Note: This article was originally published 8/30/22, but technical issues required it to be re-posted.
The World Poker Tour (WPT) Legends of Poker Main Event is through its three starting flights and, as was the case after Day 1B, Michael Dyer is the chip leader, and it’s not even close. With 739,000 chips, he is about 250,000 chips ahead of his closest competitor.
There were 303 entries on Day 1C, upping the total for the $5,250 tournament. That allowed the event to easily eclipse its $2.5 million guarantee, as the final tally came in at $3,113,700. The top 81 finishers will make the money, with first place receiving $573,350. The members of the six-handed final table will all score six-figure cashes.
Legends of Poker is a “best-stack forward” event, meaning that players could enter as many starting flights as they wanted to (and could re-enter each once) and if they made it through to Day 2 more than once, their largest stack would be the one they used. Two players, Bill Klein and Scott Eskenazi, did just that.
The defending tournament champ, Aaron Van Blarcum also made it to Day 2, in solid shape with 184,500 chips (while that’s a decent chunk behind the chip leaders, it’s still 74 big blinds). And by defending champ, we mean the winner of the last WPT Legends of Poker, not the winner of last year’s, because there was no last year’s. The last time the WPT Legends of Poker was held was 2019 because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Van Blarcum won $474,390 for his victory.
The plan for Day 2 is to play ten 60-minute levels with a 15-minute break every two hours plus a dinner break. Things change a bit on Day 3. There will still be 60-minute levels for a while, but when there are 24 players remaining, it will change to 90-minute levels. Day 3 will conclude when the six-handed final table has been determined.
The action clock will be in play when the tournament is one table away from the money.
World Poker Tour Legends of Poker Main Event – Day 1C Chip Leaders
- Matthew Wantman – 366,000
- Dorian Rios – 320,500
- Aaron Motoyama – 316,000
- Adam Brownstone – 314,000
- David Gonzalez – 310,000
- Ming Li – 308,500
- Ryan Tosoc – 304,000
- Chahn Jung – 300,000
- Deepinder Singh – 295,500
- Peter Mugar – 278,000
World Poker Tour Legends of Poker Main Event – Combined Day 1 Chip Leaders
- Michael Dyer – 739,000
- Dillon Najor – 484,500
- Jospeh Poozhikala – 414,000
- Giuseppe Pantaleo – 396,000
- Noel Rodriguez – 384,000
- Robel Andemichael – 382,000
- Matthew Wantman – 366,000
- Harrison Ashdown – 356,000
- Tal Avitan – 356,000
- Shawn Daniels – 321,000
