Sam Panzica wasn't originally a definite to participate in the €10k High Roller at EPT12 Dublin. But eventually he bought in and it proved a smart decision as the 23-year-old last night walked away with a gigantic first prize, title and coveted trophy. The American pro beat a 185-strong field and takes home €375,770 after a heads-up deal with German player Akin Tuna.

Day 2 of the EPT12 Dublin €10k High Roller saw the field reduced to the last 13 players, with Sergey Lebedev leading for the Final Day. There were 185 entries to the tournament (140 unique players + 45 re-entries). Tomorrow's champion is set to take the €397,500 first prize along with the title and a trophy.

What a festival it's been for Dominik Nitsche, and it may be about to get even sweeter for the 25-year-old German as he's leading the EPT12 Dublin €10k High Roller at the end of Day 1.

It was Valentine's Day when Nitsche took down the UKIPT High Roller early in the morning, after a long battle on the final table. The €156,160 payday was soon followed by another six-figure result as Nitsche entered the €10k Single-Day High Roller later on that day, battling his way to heads-up once again, before eventually falling in second place to Charlie Carrel for €139,450.

Those two performances moved Nitsche into the top ten in the Germany's all-time money list with $5.5 million in live tournament winnings. Nitsche doesn't seem to have slowed down at the end of the festival, bagging 305,600 at the end of play today. There were 181 entries on Day 1 (139 players plus 42 re-entries) and 80 survived for Day 2.

Source: EPT press

2014 WSOP Main Event runner-up Felix Stephensen has won the EPT Dublin €5k PLO event after beating 2013 November Niner Sylvain Loosli heads-up.

Stephensen, who won the first ever Norwegian Championships to be held in Norway, is currently his country's top live tournament player and has now added another €33,950 to his $5.5 million in winnings.

French pro Loosli, who was fourth in the WSOP Main Event the previous year, is an EPT regular and took down the EPT Barcelona €50k Super High Roller at the start of Season 12 for more than €1.2 million. He got €20,370 for his runner-up finish today, with Finnish pro Juha Lauttamus “min-cashing” the event in third place for €13,580.

There were 14 players in all, creating a €67,900 prize pool.

Source: EPT Press

Sam Chartier won last night’s €2k NL Turbo at EPT Dublin for €43,220. The EPT5 Barcelona finalist from Montreal defeated an 81-strong field to take it down, including heads-up rival Keith Johnson who finished sixth in the €25k High Roller only a few days ago. The €157,140 prize pool was divvied up between 11 players as below:

1. Sam Chartier, Canada, €43,220
2. Keith Johnson, United Kingdom, €30,720
3. Florian Duta, Romania, €20,110
4. Orpen Kisacikoglu, Turkey, €15,480
5. Mikko Turtiainen, Finland, €12,260
6. Yohann Nataf, France, €9,580
7. Adrian Mateos, Spain, €7,540
8. Mohsin Charania, United States, €5,890
9. Roberto Gazzola, Italy, €4,480
10. Luciana Manolea, Romania, €3,930
11. Michel Dattani, Portugal, €3,930

Source: EPT press rls

The Royal Dublin Society saw a turnout of 442 players for Day 1b of the EPT12 Dublin Main Event. Francisco Correia de Oliveira topped the field, bagging 175,100 at the end of the day.

Day 1b saw 262 players make it through to join yesterday's 79 survivors. Late registration stays open until the start of Day 2.

Day 1a of the EPT12 Dublin is in the bag with Gilles Bernies in the chip lead.

From Bretten, a small town in Baden-Württemberg, Germany, Bernies is yet to notch his first EPT cash but kicked off this attempt very well, collecting 189,600 chips during first eight levels.

There were 147 players competing on Day 1a and 79 of them survived.

EPT12 Dublin Main Event Day 1a top five chip counts:
1st - Gilles Bernies, Germany, PokerStars qualifier, 189,600
2nd - Mike McDonald, Canada, PokerStars qualifier, 162,400
3rd - Ian Hunter, UK, 139,400
4th - Artem Litvinov, Russia, PokerStars qualifier, 138,900
5th - Victor Ilyukhin, UK, 131,400

Source: EPT press

Less than a week after releasing his last blog post which detailed his experience playing high stakes live cash games for the first time in two years, Daniel Negreanu has now enlightened the public over the politics involved with getting invited to such a game.

You can check out the full post here.

Source: highstakesdb.com

British player Kyle Roberts has won €200 UKIPT Main Event Turbo Edition tourney. The event was supposed to only last one day but resumed yesterday with the final five playing it out for the €10,350 first prize.

Irish player David Murray took down yesterday’s €200 Chess/Poker tourney after beating EPT Player of the Year Dzmitry Urbanovich heads-up in the poker section of the event. Murray, 32, came to EPT Dublin especially to take part in the event and snagged a €2,150 first prize along with the coveted trophy. The 32-year-old Computer Science and Statistics post-graduate from Leinster is a 2180 ELO-rated player who has been instrumental in growing the game amongst youngsters in his area. He’s been member of the Irish Chess Union for 18 years. The tournament was run by FIDE International Arbiter Gerry Graham. PokerStars Mind Sports Ambassador Jennifer Shahade said: “Gerry did an excellent job. It was a great event and we were thrilled with the turnout – 30 players!” There were 22 entrants for the inaugural EPT chess/poker tourney in Prague.