Phil Hellmuth Closes In On 12th Bracelet At WSOPE 2011

Phil Hellmuth won the WSOP $1,500 NL event in Vegas back in 2007, and has been chasing an elusive 12th WSOP bracelet ever since.
At WSOP 2011, the 46 year old came tantalisingly close to reaching his goal, but fell just short of his goal after finishing in 2nd place on no less than three different occasions.
Now at the 2011 WSOP Europe in Cannes, Phil Hellmuth has started where he left off and is once again finely poised to further stamp his authority on the history of the WSOP with a record 12th victory.
Two days after the €2,500 buy-in Six-Handed event got underway, the starting field of 360 players is now down to just 12 competitors with Phil Hellmuth nicely placed near the top of the field in 2nd spot.
With 36 places being paid, Phil Hellmuth has already guaranteed himself a minimum payout of €13,228, with just an appearance at the €215,999 first-prize final table ensuring he surpasses Ben Lamb in the WSOP Player of the Year race.
While 50 players were still left, Phil Hellmuth had risen to pole position at WSOPE Event No. 1, and by the time Day 2 was over only Guillaume Humbert (541,000) had more than his 401,000 stack with a reasonable gap opened up between himself and a 3rd placed Azusa Maeda with 295,000 chips.
In the meanwhile, while Hellmuth was busy consolidating his grip on the tournament many top name pros were not so lucky with those players coming away empty-handed including Vanessa Selbst, Dominik Nitsche, Scott Seiver, Bryn Kenney, Daniel Negreanu, and John Racener.
Amongst those pros coming away with at least a cash at the €2,500 buy-in event were Todd Terry in 33rd (€4,536), Peter Jetten in 20th (€7,560), Marvin Rettenmaier in 17th (€9,936) and Freddy Deeb in 15th (€9,936).
Going into Day 3, Phil Hellmuth will now be hoping to outlast the rest of the diminished field on his way to capturing a 12th bracelet. As the action picks-up again at 3pm CET/9am ET on Sunday, here are the chip counts of the remaining players:
1. Guillaume Humbert – 541,000
2. Phil Hellmuth – 401,000
3. Azusa Maeda – 295,000
4. David Benyamine – 253,000
5. Marton Czuczor – 210,000
6. Matan Krakow – 203,000
7. Anton Wigg – 201,000
8. Alexander Salabaschew – 183,000
9. Adrien Allain – 125,000
10. Casey Kastle – 119,000
11. Bruno Benveniste – 102,500
12. Robert Finlay – 72,000