The Mini’s proved spectacularly successful at this year’s Irish Open. Players from near and far have bustled into the cavernous depths of the RDS hall to take their shot at the €500,000 GTD prize pool for the affordable price of €200. With the Main Event running in parallel today, the floor was awash with hopefuls, filling the capacious hall with the familiar sounds of chip shuffling, laughter, banter and the odd cry of anguish as some inevitable bad beats were delivered.
Today’s Mini flight was even more populated than the previous three as 487 new and old faces congregated to do battle across the felt. Despite the competitive atmosphere, there was a real sense of levity amongst the players – the group taking those famous words from Kipling ““If you can meet success and failure and treat them both as impostors, then you are a balanced man” to heart.
Gabriel Bitton proved the man of the moment as his final stack of 1,250,000 puts him well clear of not just today’s field but far outstrips the other flights’ chip leaders.
Andreas Schulte-Winkler (925,000) and Paul Gavin (730,000) found themselves in the 2nd and 3rd spots at the close of play but the massive differential between 1st and 3rd shows the dominance of Bitton. He’ll have realistic hopes of picking up this title when they pick up arms once more for Day 2 on April 1st.
We’ll be back Saturday for the next flight Day 1E but the Main Event will be back in action so join us then as the Irish Open’s unstoppable momentum continues. See you tomorrow!