Poker News

The Championship Bracelet

I returned to the Bellagio for the first time since August. Man, I missed that place. Poker, Las Vegas, and the Bellagio are three words that just blend together perfectly. I was excited to cover the Festa al Lago IV poker tournament’s main event, which began today. The four day affair has been dubbed the Doyle Brunson North American Classic. It’s also a World Poker Tour event.

The buy-in was $10,000 and 420 of some of the best players in the world showed up. Each player began with $20,000 in chips, which plenty of pros like because they have more ammunition to work with. The top 100 win prize money.

With a prize pool of over $4.2 million, first place will win a tad over $1 million and a seat in the $25K buy-in WPT Championship. Half of the field played in the poker room while the other half played in the Fontana Room, which overlooks the Strip and the historic Bellagio fountain. They also set up two tournament tables in Bobby’s Room of all places. That’s were the “Big Game” is sometimes played.

Here are some of the big names who I spotted in today’s event: Doyle Brunson, Chip Reese, Phil Ivey, Lyle Berman, Jennifer Harman, Barry Greenstein, Howard Lederer, John Juanda, Daniel Negreanu, David “The Dragon” Pham, T.J. Cloutier, Carlos Mortensen, Humberto Brenes, Ron Rose, Chris Bigler, Andy Bloch, Mel Judah, Gus Hansen, Erik Seidel, Chau Giang, Minh Ly, Dan Harrington, Josh Arieh, Thor Hansen, Carmel Petresco, Kathy Liebert, Evelyn Ng, Liz Lieu, Men “The Master” Nguyen, “My Main Man” Freddy Deeb, Jesus Ferguson, David Grey, David Singer, Sammy Farha, Paul Phillips, Layne Flack, Billy Baxter, Erick Lindgren, Minneapolis Jim Meehan, Mike Matusow, Chip Jett, Dan Heimiller, Young Phan, Paul Wolfe, Rafael Perry, Mark Seif, John Phan, Maureen Feduniak, Dewey Tomko, Kristy Gazes, Jim McManus, Scott Fischman, Joe Sebok, John Myung, Mimi Tran, John D’Agostino, Senthil Kumar, Harry Demetriou, The Grinder, David Levi, Paul Magriel, Tex Barch, Lee Watkinson, Todo Leonidas, JC Tran, “The Mighty” Quinn Do, Barny Boatman, Harley Hall, Jean Robert Bellande, Tuan Le, Richard Brodie, Gavin Smith, Ted Forrest, Kenna James, Jan Sorenson, Surinder Sunar, Capt. Tom Franklin, and Mike Gracz. Phil Hellmuth played too and he arrived late as usual.

Chip Jett was one of the first players to bust out early, along with Paul Magriel, Phil Ivey, Scott Fischman, and Tim Pham. Other notable eliminations on Day 1 included: Mark Seif, John Phan, Barry Shulman, Dustin “Neverwin” Woolf, John D’Agostino, David Levi, Eli Elezra, Erik Seidel, Humberto Brenes, Joe Sebok, Ron Rose, Paul Phillips, Chris Bigler, Thor Hansen, David Grey, John Juanda, Dan Heimiller, Richard Brodie, Farzad Bonyadi, Dewey Tomko, Allen Cunningham, Paul Wolfe, and Senthil Kumar.

When play ended, Chau Giang appeared to be the chipleader, although that was unconfirmed. Day 2 will begin at Noon on Wednesday.

Here’s the payout structure:

1st place: $1,060,000

2 $620,730

3 $327,610

4 $189,630

5 $137,940

6 $96,560

7 $68,970

8 $55,175

9 $48,280

10 $41,380

11-15 $34,485

16-20 $27,590

21-30 $20,690

31-40 $17,245

41-50 $13,795

51-100 $12,000

End of Day One Chip Counts

Chau Giang 208900

Joe Rutledge 178425

Arthur Rhea 110025

Mike Gracz 100925

Abraham Gray 99150

Bob Rahimi 97375

Lew Fleming 95725

Kevin Hong 95675

Howard Weston 93575

Layne Flack 92550

Harold Singer 89125

Reza Payvar 88800

Scott Lundberg 86050

Jean-Robert Belland 86025

Larry Etherington 84700

Mike Matusow 83025

Anthony Reategui 80475

David Oppenheim 80150

Joe Clapper 76975

Darrell Dicken 76775

Sam Rashid 76750

Chris Ferguson 76475

Massoud Nikjouian 75650

Jan Sorensen 73850

Craig Hartman 73250

David Kim 72400

Jim Mccrink 71600

Damon Ahmadi 69550

Seth Entwisle 67150

Matthew Zambanini 66800

Derick Barch 65425

Philip Gurian 63500

Neal Matthews 63475

Andy Miller 62375

Johnny Chan 62275

Amir Nasseri 61875

William Edler 61600

Eskimo Clark 60000

Wayne Lewis 59725

Jay Cullen 59275

Jason Gray 58750

David Rubin 58625

Can Hua 58500

Vasilis Lazarou 57725

Evelyn Ng 56625

Young Phan 56500

William Thorson 55825

James Caporuscio 55050

Shane Schleger 53975

Stan Wasserkrug 52125

Mark Cole 51550

Tom Lock 51450

Erik Lindgren 50725

Mark Chapic 50575

Rodeen Talebi 50000

Chad Moore 49375

Kelly Zoudo 49350

Minh Nguyen 49275

Joseph Sanders 49100

Lyle Berman 48725

Barry Greenstein 46925

Robert Mizreachi 46500

Marco Traniello 46325

Adam Richardson 45850

Sean McCabe 45300

Jordan Morgan 45075

Howard Golden 44925

Refugio Quintro 44775

William Kerkaert 44525

Adam Slutsky 44375

Brett Zimmerman 43975

Stephen Vansickle 43625

Ernie Scherer 43050

Bob Feduniak 42450

Daniel Holm 42425

Al Stonum 42000

Steve Rassi 40500

Chuck Pacheco 40300

Bob Stupak 40250

Tom Mccormick 40200

Mike Epstein 39850

Herbert Montalbano 39825

Mel Weiner 38975

Eric Weiner 38975

Gavin Smith 38575

Tony Grand 38000

Eric Kesselman 37750

Howard Lederer 37400

Jerry Burgess Jr 37275

Dan Alspach 37175

Ron Turner 36850

Davood Mehrmand 36275

Jeff Brock 35800

Meng La 35750

Michael Mizrachi 35700

Franco Brunetti 35500

Jesse Jones 35325

Tom Werthmann 35225

Alex Brenes 34375

Ron Faltinsky 34200

TJ Cloutier 34150

Tom Franklin 34075

Andy Bloch 33575

Harry Demetriou 32800

Randy Lorensen 32525

Tim Anders 32500

Daniel Negreanu 32375

Anthony George 32350

Gustavo Hansen 32325

John Hanson 32225

Khanh Hua 32050

David Ulliott 31825

Richard Brodie 31675

Alvin Zeidenfeld 31525

Daniel Shiff 31500

Arduro Diaz 31150

Max Pescatori 31000

Joe Cassidy 30975

Don Barton 30725

Alan Smurfit 30725

David Pham 30300

Bob Plonowski 30175

Mel Judah 29950

Robert Ozman 29650

Robert Anastasopoulos 29350

Lee Salem 29225

Jake Minter 28975

Lee Watkinson 28825

Bill Heupel 28425

John Pires 28325

Wayne Boich 28300

Minh Ly 28150

Arnold Spee 27975

John Myung 27875

Alan Goehring 27750

Abraham Tannous 27400

Chad Brown 27125

Daniel Clarin 26850

Ben Gilbert 26750

David Lloyd 26675

Lonnie Mason 26575

Jason Lester 26300

Kent Goulding 26150

Shane Douglas 26025

Kathy Liebert 25525

Charles McClink 25000

Mark Gregorich 24975

Nicholas Candela 24675

Kristy Gazes 24375

Blair Rodman 23700

Neil Channing 23675

Vinny Landrum 23100

Vadim Trincher 23050

Kevin Chan 23000

Gerald Rhoads 22575

Don Zewin 21925

Jim Mcmanus 21600

Walter Chambers 21450

Chris Ball 20475

Joshua Arieh 20400

Men Nguyen 20350

Seymour Guiberson 20125

Mark Muchnik 19975

Annand Ramdin 19675

Richard Tatalovich 19500

Gary Friedlander 19475

Matt Leftkowitz 19375

Mohammad Fathipour 19025

Jennifer Harman 18925

David Williams 18900

Darren Walther 18850

Steve Brecher 18200

Chad Layne 18150

Mickey Mills 18100

Mario Quijano 18025

Michael Tate 17900

Anthony Salinas 17825

Adam Smith 17750

Ronald Adams 17725

Steven Silva 17675

Freddie Deeb 17425

Jorge Arias 17325

Tony Lucci 17075

Bryan Kim 16900

Lee Markholt 16375

Chris Mccormack 15900

Alan Boston 15675

Phil Immergluck 15550

Eric Mizrachi 15175

Matt Zoorob 15000

Vincenzo Beatrice 14475

Jim Meehan 14075

David Rabbani 13350

Philippe Rouas 12950

Jeff Rine 12900

Steven Rosen 12850

Anatole Parthes 12600

Jw Young 12300

Bob Wenzl 12225

David Bertolucci 12175

Surinder Sunar 12000

Stan Jablonski 11775

Dan Woodward 11625

Daniel Harrington 11475

Doyle Brunson 10775

Jens Sjogren 10275

Damon Ramirez 10000

Thomas Rau 9900

Nam Le 9800

Daniel Alaei 7850

Harley Hall 7800

Bill Seber 6450

Petter Falting 3125

Filed under: Poker News