Grand Prix De Paris Championship

May 6 Day 1 Flight A
Beginning chip stacks are 20,000, and the blinds started at 25/50. Things got off quick as the first player busted out before all the players took their seats! One crazy hand took place between John Kabbaj and another player. There was a raise, re-raise and a call with the flop 10d 8d 4d. Both checked and saw a 2d on the turn. John has pocket Q's with no diamond, his opponent has pocket K's with one being the K of diamonds, giving his opponent a King high flush. John bets and gets called with a 4s coming up on the river. John knew his hand was muckable, but he bet big with 4500 chips....and got his opponent to fold his Kings!

Goal for the day is to play 5 levels and whoever lasts moves on to the next round. Play began at 4:00 p.m. in Paris, France and ended at 2:30 a.m. the next day with 39 players making the cut.

1. Ryad Abour -- 71,750 chips
2. Nikolai Evdakov -- 70,550 chips
3. Alexander Kuzmin -- 64,200 chips
4. Samir Shakhtoor -- 63,100 chips
5. Atanas Gueorguieu -- 62,250 chips
6. Kirill Rabtsov -- 61,175 chips
7. Gilbert Chahine -- 61,050 chips
8. Nasrodin Pirmamod -- 58,475 chips
9. Janne Lamsa -- 56,200 chips

May 7 Day 1 Flight B
Even though there were 139 for this event, top American and European players came to play. Seen in the tournament were Mads Andersen, Johan Storakers, Mark Peltscher, Patrick Bueno, Pascal Perrault, Jason Lee, Jeffrey Lisandro, Nicolas Liakos, Freddy Deeb, Jan Boubli, Sorel Mizzi (from Canada) and Ram Vaswani. The field was initially divided into two groups, Flight A that took place on May 6 and Flight B which played today May 7. Play was stopped when there were 84 total that remained in the tournament, (39 from Flight A and 45 from Flight B). They will advance to Day 2. Here are the top players with chip counts for Flight B:

1. Ram Vaswani -- 76,975 chips
2. David Redlin -- 72,425 chips
3. Jan Boubli -- 71,975 chips
4. Ryad Abour -- 71,750 chips
5. Nikolai Evdakov -- 70,550 chips
6. Sorel Mizzi -- 69,075 chips
7. Alexander Kuzmin -- 64,200 chips
8. Jeff Wallace -- 64,025 chips
9. Samir Shakhtoor -- 63,100 chips

May 8 Day 2
Action began at 4:00 p.m. with blinds of 300/600 and an ante of 50. Pascal Perrault was one of the earliest to go when his pocket 10's were outdone by another player pocket 5's with the board showing 2 7 A 4 3, giving his opponent a low end straight. Marc Goodwin was also busted out when his all-in move with A Q suited met up with another players J 10 offsuit. The felt showed 10 2 K K 10 giving Goodwin's opponent a full house.

Other players did well today such as Ram Vaswani who was as high at 220,000 before coming back down to his final 150+K. Freddie Deeb stayed steady, consistently building his stack to become chip leader. They will be joined by Will Ma 130,200, Adrien Gavile 114,400 and Jeff Wallace 61,700. Today's round stopped at close to 2:00 a.m. with 26 players who will move on to Day 3

1. Freddy Deeb -- 262,500 chips
2. Nicholas Saarisilta -- 253,600 chips
3. David Redlin -- 202,700 chips
4. Tor Gammelgard -- 165,700 chips
5. Ram Vaswani -- 152,800 chips
6. Jeffrey Lisandro -- 150,800 chips
7. Nicolas Liakos -- 140,800 chips
8. Otto Richard -- 138,300 chips
9. Runar Runarsson -- 133,900 chips

May 9 Day 3
Play resumed at 4 p.m. with blinds 1600/3200 and a 300 ante. This day was short as only 8 were eliminated from the tournament with two gone on the first hand. Which means that 18 will battle for a seat at the final table. Play was stopped after 1 hour and 45 minutes when the 18 were reached. Here are the top players with chip counts:

1. Tor Gammelgard -- 377,800 chips
2. Freddy Deeb -- 299,100 chips
3. Will Ma -- 294,500 chips
4. Ram Vaswani -- 252,400 chips
5. Nicholas Saarisilta -- 205,900 chips
6. Atanas Gueorguiev -- 202,400 chips
7. Jeffrey Lisandro -- 197,900 chips
8. Nicolas Liakos -- 140,500 chips
9. Runar Runarsson -- 123,100 chips

May 10 Day 4
Again a short day ensues with the 18 playing down to just 9 for the final table. On one table there is Tor Gammelgard and Will Ma with their big stacks looking down on the rest of the table with many short stacks. Ram Vaswani busted another player for the first elimination of the day after his flush cracked the other players pocket A's. Things did not go so well for Freddy Deeb who was on a roller coaster all day, winning small with small hands and losing with big hands. He ended up missing the final table by busting out in 10th place, losing to Jeff Lisandro who made an Ace high flush. At about 8:50 p.m. the final table was decided and the day ended. Here are the players who made the final table:

1. Will Ma -- 610,000 chips
2. Jeffrey Lisandro -- 490,500 chips
3. Ram Vaswani -- 413,000 chips
4. David Redlin -- 370,500 chips
5. Runar Runarsson -- 309,000 chips
6. Tor Gammelgard -- 255,000 chips
7. Paul Gourlay -- 122,000 chips
8. Yuriy Kerzhapkin -- 111,500 chips
9. Jeff Wallace -- 103,000 chips

May 11 Day 5 Final Table
At this final table, the tournament favorites to win were Jeffrey Lisandro and Ram Vaswani. At the other end of the spectrum was Will Ma an 18 year old who qualified over the Internet playing in his first live tournament ever. Things should prove to be interesting to say the least. Action got underway at 2:00 p.m. with blinds at 3000/6000 with a 500 ante. The first bust occurred in a wild hand between Paul Gourlay and Will Ma. Paul Gourlay went all-in with A 10 and was called by Will Ma with K Q. Table showed Q K 7 8 Q, resulting in Gourlay leaving in 9th place. Yuri Kerzhapkin claimed 8th place after his K Q lost to Will Ma's A 3 after Ma paired his Ace on the turn. Seventh place went to Tor Gammelgard who played excellently during this tournament after his Q 4 lost out to David Redlin holding K J. Jeffrey Lisandro was eliminated in 6th in a hand with David Redlin, where Lisandro's A K lost to Redlin's A Q after Redlin received another Queen on the turn.

Jeff Wallace was busted in 5th after his short stack all-in move with J 7 lost to Will Ma's A J after the remaining cards helped neither player. Ram Vaswani left the table in 4th after losing to Runar Runarsson. With 3 players left, blind were now at 15,000/30,000 with a 3,000 ante. David Redlin laid claim to third place after his Ad 5d lost to Runar Runarsson's A Q.

Now it's time for the heads up between 18-year old Will Ma and Runar Runarsson. Runar had a 2 to 1 chip lead in the beginning, but after a few hands, he lost a big hand to Ma who had pocket A's, and it was a complete reversal with Will having 2,200,000 and Runar with 550,000. In the next and final hand Will went all-in with J 4 and was called by Runar holding 10 8 who would have been anted to death with blinds of 25,000/50,000 and a 5,000 ante. The table showed 10 A J A 5 and with a bigger pair Will Ma, an 18 year old who qualified over the Internet, became champion of the Grand Prix de Paris tournament.

1. Will Ma -- 571,216 USD
2. Runar Runarsson -- 303,452 USD
3. David Redlin -- 214,206 USD
4. Ram Vaswani -- 142,804 USD
5. Jeff Wallace -- 107,103 USD
6. Jeff Lisandro -- 89,246 USD
7. Tor Gammelgard -- 71,402 USD
8. Yuri Kerzhapkin -- 53,552 USD
9. Paul Gourlay -- 35,701 USD