Denis Strebkov Finishes Top of the Counts as Day 1a Comes to an End

By Lisa Yiasemides

Following eight exciting hours of poker here at Casino Sochi, 69 entries (including re-entries) pulled up a chair in the first of five starting flights in the Main Event.

Of those, 35 survived but Denis Strebkov (pictured) was the one who had the most productive day – taking through 181,100 through to Day 2 later this week.

Strebkov told WPT.com that the biggest hand of the day came for him in Level 6. Strebkov had defended king-ten suited in the big blind against an under-the-gun open and flopped the nuts. He check-raised flop, barrelled turn and moved all in for a little over a pot-sized bet on the river. By this point, his opponent had made a straight and called the rest. Strebkov didn’t look back from there.

Strebkov is closely followed by Vahe Martirosyan (176,600) in second place, Sergey Nikiforov (134,600) in third and Nikita Kalinin (130,600) in fourth.

Champions Club member Dmitriy Gromov (pictured) (127,100) also bagged big and goes through in fifth. He wasn’t the only Champions Club member to make it through either – Alexander Lakhov joins him with 61,400.

Petr Bartagov (125,500) and Andrey Zaichenko (120,900) also finished with a six-figure stack, whilst Vladimir Lappo (97,400), Dmitry Ponomarev (96,100), Andrey Chernokoz (53,800), Daniil Kiselev (40,200) and Vitaliy Avanesyan (38,500) were some of the other big names to take a shot today.

There were a few big names who tried but failed to progress. Pavel Kovalenko, Danilo Velasevic and Anatoly Korochenskiy didn’t make it but may well return to try again in one of the four future flights.

Until tomorrow then, when we return to do it all again for Day 1b. The format of the tournament will be no different except for the earlier start time of 12 pm. Don’t forget to tune into WPT.com for live updates then.