Marques Leads 2023 PCA Main Event; Watson on Top in $100K SHR

The 2023 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure (PCA) Main Event kicked off on January 23 at the picturesque Baha Mar Resort in The Bahamas, with the first of two starting flights attracting 166 players. Only 80 of those who sat down with high hopes of becoming the 2023 PCA Main Event champion had chips in front of them after the completion of the eighth 60-minute levels, and nobody had more precious betting tokens than Portugal’s Andre Marques.

Marques turned his 30,000 starting stack into a tournament-leading 197,500 on Day 1A. Known as “PTFisherman23” online at PokerStars, Marques went about his business in an understated yet efficient way. The 2020 World Championship Of Online Poker (WCOOP) Main Event champion has done his chances of glory in The Bahamas no harm at all.

Plenty of big names litter the PCA Main Event Day 1A top ten chip counts. Team PokerStars’ Andre Akkari is fourth in chips with a 136,900 stack. Akkari received a welcome boost to his stack late into proceedings when his aces prevailed against the pocket queens of Kitty Kuo, sending Kuo to the rail with only 15 minutes of the flight remaining.

Akkari’s fellow Brazilian Yuri Dzivielevski (130,900), Chance Kornuth (127,000), Steve O’Dwyer (104,800, Diego Ventura (103,300), and Thomas Muehloecker (103,000) find themselves in the top ten.

Also safely through to Day 2 are such superstars as nine-time WSOP bracelet winner Erik Seidel (88,200), Sam Greenwood (80,000), Joao Simao (62,200), Team PokerStars’s Sam Grafton (53,400), the legendary Fedor Holz (52,600), and Belgium’s Michael Gathy (45,700).

Day 1B shuffles up and deals at noon local time on January 24, and PokerNews‘ live reporting team is on the floor throughout, bringing you live and exclusive coverage of the 2023 PCA Main Event.

2023 PCA Main Event Day 1a Top 10 Counts

Mike Watson Leads the $100,000 Super High Roller Final Table

Canada’s Mike Watson finished Day 1 of the $100,000 Super High Roller as the chip leader, and built on his blistering start by finishing Day 2 with the same title. Watson is now only five eliminations away from capturing the $1,545,080 top prize and adding a PCA Super High Roller victory to his PCA Main Event he enjoyed in 2016.

Five poker Goliaths stand between Watson and that $1.5 million prize; any of them would make a worthy champion. Watson returns with 3,015,000 chips, with Juan Pardo (2,200,000) his nearest rival in the counts. Pardo’s fellow Spaniard, Adrian Mateos (2,035,000), sits down at the six-handed final table third in chips, with Seth Davies (1,870,000) and Isaac Haxton (1,645,000) below them. Daniel Dvoress (590,000) is the final table’s shortest stack,; he has the equivalent of 12 big blinds at his disposal.

Play resumes at 12:30 p.m. local time; join the PokerNews live reporting team then.

$100K Super High Roller Day 3 Seating Assignments and Chip Counts

BSOP Bahamas Main Event Crowns Its Champion Today

The $1,100 buy-in BSOP Bahamas Main Event started with 460 players fighting it out for a slice of the $446,200 prize pool, but only 37 of those grinders remain in contention for the $86,650 top prize and the all-important trophy.

India’s Sriharsha Doddapaneni (1,087,000) goes into the third and final day’s action with the chip lead, and is the only player to have more than 100 big blinds in his arsenal. Doddapaneni will be pushed all the way by the likes of Christian Rudolph (974,000), Maria Konnikova (773,000), Brunno Botteon (590,000), Ludovic Geilich (576,000), Katie Lindsay (410,000), Women in Poker Hall of Famer Maria Ho (366,000), and regular PokerNews strategy contributer Jonathan Little (325,000).

The cards are back in the air from 1:00 p.m. local time; follow the action here on PokerNews from then.

2023 BSOP Bahamas Main Event Top Ten Day 2 Chip Counts