Marcel Luske and Joep van den Bijgaart in Contention Heading into Day 2
The second of two starting days at the World Poker Tour National event in Valkenburg was a huge success. A total of 224 players entered, as registration remained open until the end of Level 9 and out of those 71 still remain. Together with the 48 players that survived Day 1a there are 119 players still in contention for the first ever WPT title to be aware in the Netherlands.
The man with the biggest stack at the end of the night was Michel van Os who bagged up 305,000 chips. Van Os was involved in a huge pot during the second level of the day and steamrolled his table the rest of the day. Van Os briefly touched on 370,000 chips, but even with his current stack he enjoys a comfortable lead.
Among the many players that showed we spotted returning customers who decided to re-enter including Patrick Renkers, Marcel Luske, Freerk Post and his brother Zeus Post. From his group Luske and Zeus Post managed to survive and the other two won't be back on Day 2 despite giving it two shots. Renkers lasted quite a while but eventually his aces did not hold up against king-queen near the end of the night.
Luske had a bit more fortune on Day 1b, as he managed to hit two pair with ace-queen against a player who hit a lower two pair with ace-jack. At the end of the night Luske bagged up 95,500 chips and how fitting would it be if the godfather of poker in the Netherlands would be able to make a deep run tomorrow!
Alex Hendriks, another player with lots of chips throughout the day, was gifted a big stack after he made the nut flush against a straight. The last level however wasn't kind to Hendriks who bagged up 156,000 chips going into tomorrow. Marion Adriaans' day was even worse as she was knocked out holding pocket aces. Zeus Post hit a set of jacks and on the river Adriaans could not a find a way to let go of his premium hand. Zeus eventually bagged up 105,500.
Former EPT Berlin finalist and recent WCOOP event winner Joep van den Bijgaart had a great day, since a big hand with kings versus treys towards the end of the night sky-rocketed his stack up to around 145,000. Van den Bijgaart ultimately bagged up 131,500 chips and returns tomorrow with high hopes.
Make sure to tune back in tomorrow at 3:50 p.m. for the second day of this event, as we're aiming to get down to a final table of nine. PokerNews.com will be right there with you throughout this event so stay tuned for more coverage throughout the weekend.