Adam Friedman Bags Monster Lead After Day 1b of HPT Columbus
On the Heartland Poker Tour’s first-ever visit to Hollywood Casino Columbus, 157 runners took part in the second of three flights in the $1,650 HPT Main Event. Along with 103 from Day 1a, it brought the field to 260 entries so far with Day 1c still remaining. After 15 levels of play on Day 1b, just 20 remained with Adam Friedman and his stack of 807,000 leading the pack.
Friedman is a very well known poker player with over $2.5 million in live cashes including an HPT title and a World Series of Poker bracelet. He’s been tough all day building a monster chip lead, including getting involved in a hand with Greg Raymer. The 2004 WSOP champ got his chips in the last level of the night holding ace-jack against Friedman’s pocket eights. The snowman held and Raymer hit the rail.
In another hand, Friedman held pocket kings and cracked the aces of Anthony Carbone for a 240,000 pot.
Others to advance to Sunday’s Day 2 were Stephen Song (307,500), Craig Casino (448,000), Caleb King (191,000) and Mike Morgan (340,000).
Some players to play 1b but fail to advance were Iverson Snuffer, Adam Asbury, Josh Stephens, Ronald Bell and Jeffrey Hart.
Top 10 Day 1b Chip Counts
| Place | Player | Count |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Adam Friedman | 807,000 |
| 2 | Craig Casino | 448,000 |
| 3 | Mike Morgan | 340,000 |
| 4 | Richard Russo | 326,500 |
| 5 | Stephen Song | 307,500 |
| 6 | Michael Rossitto | 268,000 |
| 7 | Josia Santos | 255,000 |
| 8 | Ron Bell | 227,500 |
| 9 | Brant Madison | 208,000 |
| 10 | Caleb King | 191,000 |
Day 1c will take place at Noon on Saturday. The PokerNews Live Reporting Team will be on hand to capture all the action from both flights, so be sure to tune in all weekend for all the HPT action you can handle.
