Danchev, who scooped the chip lead by busting Day 3 chip leader Patrick Kelly about five minutes before the end of the day, will take 4,080,000 into Day 5 tomorrow.
With a runner-up finish at EPT San Remo in 2011, Danchev is no stranger to deep runs and will be tough to knock off his substantial stack.
Crowe, a Canadian pro with an impressive list of cashes live and online, bagged 2.5m to sit second but might have been the leader if not for a rough turn of the cards. Crowe got it in good with KK against Andrey Shatilov’s AK late but five spades on the board chopped up the 2.8m-chip pot.
Fair, the 2010 SCOOP Main Event champion as "toetagU," holds down the third spot with 2.49 million.
Dion, yet another online grinder with an impressive career of big cashes, holds down fourth with 2.29 million. He has a shot at making a month of poker that already includes an FTOPS Main Event win for $450k and a Sunday Million final table even more memorable.
Rounding out a truly tough top 5 is veteran pro Robert "Bro Grinder" Mizrachi with 1.99 million.
Blomlie, Sabat, Busquet In Contention
Other notables sticking around in the final 21 players include rising Norwegian star Mikal "Mikal12345" Blomlie (1.35 million), Eddy Sabat (714,000), heads-up superstar Olivier Busquet (593,000), Darren Elias (548,000) and EPT Grand Final champ Mohsin Charania as the true short stack (140,000).
Sabat has made the final 40 of the PCA $10k three years running.
The top 10 in chips heading into Day 5:
1. Dimitar Danchev 4,080,000 2. Owen Crowe 2,500,000 3. Ryan Fair 2,496,000 4. Yann Dion 2,296,000 5. Robert Mizrachi 1,990,000 6. Michael Lipman 1,562,000 7. Andrey Shatilov 1,494,000 8. Joel Micka 1,409,000 9. Matthew Reed 1,375,000 10. Jerry Wong 1,370,000Serock, Katchalov Fall Short
The list of notables hoping to make Day 5 was long but most couldn't make it happen.
Pro Joe Serock, one of the Day 3 chip leaders, lasted the longest before finally falling in 26th for a $47,000 cash.
Making it the furthest from Team PokerStars was Eugene Katchalov. Rarely getting many chips to work with throughout the tournament, Katchalov managed to make it all the way to 29th and a $47,000 payday of his own.
Also dropping out just shy of the final day were Carlos Mortensen, Greg Mueller and newly named PokerStars pros Jake Cody and Tatiana Barausova.
Action picks up tomorrow at noon and will play down to a final table of eight. Follow along with the live updates on the PokerStars blog and catch the final table streaming on Saturday.
The $25k High Roller event also kicks off tomorrow with a large field expected.
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