The final World Poker Tour Main Event of 2019 got underway Monday with Day 1 of the WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic at the Bellagio in Las Vegas. That’s right, Day 1. Not Day 1A. One of the longest standing events of the poker calendar does not have multiple flights, as we see in most major tournaments. This is likely because it is also one of the only WPT events that has maintained its $10,000 buy-in, thus attracting fewer players. Day 1 drew 705 entries, beating last year’s mark by eight. Players can enter or re-enter into the early levels of Day 2, so expect the overall total to increase.
Leading the 417 Day 1 survivors is Toby Boas with 280,400 chips. It’s quite a competitive race at the top of the leaderboard, with the usual disclaimer that there is a long way to go. Dominique Mosley has 262,000 chips and Stoyan Obreshkov is right behind him with 260,000. Six other players have over 200,000 chips.
Boas has just over $600,000 in lifetime live poker tournament earnings, with his largest cash of $143,012 coming from a third place finish in the WSOP Circuit Harrah’s Cherokee Main Event about a year ago. He has one cash on the main World Poker Tour.
Loads of recognizable names are still alive in the Five Diamond including former WPT announcer Mike Sexton, Brian Altman, Anthony Zinno, Sexton’s replacement Tony Dunst, Chris Moorman, and Victor Ramdin.
After this tour stop, that’s it for the World Poker Tour until January 2020. There are a slew of Main Tour events in the first month of the year, scattered all over the place. The first stays out west, with California playing host to the WPT Gardens Poker Championship. The following week, the WPT heads east to Florida for the WPT Lucky Hearts Poker Open. While that’s going on, players from across the Atlantic who don’t want to fly to the States can play in WPT Russia at Casino Sochi. And at the end of the month is the WPT Borgata Winter Poker Open in Atlantic City.
Donald Maloney currently holds the lead in the Hublot WPT Player of the Year race with 1,300 points. Close behind are Aaron Van Blarcum with 1,275 and Geoffrey Hum with 1,250. The season does not end with the close of 2019; there is still are still five months to go before someone will be declared the Player of the Year.
2019 World Poker Tour Five Diamond World Poker Classic – Day 1 Chip Leaders
- Toby Boas – 280,400
- Dominique Mosley – 262,000
- Stoyan Obreshkov – 260,000
- Mike Vanier – 235,300
- Jake Daniels – 227,500
- Jonathan Jaffe – 226,400
- Maria Ho – 207,500
- Simon Deadman – 206,000
- David McGowan – 201,800
- Vincas Tamasauskas – 197,600
