Day 1b of the Borgata Winter Poker Open WPT Main Event Set to Start
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The first two weeks of the Winter Poker Open were dominated by regional grinders like Cotton Snuffer and East Coast pros like Andy Hwang, but yesterday a whole host of notable names and familiar faces arrived at the Borgata for the $3 Million Guaranteed WPT Borgata Winter Poker Open Championship.
In the end though, by the end of Day 1a, it was a relative unknown who went to bed content having built an incredible chip lead.
Laz Hernandez - a man with a lone recorded cash for $1,536 - bagged 258,175, to put him more than 70,000 ahead of John Racener (186,250). The top five chip counts by the end of Day 1a were Calvin Lee (169,050), Randy Pfeifer (150,100), and George Lampert (146,000). Other notables bagging solid stacks include Matt Brady (145,200), Steve Levy (144,250), Bob Panitch (140,000), Jordan Cristos (125,000), and Noah Schwartz (124,325).
Hernandez, was reportedly down to about 3,000 early, won two huge hands to vault to the top of the counts, and he seemed to only keep climbing from there.
Notable players who fired bullets but missed their mark yesterday included Vanessa Selbst, Jonathan Little, Cliff Josephy, Chino Rheem, Men Nguyen, Kevin Eyster, and Roland Israelashvili - and we fully expect to see each back here today for a second crack at building a stack. There will also be plenty of pros who show up today t take their one and only shot, so the field is sure to be star-studded and highly skilled.
Stay tuned throughout the rest of this Day 1b as a second starting flight adds a few hundred more survivors to tomorrow's Day 2 - where the sprint for the WPT Champions Cup begins - as PokerNews brings you live coverage of the Borgata Winter Poker Open WPT Main Event.