Although both players started out the day in the lower half of the leader board they only needed to outlast 6 players to make it to the money which they both managed. Clark would eventually be eliminated in 33rd place while his table mate Sexton managed a 27th place finish.

We caught up with Clark before he was eliminated to discuss Black Friday and how it is affecting his sponsorship deal. He declined to comment on anything exactly what he is being told but did tell us that he inquired about wearing his patch for the tournament and they told him to operate as normal when it came to that.

Coming back for Day Five is Blair Hinkle, who became the first player to win seven figures in a single tournament on Full Tilt back in March in the FTOPS Main event when he chopped three handed to receive $1,162,949.74, sits atop the leader board with 1,783,000. Catching up with Hinkle during a break he discussed his FTOPs score and told us that he had not moved the majority of his funds off Full Tilt before Black Friday. He did not seem overly concerned that he would have trouble getting the funds off site, but did state that it would be nice to just win this event for his second 7 figure score of 2011.

Day Six will start at noon today with 18 players playing down to the final 6 in the High Roller room of the Seminole Hard Rock Poker Room. With no patches left and no one left to patch up players when the final six are determined this will be the first WPT final table in some time without a single player wearing a patch. Maybe that is a sign to come for future events in this post Black Friday era.

Québécois LeFrancois wins $1,500 NL

Pascal LeFrancois, a 23-year old student from Quebec, won the $1,500 NL Holdem event, winning $568,974 along with the coveted WSOP bracelet. LeFrancois defeated Max Steinberg in heads-up play, with Steinberg collecting $352,916 for his runner-up finish. The full list of results, Nolan Dalla’s tournament report, and a first for the official winner’s photo, can be found over at wsop.com.

Schmelev and Mizrachi at it Again in 10k Stud

Twelve players remain for day three of the $10,000 Seven Card Stud World Championship with Vladimir Schmelev and Michael Mizrachi looking to renew their rivalry from the $50,000 Players’ Championship won by Mizrachi earlier this week. Schmelev is the current chip leader (921,000), with Mizrachi in third (544,000). Other notables: Nikolay Evdakov (543,000), Steve Bilirakis (448,000) and Men Nguyen (302,000). The full list of chip counts is now available at PokerNews.

Chanthabousay Leads Pot-Limit Final Table

The final table of the $1,500 Pot-Limit Holdem gets underway at 2:30 this afternoon. JJ Liu is the first woman to make a final table at this year’s, starting third in chips with 479,000. Here’s how the entire final table will look:

Armen Kara 220,000
Gregg Wilkerson 230,000
Mark Babekov 246,000
JJ Liu 479,000
Edward Brogdon 89,000
Scott Haraden 224,000
Steve Chanthabouasy 533,000
Joseph Williams 385,000
James Dempsey 528,000

Gupta Going Great in $1,500 NL

Day 2 of the third $1,500 No-Limit Holdem event resumes at 2:30 this afternoon with 291 players returning, 270 making the money. Venkatesch Gupta will be the leader with 199,100 in chips. Among the notables: Blair Hinkle (112,400), Shannon Shorr (64,300), Erick Lindgren (57,600), Jerry Yang (49,100), Tom Dwan (44,500) and Neil Channing (42,000). Team Pokerati’s Pat Poels finished the day in 288th place with 3300 chips. The full list can be found over at PokerNews.

Taking it to the Limit for Day 2

The $1,500 Limit Holdem event returns with 177 players returning at 3:00pm to attempt to play down to a final table. Jameson Painter, who finished 5th at the $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw event earlier this week, starts play today as the chip leader with 47,600. David Williams is 3rd in chips (41,800) with Jason Potter (32,800), Jeff Madsen (28,700) and Matt Hawrilenko (23,900) among the notables near the top of the standings. The full list of players returning can be found at wsop.com.

Saturday Tournaments

Saturday brings Day 1a of the second $1,000 NL Donkament to the WSOP at 12pm today, with about 4,000 runners expected over the next two days. The plan is to play ten one-hour levels today per usual, but if the pace of eliminations is as rapid as it was last Saturday, there could be a change in plans. The 5pm tournament is the $1,500 NL 2-7 Lowball Single Draw event, won last year by Phil Ivey when it had a $2,500 buy-in with a field of 147.

Hellmuth falls short in quest 12th bracelet

The $1,500 NL Holdem event that started on Wednesday is down to the final table of ten, but Phil Hellmuth is not among them, finishing in 15th for $25,472. The final 10 when they return from their dinner break are:

Pascal LeFrancois – 4,000,000
Kevin Howe – 1,780,000
David Aue- 1,300,000
Max Steinberg – 900,000
Saar Wilf – 855,000
James Andersen – 665,000
Kurt Disessa – 651,000
Jose Gatmaitan – 640,000
Josh Brikis – 375,000
Daniel Wjuniski – 350,000

Follow all the final table action over at PokerNews.

Day 2 of 10k Stud W.C.

Less than 50 remain in the $10,000 Seven Card Stud World Championship with Ray Dehkharghani the current chip leader at 275,000. 2009 November Niner Eric Buchman holds down 2nd place with 270,000, while 50k Players’ Championship runner up Vladimir Schmelev is in 3rd with 230,000. Other notables: 50k Players’ Championship winner Michael Mizrachi (165,000), Men Nguyen (155,000), and Brandon Adams (120,000). Six more levels of play awaits the field or the final table of eight, whichever comes first. You can follow the progress of this event over at wsop.com.

Pot-Limit Bubble Pops

The $1,500 Pot-Limit Holdem event burst its bubble early on day 2, with the field now down to just 25 players. James “Flushy” Dempsey is the current chip leader at 290,000. Other notables: Joe Serock (140,000), JJ Liu (100,000), Melissa Hayden (95,000), and Christian Harder (75,000). Play will end when the final table of nine is established or at the end of ten levels of play. Team Pokerati’s Tom Schneider earned $3,352 for his 52nd place finish, his second cash (in three tries) at the WSOP.

$1,500 NL Day 1

A field of 2,563 started at noon in the third $1,500 No-Limit Holdem bracelet event. Less than 800 remain in action at the moment, with Tom Dwan the unofficial chip leader with 56,000. Other notables with healthy stacks include Blair Hinkle (43,000), Shaun Deeb (36,000), Annette Obrestad (25,000), and Liv Boeree (23,000). Less than four levels of play remain for day 1, with the top 270 players cashing, with the winner taking down an impressive $614,248. For the Team Pokerati fanbase, Pat Poels was the lone entry for this event.

$1,500 Limit Holdem Day 1

A field of 625 took to the felt for the $1,500 Limit Holdem event, and around 550 remain as the field takes their dinner break shortly. The duo of Vanessa Rousso and Chad Brown are the unofficial top two with Rousso (10,800) holding a slight lead over brown (10,100). For the online poker community, Jimmy “Gobboboy” Fricke is third with 8,500 and other notables such as Jeff Madsen (6,250), Team Pokerati’s Tom Schneider (5,600), and Chris Ferguson (5,400). Team Pokerati also has Julie Schneider, Danny Noam, Robert Goldfarb entered in this event. The top 63 players make the money, with first place $189,870 along with a coveted bracelet, follow wsop.com for further updates and chip counts.

Grinder chews up competition in 50k

Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi overcame a 3-1 chip deficit during heads-up to defeat Vladimir Schemelev and win his first WSOP bracelet along with $1,500,000 in the $50,000 Players’ Championship . Schemelev collects over $960,000 with his runner-up finish. David Oppenheim, who was chip leader when the remaining five players took their dinner break, finished third for $603,348. John Juanda ($436,865) and Robert Mizrachi ($341,429) finished fourth and fifth respectively. You can read Nolan Dalla’s tournament report here.

Chow Main Man in Omaha 8

The other bracelet awarded this morning was the $1,500 Omaha 8 or Better event, won by Michael Chow, defeating long-time pro Dan Heimiller in heads-up action. Chow picks up $237,140 for the win, while Heimiller adds $146,505 to his long list of cashes. Full results for this event along with Nolan’s tournament report can be found over at wsop.com.

Final table set in $1,000 NL

The $1,000 No-Limit Holdem is down to a final table, resuming at 2:30pm after plans to play to a finish this morning were scuttled. The final table almost had the first father and son to play the same final table, but Irving Rice’s elimination in 10th place meant his son Richard would take up the charge to win a bracelet. Here’s how the final table will be seated, you can follow the live updates this afternoon at PokerNews.com:

Seat 1: Dash Dudley — 1,355,000
Seat 2: Bart Davis — 1,355,000
Seat 3: Nicholas Mitchell — 1,280,000
Seat 4: Deepak Bhatti — 400,000
Seat 5: Gabe Costner — 1,830,000
Seat 6: Richard Rice — 700,000
Seat 7: Aadam Daya — 2,855,000
Seat 8: Isaac Settle — 970,000
Seat 9: Cory Brown — 2,315,000

$1,500 NL down to 23 for Day 3

The $1,500 No-Limit Holdem event has 23 players remaining when play resumes at 2:30pm this afternoon, playing down to a winner. The chip leader is Vincent Jacques with 1,498,000. Notables remaining include Praz Bansi (616,000), online stars David Sands (628,000) and Yuval Bronshtein (498,000), along with three-time WSOP Circuit ring winner Dwyte Pilgrim (209,000). The full list of remaining players is available at wsop.com.

Shootout Day 2

36 players, each guaranteed $16,607, remain in the $5,000 No-Limit Holdem Shootout when play resumes at 2:30 today. The remaining players will be seated at six six-handed tables. Those winners return Thursday for the final table, with the winner earning $441,692. Among the notables who won their table yesterday: Chris Ferguson, John Duthie, Chad Brown, Tom Dwan, Christian Harder, Blair Hinkle and Justin “Boosted J” Smith. The list of survivors can be found here.

Hanna Leads Lowball Enthusiasts

The $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw drew a field of 291 entrants for a 5pm start. After ten levels thet field was reduced to 87, with Salim Hanna the chip leader with 65,400 when play resumes Wednesday at 3pm. Plenty of big names remain including Hoyt Corkins, Allen Kessler, Jeff Lisandro, Scott Seiver, Ted Forrest, Barry Greenstein, and Archie Karas. For Team Pokerati followers, Tom Schneider finished 12th with 43,200 in chips, Pat Poels was 46th with 21,000, while Julie Schneider was eliminated on day 1. A full list of chip counts will be available soon at wsop.com.

More No-Limit On Tap

Wednesday has just one event starting today, the second $1,500 No-Limit Holdem event of the WSOP, with a 12pm start. The second $1,500 of the 2009 WSOP was won by Pete “The Greek” Vilandos, winning over $600,000 in a field of 2,506. PokerNews will have constant updates available throughout the day as the field plays ten one-hour levels.

Notable eliminations: Joe Hachem, David Benyamine, J.C. Tran, Theo Tran, Bertrand Grospellier, Blair Hinkle and Joe Serock.

The Dream Team Poker event is down to Kenna James versus Judy Tejwani for the individual title. Congrats again goes to the Tao of Pokerati team for clinching the team title a few hours ago. Live updates now available for the Main Event at www.wsop.com and more stuff from the rest of the writing team during the evening.

In a surprising move, play ended Saturday after just three levels of play in the main event, as the field is now down to about 400 players after three levels of play, which included nearly two hours of hand-for-hand play. Chip counts are unofficial at the moment, but it appears that Frenchman Ludovic Lacay will be the chip leader with 1,608,000 chips. Tom Lutz is listed in 2nd place with 1,600,000 chips. Other notables returning tomorrow with unofficial chip counts: Jordan Morgan (1,489,000), Blair Hinkle (1,399,000), Bertrand Grospellier (1,250,000), Nichoel Peppe (880,000), Kenny Tran (850,000), Tom Schneider (790,000), Lou Diamond Phillips (755,000), Dennis Phillips (630,000), Kara Scott (580,000), Joe Hachem (570,000), Noah Boeken (515,000), Joe Sebok (412,000) and Joe Serock (400,000). The returning players resume at 12 noon tomorrow, guaranteed at least $27,469.

The bubble was reached after 13 hands during hand-for-hand play. Kia Hamadani had about 160,000 in chips when they were about 20 players for the money, unfortunately for him, he took several hits to his stack until he was all in for his 500-chip ante. His last hand was 4-3o, which was crushed by someone making a large bet on a Q-Q-6 board with 9-2o. A nine on the turn and river meant that Hamadani would finish in 649, consoled by the fact that Jack Link’s Beef Jerky gave him a free entry to the 2010 Main Event.

Notables who can sleep in tomorrow: Phil Hellmuth, Patrick Bruel, Kelly Kim, Surinder Sunar, Matt Brady, Mark Gregorich, and Jesper Hougaard.

Official chip counts will be available in the morning, so return to Pokerati to see what’s turns up next.

Rui Ruling 5k NL Day Two

Rui Cao leads with ~60 players remaining in the $5,000 NL Holdem 6-max, as they play down to 6 players or 3am, whichever comes first. Others in contention include Shaun Deeb, Phil Hellmuth, Blair Hinkle, Darrell Dicken, Faraz Jaka, Yevgeniy Timoshenko, Bill Edler, Raymond Davis and Shannon Shorr.

$1,500 NL Final Table

Nine players remain in the $1,500 NL Holdem event, Jason Wheeler is the chip leader, followed by Christopher Bonita, Christopher De Maci, Joseph Chaplin, Tony Veckey, Andrew Malott, David Jaoui, Miha Remic and Sergey Konkin.

Short update tonight, check out www.wsop.com for updates, and good luck to Julie Schneider, who just won a key double up in the $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball.

The $10,000 NL Holdem Heads-Up World Championship has 8 players remaining who return at 2pm Monday to determine the winner. Here’s the matchups for the quarterfinals, which will also air on ESPN360 and wsop.pkr.com for those outside the US:

Leo Wolpert v Dustin Woolf
Jamin Stokes v Johnny Chan

Nathan Doudney v Bryan Pellegrino
John Duthie v Stephen O’Dwyer

Simmons Looking to be the Poker Guy

Joe Simmons starts day 3 of the $1,500 NL Holdem event as the chip leader (1,100,000) with 27 players playing down to a winner. You can take a look at who else is left at this link.

Tran Riding the PLO Train

J.C. Tran (176,900) is the chip leader at the start of Day 2 of the $2,500 Pot-Limit Omaha event, with 61 players remaining, only 45 get paid. Chad Layne (106,000), John Juanda (85,300), Ross Boatman (75,000) and Phil Ivey (56,600) are among the notables who return at 2pm today.

Sebastien Rings the Belle for Day 2 HORSE

Sabic Sebastien leads the field of 220 who return at 2pm today of the $1,500 HORSE event with 72,700 in chips. Marco Traniello (55,000) Andy Black (54,300), Jean Gaspard, (40,300), Ming Lee (32,500) Fabrice Soulier (32,200), and Vanessa Rousso (30,900) make up some of the notables returning to the baize.

Monday’s Tournaments and Projections

The noon tournament today is the $2,000 NL Holdem event which was won last year by Blair Hinkle in a field of 1,344 for just over $500,000. The 5pm tournament is another World Championship event, this time it’s $10,000 Limit Holdem, which was won last year by Rob Hollink in a field of 218 for almost $500,000.

The WSOP Staff Guide projects 1,344 for the $2,000 NL event (take the under for 1,275), while the $10,000 Limit Holdem event is projected for 229 (take the slightly under for 210).

Check back at Pokerati frequently for more updates during the day.

Tonight, Blair Hinkle won Event 23 at the WSOP, the $2K NLHE tournament. Less than two weeks ago, Grant Hinkle won Event 2, the $1,500 NLHE. You guessed it – they are brothers. Their mother was in the audience for both victories. The only other brothers in the history of the WSOP to each win bracelets were Puggy Pearson and J.C. Pearson, but theirs were 21 years apart. The Hinkle bros were the first to ever do it in the same year.

In other brother news, Robert and Michael Mizrachi tried to both advance to the “elite eight” round tonight in the World Championship of Heads-Up NLHE, and though Robert defeated his opponent, Michael was unable to squash Vanessa Selbst and wasn’t able to move on. While ESPN and other media outlets were disappointed at the outcome, the focus of the night is now solely on the bracelet-winning Hinkle brothers.

Congratulations to the Hinkle family… Momma Hinkle, you’re next!

In what is certainly a first (at least I think so), two brothers have won a bracelet in the same World Series of Poker. Blair Hinkle, whose brother Grant won the $1,500 NL event last week, took down his own bracelet in the $2,000 NL event, knocking out Canadian Mark Brockington.

More after the jump:

The other final table in action, the $2,500 PL Holdem/PLO final table just went on dinner break with 3 remaining. Max Pescatori is the chip leader with Kyle Kloeckner in 2nd and Greg Hurst in 3rd. Allen Cunningham was recently eliminated in 4th.

The $10,000 Headsup World Championship has one match remaining in its round of 16 (Lyle Berman v David Williams). The other winners waiting for that match to finish are: Gavin Griffin, Vanessa Selbst, Robert Mizrachi, Brandon Adams, Jonathan Jaffe, Kenny Tran and Alec Torelli. They all will play one more match and finish tomorrow with the semifinals and best of 3 finals.

The $1,500 Razz event has made the money and Tom Schneider has cashed yet again, his 4th of the Series. Mike Wattel is the current chip leader, Barry Greenstein, Archie Karas and David Levi are among the 37 left in the field.

The $1,500 NL event is now under 500, with Joe Awada the current leader. The $5,000 PLO w/rebuys event is almost at the end of the rebuy period. Rumor is that Daniel Negreanu (part of infamous table 15) is in for either 16 or 17 rebuys, which appears to be a record for this event.

More updates from me tomorrow, enjoy the rest of your Saturday evening…

The $2,500 Pot Limit Holdem/Pot Limit Omaha final table was known shortly after 5:00am today. They get to be under the glare of the ESPN360 cameras today at 3pm with this set of 9:

Seat 1: Max Pescatori 212,000
Seat 2: Jonathan Depa 185,000
Seat 3: Kyle Hegeman 198,000
Seat 4: Kyle Kloeckner 494,000
Seat 5: John Paul Kelly 79,000
Seat 6: Greg Hurst 197,000
Seat 7: Lennart Holtkamp 253,000
Seat 8: Minh Ly 174,000
Seat 9: Allen Cunningham 484,000

The other final table, plus other tournament action after the jump:

Starting around 2pm today, the $2,000 NL Holdem final table will consist of the following:

Seat 1: Andrew Jeffreys 1,051,000
Seat 2: Blair Hinkle 1,030,000 (Trying to join his brother Grant as a bracelet winner this year)
Seat 3: Dominik Kulicki 241,000
Seat 4: Daniel O’Brien 456,000
Seat 5: Mark Brockington 552,000
Seat 6: Chris Bjorin 247,000
Seat 7: Dustin Dirksen 867,000
Seat 8: David Steicke 611,000
Seat 9: Stephane Tayar 323,000

Final table conclusions from yesterday:

Scott Seiver took down the $5,000 NL event leading wire-to-wire at the final table before eliminating Dave Seidman. The $3,000 HORSE event was won by FTP Pro Jens Voertmann, Doug Ganger finished 2nd and Marcel Luske rounded out the top 3.

Tournaments started yesterday:
The $10,000 NL Heads-Up World Championship has gone from its original 256 down to their final 32, here’s the matchups for that round:

Jason Rosenkrantz vs. Brandon Adams
Emil Patel vs. Michael Banducci
Roman Paradiso vs. Sam Farha
Kenny Tran vs. Erick Lindgren
Thomas Lutz vs. John Patgorski
Gavin Griffin vs. Alexander Kostritsyn
Andy Black vs. Michael McNeil
Alex Jacob vs. Jonathan Jaffe
Brian Roberts vs. Alec Torelli
Scott Montgomery vs. Isaac Haxton
Daniel “Ansky” Stern vs. David Williams
Lyle Berman vs. David Podgurski
Jean-Claude Moussa vs. Robert Mizrachi
Jonas Entin vs. Evan Sofer
Cliff Cantor vs. Vanessa Selbst
Matt Giannetti vs. Michael Mizrachi

The $1,500 Razz event drew a field of 453, which leaves 104 to come back to day 2 at 3pm. Barry Greenstein is the day 1 leader, with David Levi, Vanessa Rousso, Mike Wattel and Sam Grizzle notables in the top 10.

Tournaments starting today:

Saturday brings the return of the amateur’s favorite tournament: the $1,500 NL Holdem donkament. Expect a sold-out field for this event . Last year’s winner in this edition of the event was Phil Hellmuth in a field of over 2,600. At 5pm, the professionals in the crowd get another chance in their attempt to buy a bracelet with the $5,000 Pot Limit Omaha w/rebuys event. Last year, Burt Boutin took down the title in a field of just 145, with 450 rebuys.

More good stuff from Dan and Jen during the day today. Something from me this afternoon…

The $5,000 NL Holdem event is down to heads-up action as Scott Seiver has a slight chip lead over Dave Seidman. The $3,000 HORSE final table is down to six, with Doug Ganger in the lead. Marcel Luske, Hoyt Corkins and Steve Zolotow are the other notable names at the table.

The $2,000 NL Holdem event is down to 47 as they’re now on their dinner break. Andrew Jeffreys appears to be the chip leader, with Matthew “mlagoo” Lagarde a close 2nd. Other names left include Blair Hinkle (his brother Grant won a bracelet last week), friend of bloggers Maria “Maridu” Mayrinck, and Brock Parker.

The $2,500 PL Holdem/PLO event just hit their money bubble and with 41 left in the field go on their dinner break. David Penly is the current chip leader, other notables include Minh Ly, Max Pescatori, Allen Cunningham and Sorel Mizzi.

The $10,000 NL Holdem Heads-Up World Championship got underway with a full field of 256. Round 2 is over and everyone whose won their first two matches has earned at least $14,000. Round 3 will start at 10pm, then finish for the night.

The $1,500 Razz event got underway at 5pm and a certainly older group of people turned out. It also caused what may be a first, with Tournament Director Jack Effel inquiring on who was interested in having sushi for dinner, because the sushi kitchen would close at 8 (before the dinner break). You can read that update, as well as more normal updating of information here.