MainEventTravel CEO Fraser MacIntyre is on a roll at the WSOP! After finishing 237th out of a staggering 7,761 entries in the Millionaire Maker for $6,043, our affable leader is now on Day 2 in yet another event – the £1k Pot Limit Omaha!
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Fraser, who bagged up 111,100 last night, reported on facebook: “In the money, and on to day two, in the 1k PLO tournament. Around 100 players left. I've got around double the average stack. Back tomorrow for a run at a final table.” Fraser recently came second to Catalin Pop in the 888Live Make It Big Festival €2,200 High Roller in Barcelona.
There were 1,058 entries for the WSOP PLO (event #25) with159 players paid, and $179,126 for the winner. Aside from our illustrious leader, other big names left in the field include Bruno Politano (51,200), Michael Mizrachi (153,800), Dan Heimiller (16,800), Tony Cousineau (24,000) and Jason Wheeler (92,000). None of them come close to the monster stack of Casey Carroll however who will be back today with 210,800.
Fraser had his aces cracked in the Milly Maker. There are now just 14 players left in that event, chasing a first prize of $1.2m.
The first two weeks of the World Series have seen some exciting wins. Love won through in the $10k Tag Team Championship when Liv Boeree and her long-term boyfriend Igor Kurganov beat Ankush Mandavia and Joe Kuether (who are close but NOT in love) for $136,982 and their first WSOP bracelet. Frank Kassella won the $1,500 No Limit 2-7 Lowball, John Racener took down the $10k Dealers Choice Championship – featuring a mix of 19 different games, and John Monette has just won the $10k No-Limit 2-7 Lowball Draw.
The biggest story of this summer’s WSOP so far is Global Player of the Week Adrian Mateos. The young Spaniard was primed for a stellar World Series of Poker before he began his WSOP campaign. He narrowly missed a PokerStars Championship High Roller event final table in Monte Carlo, then final-tabled two Aria high rollers, and had a second- and ninth-place finish in two other $10K events. And that was just in May.
Mateos won the $10k Heads-Up Championship for $324,470, allowing him to stake claim to his third WSOP bracelet and the title of youngest player to earn three bracelets, previously held by Dominik Nitsche.
Prodigy, phenom, wizard, and genius have all been used to describe Mateos who, at just 22 years old, has racked up $9,172,532 in live tournament winnings. He is now just $3m shy from claiming Spain's leading money winner title from WSOP Main Event champion Carlos Mortensen. "I know that I am not far behind," Mateos said. "It would be nice to catch him. It would be really good for my career if I could become number one."
Beyond the Rio
Outside of the Rio, Christoph Vogelsang won the ARIA Super High Roller Bowl for $6 million. He beat American pro Jake Schindler to win the $300k event, nearly doubling his career live cashes to almost $14 million. Surprisingly, it was his first live win. The high roller mainstay had previously done no better than third at the 2014 $1,000,000 High Roller for One Drop for $4.4 million. Along with his ARIA prize, the German high stakes pro (now #2 on his country’s all time money list) won a $13,500 World Series of Poker Main Event package provided by 888poker.
The Planet Hollywood poker series was the festival to get underway in Vegas this summer and MainEventTravel ambassador Simon Deadman was its first winner – taking down the the Goliath Phamous Stack event for $54,993 after beating a field of 397 players.
The Venetian’s DeepStack Extravaganza III is also notching up winners including Brian Altman who took down the $1k SuperStack for $106,479 and David Stamm who won the $10k High Roller for $306,554 and Nadar Kakhmazov, who beat a 3,273 field to win the $1k MSPT Main Event for $440,029.
Other festivals taking place around the city include the Grand Poker Series at the Golden Nugget, Binion’s Poker Jam and the Wynn Summer Classic.