EPT Barcelona 2011 Heads Into Day 3

Barcelona has shown itself once again to be the venue of choice for European poker players after setting a Spanish record of 811 entries to the EPT poker event. 
Building on the 2010 total of 757 players, this year’s winner can now expect to take home a massive €850,000 from the €5,300 buy-in event held at the Casino Barcelona.
Days 1a and 1b of the competition saw the field of 811 whittled down to 407 hopefuls, which was further reduced to 141 players by the end of Day 2. Day 3 will now get underway later today, with a cash payout awaiting at least 120 of those players. Nevertheless, most players will be aiming to make it all the way through to Day 5 of the tournament, where the final table of eight will play down to its ultimate conclusion.
Starting out on Day 1 with just 38,000 chips, Xavier Carruggi of France on a 577,700 stack, and Finnish player Toni Pettersson with 534,100 chips are currently leading the field.
However, more recognisable names still in contention with above-average stacks include Vanessa Selbst, Victor Ramdin, Chris Moorman, Nigel Goldman, and Leo Margets. Players hoping for a quick boost to their chip counts on Day 3 are Filippo Candio, Andre Akkari, Eugene Katchalov, Benny Spindler, Alex Kravchecnko and Ivan Demidov.
One celebrity player who will also be hoping to take a prize home from this year’s EPT Barcelona is the former tennis pro Boris Becker. However, he will have his work cut out as he is currently sitting on a 54,600 stack.
On the other side of the coin, where there are winners so are there losers with big names failing to progress so far including Bertrand Grospellier, Viktor Blom, Chris Moneymaker, Dario Minieri, Max Lykov, Liv Boeree,  Phil Collins, John Duthie and Fatima Moreira de Melo.
Daniel Negreanu also fell in the early stages of the competition and later posted via twitter:
“Broke. Ks Qs board J T 4 3 two spades vs AJ. Needed a 9 Q K A or spade but missed everything. Beach time in Barcelona!