Level 5 will begin after the current break, and 3 players have reached the 100K mark after 4 hours of play in this Main Event of the PokerStars Canada Cup. They hold a solid lead over the field, as the next biggest stacks all fall below the 80K chip mark.
Rayan Chamas 
Stephane Racine 
Benoit Forcier
Twitter is widely used amongst poker players as it a great way to keep your rail informed of how you are doing in tournaments. We’ve been seeing a lot of Tweets show up on our Playground page from players that are either on their way here, sitting at the tables, or were recently eliminated. Here are a few we’ve come across early in this second flight to the PokerStars Canada Cup Main Event:
Playing the main event of Canada Cup @PlaygroundPoker ! Great event!!!
— Jason Duval (@bebe_chien) May 23, 2014
Ruff start here In Montreal.22k from 30 going to 75-150 with ante
— Ronnie Bardah (@RonnieBardah) May 23, 2014
Absolutely brutal day!! After jumping to 45k, I then lost with KK KK QQ QQ 99…a flush…and a straight flush draw. #PokerStarsCanadaCup
— Josh Kimmel (@Josh_Kimmel) May 23, 2014
Out AQ < AK again. Flop A 2 9. Turn Q, I get it in. River K #ontothenextone
— Steven Kerr (@SkinnySteve) May 23, 2014
Can confirm that @PlaygroundPoker is run extremely well and is the best poker room in Canada.
— Timothy Adams (@Tim0theeAdams) May 23, 2014
Grinding the pokerstars Canada cup at the best run poker room that I’ve ever played in @PlaygroundPoker #Montreal
— sol bergren (@sollucas) May 23, 2014
Day 1b of the Main Event of the PokerStars Canada Cup is now on break after 2 levels, and the following 5 players are currently leading the tournament:
Here are a few more photos taken prior to the break:
Day 1b of the PokerStars Canada Cup Main Event has entered level 2, and 123 players have taken their seats so far today. If we do some math, we could see that there is looking to be some overlay in this $2 million guaranteed event, which is always good for the players! We have combined total of 252 total entries so far, with still a few hours left to register today, and tomorrow will be the third and final flight for this Main Event.
Here are a few photographs from the early stage of Day 1b:
It’s almost time for the second of three flights to begin of the Pokerstars Canada Cup Main Event here at Playground Poker Club, and 129 players took their seats yesterday in Day 1a to participate in this tournament that features a $2 million guaranteed prizepool!
A few poker icons have already made their appearance in this series so far, such as former world champion Jonathan Duhamel, #1 all-time on the money list Antonio Esfandiari, Pokerstars pro Marc-André Ladouceur, Michael Watson, Jeffrey Dale Gross, the Greenwood brothers – Lucas and Sam, David Yan, Yann Dion, to name a few. Many local Québec poker pros have also made their way over the poker club to take a chance at what will be a very impressive top prize.
The cards will be in the air in just under 15 minutes, and players are already streaming in to take their seats for this Day 1b of the Main Event.
Here’s a look at what we found on our Twitter feed this morning.
Here we go at the best place to play @PlaygroundPoker @PokerStars #CanadaCup 30k chips, 50/100 blinds, hr levels. Cvg on Playground site.
— Ryan Hall (@RGHall) May 23, 2014
On my way to fire the @PlaygroundPoker Main Event .Should be lots of fun! — Ronnie Bardah (@RonnieBardah) May 23, 2014
Got a good nights sleep. Playing Day 1b of @PokerStars Canada Cup at @PlaygroundPoker today at 11am #LetsDoThis pic.twitter.com/JX5DxhuEbF — Steven Kerr (@SkinnySteve) May 23, 2014
Did not win the @wsop National Championship, did not make day 2 either… Off to @PlaygroundPoker for the Canada Cup #ontheroadagain — Mike Leah (@GoLeafsGoEh) May 23, 2014
Day 1a of the Main Event of the PokerStars Canada Cup started at 11am on May 22 and played through 10 hour-long levels before the remaining players bagged their chips to take to Day 2, on Sunday. Of the 129 players who started today, 47 remained at the end of the day.
Players who did not manage to qualify for Day 2 today may re-enter the tournament either (or both) tomorrow and/or Saturday.
| Rank | First Name | Last Name | Chip Count |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Jeremy | Thompson | 260,000 |
| 2 | Marco | Caza | 191,400 |
| 3 | Marc Andre | Ladouceur | 174,400 |
| 4 | Steven | Silverman | 163,200 |
| 5 | Amer | Sulaiman | 158,800 |
| 6 | Gary | Lucci | 154,300 |
| 7 | William | Molson | 152,200 |
| 8 | Lucas | Greenwood | 150,000 |
| 9 | Pierre | Guenette | 149,000 |
| 10 | Danny | Boyaci | 135,200 |
| 11 | Johnny | Mazzaferro | 118,900 |
| 12 | Chaayanath | Mysore | 110,000 |
| 13 | Robert | Perlaki | 100,700 |
| 14 | Fuad | Nasser | 94,900 |
| 15 | Shawn | Patrick Brien | 91,500 |
| 16 | Paul Theodore | Klann | 85,800 |
| 17 | Robert | Cohen | 79,000 |
| 18 | Jonas | Mackoff | 78,800 |
| 19 | Carter | Swidler | 76,600 |
| 20 | Stephan | Langevin | 76,300 |
| 21 | Kevin | MacDonald | 72,300 |
| 22 | Jean-Philippe | Piquette | 71,200 |
| 23 | Jeremie | Bilodeau | 70,200 |
| 24 | Tomio | Tran | 70,000 |
| 25 | Viktor | Leonov | 69,000 |
| 26 | Daniel | Dvoress | 66,000 |
| 27 | Zennawi | Petros | 63,400 |
| 28 | Benoit | Pesant | 63,300 |
| 29 | Rich | Caplan | 59,700 |
| 30 | Andrew | Chen | 57,800 |
| 31 | Spencer | Stacey | 56,200 |
| 32 | Gurkiran | Mangat | 55,800 |
| 33 | Murad | Khan | 54,000 |
| 34 | Aki | Votkin | 45,000 |
| 35 | Daniel | Denghel | 43,300 |
| 36 | Jeffery | Rossiter | 42,000 |
| 37 | Ronald | Laplante | 40,200 |
| 38 | Jeffrey Dale | Gross | 39,100 |
| 39 | Alain | Dion | 38,000 |
| 40 | Claude | Comtois | 37,700 |
| 41 | Sasa | Stancic | 35,700 |
| 42 | Andrei | Cristescu | 25,600 |
| 43 | Jean-Philippe | Matte | 23,400 |
| 44 | Chris | Back | 19,200 |
| 45 | Thomas | Thomas | 17,500 |
| 46 | Ronald | Eaton | 17,300 |
| 47 | John | Andress | 16,800 |
The players are well into level 10, which is the final level to be played in Day 1a of the PokerStars Canada Cup Main Event. After a gruelling 10 hours of poker there are just 52 players left in the action.
There have been some big eliminations in the last level or so, but none bigger than Jonathan Duhamel, who tweeted about his experience:
From chip leader at dinner break of @PokerStars Canada Cup to busto in 3 hours… thats hurts, back tomorrow for day 1B #GoHabs
— Jonathan Duhamel (@JonathanDuhamel) May 23, 2014
Other recent eliminations of note include Players Club member Chris “d0r1t0s” McClung and, perhaps ironically, the 1st and 2nd place finishers in the High Roller event that finished earlier today – Samuel Chartier and Ami Alibay – were both eliminated one after the other in the Main Event.
One of the really great things about welcoming the poker world to Playground Poker Club is the fantastic reactions we get from so many players, from pros who travel the world to players who might be at their first big event.
Here’s a sampling of tweets about Playground from the past day or so:
Glad to be back @playgroundpoker I feel so at home here. Without a doubt the BEST place to play in Canada. @Jkmontreal @Jgross5
— Antonio Esfandiari (@MagicAntonio) May 22, 2014
Here at @PlaygroundPoker And right away I'm reminded how much I love this room.Great friendly staff,very well ran and amazing food!
— Ronnie Bardah (@RonnieBardah) May 22, 2014
Can confirm @PlaygroundPoker is a great poker room and happy to recommend it!
— David Yan (@missoraclepoker) May 22, 2014
Day 1a @PokerStars "Canada Cup" @PlaygroundPoker – by far my favourite poker venue to play at each year. Comfy chairs/great food/great city.
— Jonas Mackoff (@donut604) May 22, 2014
Let's do this! @PokerStars @PlaygroundPoker pic.twitter.com/EdlR6DqLhy
— Adam Tuk (@jigsflippin) May 22, 2014
The players entered in Day 1a of the PokerStars Canada Cup Main Event have completed 6 levels of play and have settled into the 45 minute dinner break. As the players are enjoying a meal from the buffet provided, we toured the room to find out the leaders at this point in the day. (Chip counts approximate)
There are also several players in the 75K-85K range – by rough count, there are at least 12 hovering around that mark and poised to join the chip leaders with one or two good pots.
Late registration ends at the end of this break (in another 20 minutes) but it doesn’t seem that there are too many waiting to register at the last minute.
After 4 levels in the Main Event of the Pokerstars Canada Cup, a few players have started to separate themselves from the average. The field is led by the following 4 players, with dozens more inches behind:
Here are a few photos taken prior to the break:
