Play has finished for the day here at the Sporting Monte-Carlo in Day 1 of the 2024 PokerStars European Poker Tour (EPT) Monte Carlo €3,000 Mystery Bounty and Alan Ferraro is the chip leader with a stack of 429,000 heading into Day 2. This event attracted 652 entrants but only 155 found a bag at the end of the night.
Ferraro is no stranger to the EPT. He already has cashes including a 38th-place finish at the 2023 EPT Barcelona €5,300 Main Event for €31,250. In second place is Sylwester Fortuna with 392,500. Fortuna won the 2023 Pokercode Festival Madrid €550 Main Event for €40,000 and already has a cash here in Monte-Carlo in the €1,100 FPS Main Event. In third is Igor Pihela. He made the final table of the €10,200 Mystery Bounty at EPT Barcelona in 2022 and will be looking to make another deep run.
EPT Monte Carlo Mystery Bounty Top 10 Chip Counts
| Rank | Player | Country | Chip Count |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Alan Ferraro | Italy | 429,000 |
| 2 | Sylwester Fortuna | Poland | 392,500 |
| 3 | Igor Pihela | Estonia | 380,000 |
| 4 | Nir Sharon | USA | 338,000 |
| 5 | Kamal Bejjani | Lebanon | 315,000 |
| 6 | Mengshi Tian | Hong Kong | 315,000 |
| 7 | Alfonso Simone | Italy | 300,000 |
| 8 | Sergi Reixach | Spain | 275,000 |
| 9 | Umberto Zaffagnini | Italy | 261,000 |
| 10 | Andrija Robovic | Croatia | 255,000 |
Other notable players that made it through to Day 2 include 2017 PokerStars Championship Prague Main Event champion Kalidou Sow with 240,000 and this year's €50,000 EPT Paris Super High Roller winner Thomas Santerne with 85,000.
PokerStars Ambassadors Parker Talbot (216,000), Ramon Colillas (105,000), Benjamin Spragg (98,000) and Maria Konnikova (50,000) also found a bag.
Some of the familiar faces who tried their luck but fell short include Uri Gilboa, Mateusz Moolhuizen and Jason Wheeler.
A candidate for craziest hand of this EPT so far, Hiroshi Nishiyama knocked out two players after having his cards accidently mucked by error of the dealer.
Ferraro's rise to the top of the chip counts was certainly helped by winning a huge three-way all that happened in the latter stages of today's play.
Fabrice Maltez also scored himself a double knockout by beating ace-king and pocket kings with pocket eights.
The current prize pool stands at €1,118,832 but expect that to increase as more players can still enter before start of play tomorrow. Day 2 starts at 12:30 p.m. local time tomorrow with blinds at 1,000/2,000 with a 2,000 big blind ante. At the start of Level 15, all players will be given a Mystery Bounty Token.
As always, stay tuned to PokerNews for continued coverage of this €3,000 Mystery Bounty here at EPT Monte Carlo.
