The short-stacked Liz Lieu made her move with A-J and found herself in a coin-flip with Steicke, who showed pocket sevens – a hand with which he’s already enjoyed success today.

The flop came 5-3-2, with the killer 7 landing on the turn to give Steicke a set and send Lieu out of the two APPT events in straight sets.

Only a few minutes later, Team PokerStars Pro Lee “Final Table” Nelson became Steicke’s next victim when he made a set of jacks on the turn against Nelson’s top pair (A-K on a board of K-10-3-J). The river blanked 4h) and the man in the matching magenta cap and T-shirt had another scalp to his name.

Despite the loaded field, it’s a number of relative unknowns who are dominating with Steicke leading from Matt Kay (56,000), Xuan Nguyen (55,000), Andrew Robl, Andrew Scott and Pakinai Lisawad (all on approximately 50,000). Of the 61 players who started the event, 38 remain. Blinds are at level five (200/400 with an ante of 50).

Watch APPT Macau 08: Liz Lieu Chat on PokerStars.tv

We have a new chip leader over at Andrew “I won a race!” Scott’s table. Xuan Ngyuen, a highly-successful online player, has been bossing Scott, PokerStars sponsored player Emad Tahtouh, and the rest of the table relentlessly with raise after raise. Even when re-raised himself, he has fearlessly come back over the top to force other players to fold. However, just when the temperature seemed to be rising to boiling point, he has changed gears, and is calmly nodding his head away to whatever tunes are emanating from his expensive MP3 headphones.

Most of the other tables have been happy to play small-ball poker and engage in pleasant conversation, as the average stacks are large relative to the blinds. Some are enjoying massages while they play.

Over at PokerStars sponsored player, Van Marcus’ table, a tournament director was called to explain to another player who had mucked his hand after being called on the river by Marcus, that in order to force another player to show their cards, they needed to show their own. It was all very friendly, and Marcus was happy to show everyone his winning two pair as a gesture of goodwill once it was all sorted out.

The only issue today appears to be the requirement for head tournament director, Danny McDonagh, to continue to remind one table not to mark the cards, as players are complaining about fingernail marks in the cards. The dealer has been instructed to check all cards as they are folded by the players.

Danny Wong and J.C. Tran have been the big movers in the first 30 minutes of level four as we tick past the halfway point of the first day.

Tran’s chips came courtesy of Team PokerStars Pro Isabelle “No Mercy” Mercier, who committed her chips with a diamond draw (K-Q on a flop of Jd-4c-5d) against Tran’s pocket kings. The board ran out 2s Ac, leaving Isabelle with plenty of time to prepare for the next PokerStars WCOOP event.

Tran, who won the 2006 WCOOP main event and celebrated his first WSOP bracelet in 2008 when he took out a $1500 No Limit Hold’em event, is now up to 55,000 in chips.

Wong stacked thanks to Hevad “RaiNKhaN” Khan after the 2007 WSOP main event sixth-place finisher bet 4000 on a flop of 10c-Ad-9s, with Wong making the call.

Khan fired another bullet on the turn of Ah, with Wong again going along for the ride. Khan’s last 6500 went in on the river (8h), with Wong calling and showing Ac-8d for a rivered full house; the same card gave Khan a straight. Andrew Scott remains the chip leader with just over 60,000.

We first met Julien Langvan on day 1C of the PokerStars.net APPT Macau main event. A Frenchman, Langvan was born with a birth defect limiting the use of his arms.

However, he can still play poker without trouble, and is currently living the poker dream after winning a televised French tournament, which earned him two years of PokerStars Sponsored player status to all the APPT, LAPT, EPT, and WSOP events until the end of 2009.

A resident of the French provincial city of St Etienne, he started playing poker online at PokerStars with the User ID zabriskir, but soon graduated to live games in a local poker room. Langvan prefers the comfortable atmosphere in smaller poker rooms to the bright lights of big casinos.

Langvan told us he is a “comportementaliste,” which as far as the closest online French-English dictionary can tell us, is a type of behavioural scientist. This makes sense because Langvan says he likes the “psychologie” of poker, and the adrenalin he gets from playing in big pots.

Well just quickly scanning the other players at his table, we know the Frenchman is going to get plenty of that, as sitting down with him are Team PokerStars Pro player, Bertrand 'ElkY' Grospellier; PokerStars sponsored players, Terrence 'Not Johnny' Chan, Ivan Tan, and Dan ‘Rekrul’ Schreiber; and Steve Sung. This who’s who of aggressive players have taken half of Langvan’s stack during play today; but a better poker classroom he could not hope to have.

Isabelle Mercier has just doubled through Chong Wing Cheong with a set of queens to take her stack above 30,000, while the other Team Poker Stars Pros Joe Hachem (29,000), Bertrand ‘ElkY’ Grospellier (25,000), Barry Greenstein (17,000), Lee Nelson (16,800) and Hevad Khan (12,000) have all successfully negotiated their way through the first three levels.

Meanwhile PokerStars Sponsored players Eric Assadourian (50,000), Emad Tahtouh (39,000), Ivan Tan (31,000), Dan Schreiber (22,000), Terrence Chan (20,000) and Van Marcus (15,300) are all still in the running.

With blinds about to increase to level four (150/300 with an ante of 25), 48 of the 61 players who started the day remain. Those KOed include Kofi Farkye, Yevgeniy Timoshenko, John Phan, Tony Dunst and PokerStars Sponsored player Celina Lin.

With Lin’s elimination, Mercier and Liz Lieu remain the only female players in the field. Lieu earned the honour of being the only player to cash in both events at the APPT Macau last year. She is also one of five players who cashed in last year’s High Roller event to return this year, along with Assadourian, David Steicke, John Juanda and Tahtouh.

“The Chuck Truck”, who learned his poker at Australia’s Crown Casino, in Melbourne, but who now resides in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, took a big hit before the dinner break at the main event final table, and thinking he had little chance left, returned from dinner having drunk half-a bottle of whisky. Seemingly past-caring, Chua won some big races, and stayed alive with a couple of big suckouts on his way to second. Unlike last night’s final table, his table draw today is filled with big names, including Team PokerStars Pro player and 2005 WSOP World Champion, Joe Hachem; four-time WSOP bracelet winner David Chiu; well-known Internet pro, Julian Powell, and Tom Hall. Chua is currently a picture of sobriety.

Watch APPT Macau 08: David Chiu Interview on PokerStars.tv

Scott hasn’t experienced the success of Steicke but has worked hard to improve his game in pursuit of that breakthrough result. But Andrew’s never-ending smile has started to fade over the past week as bad beat after bad beat have dented his resolve during this sojourn to Macau.

Not normally one to let his feelings out at the table, Scott has twice leapt from his seat and declared to the entire Grand Waldo Casino that he’s “finally won a race”.

His victim, on both occasions, was Russian Yevgeniy Timoshenko. On the first hand between the duo, Scott raised pre-flop to 800, Timoshenko made to 2600, Scott moved all-in for 14,000 and Timoshenko called. And it was a race – Scott’s Ah-Ks against Timoshenko’s queens. The board duly delivered Scott what he wanted to see: Ac-2d-6h-5d-9s.

On the same orbit, the money again went in pre-flop (only after time had been called on both Scott and Timoshenko) – this time it was Scott who held pocket queens and Timoshenko Ac-Kc. The board was jack-high – 7d-8s-Jh-7c-4s – sending Timoshenko to the rail and Scott into the tournament lead with 60,000.

Meanwhile, the defending champion and PokerStars Sponsored player Eric Assadourian has claimed a big scalp with the elimination of John “The Razor” Phan. On a flop of 4c-9s-8d, Phan bet 2500 and Assadourian called.

The turn was the 5h, with Phan taking the bait lured by Assadourian to push all-in with pocket 10s, only to find the Sydneysider holding pocket nines for top set. Assadourian is now up to more than 50,000.

Hiding behind her sunglasses, “No Mercy” joked that she almost had to bring her laptop to the poker table to fulfil her WCOOP commitments. Anything for the event sponsor!

While Isabelle shakes off her exhaustion, David Saab is full of beans, much to the amusement of Team PokerStars Pro Barry Greenstein.

Not the most demonstrative player at the poker table, Saab has been getting a few wry grins from Barry, especially after he announce to the entire tournament floor that he was going to attempt to steal the blind of the “one and only Barry Greenstein”. In respect of Saab’s dramatic declaration, Barry duly mucked from the big blind.

Play is now into level 2 and some bigger pots are starting to emerge. On table five, a four-way pot has just been played out featuring Julian Powell, Joe Hachem, David Chiu and Tom Hall.

On a flop of 2d-3s-7h, Powell bet 2200, Hachem made it 4500 and the other two players folded. Powell checked to Hachem on the turn (7s), who bet 6000. Powell raised to 12,000, enough to put Hachem all-in, and the 2005 WSOP champ made the call, tabling pocket queens.

Powell grimaced as he showed pocket nines, which stayed in arrears with the 8c landing on the river. The Team PokerStars pro is up to 33,750, with Powell, also from Hachem’s hometown of Melbourne, Australia, is down to just over 5000.

The arrival of Charles Chua, who finished runner-up in the APPT Macau main event that wrapped-up just over 12 hours ago, has ensured that the final entry list for the APPT High Roller is 61 players.

With a deep stack of 20,000 for each player, the atmosphere in the Grand Waldo casino tournament area is reasonably relaxed, with players happily chatting to each other and wandering around between hands. David Steicke just wandered past the blogging table and remarked he’d just been dealt aces for the first time in four days of tournament poker. “I won the blinds,” Steicke said happily, “I’ve been cracking other player’s aces all week, I thought it was bound to happen to me.”

The hangovers have barely kicked in for Eddie Sabat and his friends after a few celebratory drinks to toast his victory in the PokerStars.net Asia Pacific Poker Tour Macau main event, which wrapped up in the not-so-early hours of morning.

We’ve loaded up on coffee (and some MSG-soaked Chinese barbecued pork) and have returned to the main tournament floor of the Grand Waldo Casino for the start of the PokerStars.net APPT High Roller event.

Watch APPT Macau 008: APPT Macau High Roller Event on PokerStars.tv

The entries have come thick and fast in the past hour, with a who’s who of tournament poker milling around the rail ahead of the order to “shuffle up and deal” from last year’s APPT High Roller champion, PokerStars Sponsored player Eric Assadourian from Australia.

Barely a player has taken their seat that wouldn’t qualify for ‘notable’ status, starting with Team PokerStars Pros Joe Hachem, Lee “Final Table” Nelson, Barry Greenstein, Hevad Khan, Bertrand “ElkY Grospellier, Isabelle Mercier, PokerStars Sponsored players Emad Tahtouh, Van Marcus, Terrence Chan, Assadourian, Ivan Tan and Celina Lin headlining the field.

We’ve also spotted Johnny Chan, John Phan, Harry Demetriou, Liz Lieu, Tony bond18 Dunst, Mike timex McDonald, J.C. Tran, Nam Le, Quinn Do, Dan Schreiber, David Chiu, John Juanda, Shaun Deeb, Julian Powell, Kofi Farkye, Steve Sung and Tyler Cornell.

With a guaranteed prize pool of HKD $10,000,000, the event is currently showing an overlay but players continue to file into the casino seeking out registration information.

This HKD $150,000 buy-in (approximately USD $19,200) three-day event features a start bank of 20,000 in chips with 75-minute levels, so the quality field will have plenty of time to showcase their skills. For the final table, the clock will be wound back to the level that allows the average chips to approximate 40 times the big blind.

We’ll be playing six levels or until the field is reduced to 16 players, with the structure:

Level 1: 50/100
Level 2: 100/200
Level 3: 100/200 (ante 25)
Level 4: 150/300 (ante 25)
Level 5: 200/400 (ante 50)
Level 6: 300/600 (ante 75)