Nazarov Holds Chip Lead Going Into Day 3 of $3,000 EPT Mystery Bounty
The PokerStars European Poker Tour at the Merit Royal Diamond Hotel Casino & Spa, in Northern Cyprus, continued today with an action-filled Day 2 of the $3,000 EPT Mystery Bounty. Over the Day 1 flight yesterday and an additional cohort of late registers this morning, a massive 981 entrants made up this Mystery Bounty tournament. Of those, 352 players found their seats this morning to battle it out over the felt, as the Mystery Bounty tokens were introduced. After 10 hours of play, only 18 remain.
As the dust settled it was Dmitrii Nazarov who bagged the chip lead having accumulated 2,895,000 by the end of Level 27 tonight.
Nazarov wasn't alone in amassing a plentiful stack as Dumitru Pora followed closely behind having amassed a total of 2,785,000; just two big blinds away from claiming the chip lead himself.
Day 3 Seat Draw
| Table | Seat | Player | Country | Chip Count | Big Blinds |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | Walid Bou Habib | Lebanon | 2,450,000 | 41 |
| 1 | 2 | Ekrem Sanioglu | Turkey | 2,500,000 | 42 |
| 1 | 3 | [Removed:432] | France | 1,145,000 | 19 |
| 1 | 4 | Dumitru Pora | Romania | 2,785,000 | 46 |
| 1 | 6 | Manuel Fischer | Germany | 1,415,000 | 24 |
| 1 | 7 | Farid Jattin | Colombia | 2,375,000 | 40 |
| 2 | 1 | Dylan Destefano | USA | 1,575,000 | 26 |
| 2 | 3 | Quan Zhou | Hong Kong | 1,780,000 | 30 |
| 2 | 4 | Damir Zhugralin | Kazakhstan | 2,125,000 | 35 |
| 2 | 6 | Hossien Taki | United Kingdom | 1,100,000 | 18 |
| 2 | 7 | Jacques Der Megreditchian | France | 485,000 | 8 |
| 2 | 8 | Deividas Daubaris | Lithuania | 1,116,000 | 19 |
| 3 | 1 | Dmitrii Nazarov | Russia | 2,895,000 | 48 |
| 3 | 2 | Nikolay Ponomarev | Russia | 1,515,000 | 25 |
| 3 | 3 | Silius Moll | Norway | 540,000 | 9 |
| 3 | 4 | Damir Gabdullin | Russia | 365,000 | 6 |
| 3 | 6 | Milos Petakovic | Serbia | 1,785,000 | 30 |
| 3 | 8 | Kemal Aslan | Turkey | 1,805,000 | 30 |
Day 2 Action
A total of $2,664,396 made up this grand prize pool, of which $981,000 was set aside for the Mystery Bounties that came into play. For each opponent a player managed to eliminate, they would be able to claim a token that would grant them the opportunity to pull a mystery bounty. While there was plenty of fortune on offer, it was the two $75,000 bounties that captivated the attention of the field.
Francesco Blasio was the first player to lay claim to the elusive $75,000 bounty on the 16th level of the day. Currently with $23,246 of recorded live tournament cashes, this bounty pull alone exceeds his career earnings by more than three times.
It wasn’t until Level 21 that the second $75,000 would picked by Georgios Vrakas. Vrakas is no stranger to tournament success; this run in the Mystery Bountry will be his fourth and largest cash in Cyprus, this week.
A lengthy list of players to have claimed one of thirteen $25,000 Mystery Bounties included tournament veterans Jon Kyte, Alexandre Vuilleumier and Aliaksandr Shylko.
With no major bounties at large, the focus of the tournament floor is starting to switch to the looming first-place prize of $298,496.
Day 3 restarts tomorrow, October 20th at 12 p.m. local time. The structure will recommence on Level 28 with blinds at 30,000/60,000 with a 60,000 big blind ante.
The PokerNews live reporting team will be back tomorrow to bring you more coverage of the Europen Poker Tour Mystery Bounty here at EPT Cyprus as we play down to a winner, so stay tuned.