The biggest moment on the tournament poker calendar, the $10,000 Championship Event at the World Series of Poker, got off to a grand start on Saturday. While some were celebrating that special day (or lamenting the fact that it was over so quick), three other preliminary events on the WSOP schedule played down to the final day on Saturday and will award bracelets tonight.
Event #62 – $10,000 No Limit Hold’em Championship Event
The first of three scheduled Day Ones took to the felt around the Rio All Suites Hotel and Casino on Saturday, bringing a bustling crowd looking to etch their names for action later this week in the tournament.
Traditionally the smallest of the Day Ones, Day 1A was a calm occasion in comparison to what Days 1B and 1C will look like today and Monday. After the late registration period had expired, a total of 943 players had put up their $10,000 for a chance at poker immortality. By the end of the night’s action, however, only 584 of those hardy souls would be able to come back on Tuesday for the Day Two festivities.
The defending champion of this tournament, Greg Merson, would issue the “Shuffle Up and Deal” call to the crowd and take part in Day 1A; he would survive well, taking in 81,600 chips to nearly triple his starting stack. Two other notable pros, Max Lehmanski and Wilfried Harig, were able to best Merson’s day in pulling in 136,850 and 130,400 chips, respectively. The three men will have some work to do, however, as they don’t even crack the Top Ten at this point with their totals.
Once the smoke had cleared from the five two-hour levels of play, Evan Panesis holds the honor of being the Day 1A chip leader, sitting on a comfortable 190,975 in chips:
1. Evan Panesis, 190,975
2. Nicholas Crisp, 184,075
3. Abulaziz Almashal, 180,575
4. Sergio Castelluccio, 175,825
5. Michael Wehner, 170,325
6. Jason Manger, 158,150
7. Yucel Eminoglu, 147,425
8. Gal Erlichman, 146,875
9. Scott Wesley, 137,075
(tie) Jonathan Lane, 137,075
For some of the pros in the field, the 2013 WSOP has concluded with their elimination. That list includes 2007 Championship Event third place finisher Raymond Rahme, actor Jason Alexander, former World Champion Pius Heinz, Poker Hall of Famer T. J. Cloutier and 2010 “November Niner” Soi Nguyen.
Expect another huge throng to flood the Rio this afternoon. The second of the Day Ones, it could be reasonably expected that 1500 to 1750 players will be on the tables on Sunday, but Monday’s massive field will probably exceed the numbers from Days 1A and 1B combined. The final field size will probably be close to 7000 when all is said and done.
Three Preliminaries Conclude On Sunday
The final three preliminary events will wrap up their action on Sunday as the players look to get a good payday before potentially stepping up for the final Day 1 in the Championship Event on Monday.
Event #58, the “Little One For One Drop” $1111 No Limit Hold’em tournament, is down to the final eight men with Nghi Tran sitting on top of the leaderboard with 4.13 million chips. Top professional Roland Israelashvili is challenging Tran with his 3.375 million in chips and Brian Yoon (2.65 million), Joe Morneau (2.585 million) and Justin Zaki (2.3 million) sit behind Israelashvili in the two million chip club. Alex Case (1.76 million), Cuong Van Nguyen (1.05 million) and Kevin O’Donnell (655,000) have their work cut out for them to move up the ladder. $663,727 awaits the eventual winner of the “Little One,” not such a little prize for four days of work!
Event #60, another $1500 No Limit Hold’em event, is down to the last fifteen players looking for a WSOP bracelet. Ryan Julius is alive in the tournament, but he will start the day with a short stack of 479,000. Another pro, Hiren Patel, is in a bit better shape with his 1.099 million in chips, but he joins Daniel Cascado (who barely missed winning a bracelet in Event #24) and Bijon Notash in looking up at Cy Williams and his 1.372 million chip stack. The eventual champion tonight will pick up $609,017 for his efforts.
Finally, the $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha championship, Event #61 on the schedule, is down to its final 32 players with a host of notables in contention. Mike “SirWatts” Watson, Johannes Strassmann, Daniel Alaei, Jonathan Duhamel, Oleksii Kovalchuk, Alex Kravchenko, Tom Marchese, Jose “Nacho” Barbero, Yevgeniy Timoshenko, Stephen Chidwick and Tony Cousineau (looking to end his streak of most cashes without a WSOP bracelet) are all in the fight, but Russia’s Alexey Rybin will hold the pole position at the start of today’s action with 977K in chips. The winner of the final preliminary bracelet of the 2013 WSOP will also walk off with $852,692 in cash for his time on the tables.
