The big tournament on the schedule tonight in the Playground Poker Spring Classic presented by partypoker.net is Event 9, a $500 + $50 PL Omaha Single Rebuy tourney that starts at 7:30pm in the Tournament Hall.

For a host of reasons, the Montreal area continues to be very much a Hold’em region – but that being said, there is a very healthy (in terms of numbers) contingent of hard-core PLO aficionados who keep some very big games going and jump in to any PLO tourney on the schedule. With a buy-in at this level, this should attract players as well – this tourney represents fantastic value for anyone with a command of the game!

Action gets underway at 7:30pm and it’s a single rebuy event, meaning that if you bust (or go under 3K in chips) during the first 4 levels of play you’re invited to stay at your seat and buy a new stack. It’s a single rebuy, so you may do this once.

Best of luck to everyone playing the 4-card game tonight!

Tonight’s event in the Playground Poker Spring Classic presented by partypoker.net is Event 8, a $300 + $30 NL Hold’em Survivor tournament. Action gets underway at 7:00pm.

The Survivor format has quickly become one of the best-loved events in a Playground Poker Club festival’s schedule. The format is a little bit different than a regular poker tournament. Instead of playing down to a winner, play continues until 10% of the field remains – at which time play is halted and everyone still in the event gets an even share of the prize pool!

In a way, it’s similar to a satellite tourney – except that the prize at the end is cash!

A Survivor event such as this one, with a $300 + $30 buy-in, is certain to give the winners a very nice prize at the end of the night – and because play doesn’t continue through the bubble, the pace of the event – and its finishing time – is sure to be very appealing as well!

Registration tonight is open until the end of the break following level 4, which is to say it’s open until 8:35pm.

Daniel Hughes

During the last break following level 8, tournament staff removed the T25 chips from play and we took the opportunity to get a better handle on the current leaders in the event. Although stacks throughout are starting to grow very well, there were 4 players in particular whose chip counts put them at the head of the pack.

1. Daniel Hughes – 181,200 chips
2. Adam Cader – 117,100 chips
3. Behram Antia – 108,600 chips
4. Houssam Molhem – 103,700 chips

Randy Khalil

By the time the first break has arrived we always look for an early chip leader, and most of the time there’s only one player who has taken a significant lead on the field. Event 7 is no exception – during the break that players were just granted after level 4 we checked the whole room and found that only Randy Khalil had built up a real lead. He’s already playing a stack of over 90K.

Randy does have a small reputation as a tournament front-runner – but his history in Playground events also shows that he can close too…

The field is full of interesting and accomplished players both local and visiting – some of them notable for their past exploits here at Playground Poker Club, others for their excellent play in events both here and abroad, and some just due to the sheer force of their personality!

Here’s a partial list of some of the players to watch today:

• Chanracy Khun – 2013 WPT Barcelona champion, plus a member of the Playground Players Club.
• Alexandre Lavigne – Alex final tabled his first ever big live event (2013 WPT Montreal) and has had several other big scores here since then.
• Tony “Gameboy” To – won a 1K event here at Playground and has made several deep runs in other big events. Also – very memorable table presence!
• Marco Lang – accomplished tournament player who made a deep run in The $250 Frenzy in this Spring Classic.
• Bharat Shetty – has made several deep runs including in this year’s Wild $150 and a victory in a PLO event a few years ago.
• Kathy Sawers – well-known local tournament player, Event 2 Champion in this year’s Spring Classic.
• Randy Khalil – another well-known local player who has made deep runs in events at Playground stretching back to 2013.
• Rodney Ramalho – Montreal cash game specialist who had a tournament breakthrough in 2015, winning the Deepstacks Poker Tour’s Championship event in Calgary.
• Setrak Sulouksi – a huge local personality, Seto also has considerable poker skill, having won a $5K buy-in event here at Playground Poker Club in 2013.
• Edward Hislop – Edward seems to have nothing BUT deep runs in Playground-hosted events!

Geri Casey

Here are some shots of the field early in today’s $500 + $100 + $500 50/50 Bounty tournament. Registration continues to climb as late reg is still open for another hour and 45 minutes – and the prize pool just gets bigger and bigger!

Photos taken during level 3