Gerard Piqué Headlines Those Entering Day 2; Ole Schemion Leads
Welcome back for Day 2 of the €10,000 High Roller from the kickoff festival for Season 10 of the PokerStars.com European Poker Tour. Day 1 attracted a large group of deep-pocketed pros and amateurs alike, but one player in particular who was able to build a big stack transcends any type of stardom reached by any poker player in the field — superstar footballer Gerard Piqué.
The central defender for the Spanish National Team and FC Barcelona earned himself a red card and a suspension in the Confederations Cup final against Brazil back in June. Today, when the Spanish National Team takes on Finland in a World Cup qualifier, Piqué is unable to play. Unable to suit up for his team in what figures to be a victory for Spain, Piqué has opted to show off his skills on a different kind of green surface — the poker felt.
Piqué played the EPT Barcelona Main Event, but busted on Day 2 before the money was reached. Back in July, Piqué played in the World Series of Poker Main Event, but also fell short of the money there. So far in the High Roller, Piqué has done very well. He ran his starting stack of 50,000 in chips up to 308,500, which should be good enough for a top 10 stack moving into Day 2.
One of the few men topping Piqué on the leader board was chip leader Ole Schemion. THe young German phenom amassed a stack of 393,600 in chips, storming into the chip lead in the latter half of the final level of Day 1. It was then that he busted two players on the same hand, Vitaly Lunkin and Vincent Verdickt, to take the number one spot.
Other notables with big stacks were Igor Kurganov (315,300), Sam Greenwood (313,800), Richard Yong (312,200), Eugene Katchalov (260,400), and 2013 World Series of Poker November Niner David Benefield (220,400).
Like Schemion, Benefield has already made the final table of the €50,000 Super High Roller and cashed in the Main Event here in Barcelona at this stop. Both have the opportunity for the trifecta of great results from EPT Barcelona, and they've done well to position themselves thus far.
Day 2 is scheduled to begin at 12 p.m. local time. The registration and re-entry period will remain open until 11:45 a.m. this morning, then the final numbers will be tallied and released. As of the end of the night last night, around 170 entries were created.