EPT Barcelona Starts Tour Off

Close to 600 players bought into the inaugural European Poker Tour Main Event, in Barcelona, Spain. The buy in was 7,700+ 300 Euro (10, 508.90+ 409.44 USD), this volume of players created a prize pool of more than 4 million Euro (545,920,066 USD). With that kind of pay out, its not a surprise some of the biggest names in poker today are competing in Barcelona.

Of the British poker community represented, only 9 stars survived day 1a. Four of the most recognized names still playing are Philip Starrs, Richard Ashby, Dan Carter and Michael Greco. Day 1a started with 264 players, only 110 are moving on to day 2.

International names competing in Barcelona include Johnny Chan, Greg Raymer, Daniel Negreanu and Liz Lieu. At one point during play, Liz Lieu was nearly blinded out, as she was forced to leave the table to address a family emergency. The nature of the emergency is unknown, and it is also not clear if she will be back to compete in day 2.

Some of the more surprising eliminations include Humberto Brenes, Praz Banzi, Barny Boatman, and Dave Colclough. Amongst the impressive players during the day 1, was Thomas Wahlroos of Finland, who busted out fellow countryman Juha Helppi, finishing him in second place at the end of the day. The only person with more chips than Wahlroos, is Dan 'Ansky' Stern, with 99,000 chips, and a close third is Fabrice Soulier with 70 thousand chips.

Day 1b started with 279 players. The field was widdled down to 110 players, leaving day 2 to begin with 209 players total. In this Main Event, the top 54 players will cash in on the prize pool.