Now back from dinner break and midway through Level 4, play continued in the Amazon room with the blinds at 150/300 and an ante of 25. And then there was madness.

One of the chip leaders at the end of last level, Brian “tsarrast” Rast (pictured at left), has been experiencing a rough go for the last hour, as he’s been victim of several three-bets. When we caught up to Brian’s table, his stack had taken a slide from 97K to 83K and he was once again engaged in a pot. He made a preflop raise on the button for 900 and the small blind called him. The big blind, however, reraised and Brian exclaimed, “I’ve only played three hands so far this level. When am I going to get some respect for that?”

In a principled play, he pushed a stack of orange chips in the middle of the table, taking a stand. After the small blind folded, the short-stacked big blind mused, “Well, I haven’t been pushing you around. I’m not gonna lay this down.” Brian then guessed correctly: his opponent held pocket kings to his pocket queens. The flop ran out J-4-4-5-A and Brian shipped the chips his way. He was down to a still-very-respectable 70K stack after the hand.

Moving the opposite way of Brian was Russell “rdcrsn” Carson. When we caught up with Russell’s table, it looked like he had switched up gears to more aggressive play and was taking down small preflop pots. His stack had made small gains, increasing from 19K to 25K in the first half of the level.

Jason “JCarver” Somerville just sent a player to the rail about 30 minutes after players got back from the dinner break. Somerville raised to 1,350 from late position and got re-raised to 3,550 by a player to his left on the button. Somerville called and checked to his opponent on a T83 flop, and his opponent went all-in for 10K. Somerville called and promptly flipped over the nuts with TT, crushing his opponent’s pocket aces. The board ran true for Somerville who was up to 70k.

Court Harrington (pictured at right) moved all-in on a 7-7-5 board with two clubs holding pocket queens while his opponent held A-7. The turn and river were no help for Harrington and he was eliminated midway through Level 4. Others joining him on the rail include Robby “PlayaPlz” Lipkin and Andy “BKice” Seth.

Jon Wein, Jamie “pokerjamers” Armstrong and Jared “TheWacoKidd” Hamby were all seated at the same table when Level 4 began, but Wein was recently eliminated while holding a straight flush. Well, that’s what he wanted us to report. He actually got his remaining 12K in on a flop of 862 with TT against KQ. His opponent hit the Q on the river to cut Wein down to 2K. He called off those chips on the next hand with Q4 in the big blind and was unable to draw out on the small blind’s A9 when the board ran out Q9898. He’s on his way to the bar with Shaun “cougars4444″ Hendrickson, who was on the rail watching.

Armstrong was able to chip up to 31K shortly before Wein’s exit. He raised to 1,050 at 150/300 from early position and the small blind called. On a board of J53, the small blind checked and Armstrong bet 2K. His opponent called and both players checked the Q on the turn. The 5 fell on the river and the small blind check-called a bet of 3,200 by Armstong, who showed AJ and took down the pot when his opponent flashed 77.

Jerry “sandler1860″ Payne took a big hit shortly after dinner when he flat called a player’s raise preflop with pocket tens and the flop came ten high. He smooth called the initial raiser’s bet on the flop and when a K came on the turn his opponent bet again and Payne raised enough to put him all-in. The other player quickly made the call with pocket kings and Jerry was knocked down to 10K. He has been working his way back since then though and the following hand added even more to his stack:

With the blinds at 150/300 ante 25, Payne raised to 800 from the hijack and the player in the cutoff called behind him. Both players checked the flop of 886 and Jerry checked again when the 5 hit on the turn. His opponent bet out 1K and Jerry quickly raised to 3.5K total. The other player made the call and the two saw the river of the A. Jerry moved all-in for his remaining 5K and the other player turned over his JT for a busted flush draw and folded. Any guesses what Jerry showed the table? Presto! Pocket fives…

Here are some chip counts at the middle of Level 4:

David “Bakes” Baker - 107K
Darren Elias - 83K
Mohsin “chicagocards1″ Charania - 78K
David “Raptor517″ Benefield - 66k
Brian “badbeatninja” Devonshire - 55k
Jon Kalmar - 50k
Sorel “Imper1um” Mizzi - 45K
Brian “sbrugby” Townsend - 45k
Tony “tongni” Rivera - 45k
Eric “Rizen” Lynch - 33K
Jamie “pokerjamers” Armstrong - 31K
Felipe “Improved” Montenegro - 31K
Carter “ckingusc” King - 30K
Michael Benvenuti - 30K
Ezra Galston - 28K
Matt “mattg1983″ Graham - 25K
Eric “basebaldy” Baldwin - 22K
Adam “Roothlus” Levy - 21.5K
Patrick Hoffman - 21K
Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier - 21k
Jordan “Octavian_C” Rich - 20.5K
David “davidp18″ Peters - 20K
Phil “USCPhildo” Collins - 18K
Gary “GB2005″ Bogdanski - 17K
Kyle “thetruth503″ Zartman - 16.5K
Jared “TheWacoKidd” Hamby - 16K
Jonathan “driverseati” Tamayo - 15.5K
Aditya Agarwal - 14.5K
Chris “cmoney3″ Kline - 10.5K
Leo “Superfluous Man” Wolpert - 7k
Amit “amak316″ Makhija - 5.5K

• June 11, 2008 -- Lieu Doubles, Saul Busts
• July 10, 2008 -- Porter Picks Up Pot with Pocket Rockets
• July 10, 2008 -- King is Dead
• July 9, 2008 -- Divine Intervention

Many PocketFivers are moving up the chip counts on Day 1C of the WSOP Main Event and look to be in position to make a strong run into the night. They all hope to accumulate a big stack for Day 2.

Sorel “Imper1um” Mizzi’s (pictured at right) stack just took a boost, thanks to scooping two straight solid pots. In Level 3 with blinds at 150-300, Mizzi’s opponent raised to 700 and Mizzi called. His opponent bet 1,200 on a A56 flop and Mizzi raised to 3,200; his opponent called. The turn was the 9 and Mizzi’s opponent checked. Mizzi bet 4,650 and his opponent called. The river was the 2 and action checked to Mizzi, who bet his opponent all-in for his remaining 12k. He called. Mizzi dragged the pot with the T8 for a turned flush.

The next hand, Mizzi called a 900 preflop raise from middle position and took the flop in position yet again. Mizzi’s opponent bet 1,650 on an AJ8 flop and Mizzi called. The turn was the 2 and his opponent bet 5,200; Mizzi called. The river was the 3 and both players checked with Mizzi’s AQ besting his opponents A9. Mizzi’s stack ballooned to 67K after dragging both pots.

Although he got about a two-minute stare down from his opponent on the river, Jason “JCarver” Somerville (pictured at left) was able to win a 20K pot on the river without a showdown. In a limped pot, Somerville’s opponent bet 1K on a T46 flop and Somerville raised to 3,100 and his opponent called. The turn was the 2 and his opponent checked. Somerville bet 5,575 and got called. The river was the A and Somerville put his opponent all-in for his last 10k. Somerville was sitting directly to the left of his opponent, and he put Somerville through the ringer, staring right at him for a few minutes before finally folding. Somerville later told P5’s he turned the nuts with what has become one of his most profitable/favorite hands lately with the 53. Somerville has won an additional 15k since that last pot and currently sits with 57k.

We caught up with Andy “BKice” Seth sitting at his table with 19K, but he told us he had gotten as high as 30K earlier in the day before he took a big hit. He got involved in a hand holding 67 and the flop came out K-10-7 with two spades. A short stack moved all-in for 1.8K into the 2.1K pot and Andy just called. Another player then reraised all-in for 9K more. Seth made the call and learned he was in worse shape than he expected against J9. The flush hit on the river and Seth was knocked back down under his starting stack.

Phil “USCPhildo” Collins also lost a piece of his chip stack recently, but it could have been much worse. On a flop of 865 the player to Phil’s right bet out 3K and Collins made the call. As soon as the J peeled off on the turn, the other player loudly announced his bet of 10K and Phil threw his hands up and flashed his hole cards to his opponent in the process. Phil asked the player if he had pocket jacks and thought momentarily before folding his pocket queens face up. Turns out Collins made a good read–his opponent showed the table his pocket kings as he scooped the pot.

Ladbrokes pros Jon Kalmar and Steve Davis continued their chip races in the last level. As we reported earlier, both cracked the 30K mark before the end of the first level. Now at the end of Level 3, Davis continued to accumulate chips and was up to 41K. Jonas Danielsson, also a Ladbrokes pro, was down to 18K at the break.

Here’s a look at some other notable chip counts:
Brian “tsarrast” Rast - 97K
Darren Elias - 77K
David “Bakes” Baker - 67K
Sorel “Imper1um” Mizzi - 65K
Bryan “badbeatninja” Devonshire - 54K
Tom “werpennstate23″ Cummings - 52K
Mohsin “chicagocards1″ Charania - 51K
David “raptor517″ Benefield - 41K
Kyle “thetruth503″ Zartman - 38K
Ezra Galston - 37K
Eric “Rizen” Lynch - 35K
Carter “ckingusc” King - 35K
Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier - 34K
Jared “TheWacoKidd” Hamby - 32K
Justin “truesyalose” Truesdell - 31K
David “davidp18″ Peters - 31K
Jordan “Octavian_C” Rich - 30.5K
Steve Paul Ambrose - 30K
Phil “USCPhildo” Collins - 27.5K
Scott “stsitron” Sitron - 26K
Patrik “Hoffs28″ Hoffman - 25.5K
Felipe “Improved” Montenegro - 23.5K
Hung “HQrespect” Nguyen - 23.5K
Eric “basebaldy” Baldwin - 22K
Matt “mattg1983″ Graham - 22K
Michael “benvo123″ Benvenuti - 22K
Jonathan “driverseati” Tamayo - 21.5K
Jamie “pokerjamers” Armstrong - 20K
Court Harrington - 19.5K
Andy “BKiCe” Seth - 19K
Russell “rdcrsn” Carson - 19K
Jerry “sandler1860″ Payne - 18.5K
Leo “Superfluous Man” Wolpert - 17K
Gary “GB2005″ Bogdanski - 17K
Chris “cmoney3″ Kline - 15K
Keven “Stamdogg” Stammen - 14.5K
Amit “amak316″ Makhija - 12K
Aditya “Intervention” Argawal - 8.5K
Jon Wein - 6.5K
Scott “SCTrojans” Freeman - 6K

Here were a few departures over the last level:
Derek “blackpipe” Blenman
Joseph “WSOPJoe” May
Justin “zeejustin” Bonomo
Jordan “scarface_79″ Smith
Brent “bhanks11″ Hanks (pictured at right)
Randy “randers” Haddox

• July 6, 2008 -- Main Event Madness!
• June 16, 2008 -- Strong Online Presence Deep in $3K NLHE
• June 12, 2008 -- Greenstein Cracks Competition, Somerville Sinking
• October 14, 2008 -- Mizzi and Sebok Hit the Road

Jordan “Octavian_C” Rich felt the excruciating pain of a one-outer in the past hour. At the 150/300 level, a player in early position limped and Rich (pictured left) raised to 1300 in middle position. It folded to the big blind, who reraised to 3,000 and Rich made the call after the limper folded. The flop brought AJ5 and both players checked. The turn was the 7 and the big blind checked to Rich, who bet 3,300. He was then check-raised all in for 6500 more and made the call with AQ, which had the big blind’s KK drawing to one card in the deck. Sure enough, the K appeared on the river and Rich leaped out of his seat in disgust. He was left with 14K after the hand.

 Justin “truesyalose” Trusdell, who had been sending chips over to David Singer earlier in the day, just shipped more to Steve Jelinek. Jelinek raised to 900 on the button and Truesdell called in the big blind. The flop brought 952 and Truesdell led out for 1,100. Jelinek called and saw the A fall on the turn. Bother players checked and the river was the K. Truesdell bet 1,500 and Jelinek raised to 6,500. Truesdell stared him down for a minute, asking the player if he had the nuts or nothing, and finally folded to cut his stack down to 13.5K.

Keven “Stammdogg” Stammen had quite a wild ride during this level; when we caught up with him before last break, his chip count had soared to 42K.  However, when we went back to the Brasilia Room to check on his play, he sat with only 3.5K in chips in front of him.  Though he was down, Keven was definitely not out as he played aggressively and was unafraid to put all his chips in the middle.  In one hand, from middle position, he pushed his whole stack in the middle and the action folded around to him.  The very next hand, Keven again pushed all his chips out and got a call from the small blind for all 4,350 of his chips.  Keven flipped KQ to his opponent’s JJ, but the board ran out K7629 and he doubled up to nearly 10K.  Still short, Keven was still looking to make a move, but a lot more comfortable in the meantime.

Ezra Galston got a double up at his table when he and another player got it all-in preflop with Galston holding AK to his opponent’s AJ.  The board ran out QT449 and shot Ezra’s stack up to 34K.  Adam “Roothlus” Levy (pictured right) also picked up a few chips without having to go to showdown in a hand where he picked up pocket kings. With the blinds at 100/200 a player raised to 700 and Adam flat called in the cut off and the big blind called as well.  The flop came 9-7-5 rainbow and it checked around to Levy who bet out 1.4K.  The big blind folded and the initial raiser flat called.  Adam told us after the fact that he was afraid his opponent may have flopped a set on him, but when the K hit on the turn his hand improved vastly, but also put two spades on the board.  The other player bet out 2.1K and Levy raised to 6K.  His opponent thought before folding what he claimed was pocket queens and Adam took down the pot.  He currently sits with 23K.

We also caught up with Matt “mattg1983″ Graham, who had a story for us. Graham raised to 750 with A-Q and a woman in seat one made the call. A player in seat 6 then moved all in for more than 11,000. Graham, fearing only the woman behind him, laid the hand down and the woman called with a pair of tens. The “idiot” who moved all in, as Graham referred to him, had K-Q and was eliminated when his hand failed to improve. Matt then said that if he had called he would have been sent packing, as the woman admitted she would have called Graham’s all in as well and would have made a set of tens to trump Graham’s pair of aces. Nice laydown, sir.

Here are the chip counts of some notable P5ers midway through Level 3:

Sorel “Imper1um” Mizzi - 67k
Brian Devonshire - 54k
Tom “werpennstate23″ Cummings - 50.5K
Darren Elias - 50K
Tony “tongni” Rivera - 50k
David “Bakes” Baker - 47.5K
David “Raptor517″ Benefield - 44k
Jason “JCarver” Somerville - 41k
Kyle “thetruth503″ Zartman - 38K
Carter “ckingusc” King - 35K
Jared “TheWacoKidd” Hamby - 33K
Justin “zeejustin” Bonomo - 29k
David “Davidp18″ Peters - 26k
Eric “basebaldy” Baldwin - 26k
Leo “SuperFluous Man” Wolpert - 23k
Joseph “WSOPJoe” May - 23K
Court Harrington - 22.5K
Jon Wein - 22K
Gary “GB2005″ Bogdanski - 18k
Jamie “pokerjamers” Armstrong - 17K
Scott “SCTrojans” Freeman - 12K
Amit “amak316″ Makhija - 12K

Out: Chad “lilholdem954″ Batista, Vivek “psyduck” Rajkumar, Scott “gunning4you” Seiver

• June 25, 2008 -- Pocket Fives No Good to Graham
• June 26, 2008 -- Treacherous Tables in Rebuy
• July 6, 2008 -- BadBeatNinja Disappears Into the Night
• July 5, 2008 -- Main Event Day 1c!

• July 6, 2008 -- Finally Friedberg’s Time
• July 6, 2008 -- Last Chance to Dance
• July 6, 2008 -- Chip Count Chocula
• July 6, 2008 -- Hamby Busts; Sad Pandas at the Rio

Chad “lilholdem954″ Batista has a reputation for speaking his mind, as hasn’t held back so far on Day 1c. Batista got involved in a pot with a player at his table, raising to 275 preflop with blinds at 50/100. A player in middle position called and the cutoff moved all in for almost 3K. Batista made the call and the other player folded:

Batista: A9
Cutoff: 88

The 8 in the door spelled disaster for Batista and he was unable to catch a miracle to drop his stack to 19K. Then came the comments, as Batista began calling the player a “fish” based on previous plays he had made and wasn’t afraid of using expletives to get his point across. The floor was called over and Chad was given a warning, but no penalty — to the dismay of his opponent.

Back to the poker side of things, Ladbrokes pros Jon Kalmar and Steve Davis are off to fast starts. Both cracked the 30K mark before the end of the first level. Kalmar has around 32K while Davis is up to 36K. Here’s a look at some other notable chip counts at the end of Level 1:

Mohsin “chicagocards1″ Charania - 36K
Bryan “badbeatninja” Devonshire - 33K
Jordan “Octavian_C” Rich - 32.5K
Gary “GB2005″ Bogdanski - 31K
Jon Wein - 25K
Sorel “Imper1um” Mizzi - 25K
Eric “Rizen” Lynch - 24K
Felipe “Improved” Montenegro - 22K
James “tobiasjosias” Johnson - 21.8K
Mark “PokerHo” Kroon - 21.5K
Jason “mkind0516″ Laso - 21K
Justin Bonomo - 20K
Amit “amak316″ Makhija - 18.5K
Court Harrington - 18K
Jared “TheWacoKidd” Hamby - 16.7K
Jason “JCarver” Somerville - 16.5K
Micahel “benvo123″ Benvenuti - 16.5K
Jordan “scarface_79″ Smith - 15.5K
Eric “basebaldy” Baldwin - 13K
Jamie “pokerjamers” Armstrong - 12K
Matt “mattg1983″ Graham - 10K

• July 6, 2008 -- Finally Friedberg’s Time
• July 6, 2008 -- Last Chance to Dance
• July 6, 2008 -- Chip Count Chocula
• July 6, 2008 -- BadBeatNinja Disappears Into the Night