The field reduced to the final 109 on Day 5. The finale is getting closer!
Houston based player, Michael Dyer accumulated more than 12 million chips by the end of Day 5, giving him a 3.5 million lead over 3-time bracelet winner, Brian Yoon in the second place. Yoon is followed closely by four-time Circuit ring winner, Jeff Trudeau, they have 8,395,000 and 8,305,000 respectively, while two additional players sit on more than 7 million, Israel’s Hari Bercovici has 7,650,000 and Belgium’s Bart Lybaert bagged 7,530,000.
Dyer managed to hit a lucky river in a huge hand, resulting in the bust-out of former November-niner, Cliff Josephy. The stacks were in the middle before the flop with Josephy holding KK against the AK of Dyer’s. The 635 board seemed pretty safe for Cliff, but the A on the river changed everything. Josephy busted in 123rd place for $57,010
As Michael explained later: "I beat Johnny Bax with ace-king versus kings. He had a ton of chips, I had a little more, and it didn’t really matter if I lost. It isn’t fun if I lose [the hand], but I still would’ve had about 2.5 [million]. He had too many chips where I could five-bet, and he could four-bet…”
There were some other notable hands some of them involving Denmark’s Frederik Jensen. He got extremely lucky in a huge pot when his Kings managed to outdraw Aces in a pre-flop confrontation.
"I got lucky as well. I had aces against kings for a huge pot, and after that, the guy tried to bluff me, and I figured it out. I made the call after 15 minutes; I think the table counted it at 15 minutes. They didn’t even call the clock. One guy said, ‘There was such a huge pot, we could have waited 35 minutes.’" he said afterward "The folds I made – I made a huge fold that let me keep the largest part of that [stack] in this tournament. I was pretty satisfied with that."
Frederik is waiting for Day 6 in 15th place with 5.5 million chips. Having almost $4 million in tournament earnings, Jensen himself is a seasoned pro: "I think this is my 13th summer here playing. I love different poker tournaments. But I didn’t do so good over here, so I hope it’s time for redemption, and that I make a huge cash here."
Even though many have busted, some well-known players are still in: Ben Pollak, Ival Luca, Joe Cada, Shannon Shorr, Shaun Deeb and James Obst are all amongst the remaining players. The play will continue on Saturday, July 14.
