Day 1d Sees 30 Survivors Bag Chips as Day 2 Field is Set
That's a wrap on the Day 1 qualifying flights for Event #1: $200 No-Limit Hold'em $50,000 guarantee at the 2018 Western New York Poker Challenge. Day 1d gathered the largest field yet closing registration with 229 entries. After 14 30-minute levels, just 30 were left with chips to carry into Day 2.
Sitting atop of the counts for most of Day 1d, Chris Babula finished with the largest stack, bagging 302,700. Babula will return to action on Day 2 with the third best stack chasing overall chipleader Daniel Wagner with 325,000.
Tyler Dietz surged late in the day to end with the second-best stack of 248,500 while Andrew Streit (244,000), Blake Napierala (221,600), and Robert Falanga (184,300) round out the top five.
With all four flights combined, a total of 798 entries were accumulated creating a prize pool worth $128,877, smashing the guarantee by more than 150%. Day 2 will begin with 104 hopefuls provided nobody qualified through multiple flights.
Day 2 will get underway at noon local time on Sunday in the Seneca Niagara Falls Poker room and play down until a champion is crowned.
PokerNews will be here throughout the festival, bringing you all the news and live updates. Follow @pokernews on Twitter, on Facebook, and Instagram.