WSOP Event #57: Nazgul Going For Glory On Day 6

Pro players that are still in and doing well are: Phil Ivey with 6,345,000 that places him third on the list. Ludovic "Cuts" Lacay is only two places behind Ivey with close to 6,000,000 chips. Antonio Esfandiari is right behind Ludovic with 5,610,000 in chips and Jeff Shulman is somewhere around the top with 4,745,000 in chips.

Nazgul (pictured left) started the day with 1,315,000 in chips. At the start of the day Nazgul had a very tough table, with good young and aggressive players. He got it in within 15 minutes with pocket tens and was called by pocket aces for only a small pot of 600,000 or so. Nazgul managed to spike a ten on the river eliminating the other player.

Only a few rounds later, Nazgul five-bet pocket queens all-in and got called by AK. They were racing and Nazgul got the best of it. Nazgul had his opponent covered and eliminated another player. His stack was up to 3,200,000.

After this point it got much harder for our Team PokerStrategy.com player. He didn't get many hands and he didn't hit much either. On top of that he was faced with an aggressive table. His stack size floated around 2.5 and 3.2 million for 8 hours until the very last level.

Nazgul lost a rather big hand with K-Q against A-Q on a K-Q-8-A-2 board. After this hand he was down to 2.2 million and he couldn't win a hand so he blinded down a litte more even. Then he made a classy call down with Ace high on a 2-4-8-Q-4 board where the flush draw hit on the river. His hand was good and he scooped a decent pot.

Then there were only 81 players left and Nazgul got moved to a new table. With the blinds already at 20,000-40,000 and a 5,000 ante he was getting shorter. In one hand the button opened to 110,000 and Nazgul re-raised him from the small blind with A-K. The button went over the top and was all-in for 1,145,000 total. Nazgul-snap called and saw he was up against pocket kings. He couldn't hit and he took a big hit to his stack.

With only 850,000 left himself he picked up A-Q one orbit later on the button. The cut-off opened it to 115,000 and Nazgul pushed all-in. He got instantly looked up by A-K. No miracle flop, turn nor river for Nazgul and he was eliminated in 74th place. He survived over 6,420 players total and had to play six full days for that. Over 60 hours of play altogether. He got rewarded with a very nice cash of $68,979. Congratulations!

Source: IMPDI for 2009 WSOP

Day 6 saw many notable names who marked the previous play days getting eliminated. Bertrand "ElkY" Grospellier (pictured right) was on his way towards the final table but lost a bit of his momentum on Day 5 and now, he will have to wait for the next year to take another shot at the Main Event title.

Peter Eastgate, David Benyamine, Theo Tran, Joe Hachem, J.C. Tran, Noah Boeken and Joe Serock were also busted before the play was concluded for the day. Meanwhile, Ludovic Lacay has grown fond of the top 10 position on the leaderboard, as he is still very much alive with a healthy stack of nearly 6,000,000 chips.

Despite Ludovic's great performance thus far, most attention is given to one man - Phil Ivey. Could he crown his great WSOP run with another bracelet? Entering the next play day with the third largest stack, Ivey definitely has good chances of at least reaching the final table.

The last year's Main Event final tablist Dennis Phillips is still in the tournament, though in a shy 43rd place with 2,305,000 chips. Antonio "The Magician" Esfandiari is currently in 6th place and will return for the next play day along with 63 other survivors.

Here are the top 10 chip stacks after Day 6:

World Series Of Poker Main Event Day 6 Standings
Rank	Name	Chips
1st	Darvin Moon	9,745,000
2nd	Billy Kopp	8,245,000
3rd	Phil Ivey	6,345,000
4th	Steven Begleiter	6,315,000
5th	Ludovic Lacay	5,965,000
6th	Antonio Esfandiari	5,610,000
7th	Tommy Vedes	5,430,000
8th	Antoine Saout	5,195,000
9th	Ben Lamb	4,975,000
10th	Nick Maimone	4,900,000