What happened last night, as we finish the preliminary events of the Series today before the Main Event begins tomorrow:

Phil Hellmuth was unable to take down the $1,500 HORSE event for his 12th bracelet, as he finished in 3rd place. James Schaaf, from Torrance, California takes down the bracelet in what also appears to be his first tournament cash. Tommy Hang follows up on his 3rd in the $10,000 Limit Holdem World Championship by finishing in 2nd.

The $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha World Championship was won by Irishman Marty Smyth who eliminated Canadian Peter Jetten in one of the more exciting final hands of the Series. Both players flopped a straight when all the money went in, but Smyth was freerolling to a club flush. The turn was a brick, but when the 6 of clubs appeared on the river, the Irish part of the crowd exploded with delight while the Canadian contingent groaned in despair at Jetten’s turn of events. Smyth takes down almost $860,000 with the bracelet, while Jetten is consoled with the fact of winning $528,000 for second place. Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi ground to a halt in 3rd.

The last two tournaments conclude today, the ESPN360 table and the WSOP POY on page 2:
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What’s been happening at the WSOP since last night, while Dan Michalski anxiously awaits his attempt to make good on his $300 All-In “investment”:

The $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha final table has been set, this group of 9 faces the hot lights of the ESPN cameras:

Seat 1: Kido Pham 1,080,000
Seat 2: Brandon Moran 1,286,000
Seat 3: Peter Jetten 492,000
Seat 4: Michael Mizrachi 1,767,000
Seat 5: Billy Argyros 729,000
Seat 6: Greg Hurst 637,000
Seat 7: Tom Hanlon 192,000
Seat 8: Marty Smyth 1,068,000
Seat 9: Richard Harroch 372,000

The other final table scheduled for today and the other tournament action on the next page:
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What’s happening tonight at the WSOP, while Wicked Chops Poker is celebrating the good news.

JC Tran takes his name off of the “Best player to never win a bracelet” list, taking down the $1,500 NL Holdem event against Danish pro Rasmus Nielsen. JC, at one point down 3-1 headsup, chipped away at Rasmus until he eventually took the chip lead, winning when his KQ nipped the Dane’s QJ on a Q-high flop. Tran takes home over $631,000 plus 100 WSOP POY points, moving him into 6th in the race with 1 event remaining. Nielsen will be consoled with almost $390,000 to take back to Denmark.

Other tournament happenings on the next page:
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Recapping last night’s action, with an eye on what’s going on today:

As noted below, Scotty Nguyen takes down the $50,000 HORSE event, taking down almost $2,000,000, his 5th bracelet, and the first to have won the WSOP Main Event and the $50k HORSE event. Erick Lindgren’s 3rd place moves him into first in the Milwaukee’s Best WSOP Player of the Year race with just 2 tournaments left.

The $1,500 NL Holdem final table has been set, scheduled to start at 3pm. The two most notable names are two WPT winners, JC Tran and Joe Pelton, here’s how the rest of the table will look like:

Seat 1: Christoph Kohnen 293,000
Seat 2: Joe Pelton 1,093,000
Seat 3: Jesper Hoog 320,000
Seat 4: John Conroy 501,000
Seat 5: Robert Kalb 456,000
Seat 6: J.C. Tran 1,438,000 (his 3rd final table of the Series)
Seat 7: Chad Siu 185,000
Seat 8: Peter Nguyen 870,000
Seat 9: Rasmus Nielsen 2,998,000

Other tournament stuff on the next page:
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Wrapping up yesterday’s action, with a preview of today’s tournament (with a moment of silence for John Bonetti):

The $5,000 NL Holdem 6-handed event finally reached their final table at around 5:30am, now they have to attempt to get some rest before returning in front of the watchful eye of the ESPN360 cameras at 2pm with this sextet:

Seat 4: Richard Lyndaker 2,345,000
Seat 3: Joe Commisso 1,961,000
Seat 5: Tom Lutz 1,493,000
Seat 1: Samuel Trickett 1,045,000
Seat 6: Edward Ochana 928,000
Seat 2: Davidi Kitai 298,000

The $1,500 Stud Eight or Better stopped play with 13 players remaining as they play down to a winner starting at 3pm. Here’s the approximate chip counts of the baker’s dozen (chip counts and seats to be rearranged later):

(Table 14)
Seat 1: Ryan Hughes 73,000
Seat 4: Margaret Macre 173,000
Seat 5: James Richburg 274,000
Seat 6: Ron Long 33,000
Seat 7: David Brooker 45,000
Seat 8: Daniel Nicewander 41,000

(Table 15)
Seat 1: Mike Hefer 71,000
Seat 2: Tim D’Alessandro 82,000
Seat 3: David Sklansky 110,000
Seat 4: Thomas Hunt III 101,000
Seat 6: Alessio Isaia 172,000
Seat 7: Joshua Feldman 121,000
Seat 8: Jonas Klausen 346,000

Other tournament action (plus the final 24 in the $50k HORSE) on page 2:
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Ya gotta love poker history - those great moments that are more than just statistics but interesting stories. Okay, you don’t have to love it, but can you at least be mildly amused?

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!