Gaelle Jaudon
The EPT Festival has just opened the festivities with a UK and Ireland Poker Tour (UKIPT) as an entry. that UKIPT Main Event to £1,100 at PokerStars attracted 344 entries on Day 1 and 184 entries on Day 2. David Gassian, a former finalist in the same event, tops the provisional rankings. Two more kickoffs follow on Wednesday at Hilton Park Lane.
Gassian counted 577,000 chips at the end of Day 1a, which put him in the chip lead after the first two days. Remember, the Frenchman has already been very close to winning the UKIPT title since finishing second against Usman Siddique in 2016 and then £51,930 in pocket.
The top three stacks after Day 1a also included another well-known Frenchman on the field, Julien Sitbon with NOK 560,000 and Robin Scheidegger with 465,000. Sitbon is also a regular in the deep running of this event since finishing sixth in the UKIPT last April for £24,242.
PokerStars Ambassador, Ben “Spraggy” Spraggalso shined on this day as he collected 300,000 chips to slide into the top 10 of Day 1a chips.
Day 1b then Vladas Tamasauskas become the chip leader with 564,000, while Mauricio Ferreira Pais (530,000) and Diego Zeiter (421,000) complete the top three.
Many French people have already turned up at the starting line in this UKIPT, and several have managed to find a place on Day 2 and secure a min-cash i.a. Liece El Berrak, David Taib, Fabrice Bigot, Antoine Labat, Mikael Ecanvil or Dimitri Joubert. But not everyone was so lucky since Alexander Reard, Sylvain Loosli, The angel Besnainou, Antoine Saut, Florian Guimond or i Julien Loire found himself eliminated.
However, they could try their luck again today, with Day 1c starting at noon local time, followed by Day 1d at 6pm, and hopes to join the 79 players who have already qualified for Day 2 on Thursday 20 October.
Stay on PokerNews.com to follow all the action tomorrow and continue to cover the event until a winner is chosen on Saturday 22nd October.
Gaelle Jaudon