James Obst Leads as Aussie Millions Main Event Approaches the Bubble
The overall chip leader is one of Australia’s own, James Obst. Adelaide-born Obst is a phenomenal poker talent who may be better-known to online poker connoisseurs as “ANDY MCLEOD”
James Obst is the man to catch as the money bubble rapidly approaches in the 2013 Aussie Millions Main Event.
Just hours ago, Day 2 of the $10,000 Main Event was completed after more than 12-hours of high-octane poker. At the start of play there were 312 players in their seats - from 629 entrants across the three starting flights - but when Day 3 commences at 12:30pm local time (01:30GMT) there will only be 69 seats filled.
As mentioned, the man who ended Day 2 as the overall chip leader is one of Australia's own, James Obst. Adelaide-born Obst is a phenomenal poker talent who may be better-known to online poker connoisseurs as "ANDY MCLEOD" -- the alias he uses to terrorise his opponents online. Obst was the only player to finish with a seven-figure stack, his 1,061,000 chips will take some stacking when he un-bags them at the start of Day 3.
Obst's nearest rival, in terms of number of chips, is Scott Wilson and his 933,500 stack. Wilson remained relatively unknown until the dying moments of Day 2 when he won a massive pot to eliminate Rajkumar Ramakrishnan. Each player's chips went into the middle on a 10h-7d-Jc-Qh board, Ramakrishnan holding 9d-8d for a straight, but Wilson was holding Ac-Kh for the nut straight! That hand added over 500,000 chips to Wilson's stack and he now stands a realistic chance of winning this tournament.
Some of the notable players who managed to navigate their way through to Day 3 include Jay Tan (633,000 chips); Daniel Neilson (508,000); Phil Ivey (390,500); Lee Markholt (356,000); Patrik Antonius (332,000); Dylan Honeyman (327,000); Brandon Adams (263,000); Dan Shak (243,500) and the short-stacked Brit Craig McCorkell (75,000).
The top 64 finishers will be awarded prize money, which means just five players will go home empty handed tomorrow. Those who do managed to progress to the money place will lock up a payout of at least A$15,000 and should they make it through Day 3, they will be one step closer to that massive A$1,600,000 first place prize!
2013 Aussie Millions End of Day 2 Top 10 Chip Counts
1st: James Obst - 1,061,000
2nd: Scott Wilson - 933,500
3rd: Mervin Chan - 774,500
4th: Jay Tan - 633,000
5th: Ping Chan - 630,500
6th: Daniel Neilson - 508,000
7th: Ang Pangleng - 491,000
8th: Zoltan Szabo - 486,000
9th: Man Hei Lam - 469,500
10th: Mark Betts - 464,500
Prices quoted in copy are correct at time of publication but liable to change.
