Time has just run out in level 8, and at the moment it is still Sylvain Siebert who is leading the field, as he has climbed to nearly 200,000. Marcello Rosa and Jean-Francois Bouchard are also maintaining their position amongst the leaders. Rejean Grenier has joined them recently, as he has been stacking quite a few chips lately, breaching the 100,000 mark.
Photographs from levels 7 and 8:
Thomas Lefort found himself very short-stacked and went all-in from the cutoff for his last 5,725 in tournament chips. Denis Quirion didn’t think too hard about it and just flat called and it looked like both blinds were about to fold when Sylvain Siebert in the big blind thought better of it and tossed in calling chips as well.
The flop was dripping: 
and both live players checked. The dealer turned over the 
and again both players checked. On the river 
Sylvain exclaimed that he won as the betting went check-check once again. Sylvain turned over 
for two pair – which would very often rate to be good in that spot – but Thomas tabled 
for a rivered straight and the triple up.
Jean-Francois Bouchard has been amongst the big stacks for most of this Day 1a, and although he recently lost a few chips, he just took a huge pot of table-mate Jeffrey Cormier to regain a spot atop the leaderboard.
Apart from a preflop raise, action was rather quiet until the turn, with a board showing 
. This is where things blew up, as we saw a raising war between the two players which finished when both of their stacks were in the middle. Jeffrey opened up 
for two-pair, but was drawing dead to Jean-Francois and his set of 
. To add insult to injury, the river brought the 
, filling up both players.
With that pot, Jean-Francois jumped up to over 125,000, which is likely one of the biggest stacks in the room.
Jean-Francois Bouchard
It’s only been half a level since we last did an update on the chip counts, and at the time Sylvain Siebert was in 2nd place holding just north of 100,000. Since then, he has increased his stack to nearly 180,000, putting him in the driver seat of this Day 1a.
Late registration is now over, and this starting flight saw a total of 144 players. Play has been brought down to 9-handed poker, and will remain so until the end of the day.
Sylvain Siebert
Late registration is now closed and there are a grand total of 144 entries in today’s Day 1a. This is typically the smallest (by far) of the starting flights in an event like this – so in fact this is quite a decent total for today.
Two players have jumped out to an early lead as their stacks surpass 100K but the leaderboard trends quickly to smaller stacks and there are quite a few players below the 75K it took to make the leaderboard who are still looking to make a bigger move than just doubling their starting stack.
That being said, there are still a full 7 levels to be played today – more than enough time for someone to build a stack with which to make a run on Day 2.
| Name | Chip Count |
|---|---|
| Stephane Dallaire | 102,500 |
| Sylvain Siebert | 100,500 |
| Leandre St-Laurent | 91,000 |
| Jean François Bouchard | 84,000 |
| Jeffrey Cormier | 75,000 |
| Marcello Rosa | 75,000 |
Play in the Main Event of the Montréal Poker Expo has progressed most of the way through level 6, and at the end of the 15-minute break following this level, late registration will close. During the break we’ll be putting together a leaderboard for today’s starting flight as well as updating the photos of the event.
Sylvain Siebert
There are a few players of note in the field – notable because of past successes here in big events at Playground Poker Club.
Here are some shots of the early action in the Main Event of the Montréal Poker Expo.
Mike Leah is one of Canada’s top poker players and a frequent visitor to Playground Poker Club events, and the Montréal Poker Expo is no exception. He just came to say hello, though, and let us know that he was – unexpectedly – taking a day off today… he ran his KK into AA preflop and the better hand held up.
He was smiling for a few reasons: a) he’s a very experienced player and knows that these things happen; b) he’s just a nice guy; but mostly c) this is a next-day re-entry event, so he didn’t travel to Montreal for nothing – he can go for the win again tomorrow.
Playing Poker Expo Main Event 1A @PlaygroundPoker $1100 buy-in 500k guarantee
Maybe 2 days off or maybe 2 re-entries..
#vamooo
— Mike Leah (@GoLeafsGoEh) August 28, 2015
Tournament staff have made their opening announcements and the dealers and players have taken their place in the Tournament Hall and with that, Event 9 of the Montréal Poker Expo is underway!
So far there are 90 players at the tables, but late registration for the event is open until 4pm and players are understand that late registrants get a full stack, so we expect that attendance will continue to grow throughout the morning and early afternoon.
