The fortieth event in the 42nd World Series of Poker has started in Las Vegas as the organisers power through the large range of events and poker genres represented this year.
39 players in event 36: $2,500 No-Limit Hold’em returned to the felt Thursday for the third day of play in an event which boasted an original entry field of 1,734 and a prize pool worth $3.94 million.
Thomas Miller was in charge on a chip count of 1.5 million, but there were plenty of competitive threats still active in the shape of Randy Dorfman, Eddy Sabat, Steven Watts, Lars Bonding, David Pham, Dwyte Pilgrim and Nam Le in the remaining field.
Late Thursday night Vegas time the field was down to 6 players at level 28, with the next elimination in line for a $119,528 cash.
The survivors at that stage were – in order of chip counts – Matthew Berkey (3,850,000), Thomas Miller (2,800,000), Mikhail Lakhitov (2,405,000), Eddy Sabat (2,015,000), Hassan Babajane (1,300,000) and Thomas Middleton (1,160,000).
Event 37: $10,000 H.O.R.S.E. Championship also entered its third and last day Thursday with Michael Binger leading the chip race on 742,000 and only 23 players remaining from the initial field of 240, each of them guaranteed a payday of at least $21,905.
Still in contention were quality players like Fabrice Soulier (560,000), Daniel Ospina (532,000), Jacobo Fernandez (526,000) and Ram Vaswani (505,000) along with John Monnette (325,000), Chau Giang (262,000) and Max Pescatori (243,000), with Tom Dwan further down the list at 135,000.
Late Thursday night Tom Dwan had just busted in fifth place for $134,480 playing Stud, and the remaining four players at level 25 were, in chip order, Andrey Zaichenko (2,500,000) Fabrice Soulier (2,200,000) Shawn Buchanan (1,360,000) and Daniel Ospina (445,000).
The next one to bust goes home with $180,750, but every one of these competitive players is still going after the main prize of $609,130 and a prestigious bracelet.
Event 38: $1,500 No-Limit Hold’em attracted another large entry field of 2,192 when it kicked off Wednesday, with 298 returning Thursday and the money bubble just 82 positions away.
Jonathan Spinks was in the second day lead, showing every intention of adding more tournament cash to his career earnings of over $2 million, but there was a still lot of firepower in the field, including 2010 WSOP Main Event champion Jonathan Duhamel, Melanie Weisner, Bernard Lee, Sam Trickett and Justin Smith.
Late night Thursday just 52 survivors were playing at level 18, with Jamie Armstrong leading and Spinks still in the top ten chip counts, but only just in the tenth position. Melanie Weisner was still going strongly in the number five spot.
By late Thursday night level 15 had been reached on the second day of event 39: $2,500 Pot-Limit Hold’em/Omaha, with Rodney Brown (290,000) and Scott Clements (285,000) leading 35 survivors – all that was left of a starting field of 606 hopefuls.
The first day of the event had seen major names heading to the exit, including Eric Froehlich, JC Tran, Gavin Griffin, Layne Flack, Daniel Negreanu, Andy Black, Ted Lawson, Jeff Lisandro, Erik Seidel, Dan Shak, Phil Hellmuth, Al Barbieri, Vinny Vinh, Liv Boeree, John Racener, Phil Laak, and David Sklansky.
Surviving into the second day were 131 players led by David Williams and including Humberto Brenes, Erica Schoenberg, Bill Chen, and Mitch Schock.
Still in the field as the competition approached midnight Thursday were Joe Hachem, Scott Clements, Tom Schneider, David Baker, Carter Gill and Adam Junglen…still a formidable field, then.
Commencing Thursday was event 40, the $5,000 buy-in Six-Handed No-Limit Hold’em, which predictably attracted a slew of 732 (2010: 568 entries) mainly professional players, among them Matt Graham, Jeffrey Papola, Eric Baldwin, Andy Seth, Billy Kopp, Simon Watt, Isaac Haxton, Lex Veldhuis, Antonio Esfandiari, Alex Gomes, Joe Cada, Bertrand Grospellier, Chad Brown, Andy Black and Vanessa Selbst.
Getting on toward midnight Thursday the competition was well into level 10 on the first day’s action with just 213 players left, headed by Randy Dorfman (225,000) chased by Daniel Negreanu (144,000) and a top ten chip count list that still includes Eugene Todd, Mclean Karr, Matthew Jarvis, Jude Ainsworth, Matt Hawrilenko and Faraz Jaka.
There’s plenty of action and potential for excitement remaining in this event as it nears its first day close, with the promise of some very competitive poker going into the second day.