Those busy obsessing over the World Series of Poker Main Event, may have missed the fact that there's quite an exciting little tournament going on just down the street from the Rio as well, the $15,000 + $400 buy-in World Poker Tour Bellagio Cup V.

This year's Bellagio Cup, which started Monday, saw 268 players sign up to create a total prize pool worth $3,899,400.  Many of the big name tournament rounders you'd expect were among that starting 268 including Mike Matusow, Doyle Brunson, Phil Laak, Erik Seidel, Barry "The Bear" Greenstein, John Juanda, Jeff Madsen, Isaac Haxton, Jennifer Tilly, David Benyamine, Freddy Deeb, Erick Lindgren, Hoyt Corkins, Alex Kravchenko, Phill Hellmuth, Todd Brunson, Kevin Saul, Ralph Perry, Justin Bonomo, Bertrand "ElkY" Grospellier, Vivek "FLOG" Rajkumar and Sammy Farha.

After two Day Ones and One Day Two, only about a third of that field remains as Day Three began today (7/16) with 93 players.  Obviously many of the above names have long since departed from the Bellagio, but some are still going strong and have a very real shot at the $1,187,670 posted top prize including Seidel, Hoyt, "ElkY," Madsen, Kravchenko, Saul, Ralph, Freddy and the "FLOG."

For complete updates from this event, as well as chip counts, photos and videos starring PokerRoad's Amanda Leatherman visit www.worldpokertour.com.


Story by Mark Anderson