On Course – The Festival in Bratislava Day 2
The first starting flight of the Main Event of The Festival in Bratislava is in the books and with 134 entries the tournament is on course to hit the €500k guarantee.
After 12 levels of intense poker action in the main event area, 39 players bagged chips with Rickard Larsson being the lead with 256k chips – more than eight times the starting stack. Not long before the end of the day, he had an even more impressive stack of over 350k, but he lost a pivotal hand against Peter Behr, who is also in the top 10 of the count.
Those are the top 10 players of yesterday’s Main Event flight:
| Player | Chips | Big Blinds |
| Rickard Larsson | 256,000 | 107 |
| Carsten Lund Larsen | 245,000 | 102 |
| Aaron Frese | 194,000 | 81 |
| Kenneth Aspestrand | 180,000 | 75 |
| Kristiansen Eirik | 177,000 | 74 |
| Michel Molenaar | 177,000 | 74 |
| Peter Behr | 156,000 | 65 |
| Ian Vertefeuille | 145,000 | 60 |
| Istvan Kovács | 141,000 | 59 |
| Wessam Bitar | 140,000 | 58 |
Today the Main Event starts at noon with day 1B. We expect a slightly bigger field than yesterday, but the big action is reserved for Thursday and Friday when the huge flights 1c through 1e will be played.
You can find the full counts in our live blog
Here is what else happened yesterday:
Swede Wins Sviten Special
The Sviten Special was the first tournament of this year’s Festival in Bratislava and the Nordic poker variant found a Swedish winner after the final table was played out yesterday afternoon.
Michael “Lilly” Johansson won against the Italian Matteo Crapanzano after both players agreed on a 2-way deal.
Full Results:
| 1 | Michael Johansson | €3,841 |
| 2 | Matteo Crapanzano | €3,500 |
| 3 | Barrie Dear | €1,650 |
| 4 | Totti Lind | €1,150 |
| 5 | Janne Risberg | €835 |
| 6 | Joshua James Stewart | €705 |
| 7 | Edward Furniss | €580 |
| 8 | Jonas Norrstroem | €350 |
Daniel Sahlin wins the PLO Masters
The first big PLO event of The Festival Series was the €250 PLO Masters – a one-day four-card PLO tournament that attracted 94 runners. In the little hours of last night Daniel Sahlin prevailed in the heads-up against Leif Iversen and took home a little under €5,500.
Those are the full results:
| 1 | Daniel Sahlin | €5,482 |
| 2 | Leif Iversen | €3,365 |
| 3 | Miroslav Zitka | €2,560 |
| 4 | Jakob Pilgaard | €1,960 |
| 5 | Toni Mykkaenen | €1,555 |
| 6 | Roy de Jonge | €1,255 |
| 7 | Sandeep Nene | €1,055 |
| 8 | Joel Holmberg | €855 |
| 9 | Ville Konttinen | €665 |
| 10 | Philippe Laval | €460 |
| 11 | Ylva Thorsrud | €460 |
| 12 | Stevan Kusicki | €420 |
Daniel Pirlot Wins the Button, Franke Cruises to Cash
The last event to finish this night was the €125 Win the Button. A small NLH tournament that saw 91 participants.
After more than four hours of play the bubble burst and The Festival Series founder Martin “Franke” von Zweigbergk was still in the tournament and cashed for €270. A little while later the tournament was decided and Daniel Pirlot took home the title and €2,600 prize money.
| 1 | Daniel Pirlot | €2,600 |
| 2 | Carsten Lund Larsen | €1,620 |
| 3 | Ole-Johnny Fagerslett Karlsen | €1,240 |
| 4 | Terje Jahn | €950 |
| 5 | Lior Goffer | €760 |
| 6 | John Tunstall | €620 |
| 7 | Daniel Jackson | €500 |
| 8 | Sami Pullainen | €380 |
| 9 | Gerianne Dijkstra | €300 |
| 10 | Jonatan Wedde | €270 |
| 11 | Martin "Franke" von Zweigbergk | €270 |
Today: Blackjack, PLO Highroller and 8-Game
Today will be another busy day in the Banco Casino in Bratislava. Besides the Main Event, many other tournaments will run on the various poker floors.
At 2 pm the first true mixed game tournament, the €125 8-Game starts. Later in the afternoon the first High Roller Event of the series, the €1,100 PLO High Roller starts with a guarantee of €20k and during the day, at 2 pm, 5 pm and 7 pm we will offer the starting flights of the Blackjack Championship.
Here’s the full schedule for today:
| Time | Event | Buy-In | Re-Entry | Chips / Level |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 12:00 | MAIN EVENT DAY 1B - 12 Levels €500,000 gtd. | 500+50 | 2x per flight | 30k / 40 |
| 14:00 | 8-Game | 110+15 | 6 lvls | 10k / 20 |
| 14:00 - 22:00 | Blackjack Championship Day 1A + B + C | 225+25 | 3 rounds | 10k / 20 hands |
| 17:00 | PLO High Roller €20,000 gtd. | 1000+100 | 8 lvls | 100k / 30 |
| 17:00 | Gambling Cabin Sportsbook Tourney | 50+10 | No | - |
| 19:00 | Satellite to Main Event 5x €550 Main Event tickets gtd. | 50+10 | 8 lvls | 10k / 20 |
| 20:00 | Cash Game Challenge €2/2 Texas (*) | 250 | - | |
| 21:00 | Turbo Sat to NL HR (2 Tickets gtd) 2x €1,100 NLH High Roller tickets gtd. | 135+15 | 8 lvls | 10k / 15 |
| 22:00 | Roulette Championship Day 2 | - | ||
| 22:00 | Texas Progressive Knockout | 125+100+25 | 6 lvls | 15k / 20 |
| 22:30 | Cash Game Challenge €2/2 PLO4 (*) | 250 | - | |
| 00:00 | Blackjack Championship Day 2 | - |
