German poker pro, and recently signed representative for Party Poker, Marvin Rettenmaier maintained his chip-lead during Day 5 of the World Poker Tour $25k Championship, and will take a commanding lead into Saturday’s official final table.

Nine players took their seats on Thursday, with the tournament scheduled to play down to the official final table of six, and it was Marvin Rettenmaier who was out in front of the field, with Mike Mizrachi close on his heels. However, Rettenmaier absolutely crushed the table during the shortened day on Thursday, doubling his chip-stack, which now sits at over 6.7 million, with his nearest competitor. Still Mike Mizrachi, far behind with just over 2.5 million!

Rettenmaier signed with Party Poker just before the WPT Championship got underway, giving his run an even more intriguing storyline. The young German, known as “Mad Marvin”, has pocketed nearly $1.7 million in tournament winnings during his career, but is still in search of his first major tournament title.

Rettenmaier will actually be taking a stack of over 100 big blinds into the final table, an almost unheard of occurrence. Here is a look at the six players still in contention for the 2012 WPT Championship, along with their seating assignments and chip counts:

* Seat 1: Michael Mizrachi – 2,560,000 (43 BBs)

* Seat 2: Marvin Rettenmaier – 6,715,000 (112 BBs)

* Seat 3: Steve O’Dwyer – 2,035,000 (34 BBs)

* Seat 4: Nick Schulman – 1,555,000 (26 BBs)

* Seat 5: Trevor Pope – 1,480,000 (25 BBs)

* Seat 6: Philippe Ktorza – 895,000 (15 BBs)

Despite his chip-stack, Rettenmaier’s path to the title will likely be a difficult one. In addition to Mizrachi (known for his ability to go from a short-stack to the chip-leader in the blink of an eye, or vice-versa) the final table also includes one of the hottest tournament players in the game in Steve O’Dwyer; former WPT Champion Nick Schulman; poker pro Trevor Pope; and Frenchmen Phillipe Ktorza, who has racked-up dozens of cashes in tournaments over the past three years.

The final six players will now get a much deserved day off before returning to the Bellagio on Saturday for the televised final table. Players looking for some tournament action on Friday will be able to tune in for the final table of the $100k Super-High-Roller event.

One elimination on Thursday proved very important for 10th place finisher Joe Serock, as the elimination of Moon Kim in 7th place sealed the deal for Serock, who is now officially the Season X World Poker Tour Player of the Year. Kim needed to finish in 4th place to tie Serock, and could have won the award outright with a 3rd place or better finish.

Tags: blinds, Blink Of An Eye, Chip Stack, Commanding Lead, Competitor, Contention, Dwyer, Frenchmen, Intriguing Storyline, Marvin, Michael Mizrachi, Nick Schulman Poker, Occurrence, Party Poker, Rettenmaier, Seat 6, Seating Assignments, Steve O, World Poker Tour, WPT Championship

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