Another day another bracelet awarded at the WSOP as Larry Wright scored his 9th (and biggest) WSOP cash and his first title taking down Event 30 ($1.5k 2-7 Draw Lowball), defeating two time bracelet winner Brandon Cantu in heads up play to take the championship at the $101k prize money.
Wright can be doubly proud of himself as not only did he win the bracelet but he also overcame one of the most talent packed final tables we've seen at this years WSOP with not only Cantu but also bracelet winners Michael Mizrachi, Erick Lindgren and Rep Porter as well as online phenom Andrew "LuckyChewy" Lichtenberger all standing in his way. Wright really dug deep and it looked very likely that despite battling his way through to the final three after starting the day 2nd from bottom that he wouldn't get any further as his 65k chip stack was dwarfed by both Cantu and Lichtenberger who both held in excess of 500k. Wright was determined however and after doubling two hands in a row gave himself the cushion he needed to start putting some real pressure on his opponents and fought back to hold the chip lead. Once Lichtenberger eventually fell in third Wright held a slight lead over Cantu and held it all the way to the finish to mark a great comeback and earn Larry Wright his first WSOP title.
We also saw the field at the seniors $1k event play down to 4 (the event was scheduled to finish yesterday but when time ran out the players agreed to reconvene today at midday local time to wrap things up. Leading the way is former November niner, Dennis Phillips who has a commanding chip lead of close to 2m with his 5.3m stack, followed by Bob Phelps on 3.475m. In third place we have two time WSOP champ Hoyt Corkins with just under 2m chips and bringing up the rear is the Barry Shulman's wife, Allyn Jaffrey Shulman - the third member of the family to reach a 2012 WSOP final table after Barry made 8th in a $1500 NLHE event, while his son Jeff made 4th in the $5k LHE event. The four will be playing for a hefty first prize of over $600k.
Event 31 ($1500 NLHE) played down to 19 yesterday from the 331 players entering day 2 (day 1 saw over 2800 players register for the event). Leading at the start of the day was Cherish Andrews with over 225k chips. Andrews also perfomed exceptionally today and ended the day in 4th with 1.38m chips. The current chip leader is 2009 WSOP Main Event Champion Joe Cada with 1.87m chips. Two time WSOP Champ JC Tran is also among those remaining but will have a lot of work to do to catch up with the chip leaders later today.
The $10k HORSE event always attracts major talent and this year is no exception - with 15 players remaining from the starting 178 the entire list of remaining players are quality players with heaps of experience. Leading the way as we head into the final days play in the event is two time bracelet winner John Monnette who is having a tremendous series with a bracelet, a 3rd and a 12th place finish already under his belt. Monnette sits on 825k chips, with second place currently with David Bach on 645k. Poised ominously in 4th place is a rampant Phil Hellmuth who steadily chipped up during the last few levels to end the day with a very strong 571k chips and he will be looking to use all his vast wealth of tournament end game experience to try to capture bracelet number 13. Also among those remaining is none other than Phil Ivey. Since a poor early start to the series Ivey has been on fire, making 3 back to back final tables and now reaching the final day of this highly competitive event. In fact, if it hadn't been for losing some big hands in the final half hour or so of play Ivey would have been among the chip leaders. However, he currently sits in 13th spot with just over 100k chips and although not quite on life support yet he will need to win some pots quickly later today to give himself a chance of realistically competing for his 9th bracelet. Play will resume today at 2pm local time.
Finally we saw day 1 of Event 33 ($1k NLHE) reach a conclusion today with 231 of the starting 2,795 players remaining. Day 1's chip leader is Brad Lisbon on 117k chips. Name players still in the hunt for gold include; Faraz Jaka, Amanda "Mandy B" Baker, Vincent van der Fluit, Humberto Brenes and Daniel Idema.
Find more of the latest news and articles relating to the World Series of Poker in the 2012 WSOP-section.