New Pastures
As I scour the cardroom, I notice a few Brits still plugging away: Gary Jones, Jeff Buffenbarger, Dave Colclough, Ian Frazer and Karl Mahrenholz among some of the names still flying the British flag.
In fact the latter of those five, Karl 'Mantis' Mahrenholz is doing particularly well, just creeping into the current top 10 with 184,000 in chips.
A former city banker from London, Karl burst onto the scene a year or two back and quickly quit his job to pursue the pro scene. Evidently, this decision was a wise one, the caterpillar eyebrower finding some nice scores including a runner up finish in the inaugural GUKPT in Bolton and a few chunky cashes in Vegas this year.
Now traveling the circuit as a sponsored play with his fellow Hit Squad members, Karl might be a dark horse for this tournament. He's cool, calm and collective, yet timely aggressive and knows how to play a big stack.