The final table is set at the 2013 Aussie Millions $10k main event. Dan Shak has a slight chip lead over Jarrod Glennon (3.775m to 3.6m), while the rest of the seven-handed table stacks up as follows: Patrik Antonius (3.345m), Mervin Chan (2.91m), Joseph Cabret (2.655m), David Yan (1.45m), with lone female and Bodog-sponsored pro Jay Tan holding the short stack at 1.22m. Shak seems to flourish down under, having finished fourth at this year’s Aussie Millions $100k Challenge, which echoed his fourth-place finish in the same event in 2009, and Shak won the $100k Challenge in 2010 while also finishing 11th in 2010’s main event.
With A$1.6m awaiting the winner, online star Antonius is hoping for a finish that tops the $635k he earned last April for his fourth-place finish at the EPT Monaco High Roller, while Tan is hoping to outdo her boyfriend ‘Hong Kong’ Kenny Wong’s runner-up spot at this event last year. Wong exited this year’s event in 28th spot, earning $35k (compared to last year’s $1m), sadly eliminating the tantalizing possibility of a boyfriend/girlfriend heads-up battle. Melbourne native Glennon is looking at his biggest score ever, while fellow Melboune man Cabret is on track to best his best ever live prize ($130k at the 2009 PokerNews Cup Challenge main event), and Auckland native Yan is set to vastly improve on the $10k he earned via the Team Event at last year’s Aussie Millions.
IVEYPOKER CONTINUES TO GROW AND CONFOUND
If you weren’t aware, today is Phil Ivey’s 37th birthday. Ivey, who finished 12th in last year’s main event, managed no higher than 30th position this year, but earlier this week Ivey announced he’d signed Shak to the yet-to-launch IveyPoker.com training school. Shak’s 2010 Aussie Millions $100k Challenge victory came as a result of defeating Ivey heads-up, so perhaps revisiting the scene of the battle caused Ivey to consider Shak worthy for inclusion among the now 30 IveyPoker pros serving precisely 0 students.
IveyPoker also added Johnathan Jaffe, Aaron Jones and Christina Lindley this week. The signings have produced no shortage of Twitter tittering, with poker commentator Norman Chad leading the way, saying IveyPoker “now needs only 36 more instructors to run its own TeamIvey Heads-Up Poker Championship” and how the site was “starting to remind me of the Ted Baxter Famous Broadcasters School, but at least the TBFBS had one student.” But perhaps the best observation came via this illustration from @pokerlolz:
