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1.10pm: Family duels
The best fights can be fights between family members; all smiles to the outside world but vicious when they decide to battle. Can the same be said for members of the PokerStars family?
Team PokerStars Pros Arnaud Mattern and Eugene Katchalov are sat at table one, with the latter in position. Just one table across on table two sits Randy "nanonoko" Lew from Team Online and Johnny Lodden from the live team.
These two tables will not break today so we look forward to how these key battles will evolve. One player who doesn't know or care about the latter two's reputation is Agris Klaise. He three-bet from the cut-off after Lodden had raised from under the gun and Lew had called from seats further along. He got respect though as both of them folded. -- MC
12.55pm: Big name
Yesterday we were bigging up Konstantinos Nanos as one of the biggest names in Greek poker. But in more ways than one, Nanos has nothing on Athanasios Polychronopoulos. The latter not only has 25 letters in his name, versus a meagre 17 for Nanos, but Polychronopoulos won a World Series of Poker bracelet in Las Vegas this summer, the first from these parts to win the bling.
Polychronopoulos beat a field of 2,713 players to earn that bracelet in a $1,500 no limit hold 'em event - a victory worth $650,223. Also on the final table was a little known German named Pius Heinz, who would go on to win the Main Event and be crowned World Champion.
Much like Heinz, Polychronopoulos appears to be far more than a flash in the pan. He also made the final table of the Master Classics in Amsterdam this month, finishing fourth for $144,018. He's hogging most of the limelight of the Greek press this afternoon, but now the whole world is watching. -- HS
12.42pm: MacPhee starts again
Kevin MacPhee is back at the EPT and looking for another shot at a second title. The American bust out in ninth place at EPT San Remo for €63,694 and made no bones about how disappointed he was to have bust out (cue Twitter storm). Here's a more gentle tweet from MacPhee:
"New chips, 7 handed tables and people folding hands face up... I think I am going to like this tournament!"
Although he's looking very settled at a table with no standout players that I recognised - always a good starting point - he is down a small amount from his 30,000 starting stack. -- RD
12.35pm: No early trip up for Rettenmaier
Marvin Rettenmaier is a player who doesn't like to hang around and was in one of the first hands at his table. He bet 350 on a [3d][6c][3s] flop after he three opponents checked to him. He soon folded when there was a check-raise and call behind him. It was just as well as the player in the big blind had trip threes with [7s][3c].
Rettenmaier has played almost every major live MTT in Europe this year as he aims to become European player on the year. He's near the top of the rankings and every tournament he can play before the end of 2011 can earn him valuable points. -- MC
12.25pm: Late regs and breaking tables
The tables are breaking from the top down so Mick Graydon's table number 25 is likely to be the first to break, unless there's a large glut of players late registering. Play is set up to be eight-handed at the moment to allow the late regs to be spread across nine-handed play. That make sense? Good.
There are 165 players currently on the board. -- RD
12.15pm: Away we go
We're off. By some measure the most immediately attractive table this afternoon features the Team PokerStars Pro duo of Theo Jorgensen and Jude Ainsworth, as well as the young German tyro Jan Collado. All three of those guys are in the overlapping intersection of "fiercely aggressive" and "darn good". Expect pyrotechnics. -- HS
12pm: Set to start
The clock is currently frozen on "Level 1, 60:00". Around 30% of the seats of some 23 tables are occupied with a steady stream of players filtering past the security guards at the door towards those remaining seats and chip stacks. We're expecting a larger turnout today than yesterday's 145 (standard Day 1B behaviour). Give it 15 minutes and we'll (probably) be up and running. -- RD
11.45am: The same but different
Morning all, and welcome back to Loutraki. Weather report: it's bright and sunny in Greece today. Thought you'd be interested.
It doesn't matter a great deal to all of us here as our focus of attention is downstairs in the conference room where we're eagerly anticipating the arrival of the players for day 1B of the inaugural EPT Loutraki.
In case you missed it yesterday, there were 145 players who showed up for day 1A, of whom the German player Julian Herold bagged up the most. There will likely be a larger field today, and we'll find out the payout structure, etc., once everyone is paid up.
Expected in the field today: a smattering of Team PokerStars Pros including Johnny Lodden, Theo Jorgensen, Arnaud Mattern, Jude Ainsworth, Toni Judet and Eugene Katchalov. Also Randy "nanonoko" Lew will be peeling himself out of cyberspace and planting himself at only one table. We'll see how long he can last there.
Plenty more to follow, so stay tuned. Cards are due in the air at noon, so join us not a minute after 12.30pm.



Drinking the ambrosia on the summit of Olympus: Marc Convey, Rick Dacey and Howard Swains.


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