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By the third official day of action at the European Poker Tour San Remo (after two Day 1 starting flights), the initial field of 879 runners had been whittled down to just 482. The pace of play only became more brutal as Day 2 went on, with noted pros constantly hitting the rail and the tournament nearly reaching the money bubble within seven levels of play.

After over 300 eliminations, Joseph Cheong was in the lead with approximately 632k chips at 1:00am. He’ll have a comfortable lead and over 150 BB’s to play with on Day 3.

Cheong made his biggest poker headlines in 2010 when he finished third in the World Series of Poker Main Event, bagging $4 million in the process. He also scored a runner-up finish in the Season 7 EPT London Turbo High Roller, winning an additional $250k. A victory at EPT San Remo would represent his first money finish in an EPT Main Event.

Vanessa Selbst of Team PokerStars Pro had a successful day as well, maintaining a solid stack until the later hours of the day when her endurance paid off. She’ll be among the 144 players returning for Day 3, bringing 497k chips along with a whole lot of momentum.

Other pros that could pose a danger to Cheong on Day 3 includes Chris McClung, Nick Yunis, Sergey Tikhonov, William Thorson, Mustapha Kanit and Daniel Neilson, all of whom are carrying stacks between 400k and 585k.

Elio Fox, who won the WSOPE Main Event just a few days ago, is currently in 11th place with 346k chips. A number of Team PokerStars Pros aside from Selbst, including John Duthie, Johnny Lodden and Lex Veldhuis, will return as well, albeit with slightly smaller stacks. Only 16 eliminations must be made before the money bubble is broken, a certainty for Day 3.