partypoker Qualifier Daniel Clark on Playing with O'Dwyer, Urbanovich, Troyanovskiy and Pateychuk, All At the Same Table!
Another partypoker qualifier Daniel Clark has just been eliminated from the Main Event whilst on the feature table, and we caught up with him to chat about his experience not only in the tournament as a whole, but playing with some of the world's top players.
"I got in through a $109 satellite," explained Clark. "Then on the $550 satellite I was one of the first 100 players to get through, so we all got our $550 back. So essentially I was free-rolling!
"It's an amazing place. A really lovely place. Honestly, my expectations of Russia weren't what Sochi is like. It's a beautiful place."
Russian players are notorious for being hyper-aggressive, and Clark's experience at the tables this week shows nothing to the contrary.
"It's been mostly fine! Some crazy players! But I only played from Day 2 onwards live, because I played an online Day 1, so I didn't have that much contact with them apart from on those two days."
Shortly before the bubble burst, Clark's table was awash with big names: home-favourites Andrey Pateychuk and Vladimir Troyanovskiy, High Roller regular Steve O'Dwyer and partypoker Sponsored Pro Dzmitry Urbanovich.
"I didn't get much pressure from Urbanovich or O'Dwyer, mainly because they were short but also because the cards fell in such a way that I sort of just avoided spots with them, so I didn't get into any difficulty with them.
"I had one big hand with Troyanovskiy which was a three-bet pot. I ended up getting there on the river, which tilted him I think, but I didn't play many pots with the others."
After the bubble burst, Clark's table was selected as the first feature table for the live stream. It would be Clark's first time ever playing on a livestreamed feature table.
"At first I thought that it would affect me, or that it would phase me a little. But because I got to move away from the main tournament room, it allowed me to focus a bit more on playing.
"I was pretty card dead, so they were easy decisions for the most part. I don't think I had any tough pressure decisions."
Supported by friends and family online, Clark said that it was exciting to know that everyone could see how he was getting on.
"It was also just nice not to have to update people on how my tournament was going!"