Day 2 of the 2016 World Poker Tour L.A. Poker Classic Main Event saw significant chip movement as two-thirds of the field that remained after Day 1 was eliminated, leaving just 111 players to continue the trudge toward the final table on Monday. Sam Soverel is the chip leader with 466,400 chips, followed closely by Ty Reiman with 442,700.
488 players signed up on Day 1, but 27 more registered by the end of the first level on Sunday, upping the total field to 515 players. That is just a few players shy of the number need to get the prize pool to $5 million; as it stands, the prize pool totals $4,944,000. The winner will receive $800 more than $1 million (that’s a complicated way of saying $1,000,800). The payouts will go down to 63rd place, with a min-cash of $18,240.
Sam Soverel, currently ranked 577th on the Global Poker Index, has over $1.3 million in live tournament earnings, according to TheHendonMob.com. He only has ten live tournament cashes, so that is quite the nice average per cash. From 2011 through 2014, his positive results were scattered, but he has really picked up the pace of late, recording four non-trivial cashes since December 2015. He placed second and fourth in back-to-back $25,000 No-Limit Hold’em High Roller Events at the Aria in December for about $234,000 total and followed those up a week later with a 41st place finish in the WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic Main Event. Just over a month ago, Soverel won another High Roller at the Aria, banking $309,400.
This is the first stop on what the WPT has dubbed the “California Swing,” so named because there are three WPT stops in a row in the Golden State. Immediately following the WPT L.A. Poker Classic is the WPT Bay 101 Shooting Star up in San Jose and right after that is the WPT Rolling Thunder in Lincoln, California. Everyone who participates in these events will earn points toward the California Swing leader board. The points leader at the end of the Swing will receive up to six nights of accommodations and a complimentary massage at the Meridian Spa during the 2017 WPT L.A. Poker Classic, Shooting Star status at the 2017 WPT Bay 101 Shooting Star, and up to five nights of hotel accommodations and $500 room credit during the 2017 WPT Thunder Valley Series.
Players must compete in all three California Swing events to be eligible for the prizes. The leader board will be posted after Bay 101.
Day 3 of the 2016 WPT L.A. Poker Classic is underway at the Commerce Hotel & Casino; players will work their way through five 90-minute levels before calling it a night.
2016 World Poker Tour L.A. Poker Classic Main Event – Day 2 Chip Leaders
1. Sam Soverel – 466,400
2. Ty Reiman – 442,700
3. Matthew Lapossie – 398,700
4. Oleksii Khoroshenin – 320,700
5. Stephen Chidwick – 317,000
6. Alex Rocha – 311,400
7. Dietrich Fast – 306,700
8. Farid Jattin – 306,500
9. Ryan Riess – 299,800
10. Binh Nguyen – 297,200
