WSOP-C Eastern Regional Championship Day 2

As predicted, Day 2 of the WSOP Circuit’s Eastern Regional Championship at Harrah’s in Atlantic City, New Jersey proved to be quite eventful despite the weak initial turnout. Less than an hour into the Day 2 action, six strong players had already busted out, but it was still a long day of play; all in all it took more than 12 hours to whittle the field from 93 to 27.

The day’s biggest surprise probably came via Vanessa Selbst’s elimination. Selbst had ended Day 1 as the clear favorite with a nearly 40,000 chip lead. Several hours into the day, Selbst was still holding the lead, but her very tough table had tested it several times. Finally, opponent Chris Klodnicki called a big three-bet from Selbst and hung on through the flop to finally scare her off with a big bet after the turn. It was enough to make Klodnicki the new chip leader.

Only a few hands later, Selbst fired off the largest river bet at that point in the tournament, only to have opponent Seth Fischer call and beat her with two pair. It was a big enough pot to move Fischer into the chip leader position while Selbst dropped back to the middle of the pack. Yet again, only a few more hands into the level Selbst eliminated Matt Stout, recouping a significant portion of her earlier losses and putting her close to the top again.

Selbst was back on the prowl when she decided it was time for a rematch with Klodnicki. Selbst went into the hand pretty confident with pocket kings, but Klodnicki outdrew her with a 7-8 suited. His resulting flush made him the first player to pass the 300,000 chip mark while Selbst was left with a stack of only 10,000. Only moments later Selbst pushed all in against Jordan Morgan and was outpaired, sending her home far sooner than anyone expected.

1. Chris Bell – 434,500

2. Seth Fischer – 386,700

3. Eugene Katchalov – 306,400

4. Frank Calo – 255,100

5. Jason Burt – 195,300

6. Kevan Pandya – 186,200

7. Nick Mitchell – 183,200

8. Matthew Waxman – 179,800

9. Chris Klodnicki – 179,700

10. Jack Schanbacker – 168,000

As you can see, there’s been quite a shake-up of Day 1’s top contenders with only Mitchell, Klodnicki and Burt parlaying their early leads into a strong position for Day 3. Kudos too to Matt Waxman who already won the Atlantic City tournament’s Main Event less than a week ago and is working hard to secure his second career live tournament win this week.

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