World Series of Poker -- Getting To Know Your Day 3 Chip LeadersCard Player Looks At Three Unfamiliar Faces Atop the Leader Board |
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There are some familiar faces and notable professionals sitting atop the leader board in the 2010 World Series of Poker main event, but a tournament of this magnitude is bound to have some complete unknowns as well.
For the remainder of the main event, Card Player will take a look at a few of those newcomers each and every day, until the November Nine are set.
Day 3 Chip Leaders
Rank: 1st
Chip Count: 387,800
David Assouline, from Montreal, Canada, is the overall chip leader heading into day 3 with 387,800 in chips. The 25-year-old is competing in his first WSOP main event, but does have some big buy-in tournament experience, having played in this year’s PokerStars Caribbean Adventure.
Primarily an online tournament player, Assouline is hoping to make a smooth transition to the live arena after having put up impressive online results in the past year.
In October, Assouline took down the Sunday Warmup for $149,171. He followed that up with a win in the Sunday Second Chance in April for $53,831. This summer, he continued his success by final tabling the Sunday Million for another $61,500.
Here’s what he had to say about his tournament run.
“To have as many chips as I do at this point in the tournament, you have to have a few coolers go your way,” he explained. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m playing well, but I’ve had my aces run into kings twice already. On another key hand, I flopped a straight and flush draw with 8
4 and it came in on the river to give me an 85,000 pot.”
Charles “chilax chuck” Alexandre Sylvestre
Rank: 13th
Chip Count: 292,300
Chalres Sylvestre is playing in the second WSOP main event of his career, but he’s already put himself in position to make a much deeper run than his first time around. Sylvestre, who bought in directly, is currently in 13th place overall with 292,300.
The man from Montreal, Canada got his first WSOP cash under his belt after a deep run in event no. 20, a $1,500 pot-limit Omaha tournament. Sylvestre finished in 23rd place and earned $8,064 for his efforts.
The 27-year-old is a self-described professional poker player and had this to say about his tournament.
“With an hour left in day 1, I was sitting with just 17,000 in chips,” he recalled. “I ended up getting it all in with A-J and thought I was crushed, but luckily he turned over A-10 and my hand held to give me a decent stack. I grinded that up on day 2 when I started to get into it with another guy at the table. We played a massive pot and he ended up calling my push with top pair against my flush draw and over card. The flush came in right away and that put me over 230,000. The rest came by picking my spots and playing aggressively.”
Rank: 45th
Chip Count: 241,000
Gabe Walls is currently in 45th place overall with 241,000 in chips, though he may have been the chip leader had a three-outer not taken a third of his stack late on day 2.
Walls is a former professional poker player who retired at the age of 21 and used his winnings to open up four, ten-table poker rooms in Indiana. He now owns and operates $20 million recycling facilities all over the country.
The 26-year-old is competing in his third WSOP main event, having cashed in the previous two. In 2005, Walls was chip leader with 100 remaining only to bust in 87th place. In 2009, Walls was once again chip leader with 250 remaining, but a string of bad beats saw him hit the rail in 239th place.
The former Magic: the Gathering player is hoping that his 2010 run not only gives him his third consecutive in-the-money finish, but perhaps reserves him a seat at the final table.
Here’s how Walls summed up his tournament thus far.
“There wasn’t really a key hand thus far,” he said. “I’ve just managed to win a lot of little pots. Luckily, I haven’t had to fade very much. On my first double up, I got a guy to put it in with A-10 on a K-9-9 flop against my pocket kings. Then on my second double up, I got a guy to pay me off with trip aces against my sevens full. After that, I just cruised.”
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