Vial Claims Day 1d Chip Lead in Record Breaking EPT National in Barcelona; Trofimov, Miles, Sethi Also Through
The final starting flight out of four in total has come to an end to finalize all the numbers. Day 1d of the €1,100 EPT National attracted a record number of 964 players to bring the total number of entries up to 4,682 which surpassed all the records. Out of those 964 players, 195 were allowed to bag and tag their chips for Day 2 as they were done playing and could celebrate the fact that they were all in the money.
Claiming the Day 1d chip lead here in Casino Barcelona is Romain Vial from France who bagged 700,000 in chips after bursting the bubble by eliminating Tobias Leknes. It wasn’t an easy bubble to burst though as both Arthur Conan and Jaroslaw Lipien both doubled up first before Leknes was sent to the rail by the river card which gave Vial a set for the upper-hand.
Vial is followed in the chip counts by Hafthor Hlynsson (667,000), Luis Hernandez (624,000), Daniel Nilsson (616,000), and Andrei Popugaev with 553,000. Other notable players to make it through to Day 2 include Dragos Trofimov, Ran Ilani, Hussein Hassan, Casey Kastle, Aladin Reskallah, Ad Schaap, Chin Wei Lim, and Katie Lindsay.
Tony Miles also found a bag to put 115,000 in chips in after a day of some ups and downs. PokerStars Ambassador Muskan Sethi ended the day with 90,000 in chips which is less than what she had earlier in the day but she still has some room to battle with when she returns to the felt. This was unfortunately not the case for her colleagues like Fatima Moreira De Melo, Andre Akkari, and Maria Konnikova.
When the 702 remaining players return at noon local time on Friday, August 23, they will all be in the money. How much a min-cash is worth exactly is unknown at this point but will be announced at the start of the day. Play will recommence with Level 17 with features a small blind of 3,000, big blind of 6,000, and a big blind ante of 6,000. Level duration will be increased to 60 minutes with a break after every two levels. The rest of the schedule like the dinner break or how many levels will be played in total are to be confirmed.
The PokerNews live reporting team will be roaming the floors to bring you all the live updates until a winner has been found at the end of the road so make sure to return to follow along.