Tournament: Andras Koroknai leads WPT LAPC Final Table

After a Day 5 field at the World Poker Tour LA Poker Classic that looked like a "Who's Who" of the game, the final table of the US$10,000 no-limit Texas Holdem event now looks like a "Who's He?" list.

Hungarian Andras Koroknai leads the field at the start of his first TV final table with nearly five million chips. His only previous cash finish of record was a EUR2,000 buy-in tournament in Vienna, Austria, last October, where he finished eighth out of eighty-three players.

Raymond Dolan, a native of nearby Huntington Beach, California, sits in second place at the final table with 3.3 million chips. While this is Dolan's first TV appearance, he cashed in an earlier event in this series. He finished in twelfth place out of nearly six thousand players in the US$335 buy-in no-limit Texas Holdem event, earning US$12,380.

Several recognizable names in the poker world made it to Day 5, but could not hang on to make the final table. One of those notable pros was Annie Duke, winner of the first World Series of Poker Tournament of Champions. Duke, arguably the most recognizable female poker players, finished in nineteenth place after her ace-eight offsuit failed to improve against her opponent's pair of fours. She took home US$45,773.

Another famous face that will not be under the bright TV lights is the 2001 WSOP Main Event Champion and 2007 WPT Championship winner Juan Carlos Mortensen. Although he had the chip lead going into Day 5, he fell in ninth place, three spots short of the TV table. He moved all-in for his last 290,000 chips with ace-four suited, but did not catch the ace or flush he needed to beat his opponent's pocket tens. He earned US$100,000 for his finish.

The final table will start at 4pm PST on 4 March from the Commerce Casino in Commerce, California. All of the action will be taped and edited for broadcast around the world. The winner of this prestigious event will take home more than US$1.7 million, with US$1 million for the second-place finisher.

Here are the chip stacks going into the final table:

1. Andras Koroknai (Budapest, Hungary) - 4,995,000
2. Raymond Dolan (Huntington Beach, California) - 3,300,000
3. Tri Huynh (Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada) - 2,565,000
4. Gevork Kasabyan (Los Angeles, California) - 2,000,000
5. Jean-Claude Moussa (Brighton, Massachusetts)- 1,360,000
6. Michael Kamran (Los Angeles, California) - 680,000

Discuss this article below or on our Facebook Fan page.