Omaha

The World Championship of Limit Omaha High - Low 8 or Better, day two played out yesterday. 179 players put up the $10,000 entry fee. For any unfamiliar with the game, each player is dealt four cards, there is a flop/turn/river for five community cards and the winner(s) must use exactly two cards from their hand and three from the board to make winning hands. The perfect low is A-2-3-4-5 because straights and flushes do not count on the low side. The "8 or Better" rule makes things interesting in that in order to qualify to win the low half of the split pot the player must make at least an 8 low or better, otherwise, the entire pot goes to the high hand.

The field had begun with 179 players and by late afternoon there were about 70 players left. I pushed into a table that included Daniel Negreanu (pictured). Daniel was quite short stacked. He played a few hands I dealt but having missed his draw, he had to fold leaving him with just $4700 in chips when the average at that point was over $70,000. Everyone had begun the tournament with $30,000 in tournament chips. Next hand, with all of his chips in the middle, Daniel won three quarters of a four way pot by winning the high hand and splitting (tying) the low half. This gave him $17,000, a better position but still very low. The money starts when 18 players remain and Daniel was very much at risk of busting out way short of the money.

By the end of the night, Daniel had scooped several large pots, quadroupling up his stack twice along the way and with only 17 players left in the field Daniel survived with over $100,000 and made the money.

The remaining 17 players will reconvene after a night's sleep to decide a winner. Making the money in this event is worth $26,921 (for 16th, 17th or 18th place) and the winner gets the gold bracelet along with $445,898.