Two of the bigger stacks in the room were seated at the same table — Dmitrii Valouev sitting with a stack of approximately 90,000 and Allan Le not far behind with close to 80,000. Le opened the action to 2,400 and was called by Anthony Costa. Valouev popped it up to 8,400 and after thinking for a moment, Le made it 27,600 to go. Costa quickly got out of the way and after finding out how much more it was to call, Valouev did so.
The flop came and Valouev immediately announced "pot." Le didn't waste too long before saying "all right, I'm in," and soon their hands were tabled:
Valouev:
Le:
Le had flopped two pair while Valouev had the nut-low draw and gutshot wheel draw. The turn was the , keeping Le in the lead. The river was a low card, but it was the which was no good for Valouev. Le scooped the entire pot with tens and threes and Valouev could only sit there and mutter "well, that sucked." With only 7,500 left and close to the money, Valouev said "I'll be back" as he went for a walk.
Three players paid 2,700 to see a flop of . Action checked around to Matt Waxman on the button, who bet 4,700. Glen Altham check-shoved all in for not too much more and after the player in the cutoff seat folded, Waxman made the call.
Altham tabled flopping a flush, leaving Waxman almost drawing dead, as Waxman's attempt to bluff-steal the pot with a lesser hand had failed. The turn and river bricked out and Altham scored the double-up.
With the flop reading there was a three-way all-in between Jeff Madsen, Ben Yu, and the player in Seat 9. The hands were turned over:
Seat 9:
Yu:
Madsen:
Madsen was in the lead with trip fours and there was a low draw out there. The turn was the and Madsen just needed to avoid a ten or low card to scoop the pot. He'd have to settle for half the pot, however, as the river was the and Yu and the player in Seat 9 would split the low.
We didn't catch the hand or the action but we did see Jeff Madsen matching Tim Burt's stack with Burt having and a jack on the board. That moved Burt up to 88,000 in chips while Madsen's stack takes a significant hit and now sits at 52,000.