Manuel Bevand Leads Day 1A of WPT Barcelona

(Photo: Manuel Bevand)

The World Poker Tour (WPT) stop in the Catalonian capital of Barcelona has always been a premier European Main Event. It’s an event that not only attracts the very best players in Europe, but also an influx of players from the United States.

In previous years we have seen two Germans, a Dane, an American and a Swede etch their names into the WPT Champions Club trophy; and as Day 1A came to a close it was a Frenchman who stood in pole position with 141,200 chips. There’s a long way to go, but a deep run is never far beyond the starting flight chip leaders and Manuel Bevand is a player with the ability, and experience, to keep up with the trends.

Here are the Day 1A highlights….

The first few levels saw two WPT Champions Club members struggling at the bottom of the chip counts. Davidi Kitai finished fourth at WPT Mazagan this year and Vladimir Bozinovic was victorious at WPT Baden just last month. But neither could find the form, or luck, to stop their stack from dwindling to less than 10,000 in the first level of the day.

In stark contrast, Kevin Vandersmissen and Toby Lewis were the fastest players out of the gate. Lewis final tabled the L.A. Poker Classic earlier this year. A performance that helped him reach the UK Global Poker Index (GPI) No.1 rankings for the first time in his career, and Vandersmissen has never cashed in a WPT event, despite earning close to $1.5 million in live tournament earnings. Both players soared in the first few levels of the day.

(Photo: Kevin Vandersmissen)

Kitai was one of the first big names to exit, followed by Guillaume Darcourt.

"I didn’t win a single hand," said Kitai after his elimination.

Neither did Darcourt. The WPT Champions Club member had a torrid time at the Venice Grand Prix last week. The pink-haired Frenchman was eliminated on Days 1A & B in quick-fashion, and he followed that up with a similar performance today. But to be fair the whole world was seemingly against him when he ran queens into aces, before flopping a nicely disguised three-of-a-kind on a board of Q44 whilst holding 43 in the blinds. He managed to get it in with an opponent holding KQ but a third queen on the river sent Darcourt to the rail.

The level before the dinner break saw Yannick Bonnet rise to prominence. We last saw Bonnet shaking things up when he finished as the Day 1C chip leader at WPT Prague. He didn’t have the legs for that one – finishing in 31st place – but it was a case of deja vu as he doubled through our reigning champion Lukas Berglund to take the chip lead going into the salad bar.

After the dinner break players started dropping like flies. We lost WPT Champions Club members Giacomo Fundaro & Vladimir Bozinovic and quality players of the ilk of Jason Wheeler, WPT Baden runner-up Paul Berende and former WPT Festa Al Lago runner-up Michael Benvenuti.

At the top end of the charts Manuel Bevand was taking advantage of a three-street bluff from Artem Litvinov to find himself sitting pretty at the top of the charts, with the likes of Nicholas Verkaik, Adrian Diaz and Kevin Vandersmissen pulling at his trouser leg.

The last level of the day turned into the ‘elimination station’. Kevin MacPhee eliminated the WPT Championship runner-up, Philippe Ktorza, to get right into the thick of the action; Scott Baumstein made a stand with the mighty five-four off-suit and was picked off by Gaelle Baumann; Ilan Boujenah ran pocket nines into the pocket kings of Robin Ylitalo; the youngest WPT Champion ever, Lukas Berglund was ousted by Henri Koivisto and the active Italian, Mario Adinolfi, sent the WPT Player of the Year, Matt Salsberg to the rail when his ace-jack found an ace on the flop to beat the pocket sevens.

(Photo: Kevin MacPhee)

And just like that it was all over. 106 players all tried there very best, but for 47 of them there best was just not good enough. 59-players found their way into the draw for Day Two and they included WPT Champions Club member Marcin Wydrowski, Bryn Kenney, Toby Lewis, Steve O’Dwyer, Daniel Cates and Kevin MacPhee.

Day 1B will allow some of these lost souls to find their way back into this thing when the action starts at 14:00 (CET). Make sure you are with us every step of the way.