With registration open until the start of Day 2, the first ever Florida stop for the World Poker Tour (WPT) kicked off on Wednesday and attracted 406 players. The Seminole Hard Rock Showdown in Hollywood, a $10,000 buy-in tournament, features poker pro Randy Dorfman on top after one day of play with a stack of 160,000. The tournament took place in the casino’s arena, far from the poker rooms of Las Vegas and Los Angeles.
Dorfman will captain Table 22 on Thursday for Day 2, where his competition will include Curt Kohlberg, Tim “highlandfox” Finne, World Series of Poker (WSOP) Heads-Up Championship winner Ayaz Mahmood, DoylesRoom Brunson 10 member Amit “amak316” Makhija, and Kyle “kwob20” Bowker. A total of 290 players remain.
Dorfman told WPT officials following Wednesday’s action, “I got lucky in a couple of spots. There were a couple of real amateurs at the table who were, to be honest, pretty bad.” He is fresh off a win in a $5,000 preliminary event during the L.A. Poker Classic for $163,000. Dorfman also final tabled the 2011 Aussie Millions Main Event and was the runner-up to Vanessa Rousso in the 2009 European Poker Tour Grand Final High Roller Championship.
One of the day’s final eliminations went to WPT champ Hoyt Corkins, who moved his short stack into the middle with K-6 and wound up in a race against pocket fives. Neither player improved and Corkins was busted from the $10,000 buy-in Florida poker tournament.
Also finding the rail yesterday in Florida was Dwyte Pilgrim. The boisterous poker pro ran pocket nines into cowboys on his final hand and watched as his opponent turned a set to leave him drawing dead.
Surviving Day 1 on Wednesday was Full Tilt Poker pro and inaugural WSOP Europe Main Event victor Annette Obrestad. She was all-in with K-J for top pair on a flop of J-8-3 and up against a player with an eight in their hand for middle pair. A running A-6 gave Obrestad the double up and, by the time all was said and done, the Norwegian sat in 244th place with 18,200 in chips.
The U.S. internet contingent, unable to play on sites like PokerStars and Full Tilt due to the April 15th indictments, was out in full force. In fact, the Seminole Hard Rock Showdown allowed anyone age 18 or older to play. With this in mind, the WPT is awarding a unique prize package that includes a guitar autographed by Aaron Lewis of Staind to the last person standing from this age group.
Finally, we’d be amiss if we didn’t talk about Jason Mercier. The Floridian and PokerStars pro had the misfortune of busting on the very last hand of the night. If you don’t believe us, we’ll go ahead and quote his Twitter account: “Played WPT Day 1 at Hard Rock Florida today. Busted on last hand of the night. Mizz day.”
Carrying the banner for Florida residents into Day 2 will be the likes of UB.com pro Adam “Roothlus” Levy (23,650), Adam Katz (32,050), and Noah “fouruhaters” Schwartz (83,250).
Here are the top 10 chip stacks entering the second day of play in the WPT Seminole Hard Rock Showdown:
1. Randy Dorfman – 160,000
2. Nick “Grip” Grippo – 149,375
3. James “croll103” Carroll – 130,925
4. Todd Terry – 124,975
5. Seth Davies – 115,225
6. Joe Serock – 113,150
7. Marsha Wolak – 106,350
8. Elio Cubrera – 105,025
9. Jorge Chavez – 104,525
10. Aaron Schaff – 104,225
Other pros remaining in the top 50 include:
14. Matt Waxman – 96,425
18. Lauren Kling – 93,150
19. Chris “SLOPPYKLOD” Klodnicki – 90,225
25. Steve Brecher – 78,350
30. Grayson “gray31” Ramage – 73,950
43. Ali Eslami – 69,775
44. Darren Elias – 69,150
48. David “Davidp18” Peters – 65,900
The tournament will crown a champion on Monday. Stay tuned to Poker News Daily for the latest WPT headlines.