Ike Haxton Bags Big as Furkat Rakhimov Leads Triton £100,000 Short Deck Main Event
The first day of the Triton £100,000 Short Deck Main Event has come to an end after seven intense levels of play. A total of 91 entry slips were sold during the first day, and by night's end only 40 remained, with Furkat Rakhimov bagging the lead after an eventful last few hands of the night.
Rakhimov built a stack up throughout the day with patience, picking great spots with hands that were almost always ahead. He took down a pot at the end of the night that propelled him into the chip lead with a pair of queens against the ace-king of Robert Flink and king-jack of Ben Lamb. The Russian flopped a queen and never looked back, bagging the chip lead at the end of the night.
Right behind Rakhimov on the leaderboard is partypoker pro Isaac Haxton who finished the night with a healthy stack of 1,906,000. The American pro shot off like a rocket instantly after taking his seat and showed no fear when it came to gambling in pots. Haxton had some downs but managed to always swing his way back up even higher than before. Haxton currently sits 14th on the all-time money list with over $26 million in live cashes and is in a prime position to add another healthy cash to his resume.
Another partypoker pro to make the second day with a nice stack is Jason Koon who will be coming into Day 2 with 1,051,000 in chips. Koon is a Triton regular who has quickly been recognized as one of the best Short Deck players in the world having won two Triton Short Decks already. Those wins came in Montenegro in the HK$1,000,000 No-Limit Hold'em - Short Deck Ante Only for $3,579,836, and in Jeju in the HK$1,000,000 No Limit Hold'em - Short Deck Ante Only for $2,840,945. Both are Koon's largest scores to date.
Many other well-known high rollers bagged up on Day 1 and that list includes Cary Katz (1,660,000), Triton London Main Event Champion Wai Kin Yong (1,355,000), French pro Rui Cao (1,289,000), Danny Tang (1,271,000), Daniel Dvoress (1,211,000), partypoker pro Timofey Kuznetsov (1,206,000), Canadian grinder Mike Watson (1,178,000), and Stephen Chidwick (1,047,000).
Some players still have bullets behind and will have to cash them in at the end of the eighth level when late registration closes. Any player may join up until that point but will be forced to use all three of their 100,000 bullets upon entering during the last level of late registration. A shot clock will be brought into play once the tournament reaches the final 18 and all remaining players will receive ten 30-second time bank cards.
Day 2 will start at 1 p.m. local time in the seventh level with a 6,000 ante and a 12,000 button ante. The tournament will continue with levels of 60 minutes in length and there will be a 15-minute break at the end of every two levels. No dinner break is scheduled as of yet but that is subject to change depending on the players. The plan for Day 2 is to play down until a final table before bagging up and headed into the third and final day of the Short Deck Main Event at Triton London.
The PokerNews live reporting team will be bringing you all the coverage throughout the event, so stay tuned as all of the action unfolds!