Event 10 Recap

  $400 + $50 Six-Max Deep Stack NLH (Re-Entry)

This event has been rising in popularity over the last couple of years since the entire tournament is played short-handed -- six players at most per table (until the final table is formed with the final seven players).  During previous Borgata Open series, this has been a one-day event, but inevitably ran into the early hours of the following day.

This time the event was expanded to be a two-day event.  Out of the 299 players who ponied up the $400 + $50 to enter, 23 of them survived 15 hours of play on day one and returned for day two.

The final 30 players would eventually claim a piece of the $119,600 total buy-ins.  Some notable names that did not make it that far are WPT titleist Kevin Saul, Gordon Eng, Matt Brady, Austen Johnson, David Inselberg and last woman standing, Amanda Musumeci.

Notables among the 23 players that returned for day two are
James Boyle - 22nd ($870)
Mike Castaldo - 15th ($1,160)
Harry Korotki (winner of event 5) - 13th ($1,160)
Daniel Chan - 9th ($1,740)
Mike Lydon (winner of event 1) - 4th ($10,731)
Kalid Ali was the chip leader coming into day two, but busted out 17th ($1,160).

Michael Michnik (Hollywood, FL) was hoping to improve on his 2nd place finish in event 1 ($400 Deep Stack NLH, $49,868) but once again had to settle for second when his A3 was dominated by Mark Sykes' A8.  For his 2nd place finish in this event, Michael added $17,576 to his already impressive tournament earnings.

Mark Sykes (Hamden, CT) walked away with the top prize of $28,586 and the beautiful engraved Borgata trophy.  Mark sliced through the final table of six, busting three of his five opponents and eventually accumulating all 7.475 million chips in play.

Mark started playing tournament poker a couple of years ago when he decided he needed a hobby.  He was a professor of clinical psychology and says he uses some of the data gathering skills from that field in his poker play.  He learned the game mostly playing online and chatting with poker-playing friends.

"The structure for the six max is really good"  he commented.  "I definitely made some mistakes, but I like the way I played overall".

Mark has definitely changed careers for the better.  He already has one other cash during the Borgata Fall Poker Open.  In event 3 ($400 NLH) he finished 5th for $8,034.