Seneca Easley limped in from the small blind and Lori Nunes checked in the big blind to see the flop come down . Easley bet 25,000 and Nunes thought for a minute. She began looking around as if looking for some help from someone that she couldn't find. She then looked to the sky for a little bit prior to folding the face up.
2010-11 World Series of Poker Circuit Event - Rincon
Hayden Fortini raised to 23,000 from the hijack seat and Michael Simon called from the big blind to see the flop come down . Simon checked and Fotini fired a continuation bet of 26,000. Simon mulled it over for a little bit and then gave it up.
On the first hand, action folded to Alex Masek in the cutoff seat and he raised to 25,000. Everyone folded and he won the pot.
On the second hand, Hayden Fortini raised to 23,000 from the button and Narinder Khasria called from the big blind to see the flop come down . Both players checked and the turn was the . Both checked again and the river completed the board with the . After Khasria checked, Fortini bet 25,000 and won the pot.
The button is in Seat 6 with Paul Hails and the cards are in the air!
Level: 22
Blinds: 5,000/10,000
Ante: 1,000
Coming into the day in fourth place with an above-average stack is Patrick Karschamroon.
A 29-year-old poker pro from Los Angeles, California, Karschamroon was a lowly retail salesman before making the jump to the felt full time. In 2009, he binked a $1,000 event at the Legends of Poker to scribe his first real mark onto the tournament scoreboard. He improved on that result in a big way one year later at the California State Poker Championships where he took down a $3,085 event, besting a stacked final table to take more than $160,000 in cash. He went on to add two small cashes to his credit as last year's WSOP.
Wherever he finishes today, Karschamroon will top $250,000 in career earnings. Will he snag his first gold ring as well?
This final table contains just one poker millionaire, and it's Seat 2, Michael Simon.
Simon comes to California from his home in Champlin, Minnesota (a suburb of Minneapolis), and he knows a thing or two about dough; Simon is a baker back home. He's 54 years old, married with two children.
Simon's big tournament score came in 2006 when he outlasted a field of 592 players to win the 2006 WPT World Poker Challenge in Reno, Nevada. From a final table that included Barry Greenstein, Greg Mueller, Tom Schneider, and Jason Stern, Simon emerged victorious to add his name to the list of WPT champions and more than a million dollars to his bank account.
Since then, Simon has added a few small cashes to his r��sum��, but nothing of real significance. He does have one tiny cash ($479) in a Circuit event in Indiana in 2008, but this finish will far and away surpass that previous best WSOP-C result.
Simon is looking to add a WSOP-C title to his list of accomplishments, but it'll be a long uphill climb. Simon comes into the day on the second shortest stack of 172,000 chips.
Here is your chip leader for the final table, Seneca Easley from Fort Worth, Texas. He comes into the final table with 856,000, which is over 200,000 more than his closest competitor.
Easley holds $18,251 in live tournament earnings on his record, spread across eight cashes. This cash is already the largest of Easley's career and he has plenty of potential to make it even bigger with the chips he holds coming into the final table. Previously, Easley's best result was a seventh-place finish in an event at the World Series of Poker Circuit stop in New Orleans in May 2010.
Lori Nunes from Crowley, Texas is 25 years old and a medical professional, but now spends most of her time playing poker. The mother of four boys, this finish will be the best of Nunes' young poker career by far. The only record we can dig up from her is a 10th-place finish in a $120 No-Limit Hold'em Evening Event back in February at the World Series of Poker Circuit in Tunica where Nunes earned $432. Here, she's locked up a minimum of $6,335 with a chance to win a lot more.
Nunes enters the final table sixth in chips out of the final nine players with 236,000. Her favorite poker player is Scotty Nguyen. "You call and it's all over, baby!"
A 26-year-old law school student, Alex Masek attends the University of San Diego. He also collects World Series of Poker Circuit gold rings, as evidence by the three that he's previously won. Those three wins came from two in Rincon and one in Atlantic City.
In May 2009, Masek won his first ring in the $200 No-Limit Hold'em event at Harrah's Rincon and $9,654. Fast forward one year later in the same month, Masek scored his second ring and $39,372 in Atlantic City for winning the $300 No-Limit Hold'em event. His third ring was won right here at this series in the $345 No-Limit Hold'em event. That win earned him another $22,794.
Not only did Masek's most recent win net him some nice pocket change and a third piece of jewelry, but he earned him some important leader board points in the race for becoming Casino Champion. Right now, Mstr Lynch sits on top of that leader board with 100 points while Masek holds 50. If Masek can land himself in fifth place at this final table, he'll tie Lynch. The tiebreaker is most money won at a specific stop. Lynch won two rings at this stop for a total of $46,133. Masek won one ring for $22,794 and fifth place is worth $17,226, which would put him at $40,020. That's not enough to overtake Lynch.
That means Masek needs to earn fourth or better to win the Casino Champion race and earn himself a seat in the $1,000,000 National Championship Freeroll. Lynch will be rooting for Masek to bust out prior to fourth place, but if he makes it that far, he'll be looking for Masek to win as he'll win a seat to the National Championship that way and Lynch will still earn Casino Champion honors. This creates an interesting dynamic and one that will surely heat up if there are five or six players left and Masek is put to some big decisions for all of his chips.
In total, Masek has over $228,000 in live career tournament earnings. If he can come out on top of this final table, one where he starts fifth in chips with 246,000, he'll become tied with a couple others players for the most WSOP Circuit gold rings at four.