/ Short-Stacked Shamus / 31 August 2011 /

A long Day 3 at the European Poker Tour Barcelona Main Event saw the field trimmed from 141 players down to the final 24, with Spain's own Tomeu Gomila ending the day atop the counts with 2.547 million. Fellow Spaniard Raul Mestre finished not far behind with 2.363 million, and Saar Wilf of Israel ended the day in third with 1.999 million.

Gomila surged into the lead amid much drama near night's end in a huge 2 million-plus chip pot that saw both Simon Charette (Canada) and Jose Angel Latorre Marina (Spain) eliminated in 27th and 26th respectively.

After opening with a button raise, Gomila saw Marina reraise all in for 600,000 from the small blind. Then, just as Charette began to consider his options from the big blind, Gomila surprisingly called the clock on him. The floor ruled that the Canadian hadn't adequate time to that point and actually declined to limit his time to act just yet.

Charette then reraised all in himself for 680,000 and Gomila quickly called, showing Ks-Kh to Marina's Kd-Qs and Charette's 8c-8h. The kings held, and Gomila had vaulted to the top of the counts.

Massimiliano Martinez (4th), Eugene Katchalov (6th), and Matthias de Meulder (7th) will all be returning to above-average stacks on Day 4. And start-of-day 3 chip leader Xavier Carruggi will be returning as well to a now below-average stack.

Min-cashers (for €8,000) on Day 3 included Benny Spindler (118th), Tobias Reinkemeier (113th), and former tennis star Boris Becker (97th).

Among those getting a little better return on their €5,300 buy-in were Filippo Candio (94th), Vanessa Selbst (84th), Victor Ramdin (74th), Toni Pettersson (70th), Andre Akkari (61st), Guillaume Darcourt (46th), Alex Kravchenko (39th), and Leo Margets (36th).

The big money, of course, awaits those who make it through Day 4 and to Thursday's final eight-handed table, where the eighth-place finisher will earn €73,000 and the winner a cool €850,000.

Here's how the top 10 -- a.k.a., the millionaire-chip club -- will look when play resumes at the Gran Casino in Barcelona on Wednesday:

1. Tomeu Gomila - 2.547 million
2. Raul Mestre - 2.363 million
3. Saar Wilf - 1.999 million
4. Massimiliano Martinez - 1.795 million
5. Marcos Fernandez - 1.699 million
6. Eugene Katchalov - 1.452 million
7. Matthias de Meulder - 1.376 million
8. Jose Miguel Esteban Neto - 1.169 million
9. Javier Contreras - 1.156 million
10. Evgeny Zaytsev - 1.095 million

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