Level 29 Over, 29 Remain
Whew. What a level.
When we went to dinner, there were 42 players still with chips, and we all speculated over our meals about how much longer it would take to get to the final 27.
Play resumed, and for a while we were looking at the same relatively slow pace we'd seen for the 45 minutes or so before dinner, when there were no eliminations. Jerry Payne went out in 42nd, followed by Damien Luis in 41st. We crossed the halfway mark of the level… then, BOOM.
It all started with a huge double-knockout of Jakob Toestesen (40th) and Jonathan Driscoll (39th), both fallen victim to Brandon Steven's flopped nut flush. Within a just a a couple of minutes, Nicolas Babel (38th) and Dag Palovic (37th) had followed. Each of those first six to go in Level 29 earned $206,395.
And the bustouts continued, with Michal Wywrot (36th), Gabe Costner (35th), Edward Ochana (34th), Corey Emery (33rd), Eduardo Parra (32nd), and Michael Skender (31st) all being eliminated within the space of about 20 minutes. Finally came a stretch during which all of our players kept their seats, then Theo Jorgensen went out in 30th. Each of these seven took home $255,242.
Amid the carnage, Joseph Cheong pushed out in front, with Soi (a.k.a. "Cuong") Nguyen also adding to his large stack. Those two were the first to reach 20 million, and remain out in front with 29 left.
Let's take 20 minutes to catch our breath. We'll be back to see who are the final two eliminations of the night.