Why So Cserei-ous? Chip Lead Snatched by Baranov
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Day 1A is officially concluded. 234 players took up the deep-stacked Pokerstars.net EPT Vienna challenge and just over half of them remain in contention. Of those, just a few are still enjoying the hospitality of the Kursalon as nine levels of tough tournament poker are enough to tire even the hardiest of players. A day off awaits all 123 or so (when the last hands were being dealt it read 124 and I know at least one Italian busted during this final period).
Leading the field for much of the latter part of the day was Ramon Demon Cserei, who looked like he would clinch the end of day lead from Team Pokerstars Pro Martin Hruby (the only Pokerstars Pro from the Czech Republic). His 168,300 is a pretty impressive stack (Hruby's 159,000 only slightly trailing), but anyone taking six figures through to Day Two on Thursday will be pleased with their accumulation. Mihai Manole, for example, ends the day with 138,000.
Chip leader when the bagging and tagging was done, however, was Ukrainian Sergii Baranov, on 183,200.
At the other end of the spectrum Ruben Visser with <10k joked with the dealer that he'd like another bag at the end of the day.
"For what?" deadpanned the dealer.
At least he's still in the running, unlike a host of experienced players who failed to finish the day - Arnaud Mattern, Fabian Quoss, Cristiano Blanco, Kristijonas Andrulis, Andre Coimbra and Alex Kravchenko among them.
Tomorrow we start all over again, with an even larger field expected to receive their 30k starting stack and play for nine levels, cards willing. Live coverage will start at midday - full chip counts from tonight will be posted when we receive them (before tomorrow kicks off).