The Bounty is just 1 elimination away from the final table. Players are enjoying a short break while the T1000 are being raced off. Here are the full counts:

16th: Mathyeu Provost – $600
15th: Nader Ammar – $650
14th: Sean Raboy – $650
13th: Joseph Abou Khalil – $700
12th: Charles Senez – $700
11th: Dimitrios Marmagkiolis – $760

Bounty players are back from a short break, and the T500 chips are now off the tables. Jean-Philippe Piquette is back on top, after winning a 3-way all-in on the last hand before the break. Play has resumed with a quick elimination, which allowed for a table break, leaving 2 tables of 8 players.

Here are our top 4 stacks:

25th: Raphael Ohayon – $440
24th: Evangelos Nickolaidis – $440
23rd: Kimberly McClymont – $470
22nd: Tanvir Ahmed – $470
21st: Steve Cotton – $510
20th: Jia Yi luc – $510
19th: Kelvin Tang – $550
18th: Yacine Zekkour – $550
17th: Leor Wasserman – $600

David Bonneau had lost a lot of chips to Stéphane Chartrand, but was still healthy and active. During hand-for-hand play, he open-raised the 12K big blind to 31K, and was met with a 3-bet shove by Raphael Ohayon, for about 100K. Bonneau reluctantly called, and they went to showdown.

David Bonneau:
Raphael Ohayon:

The flop came , as good as Ohayon could hope for. But poker is cruel. When the came on the turn, Bonneau casually asked for a 7, and sure enough, he was answered. !

Raphael Ohayon goes out on the bubble, allowing many shorter stacks to sneak into the money. Players have now secured $430, and are looking at some very nice numbers if they manage to survive until the final table.

*Update: Raphael Ohayon actually min-cashed. Another player having busted just before him, the field was in reality 25-player deep at the moment of his elimination. 

David Bonneau, who appeared in every single leaderboard we produced so far, now has a serious option on the top prizes. He already collected 11 Bounties, and a prodigious amount of chip. His stack of 632,500 is colossal, allowing him to play with great confidence, striking fear in his opponents. Below his photo is the updated top 5, also featuring Ronaldo Uliana de Oliveira, who’s ascent was mentioned in a previous story.

We caught a hand that turned out to result in the biggest pot of the night. Ronaldo Uliana De Oliveira open-raised the 6K big blind to 15K from the button with , and Andy D’Alessandro defended his blind with . The flop came , setting the table for possible fireworks.

D’Alessandro checked, and De Oliveira placed a continuation bet of 15K, which was raised to 45K by D’Alessandro. De Oliveira called, and filled up right away on the turn: .

At that point, there was about 130K in the pot. D’Alessandro went all-in for an effective pot-size bet, and De Oliveira called right away. The river did not pair the board, and the 400K pot went to Ronaldo Uliana De Oliveira. He did not get the Bounty, missing a few thousand to do so, but that pot was worth a lot more in terms of equity.

Players have taken their 3rd break of the night, which allowed us to update the leaderboard. Jean-Philippe Piquette managed to add even more chips to his already bulky stack, keeping himself above the field. The second place is now held by Arthur W. In third place is Playground’s own Nader Ammar.

Here is the updated top 5, followed by late photos of healthy stacks: