by Simon Young

It's not often you can make $6 go a long way, but Yannick Pons has done just that. His investment in a $3 rebuy on PokerStars (he took the add on) has taken him all the way from France to Vegas, bought him into the $10,000 WSOP Main Event, and given him a hotel and spending money. What's more, it's now got him more than 60,000 in chips.

Yannick Pons: Feeling chipper

Pretty smart stuff, I think you'll agree, but his current success here is even more impressive when you learn he hardly plays live games. "I played a few small tournaments in Paris, but this is my first real big event. I'm just used to playing online, so this is a bit different," he said.

Yannick sells packaging back in Amiens, north of Paris, and is looking to get a decent stack wrapped up tonight to carry him safely through to Day 2.


Sverre Sundo: rollercoaster day
Another PokerStars man, but with distinctly more live experience, is Norway's Sverre Sundbo. By his own admission, he is having something of an "up and down" day. Happily, he's currently on the "up" side of that cycle, and sitting behind 40,000 chips. "It's okay," he added, "at least my overall trend is going the right way."

Sverre has one cash under his belt here already, after finishing 63rd for $11,800 in the $1,500 No Limit Holdem event.

He won't mind me recalling the time when cash caused him a problem. In Warsaw, Poland, for the EPT back in March, he was standing by the side of the road trying to hail a cab. A passing police patrol mistook him for a beggar, and insisted on searching him. Being a successful poker player, he had a large quantity of cash in his pocket, giving the police a problem: Unless he was the world's most brilliant beggar, they should let him go.

Instead, and to his horror, they decided he had to be a drug dealer, hauled him down to the police station... and threw him in a cell for three hours.