With an average of just over 27K per player, everyone still has lots of ammo left as blinds are just going up to 200-400 with a 50 chip ante.
3 players have managed to build up an early lead – particularly Andreas Kanakis!
Late registration is very popular at Playground Poker Club, and with a larger buy-in such as this, there are some players who have a definite preference for jumping in late – and there will almost certainly be a few last-minute registrants. The first break will end shortly and following that players will have 60 more minutes to join Event 5.
Photos taken during level 4
The tournament is only in the 2nd blind level and there are already 74 players registered. Remember there are 6 levels of late registration in this tournament, so players will continue to join during the next 90 minutes or so.
Photos taken during level 1
With The Wild $150 in the rear-view mirror and just 26 players left in The $250 Frenzy, today is the day that the Playground Poker Spring Classic turns to its higher buy-in tournaments – this is the first of 6 tournaments (including the WPT Canadian Spring Championship) with a total buy-in of $550 or more.
Event 5 is a $500 + $50 NL Hold’em Freeze that gets underway at 11am this morning. Blinds are 30 minutes long and players start with 25,000 tournament chips, ensuring a lot of play throughout the tourney. It’s a one-day event and as the name suggests, it’s a true freezeout event, meaning players cannot rebuy or re-enter – it’s tournament poker in a very “pure” form.
Late registration in the tournament is available until the end of level 6, which is to say that players may join the tournament any time until 2:15pm (6 x 30-minute levels plus 1 15-minute break following level 4).
Good luck!
251 players started Day 2 of The $250 Frenzy and after almost 12 complete levels just 26 players remain in the tournament! Play was slated to conclude with 27 remaining, but there were 2 eliminations on separate tables at the end of the day, leaving one fewer player left to join the restart tomorrow night (Tuesday April 26th) at 7:00pm.
The chip leader is local player Tomas Larivee Magni, primarily a cash game player but with some solid tournament experience as well. Tomas came in 2nd place in this event during the most recent Playground Poker Fall Classic, so he’s clearly trying to improve on that finish this time.
Second on the leaderboard (almost 400K behind Tomas) is Marco Lang, who also began Day 2 in the chip lead. Marco also has a long history of strong tournament results in events spanning the globe – so as one of the leaders he has to be viewed as a threat to win the event.
In addition to the top two and some visiting players like Thierry Blanc who have already had success during the Spring Classic, there are several well-known local heroes still in the field, including George Kazarian (it’s his 2nd Day 3 of the festival as well) and Bob T, plus the almost-local Joey Boczek.
| First Name | Prénom | Last Name | Nom | Seat | Siège | Stack | Tapis |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tomas | Larivee Magni | Table 36 - Seat 1 | 2,250,000 |
| Azim | Lavji | Table 36 - Seat 2 | 1,600,000 |
| Jean-Manuel | Estrala | Table 36 - Seat 3 | 1,300,000 |
| Duy Toan | Pham | Table 36 - Seat 4 | 1,815,000 |
| Jaroslaw Zbigniew | Jaskiewicz | Table 36 - Seat 5 | 1,655,000 |
| Arnold | Yaxley | Table 36 - Seat 6 | 1,040,000 |
| Bob | T | Table 36 - Seat 7 | 765,000 |
| Glen | Hammers | Table 36 - Seat 8 | 265,000 |
| Thierry | Blanc | Table 36 - Seat 9 | 345,000 |
| Ryan | Hodge | Table 39 - Seat 1 | 555,000 |
| Marco | Lang | Table 39 - Seat 2 | 1,860,000 |
| Rene | Berube | Table 39 - Seat 3 | 860,000 |
| Alexander | Matveev | Table 39 - Seat 4 | 1,030,000 |
| Real | Cantin | Table 39 - Seat 5 | 265,000 |
| Robert | Gariepy | Table 39 - Seat 6 | 325,000 |
| Giuseppe | Iadeluca | Table 39 - Seat 7 | 1,595,000 |
| Zheng-Yi | Xie | Table 39 - Seat 8 | 810,000 |
| Richard | Myron | Table 39 - Seat 9 | 595,000 |
| Maxime | Theroux | Table 40 - Seat 1 | 820,000 |
| Tedde | Ballanger | Table 40 - Seat 2 | 350,000 |
| Tony | Farcy | Table 40 - Seat 3 | 840,000 |
| Simon | Pin-Disle | Table 40 - Seat 4 | 1,550,000 |
| Justin | Kuzmicki | Table 40 - Seat 5 | 830,000 |
| George | Kazarian | Table 40 - Seat 6 | 660,000 |
| Joey | Boczek | Table 40 - Seat 7 | 490,000 |
| Barry | Toal | Table 40 - Seat 8 | 450,000 |
Tomas Larivee Magni
With a double elimination that occurred to close Day 2, we are now set for Day 3 in The $250 Frenzy, and 26 players will be back tomorrow to play down to a winner! Leading the way is Tomas Larivee Magni, who bagged a massive 2,250,000. Marco Lang finished with 1,860,000, putting him in second place entering Day 3, and Duy Toan Pham closed the night with 1,815,000 in chips to round up the top 3.
The full list of player-reported chip counts is available here, as well as the new seating assignment for tomorrow’s Day 3. The winner will take home $50,000 as well as a Playground Poker Spring Classic Champion’s Trophy. The $250 Frenzy prize pool and payout information is available here.
See you tomorrow!
The 27 players who will return for Day 3 tomorrow:
Only 2 eliminations separate us from Day 3 in The $250 Frenzy. The top stack for now still belong to Tomas Larivee Magni, who has increased his holdings well over 2-million. Second in chips belongs to Giussepe Iadeluca who is up over 1.6 million. A full list of player-reported chip counts will be made available once the Day 2 comes to a close.
Photographs from the last levels of play in Day 2:
Day 2 of The $250 Frenzy is slowly coming to its end, as only 45 players remain making up the 5 final tables. Once 18 more players get eliminated, the surviving players will bag for Day 3.
Photographs from level 23:
The $250 Frenzy is off a short break, and the field is now down to just 60 players out of a combined total of 1245 entries to begin with. Play will continue until our final 27 players has been reached, who will then return for the final tomorrow night.
For the moment it is still Tomas Larivee Magni with the stranglehold lead, as his 1,619,000 stack dwarfs the rest of the field. Second in chips is George Kazarian (994,000), who is fresh from a deep run in The Wild $150. Below is a look at the leaderboard as play enters level 23:
| First Name | Prénom | Last Name | Nom | Stack | Tapis |
|---|---|---|
| Tomas | Larivee Magni | 1,619,000 |
| George | Kazarian | 994,000 |
| Mustafa | Erzincanli | 817,000 |
| Rene | Berube | 742,000 |
| Zheng-Yi | Xie | 715,000 |
| Neil | Mcleod | 704,000 |
| Azim | Lavji | 668,000 |
| Jaroslaw Zbigniew | Jaskiewicz | 655,000 |
| Tony | Farcy | 631,000 |
| Marco | Lang | 620,000 |
| Duy Toan | Pham | 620,000 |
| Barry | Toal | 542,000 |
| Yantian | Huang | 510,000 |
The $250 Frenzy is into level 22, and play has been quite aggressive of late. There hasn’t been much movement amongst the chip leaders however, as it’s been the shorter stacks who have been making their presence felt in the last few orbits. There is a break scheduled in a few minutes, and while the players take 10 minutes to stretch their legs we will take a stroll through the tables to find our top stacks.
Photographs from levels 20 and 21:
