The ground was shaking down under with a record-breaking 822 players turning up for the AU$10,600 buy-in Aussie Millions 2019 Main Event. Year after year, this annual event never fails to draw players from all around the world that it has now become one of the most sought after titles next to the WSOP Main Event.
As expected, the list of highly decorated players in the field was extensive. Since this was a freezeout tournament, everyone gunned to survive the first stage. By the completion of all the starting days, only half the field advanced to Day 2 – 405 players (to be exact) – which was further cut to 169 at the end of the day.
Here’s a breakdown of the numbers:
Day 1A – 165 – 79 advanced
Day 1B – 268 – 135 advanced
Day 1C – 364 – 191 advanced
Day 2 – 25 late registration
Total entries – 822
Prize pool of AU$8,220,000 (~US$5.9 Million)
ITM: 88 places
With an addional 25 entries this today, the 2019 #AussieMillions Main Event has been officially locked out at 822 players – the largest field in its 20+ year history!!! pic.twitter.com/8KwzUBoClo
— Crown Poker (@CrownPoker) January 30, 2019
Only one player stands to make a cool million and more with the eventual winner pocketing AU$1,850,000 (~US$1,330,000). Though ITM of 88 places is still another elimination day away, among those not part of the hunt are Chino Rheem – who busted out in just two hands in Day 1B -, and defending Main Event champion, Toby Lewis. Lewis fell early in Day 2 opening up the floodgates for anyone looking to be the newest victor.
Day 3 qualifiers
Claiming the leader’s status at the end of Day 2 was Pim De Goede with a stack of 413,000, which is roughly 137 times the opening blinds of Day 3. Other notable players through were: Michael Addamo (279,300), Day 1C chip leader Cole Swannack (236,600), Matthew Wakeman (217,700), Jack Salter (202,900), Tobias Ziegler (196,400), Day 1B chip leader Julian Stuer (195,000), Jackie Glazier (149,900), Vincent Huang (125,500), and Manig Loeser (124,400).
Top 10:
| Pim De Goede | 413,000 |
| Bjorn Ostby | 386,300 |
| Ben Lai | 378,000 |
| David Yan | 363,300 |
| Shane Moran | 346,900 |
| Michael Soyza | 317,100 |
| Dingxiang Ong | 316,300 |
| Minh Nguyen | 315,700 |
| Maxi Lehmanski | 314,000 |
| Spiros Maroulis | 308,700 |
Asians in contention
Quite a number of Asian players also wrapped up the night, some with very healthy stacks and some with 20bbs or less. Several among them were: Hong Kong’s Ben Lai (378,000), Dingxiang Ong (316,300), Tao Chen (299,100), Aditya Sushant (292,800), Gyeong Byeong Lee (286,000), Chao Duan (267,100), Quan Zhou (219,200), Ngoc Hoang (183,000), Yuri Ishida (160,500), Celina Lin (62,200), and Do Hoang (58,500).
During the latter part of Day 2, GPI Asia POY 2018 Michael Soyza sat in the upper ranks where he stationed for the rest of the day. He too bagged up a big one of 317,100 which is sixth overall.
More: Aussie Millions 2019 – Full coverage
Article by Tricia David
Louis Hartwell
Graduated in Media Communication at the University of Lausanne, Louis Hartman is a co-founder of somuchpoker.com. He began his career in Cambodia as freelance journalist. In same time he was making his living by playing poker every night at that time. Intense learner, he read dozens of poker strategy books to improve his skills during many years. With a strong interest about poker "behind the scene" in Asia and his communication skills, Louis launched Somuchpoker in 2014.
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