Hojin Kim Leads After Promising Day 1a; Dhaval Mudgal Among the Big Stacks
The first of three starting days for the 2022 Poker Dream Vietnam Main Event at the luxury five-star Hoiana Resort & Golf near Hoi An has been a thorough success. A total of 293 entries were recorded for the VND 25,000,000 buy-in (~ $1,019) put the tournament on track to breeze past the VND 10,000,000,000 guarantee. Another two starting days remain, both of which are set to take place on Friday, October 21, 2022.
In a field filled with poker enthusiasts from the Asia-Pacific region, Hojin Kim was the only player to increase his starting stack of 30,000 more than ten-fold. He is one of three contenders from South Korea in the overnight top ten and advanced with 310,500, followed by Jeffrey Pamplona (280,500), and Jenam Yu (280,500).
Among the big stacks after Day 1a is also Dhaval Mudgal, who has a WPTDeepStacks title under his belt and cashed for more than half a million USD on the live poker circuit already.
Top 10 Chip Counts After Day 1
| Place | Player | Country | Chip Counts | Big Blinds Day 2 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hojin Kim | South Korea | 310,500 | 104 |
| 2 | Jenam Yu | South Korea | 280,500 | 94 |
| 3 | Jeffrey Pamplona | Philippines | 280,500 | 94 |
| 4 | Dinh Xuan Dinh | Vietnam | 262,500 | 88 |
| 5 | Shyh Chyn Lim | Malaysia | 242,000 | 81 |
| 6 | Dhaval Mudgal | India | 231,500 | 77 |
| 7 | Linh Khanh Ta | Vietnam | 221,000 | 74 |
| 8 | Jiwon Yoon | South Korea | 220,500 | 74 |
| 9 | Moses Saquing | Philippines | 200,000 | 67 |
| 10 | Aigars Plivcs | Latvia | 197,000 | 66 |
Other notables with above average stacks include Shyh Chyn Lim (242,000), Shardul Parthasarathi (179,500), Ying Lin Chua (166,500), Jingxiang Ong (154,500), and Florencio Campomanes (134,500). Fellow Filipino player David Erquiaga, who finished as the runner-up in the inaugural Poker Dreams Malaysia Main Event back in July 2022, also advanced with a healthy stack of 158,000 after flying under the radar for most of the day.
There were, however, also several high-profile casualties throughout the 12 levels of 40 minutes each in which more than two thirds of the field were sent to the rail. This included the WSOP bracelet winners Kartik Ved, Sung Joo Hyun, and Abhinav Iyer, Thailand based Dane Michael Falcon, Kunal Patni, Vincent Huang, as well as the Super High Roller finalists Dung Tien Pham and Hamish Crawshaw.
A short-stacked Crawshaw was eliminated in a three-way all-in when his ace-queen ran into kings and aces. Recent GGPoker WSOP Online Main Event runner-up Kannapong Thanarattrakul from Thailand was also unable to hold onto a large stack and found his master in Pamplona with a move gone wrong.
All those who bowed out today have another two chances to run up a stack for Day 2. The second regular heat kicks off at 1pm local time while a turbo heat with 20-minute levels instead of 40 minutes gets underway at 8pm the same evening. For both flights, the registration and re-entry period will conclude at the start of level ten.
The turbo heat 1c will continue running until it reaches the combined average stack of all qualifiers in the previous two starting days. All PokerNews updates will focus on Day 1b for the time being and final chip counts for Day 1c will be published at the end of the night.