Justin Ouimette won the Mini Main Event earlier this week and is also in this tournament to try and make it two. He raised to 73,499 from the early position and was called by Sven Poerschke in the hijack. Joni Jouhkimainen three-bet shoved from the cutoff for 300,773 for Luciano Hollanda to four-bet to 528,500 from the button. The blinds folded and so did Ouimette and Poerschke for the two players to go heads-up.
Joni Jouhkimainen:
Luciano Hollanda:
The flop came for Hollanda to stay ahead with the pocket pair.
The turn was the for Hollanda to improve to a set while Jouhkimainen to pick up the gutshot to a straight but he bricked the river as the completed the board.
In a battle cutoff versus button, the remaining 1.5 million of Paul Hoefer went into the middle and he faced partypoker ambassador Joao Simao in the following showdown.
Paul Hoefer:
Joao Simao:
Only one club and no broadway cards appeared on the board, which sent Hoefer to the rail shortly after the action resumed.
Espen Uhlen Jorstad was sitting in the middle position and had called the shove of Anna Nikolay in the cutoff for the 2,011,302 she had behind while the rest of the table had laid their cards away.
Anna Nikolay:
Espen Uhlen Jorstad:
The board ran out for Nikolay to flop two pair but to not bring any further help as Jorstad held with the higher two pair.
There was no hand for hand mode activated and pretty much all tables had several players using their time banks. Eventually, it was Marco Baldini who bowed out and that should have spelled the end for Day 1a. However, the active hands were still running and another massive pot was brewing.
Joao Simao raised to 325,000 and Dominykas Mikolaitis three-bet to 1,440,000 out of the big blind. Simao used more than 60 seconds of his time bank before jamming for more than 10.9 million and Mikolaitis beat him into the pot.
Joao Simao:
Dominykas Mikolaitis:
The board ran out and just like that, the above-average stack of Simao vanished into thin air as he departed in 89th place.
The first of two starting days for the 2021 partypoker MILLIONS Online $5,300 Main Event has wrapped up. Thanks to 591 total entries, the tournament is on track to surpass the $5 million guarantee as another starting day remains one week from now on Sunday, February 28th, 2021.
After nine and a half hours of poker action, the day ended with just 87 survivors. Initially, Day 1a was supposed to conclude with the top 15% of the field and 89 contenders remaining. However, during the final hand of the night, three players hit the rail on different tables to miss out on a payday entirely.
High Roller regular Daniel Dvoress claimed the Day 1a lead and amassed 30,582,133 in chips. Not far behind the Canadian are Hermogenes Gelonezi (27,798,834) and Andras Nemeth (27,371,860), as well as the 2020 WSOP Main Event international leg finalist Dominykas Mikolaitis (24,489,173). Mikolaitis was partly responsible for the end of the day when he knocked out partypoker ambassador Joao Simao during the most crucial stage of the day.
2021 partypoker MILLIONS Online $5,300 Main Event Day 1a Top 10 Counts
Rank
Player
Country
Chip Count
Big Blinds
1
Daniel Dvoress
Canada
30,582,133
218
2
Hermogenes Gelonezi
Brazil
27,798,834
199
3
Andras Nemeth
Hungary
27,371,860
196
4
Dominykas Mikolaitis
Lithuania
24,489,173
175
5
Arnaud Enselme
France
18,339,430
131
6
Simon Nielsen
Denmark
18,072,924
129
7
Joshua Hoesel
United States
17,591,055
126
8
Endrit Geci
United Kingdom
17,498,394
125
9
Pedro Padilha
Brazil
16,330,297
117
10
Espen Uhlen Jorstad
Norway
15,695,668
112
Some notables that made it through to Day 2 with an above-average stack in the first flight already include Joshua Hoesel (17,591,055), Pedro Padilha (16,330,297), Espen Uhlen Jorstad (15,695,668), Oleg Vasylchenko (13,787,078), Simon Deadman (10,762,859), Christian Rudolph (9,544,082), Bruno Volkmann (9,453,291) and 2019 WSOP Europe Main Event champion Alexandros Kolonias (9,127,932).
Plenty of other well-known names of the international poker circuit locked up a payday and that also includes three partypoker representatives. For Twitch streamer Jaime Staples, it was the first cash in an online poker event with a buy-in of $5,000 or higher. The Canadian made it through with a stack of 8,386,939, while sponsored pro Dzmitry Urbanovich (1,984,954) and Jason Koon (1,700,256) were among the shortest stacks at the end of the night.
It wasn't an easy ride by any means for Staples, who scored a lucky double up with king-jack versus kings when he was short. However, once that crucial step was done, the Canadian never looked back and picked up big hands along the way to consistently grow his stack.
All other partypoker representatives were not as fortunate and hit the rail throughout the day including Mikita Badziakouski, Joni Jouhkimainen, Patrick Leonard, Isaac Haxton, and John Duthie. The list of Day 1a casualties beyond that reads like the who-is-who of the international poker circuit.
The Action of the Day
There were only a handful of casualties in the first few levels of the day and among them was partypoker Advisory Board member Duthie. On a shorter stack, he got it in with fours and deuces only to run into superior two pair, which held. For Leonard, the second bullet ended against Sergei Koliakov when king-queen suited made an inferior pair versus ace-nine.
Jason Koon's first bullet ended rather early as well after a clash with Guillaume Nolet. However, Koon re-entered and ran up an above-average stack which only faltered late on once the money bubble approached.
Among the many hopefuls were also former MILLIONS Main Event champions. Benjamin Chalot won the 2019 online edition which featured a buy-in of $10,300. The Frenchman and Hungary resident fired two bullets on Day 1a and didn't make it through. MILLIONS UK live edition winner Maria Lampropulos was unable to find any help with a dominated pair to bust after the registration had closed.
Daniel Dvoress jumped to a big stack when he made the nut flush against Ramon Kropmanns and then knocked out Sergi Reixach with kings versus ace-five suited.
While the pace of eliminations certainly picked up mid-way through the day, it slowed down a ton a few dozen players away from the target. Anatoly Filatov fell victim to the hot run of Dvoress and other big names such as Dario Sammartino, Tomas Jozonis, and Georgios Karakousis, Christopher Frank, and Robert Heidorn all busted during the final stage.
All 87 survivors have guaranteed a portion of the $5 million guarantee already. However, with such a solid turnout for Day 1a, the overall prize pool may grow beyond that as the second and final starting day takes place the following Sunday, February 28th. The PokerNews live reporting team will be back then to provide all the action from the virtual arena.