Friday, 29th March 2024 15:46
Home / Kelopuro’s PSPC hopes hit by food-poisoning

There’s never a good time to get food poisoning, but they can’t come much worse than today. It’s especially true if you’re supposed to be playing Day 3 of the PokerStars Players No Limit Hold’em Championship (PSPC).

That’s the super-unfortunate position of Sami Kelopuro. It’s the reason his stack is slowly being blinded away from in front of his empty chair on Table 1.

Kelopuro vanished from the tournament room about three or four hours ago, during the tournament break one level before dinner.

It’s not unusual for players to be slightly late back from a break. Maybe they get caught up in traffic, or stuck on a phone call. But tournament officials and fellow players alike were confused — and a little alarmed — when Kelopuro did not return.

He is nominally seated next to Fedor Holz, which isn’t ever pleasant. But Kelopuro is a similarly-talented high roller and would not have been fazed by the table draw. It was definitely weird for him not to have reappeared.

LOBSTER VS. LRZLUZAK

Kelopuro’s countryman Joni Joukimainen was able to corroborate what the PokerStars liaison staff also established. Kelopuro took ill today after what he assumes was some bad shellfish last night. He’s fully occupied with food poisoning right now.

He tried to battle through much of the day, but things got too much to bear. Kelopuro headed back to his room to sleep it off. He left behind a stack of around 400,000 (or more, depending on who you talk to), but he probably doesn’t have enough to last into Day 4.

Kelopuro’s stack is forlornly dwindling as the likes of Holz, Dave Shallow, Jeremy Ausmus and Petar Kalev do battle. The man also known as “lrzluzak” online would have enjoyed this fight.

As it is, we extend all good wishes to the Platinum Pass winner from Finland. We wish him a speedy recovery. He’s guaranteed at least $61,400 having outlasted all but 70 others. But his race will probably be run in the next level or so.

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