blinds at 6K/12K, Harrington needs to make a move soon as the average stack is 460K. Good luck, Court!

• June 18, 2008 -- Let the Belittling Begin
• June 18, 2008 -- Sitron’s Good With the Ladies
• June 19, 2008 -- An Evening of Studs
• June 18, 2008 -- BigRiskky Business as Usual

Fabrice Soulier, Morgan Machina and Phil Hellmuth have all been moved to Scott “ssitron” Sitron’s table in the $1,500 No-Limit Hold’em event — all of whom made the final table of the same event last year. Hellmuth (pictured left) is the defending champion and earned $637,254; Machina took fourth for $161,425 and Soulier seventh for $64,570. The table banter picked up right as soon as Phil sat down:

Hellmuth: “Me, Fabrice and Morgan are all back here again and you know why? Because we play good.”
Ray Henson (also seated at the table): “Why am I here, Phil?”
Hellmuth: “You probably sucked out.”

Sitron has remained quiet, picking up a few small pots here and there and is now sitting with 215K with the average stack at around 90K. He recently knocked Lisa Rosenbloom out of the tournament when she moved in for her last 14K with QJ and was unable to improve against Sitron’s AK. Michael “worldsgrtest” Banducci and Court Harrington are seated side-by-side at a nearby table. Banducci has 100K and Harrington is still hovering around 60K with 75 players still in fighting for the first place prize of $573,734.

The antics continued at Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond’s table after players returned from the most recent break in the $1,500 Pot-Limit Omaha w/Rebuys. The table still includes Galfond, Jared “TheWacoKidd” Hamby, Scott “BigRiskky” Clements, and Jamie Gold. Gold and Galfond recently tangled in a hand. Both players checked the flop of 5-5-3 with two clubs and checked again then the T came on the turn. After the 2 came on the river, Galfond checked and Gold made a pot sized bet of 4,050. He then became unusually engrossed in his Card Player magazine while Galfond contemplated his options. At one point Gold even turned to his right and started showing one of the articles to Clements and the two hovered over the magazine together.

Galfond eventually made the call and showed the king high flush and Jamie quickly mucked. He then began to mock Galfond for taking so long to make the call with the second nut flush. He added “I know we haven’t played together a lot, but it is me. I mean, come on, that is a pretty easy call.” Gold was left with less than 2K in chips.

Here are some other unofficial chip counts from the event:

Tim “tmay420″ West - 48K
Brock “t_soprano” Parker - 35K
Jimmy “gobboboy” Fricke - 28K
Dan “Stainley88″ Adams - 20K
Scott “BigRiskky” Clements - 19K
Jared “TheWacoKidd” Hamby - 19K
Eric “Rizen” Lynch - 16.5K
Jamie “TheNew” Robbins - 15K

In the $2.5K 6-handed NLHE event, the final table has been cut in half and Dario Minieri, Scott “grtwhitehoop” Fischer and Justin “fluffdog” Filtz remain. Minieri is still the chip leader, but Filtz made up some ground recently after Dario doubled him up.

• June 19, 2008 -- Super Dario Powers Up!
• June 18, 2008 -- BigRiskky Business as Usual
• June 18, 2008 -- Slow Day
• June 18, 2008 -- Sitron’s Good With the Ladies

Nearly ten feet away from about a dozen fans watching his every move, Dario Minieri’s aggressiveness had the floor staff searching for chip racks.

With chips stacked six racks high and a colony of chips left on the felt in front of him, Minieri (pictured right) has seen his chip stack go from 300k to 1.8 million in the last two rounds of the 2.5k 6-max NL WSOP Event #31.

Minieri has been raising nearly every pot and his fearlessness has got him busting opponents with hands as weak as middle pair that were good.

Minieri’s aggressiveness has even made Scotty Nguyen merely an onlooker sitting to Minieri’s right. Despite not playing many hands, Nguyen’s mouth was as active as always, reporting to the players at the other table about Dario’s demolition derby.

“The young gun is taking em’ all down baby,” said Nguyen in his standard high pitch tone.

Play is down to one seven-handed table, breaking when one more opponent busts. Minieri has roughly a third of the chips in play.

Frank “Round42″ Rusnak busted out right before the consolidation when his 3-bet all-in preflop with AK was called by 88 and Rusnak failed to improve taking home 38k.

Rusnak’s stack had been on a nosedive prior to his elimination, going from 650 to 200k after he lost two preflop all-in hands with his pocket tens to pocket kings and his pocket jacks losing to Seth “grtwhitehoop” Fischer’s utg shove with pocket queens.

Justin “Fluffdog” Filtz (500k), Seth “grtwhitehoop” Fischer (320k), and Scotty Nguyen (400k) will also be battling Minieri’s stack to make the final table.

The $10K Limit Hold-em has come to an end and Rob Hollink of the Netherlands is the world champion. He defeated Jerrod Ankenman, co-author of the Mathematics of Poker, after a lengthy heads up match and will be taking home $496,931 in addition to the bracelet.

Shortly after Hollink was awarded his bracelet, John Phan was given a bracelet of his own for taking down the $3K No Limit Hold Em event.  This was definitely the hot ticket tonight at the Rio as a crowd of people, including Joe Sebok and Jason “jp osu” Potter, gathered around Phan and his heads up opponent, Johnny Neckar.

The crowd reached its peak when it was announced by the tournament director that the two players had both agreed to move all-in dark on the next hand.  The dealer then dealt out the flop, turn, and river and the two players took turns revealing their hole cards.  This continued for a couple of hands, including one in which Phan doubled up when his 7 high was good against Neckar’s 2-4, before the two returned to a more conventional game of poker.  Only a few minutes later the duo got it all in pre-flop with Phan holding A9 and Neckar holding QJ.  An ace on the river sealed the deal for Phan and he was awarded the bracelet and first prize of $434,789.

• June 18, 2008 -- Minieri and Rusnak Closing in on Final Table
• June 19, 2008 -- Super Dario Powers Up!
• June 18, 2008 -- Let the Belittling Begin
• June 18, 2008 -- Sitron’s Good With the Ladies