The survivors of the biggest Main Event starting field ever returned to the tables on Wednesday at the 47th annual World Series of Poker (WSOP). Day 2c of Event #69: $10,000 MAIN EVENT NLHE Championship saw 3,252 players fill the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino when play began. By the end of another five and a half, two-hour levels only 1,416 remained.
Day 2c fielded the largest of the Canadian contingent with many advancing to Day 3. Canada’s only 2016 bracelet winner and now two-time bracelet winner Kristen Bicknell is still in the mix along with fellow Canadian bracelet winners Sam Greenwood, Andre Boyer, and Timothy Adams. The top Canadian stack heading into Day 3 belongs to Montreal’s Samuel Roussy-Majeau who bagged 545,500 to knock off Day 2ab leader Eric Afriat. James Boettcher of Calgary and Andrew Chen from Mississauga were also able to bag top 20 stacks.
Overall Day 2c chip lead was claimed by Brazilian Gustavo Lopes who tossed 630,700 worth of chips into the bag at day’s end. Raffaele Castro (587,000), Rafael Moraes (571,900), Albert Daher (570,200), and poker legend Michael ‘The Grinder’ Mizrachi (549,400) sit atop the leaderboard.
Here is how the Canadian contingent inside the top 1,000 stack up:
| Samuel Roussy-Majeau | Montreal, QC | 545,500 |
| James Boettcher | Calgary, AB | 468,300 |
| Andrew Chen | Mississauga, ON | 447,200 |
| Griffin Benger | Toronto, ON | 394,500 |
| Kristen Bicknell | Nepean, ON | 381,500 |
| Sorel Mizzi | Toronto, ON | 369,800 |
| Noeung Troeung | Montreal, QC | 365,500 |
| David Cowling | Toronto, ON | 356,300 |
| Dominick French | Victoria, BC | 353,300 |
| Jordan Knackstedt | Saskatoon, SK | 348,800 |
| Yong Lu | Calgary, AB | 339,900 |
| Ratharam Sivagnanam | Toronto, ON | 337,500 |
| Alpheus Chan | Richmond, BC | 316,300 |
| Jean-Philippe Piquette | Laval, QC | 284,500 |
| Pavel Dyachenko | Aurora, ON | 266,100 |
| Noah Vaillancourt | Cowichan Bay, BC | 235,200 |
| Michael Smith | Saskatchewan, SK | 228,000 |
| Ami Barer | Vancouver, BC | 223,200 |
| Tyler Bonkowski | Regina, SK | 220,800 |
| Jonas Mackoff | Vancouver, BC | 214,400 |
| Homan Mohammadi | North Vancouver, BC | 202,300 |
| Danny Boyaci | Montreal, QC | 195,500 |
| Charles Rifici | Ottawa, ON | 184,900 |
| Michael Gentili | Lasalle, ON | 181,700 |
| Sam Greenwood | Toronto, ON | 175,500 |
| David Ottosen | Edmonton, AB | 174,100 |
| Derek Gibb | Oakville, ON | 172,200 |
| Felix Morindutil | Kelowna, BC | 168,700 |
| Andre Boyer | Montreal, QC | 168,400 |
| Anthony Diotte | Lasalle, ON | 160,000 |
| Jair beltran | North York, ON | 159,500 |
| David Ormsby | Ottawa, ON | 154,200 |
| Jason James | Mississauga, ON | 140,200 |
| Joshua Trott | Richmond, BC | 131,600 |
| Jeff Hakim | Montreal, QC | 130,700 |
| Adrian Kuan | Vancouver, BC | 125,500 |
| Francois Gobeil | Lorraine, QC | 124,700 |
| Jaroslaw Jaskiewicz | Kamloops, BC | 123,900 |
| Max Greenwood | Toronto, ON | 122,200 |
| Timothy Adams | Burlington, ON | 119,500 |
| Dmitry Vitkind | St. John’s NL | 118,000 |
| Troy Nisbet | Rosetown, SK | 116,100 |
| Michael Egan | Guelph, ON | 108,600 |
| Thomas Archer | London, ON | 105,000 |
| Thomas Popov | Richmond, BC | 103,800 |
| Linyang Song | Richmond, BC | 103,700 |
| Elliot Smith | Richmond, BC | 102,700 |
| John Krpan | Burlington, ON | 100,000 |
| Alex Livingston | Halifax, NS | 97,200 |
| Richard Mask | Vancouver, BC | 95,800 |
| Amy Fontaine | Whitehorse, YK | 93,900 |
| Ema Zajmovic | Saint-Augstine, QC | 93,500 |
| Omri Moga | Dollard-Des-Ormeaux | 92,100 |
| Kevin Morris | Victoria, BC | 92,000 |
| Sebastien Sambor | Guelph, ON | 90,500 |
| Michael Adamo | Provienciales, QC | 89,400 |
| Jason Bigelow | St. John’s NL | 88,900 |
| Brant Taylor | Delta, BC | 84,200 |
A few notable stars booking their Day 3 seat on Thursday include Steve O’Dwyer, Ole Schemion, JC Alvarado, Dan Heimiller, Oleksii Khoroshenin, Tony Dunst, Ashton Griffin, Chris Hunichen, and Liv Boeree. Main Event champions Phil Hellmuth, Ryan Reiss, and last year’s champ Joe McKeehen also survived.
The dream did come to an end for some. Canada’s Daniel Negreanu, Xuan Liu, and Mike McDonald had their runs come up short. Phil Ivey, 2014 WSOP Main Event champ Martin Jacobson, Nacho Barbero, and 2016 High Roller for One Drop winner Fedor Holz were also casualties on the day.
Both Day 2 fields will merge heading into play Thursday bringing 2,176 players back to the tables. Play will resume at noon local time in Las Vegas with five and a half two hour levels scheduled.
The WSOP is now quickly coming to an end, but there is still hope for another Canadian bracelet. Good luck to all Canadians on their Main Event adventure in Las Vegas. Stay tuned to Canada Poker for up-to-date WSOP news and events and follow your favorite Canadian poker players throughout the series. Be sure to follow us on Twitter and Facebook for live updates over the series
