There are 222 players returning for Day 3 of the $5,300 MILLIONS Main Event at the 2017 Poker Party Festival. The Canadian poker pro, Troy Quenneville leads them all after bagging a whopping 19,060,000 chips.
Quenneville has plenty of success here at the Melia Caribe Tropical Resort in Punta Cana, Republic, having finished second in this same event in 2016. He also took down the $2,500 event in 2016 for his largest cash of $400,000 to date. Quenneville is welcomed at the top of the leaderboard by some fellow Canadians, Kevin Rivest and Francois Billard. Rivest has a history of running deep in these large fields, finishing 15th at the partypoker MILLIONS Main Event in Montreal, Canada back in April. He also recently won the World Cup of Cards $2,200 Main Event for $276,140.
This year, there is a lot more money to play for as first place will be taking home $1,000,000. With just 222 players remaining, half of the field will need to be eliminated before the money is reached. A total of 111 places will get paid with a min-cash being worth $10,000.
The action will resume at 12:00 P.M. local time with the blinds kicking off at 50,000/100,000 and a button ante of 100,000. The schedule is to play a complete seven levels, with the blinds increasing every 75 minutes. There will be a 20-minute break at the end of every two levels with play expected to conclude around 9:30 P.M. this evening.
Follow along with the PokerNews live reporting team as we bring you all of the action from the tournament floor.
Martin Jacobson came into the day with just 20 big blinds but as we all know, being a short stack has never deterred him before. After already increasing his stack to nearly 3.0 million, the action was folded to Jacobson in the small blind who just limped in. Greg Himmelbrand raised to 350,000 out of the big blind and Jacobson called.
The flop came and Jacobson checked to Himmelbrand who continued for 280,000. Jacobson check-raised to 575,000 and Himmelbrand announced all in. Jacobson quickly called for his last 2.585 million and tabled . Himmelbrand tabled and would need help to knock out the 2014 WSOP Main Event champion. The turn brought the and the river was the , securing the double up for Jacobson.
With over 2.0 million in the middle, the board read and Mike Sexton led out for 800,000 from the big blind. Ari Engel sat in thought and finally made a raise to 2.6 million on the button.
"Ughhh," Sexton grumbled. It was now his turn to go in the tank, afraid he may have made a mistake by betting the river. After a couple minutes, Sexton dropped chips into the middle to make the call and Engel tabled for a missed flush draw. Sexton turned over as he rivered a backdoor flush and scooped the pot.
On a flop reading with around 500,000 in the pot, Kevin Rivest bet 225,000 from middle position. Julio Gaston Belluscio called in the cutoff and the landed on the turn.
Rivest checked to Belluscio who bet 575,000. Rivest check-raised to 1.825 million and that is when the table banter started.
"I told you I was going to check-raise you," Rivest said as he sat comfortably in his chair.
Belluscio called and the completed the board. Rivest reached back for a bet of 3.5 million and Belluscio began talking back.
"Do you have kings?" he asked.
"Do you have a small flush?" Rivest responded with a question of his own. "Go ahead, fold your baby flush."
Belluscio did indeed muck his cards and Rivest flashed the to the PokerNews crew before the hand was eventually turned over for the whole table to see.
Alexis Urli has wrestled the chip lead away from Troy Quenneville early on in Day 3. With the two players sitting on the same table, there is bound to plenty of chips flying around throughout the day.
On a board with around 400,000 in the middle, Niall Farrell checked the action over to Jiri Horak who put out a bet of 265,000. Farrell thought for a moment and called, before the dealer burned and turned the .
Both players checked, with Farrell leading the river for 525,000. No sooner had the chips left Farrell's hand than Horak had called, with Farrell quickly tabling . Horak then showed and dragged in the pot.