WSOP: Erik Sagstrom Takes Chip Lead to $50,000 HORSE Final Table

Lance Bradley | June 30, 2009

Chip Reese. Freddy Deeb. Scotty Nguyen. All three men have captured the $50,000 HORSE World Championship at the World Series of Poker and on Tuesday evening one of the eight remaining players at the 2009 final table will join that illustrious list.

Leading the way is Sweden’s Erik Sagstrom with 3,675,000. He began the day second in chips and along with Russia’s Vitaly Lunkin and American David Bach he spent time throughout Day 4 at the top of the leaderboard. Lunkin (2,490,000) and Bach (2,345,000) round out the top three. John Hanson, who finished 3rd in this event in 2007, sits fourth with 1,700,000.

The final four players are all WSOP bracelet winners. Huck Seed, Chau Giang, Erik Seidel and Ville Wahlbeck will all have to come from behind if they hope to add to their bracelet collection on Tuesday. For Wahlbeck this marks the sixth cash of the 2009 WSOP for him with five cashes coming in World Championship events. Seed is making his second consecutive appearance at the final table of this event.

Monday’s action began with 19 players. Todd Brunson, Brett Richey and Frank Kassela were all eliminated before the money kicked at #16. The final eight eliminations to get down to the final table took just over five hours. Gus Hansen was the final table bubble boy walking away with $123,895. Mike Wattel, Ray Dehkharghani, David Chiu, Tony G, Freddy Deeb, Steve Billirakis and John Kabbaj all made the money but fell short of the final table.

Action gets underway at 2 pm PT on Tuesday with the final table being broadcast live on ESPN360.com.

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