GPI Update: Lichtenberger Joins the Top Ten; EPT Madrid and Wynn Classic Make Their Marks

The Global Poker Index ranks professional level tournament performance over a rolling 36-month period where more recent results are weighted more heavily than older results. Learn more about how the Global Poker Index is calculated.

Lichtenberger Reaches the Top 10; Moorman, Helppi rejoin the Top 20

Jason Mercier, Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier and Shawn Buchanan remain at the top of the Global Poker Index this week with Mercier still sitting comfortably at Number One.  Joining them at the top is Eugene Katchalov who moves up two spots to GPI#4.  Katchalov should feel right at home in the fourth spot having spent twenty-six of the past thirty-nine weeks in that position, including sixteen straight weeks beginning in November.  His return to GPI#4 this week is the result of earning 112 points for his 12th place finish in the EPT Madrid €2,000 NLHE event.  Andrew “luckychewy” Lichtenberger (GPI#10 +15) joins them in the Top Ten.  He earned 259 points for his 4th place finish in last week’s Wynn Classic $5,000 NLHE Championship event.  This is Lichtenberger’s first appearance in the Top Ten and only his second in the Top Twenty, having reached GPI#19 just after cashing in the PCA Main event back in January.  Also rejoining the Top Twenty this week are Chris Moorman and Juha Helppi.  They each won an EPT Madrid NLHE 8-Max event.  Moorman took the top prize in the €2,000 8-Max Bounty and Helppi won the €10,000 8-Max Rebuy event.

Event Aging Impacts the Rankings

Will Failla (GPI#16) was also a winner last week, finishing on top in the $1,500 NLHE event at The Heartland Poker Tour’s 100th tour stop. Unfortunately for Failla, the 190 points he earns for his HPT win is not enough to counteract the effects of other scores aging.  His score for cashing in last year’s Partouche Poker Tour NLHE Main event and his score for cashing in the 2011 Borgata Poker Open NLHE Championship both age into Period 2 this week knocking out two other scores, both 2011 WSOP cashes, costing him a combined 502 points.  Those scores aging into Period 2 open up two spots in Period 1 allowing his 8th place finish in the 2011 EPT San Remo NLHE Bounty event to count along with the new HPT result gaining him 351 points. The net effect of the new scores and the aging scores lowers his overall points by 155 and causes his seven spot fall in the rankings.

Also affected by aging this week are Christian Harder and Sam Stein, both of whom fall out of the Top Twenty.  Two of  Harder’s Borgata Poker Open scores age into new Periods this week lowering his overall score. His 2011 NLHE Heads-up win ages into Period 2, allowing his previously excluded score from the 2011 Borgata Deep Stack Double Play Open $1,500 NLHE event to count in Period 1.  However, it also knocks his 2011 WSOP $1,500 NLHE score out of Period 2.  The net effect of these changes is a loss of 36 points.  In addition his 2010 Borgata Poker Open Heads-Up 3rd place finish ages into Period 4 and is excluded by the cap costing him an additional 50 points.  Sam Stein also falls out of the Top Twenty this week, putting him in uncharted territory having never been ranked lower than GPI#18.  His fall this week is due to a 2010 WSOP Europe PLO event aging into Period 4 where it is excluded by the cap costing him 70 points.

Like Stein, this week finds other players in areas of the Index they are unfamiliar with, including John Racener (GPI#232) who suffers the largest drop in rank and score this week. The 2010 WSOP Main event runner-up sees his overall score drop 347 points and falls 128 spots in the rankings.  This is by far his lowest rank ever, and a long way from his highest of GPI#14.  Racener’s most recent scores were both from last year’s Borgata Poker Open.  His 3rd place finish in the $1,500 NLHE event and his cash in the $3,300 NLHE Championship event both age into Period 2 this week where he already had four scores, leaving him with no scores in Period 1.  This causes the Championship score to knock out his lowest Period 2 score and the $1,500 NLHE score to be excluded by the cap causing the majority of his overall score drop.  Giuseppe Pantaleo and Salman Behbehani(GPI#115 -63) both fall in the rankings this week due to the 2011 Partouche Poker Tour NLHE Main event aging into Period 2 and knocking out one of their 2011 WSOP scores.  Pantaleo has a combined loss of 176 points, 71 points from the Main event aging and 105 points for the loss of his score for his WSOP cash.  For the same reasons Behbehani’s overall score drops 258 points.  This causes Pantaleo to tumble into the bottom of the Index this week, ranking below GPI#200 for only the third time since it’s inception, and Behbehani to fall out of the Top One Hundred after ranking as high as 31st in January.

Jensen and Baron Win the EPT Madrid and Wynn Main Events 

The Wynn Classic wrapped up last week with it’s $5,000 NLHE Championship.  In addition to Lichtenberger, several other GPI ranked players did well at the Wynn.  After dropping in the rankings last week due to aging, Isaac Baron reverses that course this week with one of the largest jumps thanks to winning the event.  He picks up 352 points for his win and moves up 108 spots to GPI#69.  Cary Katz finished 7th in the Championship event and returns to the Index this week for the first time since December at GPI#238.  Tyler Reiman (GPI#142 +57) and Keven Stammen (GPI#114 +20) move up the rankings thanks to their 9th and 10th place finishes and Jeff Sluzinski (GPI#238) makes his Index debut after finishing 12th.

The EPT Madrid €5000 NLHE Main event also concluded last week with the consistently GPI ranked Frederik Brink Jensen taking the top prize.  Jensen had not cashed since last September’s Partouche Poker Tour events and therefore had been steadily falling in the rankings, falling off the Index entirely just two weeks ago.  But he’s back in a big way with his win in Madrid, and is now GPI#165.  Bruno Lopes (GPI#106 +130) earned 363 points for his 4th place finish and gets a big boost in the rankings.  Ilan Boujenah (GPI#67 +65) and Nicolas Levi (GPI#85 +102) both move into the Top One Hundred following their 6th and 7th place finishes.  Rounding out the final table was Mike McDonald (GPI#12 +1).

Debuting on the Global Poker Index

Zimnan Ziyard (GPI#261) joins the Index for the first time this week after finishing 3rd in the EPT Madrid  €2000 NLHE event. Stuart Fox (GPI#296) also makes his debut after cashing at the Merit Spring Open. Additional first time appearances this week are Jeff Sluzinski (GPI#278) and Epic Poker League card holders, Mihai Manole (#298) and David Pham (GPI#299).

Returning to the Global Poker Index

Taylor Paur (GPI#194) leaps back onto the GPI this week after earning 274 points for his 13th place finish in the EPT Madrid €5000 NLHE Main event.  Johnny Lodden (GPI#289) also returns to the Index after doing well in Madrid, cashing in both the €5000 NLHE Main event and the €2000 NLHE 8-Max Turbo. They are joined by Cary Katz (GPI#238),Manuel Bevand (GPI#295), WSOP Circuit NLHE Main event final tabler Tyler Kenney(GPI#297) and Christophe Benzimra (GPI#300).

Exiting the Global Poker Index

Several 2011 Partouche Poker Tour events aged into Period 2 this week triggering the exit of Massimiliano Martinez, Anton Ionel, Sebastian Winkler, and Yuliyan Nikolaev Kolev.  Also aging into Period 2 this week is the 2011 Borgata Poker Open NLHE Championship event, which contributes to the departure of Daniel Colman and Kevin Calenzo. Other exits this week are Matt Berkey, Fabian Quoss, Steven Kelly, Liv Boeree, Owen Crowe, andTamas Lendvai.