Stephane Nadot Leads WPT500 Montreal Final Table; CA$143,300 to the Winner

By Tim Duckworth

Welcome back to Playground in Kahnawake, Quebec, for the WPT500 Montreal final table where one of the final nine players will join Miguel Goncalo as a WPT500 Montreal champion.

Across a total of 13 starting flights where five were played online at partypoker, and eight here at Playground, a field of 2,135 entrants created a prize pool of CA$1,035,475 that paid the top 304 players along with guaranteeing a WPT Montreal Main Event seat worth CA$3,300 for the top 20 players.

With everyone returning on Day 2 already in the money with a guaranteed CA$1,000 payday, the likes of WPT Champions Club members Matt Salsberg, Ema Zajmovic, Daniel Strelitz, and Chanracy Khun, along with notables Toby Lewis, Joseph Cappello, Laurence Grondin, Patrick Eskandar, Gal Yifrach, Ubaid Habib, Ami Alibay, Scott Montgomery, and Bill Jennings all fell to the rail. In his title defense, Goncalo would be eliminated in 203rd place.ut up a gallant effort before being eliminated in 203rd place.

There is 23:07 remaining in Level 35 with blinds at 150,000-300,000 and a 300,000-big blind ante.

Leading the final nine players is Frenchman Stephane Nadot with 13,375,000 in chips. Nadot shot up the leaderboard in the middle stages of the day, and although he relinquished the lead at a point, he ended up snatching it back in the final few hands of the night with an elimination of Robert Greenberg. Second overall is Rodney Ramalho who is the only other player in the eight-figure club. Ramalho catapulted ahead in a hand where he flopped trips and found value from two pair before eliminated three players on the play down to the final table to finish with 12,000,000 in chips. Ramalho has four WPT cashes to his name – three here at Playground – but his appearance at the WPT500 Montreal final table is his best to date.

Tzu Sheng Huang sits in third place with 8,700,000 and leads a jumbled middle pack of chip counts ahead of Bradley Smith with 7,400,000 who cashed in 44th place in this event last year and has two other WPT Main Tour cashes in Montreal. WPT Champions Club member Shawn Buchanan sits in fifth place overall with 6,725,000 in chips. Buchanan has over $2.8 million in lifetime WPT earnings including four final tables to go along with his win in the Season VI Mandalay Bay Poker Championship. If Buchanan can be victorious in the WPT500 Montreal, he will join Craig Varnell as the only player to win both a Main Tour and a WPT500 title.

Sixth overall is Kevin Bergeron with 5,626,000 in chips, and both he and Michael Pitcher (4,225,000) are collecting their first WPT cash. Mathyeu Provost bagged the biggest chip stack across all the Day 1 starting flights, and he has parlayed that into a final table berth. Provost sits with 3,475,000 in chips and has improved on his best WPT result already after finishing in 22nd place in last season’s WPTDeepStacks Montreal. Rounding out the final table is Natalya Goldis with 2,500,000 who will be looking for her first WPT cash also.

The final nine players are each currently guaranteed CA$15,000 in prize money along with a CA$3,300 WPT Montreal seat. For whoever can ascend to the top of the WPT500 Montreal field, a CA$143,300 first prize awaits them along with the title of WPT500 Montreal champion.

The WPT500 Montreal final table kicks off at 12 p.m. (ET) from Playground. Stay tuned right here to WPT.com for exclusive live coverage of the tournament from start to finish, and to see who will be the next player to take home the WPT500 Montreal trophy and title.

Photography by Tomas Stacha / Poker-Photo

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