The sun is shining in the 'Garden City' of Vina del Mar, and Day 3 is set to kick off at noon local time for this penultimate day of the PokerStars Festival Chile $500,000 guaranteed Main Event.
First place is paying $97,360 and just 32 players are in contention from the 329 entries between the two starting flights. A min-cash was worth $2,840, with a total of 47 spots being paid out by the end.
Two-time LAPT high roller champion, Amos Ben, leads the way with 796,000 chips after crushing his way through the field in the last few levels of Day 2 yesterday. He admitted to firing several bullets in this, but had a smile on his facing while explaining that he made the most of his last chance now that he has bagged the chip lead. Miguel Zarzar (632,000) sits in second after spending most of the day at the top of the counts, and Hector Valenzuela (471,000) rounds out the top three counts.
The day ended early yesterday, and Day 3 is scheduled to complete at the end of ten levels or until just eight players remain. Day 4 is tomorrow, and will be the final day where a winner will be crowned.
As usual, there will be a 20-minute break every two levels, and a dinner break will be scheduled by the tournament staff once play is underway today.
Here is a look at the Day 3 seating assignments and chip counts:
Table
Seat
Player Name
Chip Count
1
1
Richard Dubini
287,000
1
2
Rodrigo Zambra
282,000
1
3
Tomas Carvallo
381,000
1
4
Daniel Vejar
125,000
1
5
Victor Vega
388,000
1
6
Pedro Sepulveda
87,000
1
7
Aurel Bogdan
251,000
1
8
Juan Parra
188,000
2
1
Sergio Tello
341,000
2
2
Martin Piñeiro
130,000
2
3
Daniel Foti
293,000
2
4
Muhammad Sadiq
110,000
2
5
Camilo Florez
156,000
2
6
Diego Lizana
405,000
2
7
Miguel Zarzar
632,000
2
8
Cristian Velasquez
158,000
3
1
Rodrigo Delgado
245,000
3
2
Hector Valenzuela
471,000
3
3
Andres Finkelberg
125,000
3
4
Jose Luis Capdevila
223,000
3
5
Juan Sebastian Gomez
419,000
3
6
Amos Ben
769,000
3
7
Francisco Salazar
87,000
3
8
Alejandro Sicuro
160,000
4
1
Jorge Ottaviano
121,000
4
2
Hernan Panulti
352,000
4
3
Walter Hahn
251,000
4
4
Joaquin Barcena
155,000
4
5
Nicolas Malandre
269,000
4
6
Wladimir Tarifeno
108,000
4
7
Oscar Toloso
10,500
4
8
Christopher Franco
127,000
Stay locked in for live updates as PokerNews continues to relay all of the action throughout the conclusion of this festival!
According to the table, Richard Dubini raised to 21,000 from the hijack. Daniel Vejar was in the small blind and re-raised all in for roughly 30,000. Andres Vega was in the big blind and also went all in. Dubini called.
Vejar showed ace-deuce, Vega had pocket kings and Dubini had pocket queens.
The board ran out ace-high and Vejar collected the main pot, while Vega collected a much larger side pot, vaulting him up the leaderboard and eliminating Dubini.
Juan Sebastian Gomez was in early position and raised to 26,000. Amos Ben was in the hijack and called, as did the player in the cutoff, Joaquin Barcena in the small blind and Oscar Toloso in the big blind.
The flop was and Barcena moved all in for 51,000. Toloso folded and Gomez called. Ben then moved all in for roughly 800,000. the cutoff folded, as did Gomez, who flashed pocket kings.
Ben tabled and Barcena showed . The board bricked off with the and the and Ben climbed back over the one million chip mark. Barcena graciously wished the players good luck as he left the table and headed over to the payout desk.
With the recent elimination of Cristian Velasquez in 10th place, the final nine players in the PokerStars Festival Chile Main Event have come together.
After one more elimination, play will end for the day and the final table of eight players will play down to a winner tomorrow beginning at noon local time.
Amos Ben leads the way with 2,300,000, with Daniel Vejar sitting as the short stack with 445,000.
Action folded to Sergio Dario Tello in the cutoff and he raised to 100,000. Daniel Vejar was in the small blind and moved all in for 255,000.
Tello went into the tank for about a minute and eventually called.
Tello:
Vejar:
Vejar was the player at risk and needed to hit a king to stay alive. The board ran out and Vejar was eliminated on the final table bubble, pocketing $10,000 for his 10th place finish.
All remaining players are guaranteed a payout of $12,200. Play has now concluded for Day 3, with the remaining eight players coming back tomorrow at noon to play down to a winner.
The final table of the PokerStars Festival Chile, $500,000 guaranteed Main Event is set after six and a half levels of play today on Day 3.
Five of the eight final tablists are Chilean, and they all make up the top five spots on the leaderboard. Leading the way is two-time LAPT high roller champion Amos Ben. The Chilean pro dominated throughout the day and already has three high roller titles under his belt. He clearly demonstrated his skills as he remained at the top of the leaderboard for the vast majority of play. Ben bagged 2,237,000 today and has a big lead on the second-biggest chip stack. Ben used his chips aggressively and put pressure on all of his opponents in many different scenarios, contributing to his success throughout. Ben has more than a quarter of the total chips in play and is arguably the most decorated player at the table.
Here is a look at how the final eight players stack up:
Seat
Player Name
Country
Chip Count
1
Andres Vega
Chile
740,000
2
Juan Sebastian Gomez
Colombia
716,000
3
Christopher Franco
Chile
1,512,000
4
Oscar Toloso
Argentina
692,000
5
Amos Ben
Chile
2,237,000
6
Rodrigo Zambra
Chile
790,000
7
Diego Lizana
Chile
808,000
8
Sergio Dario Tello
Argentina
728,000
In second place is Chilean, Christopher Franco. He started the day with 127,000 chips and steadily built it up, bagging 1,512,000. He won a big flip versus Malandre, and used that to gain momentum as he climbed the leaderboard. He even took over the chip lead from Ben for a short period of time, which no one else was able to do. Franco has one live recorded tournament win under his belt after taking down a Venetian Deepstack Extravaganza event last year and is looking to add to that success tomorrow.
Diego Lizana sits in third place after having bagged 808,000 and is looking for his first live recorded win. Lizana won some big flips early and never looked back as he remained in the top three chip stacks for most of the day. In fourth place is Chilean, Rodrigo Zambra, with 790,000 chips. Zambra has multiple live cashes but is still in search of his first live recorded title. Zambra played a steady game throughout, not getting into any big flip scenarios. Fifth in chips is Chilean, Andres Vega, bagging 740,000. He has one recorded live win under his belt and two main event final tables from the Dreams Poker Tour. Sixth in chips is Argentina's, Sergio Dario Tello, with 728,000. Tello finished in second place in Event #1 of the PokerStars Festival Chile $220 event. He looks to improve on that finish tomorrow and get his first live recorded tournament win. In seventh is Colombian, Juan Sebastian Gomez, with 716,000 chips. Gomez looks to build up his live tournament resume as this is going to be his highest career cash, being guaranteed $12,200 tomorrow. He has one other career live cash and has been a force to be reckoned with in this event. Rounding out the top eight is Argentinian, Oscar Toloso, with 692,000. This is Toloso's first cash and he has represented himself well among an extremely tough field.
Besides the top two chip leaders, the other six stacks are all within five to six big blinds of each other. This should create a very competitive dynamic for tomorrows action. The average stack for the final table is 1,028,125 which is roughly an average of 40 big blinds. When play returns tomorrow, blinds will be at 12,000/24,000 with a 4,000 ante. The level has five minutes remaining before blinds will increase to 15,000/30,000 with a 5,000 ante. Tomorrow will play until a champion has been crowned and someone walks away with close to $100,000 for the victory.
Here is a look at the remaining prizepool:
Place
Prize (USD)
1
$97,360
2
$61,900
3
$46,400
4
$37,560
5
$29,600
6
$22,600
7
$16,600
8
$12,200
The tournament attracted 329 total entries and today's action began with 32 players. There was no shortage of action from the moment the first card was dealt, and some big names hit the rail including the likes of three-time high roller champion, Richard Dubini, falling in 29th place ($3,660) after his pocket queens ran into pocket kings. The next big name out the door was last years, LAPT Player of the Year, Nicolas Malandre. Malandre took a big hit when he lost a flip with versus Christopher Franco's pocket jacks. He was unable to recover and had to settle for 26th place, pocketing $4,160. Joaquin Barcena is an Argentinian pro and one of the high roller contestants. He fell in 23rd place ($4,660) after flopping trips versus Amos Ben. Ben had him out-kicked and sent him to the rail as he did to so many others. Roberto Andres Finkelberg has an LAPT high roller title to his name from back in 2013. He fell in 21st place ($4,660) and wasn't able to put much together on the day. Tomas Carvallo is a Chilean Pro who has a national Main Event title under his belt and finished in a respectable 15th place for $6,660. Martin Pineiro from Argentina has multiple deep finishes on various South American Tour stops and finished in 12th place ($7,400). The final elimination on the day was Daniel Vejar in 9th place ($10,000) and was the final table bubble boy. Vejar got it in pre-flop with versus Tello's pocket queens and was unable to improve.
Day 4 begins at noon tomorrow, so stay locked in with PokerNews as we bring you all the live reporting and updates throughout the final table.