World Poker Tour Grand Prix de Paris Day 1A: Touil Takes Charge
After a four-year hiatus, the World Poker Tour is back in Paris for the 2010 WPT Grand Prix de Paris, and when all was said and done after day 1a, it was Fabrice Touil who looks to be the chip leader with just over 200,000.
Touil was on the fortunate end of a handful of flops throughout the day. During the last level, Touil was involved in a hand having flopped a straight with the 8♥ 6♦ on a 7♥ 9♥ 5♠ board. His opponent, Marc Inizan, who recently was at the EPT Berlin final table, held pocket fives, and the two players got all the chips in the middle. The board failed to pair for Inizan, and Touil stacked up about 200,000.
Nicolas Babel also had an excellent day, and he made most of his progress post-dinner break, taking a significant pot off of Sorel Mizzi when Babel raised Mizzi to 8,200 when Mizzi initially bet out 3,200 on a 3♥ 4♠ 8♠ flop. Mizzi eventually passed, however. Babel then took a nice chunk out of Vikash Dharasoo's stack when Babel bet when the ace hit on the river of the 7♠ 10♣ K♦ 4♣ A♥ board. Dharasoo called the bet and then mucked when he saw the flopped set of sevens for Babel.
Joining Babel and Tuil at the top of the chip counts was Stephane Albertini and Guillaume Darcourt. The latter recently won the WPT event in Bucharest. Also moving on to day 2 were Jim "Mr_BigQueso" Collopy, Arnaud Mattern, Antony Lellouche, Antoine Saout and Anton Wigg.
Just over 100 entrants in total made their way to the ultra-exclusive Aviation Club de France, which requires players to get fingerprinted to gain access for today's day 1 flight. With 90-minute levels and 30,000 in chips, there was plenty of play for the 53 players who survived to see day 2.
The less fortunate, who will be spending the rest of their time in Paris sightseeing, were Ludovic Lacay, Allan Baekke, Praz Bansi, Michael Tureniec, Oliver Busquet, Nocholas Levy and Roberto Romanello.
Day 1b of the WPT Grand Prix de Paris gets under way on Sunday at 3 p.m. here at the Aviation Club de France, and we are expecting approximately 160 to 170 players to join the fray. PokerNews will be there for all the action so be sure to check out our brand new live reporting client for all the action.
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