EPT Prague: Allanon and Nazgul shine - BongBob joins Team PokerStrategy.com

Two of three Team PokerStrategy.com members survived the day, with ScHnibL0r being the sole casualty. The other PokerStrategists also did well, with Gork taking top spot and FA_Morgoth in tenth.

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The first day of the PokerStars.com European Poker Tour Prague event drew 219 players to the tables. A little more than half of them can congratulate themselves for surviving the battle.

Among the 117 survivors are Team PokerStrategy.com players Daniel "Allanon85" Drescher and Tim "Nazgul" Kahlmeyer and PokerStrategists Florian "fa_morgoth" Langmann and vedevas. EPT Dortmund second runner-up Mark "gork" Gork capped a brilliant day to sit on top of the chip leaderboard.

Team Member Simon " ScHnibL0r" Münz, EPT Dortmund runner-up Holger "tonding" Kanich and Fabian "fabstinho" Quoss did not make it through the day.

Follow Day 1B on our live ticker

Day 1B which begins at 12:00 CET will see Benny "psychobenny" Spindler, geniodelletartarughe and andimat joining in the action. The latest Team PokerStrategy.com member Konstantin "Bongbob" Bücherl will also make his debut on Day 1B.  To learn more about him, check out our interview with him here.

Be sure to follow the action in the live ticker thread and to give your support.

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Allanon racing with FA_Morgoth

Halfway through the day we asked Allanon85 a simple question: “How many chips do you have?” But for him, giving an answer was not so straightforward: “Come back in a few minutes. I have too much to count”.

After nine hours of play Allanon built up his initial stack of 30,000 to a little over the magic 100,000 chip count. This came as quite a surprise, seeing that his day almost ended in a nightmare early on. He had already lost over half his stack within the very first hour when everyone was still playing with baby blinds.

Short in chips, Allanon decided to show off his true skills. In a 3-bet pot, he raised in position holding . He flopped 9-9-2, which pretty much gave him the nuts. He received an almost full payout on the hand, and was quickly back on track.

After that it was smooth sailing and chips just kept piling up. He hit so many hands and the villains just kept paying him off. At the end of the day, Allanon ended with 105,200. This placed him right below FA_Morgoth, who concluded the day tenth in chips with 108,700.  The average is currently at 55,000 chips.

ScHnibL0r flushed out

ScHnibL0r had a relatively short stint in this event. With blinds at 150/300 in the third level, he decided to make a play preflop with . He started the hand with a little over 30,000. As play got down to the river, Schnibl0r figured that he had hit the nuts with a king high flush.

However, he could only look on in disbelief when his opponent showed him a better ace high flush. While hoping to win a monster pot, he actually got himself sent off early in the day. On a more positive note, he now has plenty of time to prepare for the German High Roller cash game that takes place next week.

Nazgul stacks up quietly

Not much was reported about Nazgul throughout the day in the Live Ticker. He said himself: “Nothing really worth reporting about. I squeeze, they fold. I squeeze they call and I bet the flop, they fold. I raise pre-flop and they fold!"

"The only hand sizeable hand I played was against Michael Keiner. I raised pre-flop with pocket Queens and he smooth called me. Flop, turn and river action went bet call and he showed me pocket Jacks. I’m happy about my day though”, added Nazgul.

He ended with 56,200 chips, which is just over the chip average. This gives him over 56 big blinds to play with on the start of Day 2.

Two PokerStrategists in the Top 10

As mentioned earlier, fa_morgoth had a really great Day 1. He just made it into the Top 10 at the end of the day and sits just above Allanon in the chip counts with 108,700 chips.  vedevas didn’t run too badly either as his aggressive play meant he picked up many hands. At one point, he had around 90,000 chips but closed the day with a smaller stack of 50,500 chips.

tonding who had vedevas to his left was seen forfeiting a few pots to the aggressive Russian. He never quite managed to hit any cards and just could not get his day going. An hour into the event, he was forced to get up from the table. fabstinho who was equally card dead faced a similar fate. After nursing a short stack for a couple of levels, he was finally sent off, well before the day was over.

The story of the day however has to be gork who finished with just enough chips to end the day in top spot. Gork continues his fine EPT run after an excellent third place finish in the Dortmund leg earlier this year.

Here are the current top 10 chip stacks: