2013 Aussie Millions Main Event Day 1b: Rusnak Tops the Pack
A total of 196 players signed up for Day 1b of the 2013 Aussie Millions Main Event. This brings the total amount of players after two days up to 353, and that's 13 more than last year after two starting days. The chip leader after seven levels of play was Frank Rusnak, who bagged up 165,100. Just over 100 players survived Day 1b, and they will return to action on Wednesday.
Plenty of notable players were in the mix,including 2010 Aussie Millions Main Event winner Tyron Krost. He was seated at the same table as Neil Channing, and both players managed to survive the first day. Jason Mercier also joined the action on Monday and closed out the day with 93,000.
The above couldn't be said for some of the high rollers who played the AU$100,000 event yesterday, and some even today. Vanessa Selbst, Fabian Quoss, Philipp Gruissem, Tobias Reinkemeier, Niklas Heinecker and Igor Kurganov all entered the Main Event today, but their results were far from satisfying. Only Kurganov made it to Day 2 with just 13,600, and he also happened to be the runner-up to Andrew Robl in the AU$100,000 Challenge for AU$610,000.
Local favorites Joel Feldman and Kristian Lunardi also didn't have fortunate days, and they were eliminated towards the end of play. Aussie Millions regular Sherrie Kramper was among the unlucky players today as well. She got her money in good against Jackson Zheng, who showed a lower two pair on the turn with a flush draw. Zheng hit his flush and survived the day with 54,100 while Kramper was knocked out.
One of the most interesting players that showed up today was Kenny Tran. Tran, who's not playing tournaments regularly anymore, made the trip down to Melbourne for the first time since 2008 and Lynn Gilmartin spoke to him on one of the breaks. Tran survived the day with 28,700.
Play in Melbourne will resume Tuesday at 12:30 p.m. local time with the third and final Day 1 flight. All the remaining players you haven't seen on these first two days will most likely be in the field then. We've seen Phil Ivey, Antonio Esfandiari and Patrik Antonius at Crown, so hopefully they will all make their way down to the poker room.
To follow all the action from the 2013 Aussie Millions, head over to the PokerNews Live Reporting pages.
Get all the latest PokerNews updates on your social media outlets. Follow us on Twitter and find us both Facebook and Google+!