It’s another beautiful, postcard-like day in Monaco. Outside the cruise ships constantly pass nearby, there is lots of activity on the beach, and pedestrians are out everywhere you look. Meanwhile inside the Monte Carlo Bay Resort and Hotel several side events in the PokerStars and Monte-Carlo®Casino EPT Grand Final festival are playing out as well.

Sorta kinda makes for its own postcard-like view.

Greetings from Event #46! Wish you were here!We have a few quick updates from three of the events in action at present ones we might’ve fit on postcards, if our scribbling were small enough. Let’s start with the second and final day of the big €2,000 no-limit hold’em event that is highlighting side action today, the one playing out in the photo above.

There were 62 left from a starting field of 263 to begin play in the €2K (Event #46), and after a couple of hours they’d played down to 39 players to burst the money bubble. Team PokerStars Pro Liv Boeree was among those falling shy of the cash after returning to a below average stack today.

Among the min-cashers taking away €3,520 was Germany’s Rene Knapp (knocked out in 32nd) who had been one of the start-of-day leaders. Ivan Luca of Argentina had begun the day in the top spot, but with less than 30 players left he’s now back to the pack with an average stack of about 115,000.

Meanwhile a couple of players have begun to accumulate and create some distance from the field so far, one being the man with the momentum, three-time WPT champion Anthony Zinno of the US who sits with about 320,000 at present.

Anthony ZinnoBut Georgios Sotiropoulos of Greece has had it even better today, having just knocked out another player to push up over 450,000, well clear of nearest-challenger Zinno.

Georgios SotiropoulosZipping along right beside the €2K is Event #52, a €500 NL Turbo event that is already down to a couple of tables. And down in the America Room the €5K NL 8-handed Event #51 is proceeding apace like all of those ships and walkers outside, with several familiar faces among the remaining crowd.

A total of 121 players signed up for Event #51, creating a €586,850 prize pool to be divided among the top 17 finishers with €147,700 going to the winner.

The PokerStars Blog heard a story about one of the entrants being found fishing frantically through the garbage bin just outside the poker room as late registration was about to conclude. At last he found what he was looking for — his tournament ticket!

No word on whether afterwards he was playing trash hands.

Just now they were down to 56, with Sorel Mizzi, Philipp Gruissem, Mayu Roca, Talal Shakerchi, Yann Dion, Sylvain Loosli, Dan Heimiller, Thomas Muehlocker, Mike Watson, Patrick Bruel, and Fabian Quoss among those left.

Fabian QuossScott Seiver and Bryn Kenney — both of whom won side events yesterday — are alive in that one as well.

Stay tuned, as we’ll be sending you more cards about the cards being played all day and night.

Click here for a continually updated list of all side event results from the EPT11 Grand Final.

Follow all the action from the €10,000 Main Event is on the Main Event page. Also watch on EPT Live. It’s also about time you downloaded the EPT app. There you will get all the latest news, chip counts and payouts. You can download it on Android or IOS.

Martin Harris is Freelance Contributor to the PokerStars Blog.

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