Aussie Millions $100k Event's Stellar Final Table; Hansen, Trickett, Hachem
January 23, 2012 12:54 pmSunday night in Melbourne, 22 players skipped the $10,000 Main Event to take a shot at the $100,000 Aussie Millions Challenge, instead.
Last year the event was won by Sam Trickett, who walked away richer to the tune of AUS$1,525,000 (US$1,508,258), after overcoming a field of 38 players on his way to capturing the title. Despite the lower numbers this year, the quality of pros making it through to the final table would seem to more than compensate for the reduced quantity of entrants.
However, the eight remaining finalists will still have to survive half the table if they are to see some reward for their efforts as the payouts will be as follows:
1st: $1,012,000
2nd: $616,0000
3rd: $330,000
4th: $242,000
Amongst those players taking part in the tournament but failing to make it through to the final table were such stellar pros as Tom “durrrr” Dwan, last year’s third place finalist Erik Seidel, Daniel “jungleman15” Cates, J.C. Tran, last year’s runner-up Tony Bloom, and local hero Jonathan “Monster_Dong” Karamalikis.
Daniel Negreanu, too, found himself out after going all-in holding A-J to his opponent’s A-Q, while Jason Mercier finished just short of the final table, later tweeting:
“Busto. 10th. Decided to 3 bet call with 88 and ran into TT. Hate busting 100k tourneys.”
Phil Ivey then had to contend with being the bubble boy after moving all-in with pocket eights on a 9-7-6 flop, but with Gus Hansen’s 6-7 holding firm until the end.
However, despite a top cast exiting the $100k tournament, an equally impressive one still made it through to the final table after 10 hours of play. As the action resumes on Monday at 1445 AEST (1900 PST Sunday), the blinds will be at 2,500/5,000 with the competitors lining-up as follows:
Gus Hansen: 567,000
Joe Hachem: 538,500
Dan Smith: 346,500
Mikhail Smirnov 265,000
Sorel Mizzi: 228,500
Tony G: 102,000
Nam Le: 79,500
Sam Trickett: 73,000
Gus Hansen seems to be on a bit of a roll after winning $4 million recently at the Macau Big Game. We’ll see if he can now take his chip lead and follow up with victory in the $100,000 Aussie Millions Challenge.