From a starting field of 2,570 entries, 269 hopefuls returned to the felts today for Day 2 of the Grand Prix Canada, and after 14 levels of play only 38 remained to bag chips onto Day 3. Players have now locked in a prize of at least $1,550, and a cool $100,000 is reserved for the eventual tournament champion. In addition to these prizes, partypoker.net offered up a $20,000 bonus in the form of a “last-longer” amongst the first 100 players who qualified online through their site – and a handful of these players bagged chips after Day 2, including chip-leader Mike Leah. They carry a “Golden Chip” with them which they must leave next to their stack so that they can be identified.
After leading the field for most of the last few levels of play, Leandre St-Laurent was passed in the last level by Mike Leah, who returns with the chip-lead tomorrow when Day 3 begins. Mike ended the day with a massive 6,054,000 in chips, roughly 3 times the current average stack. Leandre ended the day second in chips with 5,414,000, while Benjamin Bracken closed Day 2 in 3rd place.
The full list of player-reported chip counts will be made available shortly, along with the seating assignments for Day 3, which begins at 7pm. The final table of this Event 1 of the Playground Poker Spring Classic will be streamed with cards up (and a short delay) – links will be made widely available tomorrow.
Top counts to end Day 2:
| First Name | Prénom | Last Name | Nom | Stack | Tapis |
|---|---|---|
| Mike | Leah | 6,054,000 |
| Leandre | St-Laurent | 5,414,000 |
| Benjamin | Bracken | 4,239,000 |
| Robert | Leboeuf | 3,916,000 |
| Kyle | Chang | 3,570,000 |
| Timothy | Deering | 2,900,000 |
| Karim | Abdelhamid | 2,908,000 |
| Kevin | Zeidler | 2,900,000 |
Photographs from levels 25-26:
