Championship Flight B: Matt Berkey Bags Day 1B Chip Lead, Brian Hastings Holds Overall Lead

$3,500 Seminole Hard Rock RRPO Championship
End of Level 10: 500/1,000 with a 100 ante
Players Remaining: 165 of 421

Matt Berkey leads the 165 Day 1B survivors

The second and final starting flight of this year’s Rock n’ Roll Poker Open Main Event is in the books and after 10 levels of no-limit hold’em, Matt Berkey bagged the chip lead for Day 1B.

Berkey finished the day with 275,200 in chips which was good for the biggest stack among the Day 1B survivors. Berkey had a strong performance on the Poker Night in America high roller cash game on Friday and kept that momentum going into the Rock n’ Roll Poker Open Main Event.

Joining Berkey at the top of the Day 1B chip counts are Iosif Beskrovnyy (265,500), Avery Bass (230,300), Joseph DiPascale (229,800), and Erik Christensen (207,300).

Brian Altman (193,600), Matt Glantz (166,400), Joe McKeehen (160,900), Keven Stammen (136,600), Chris Moorman (134,900), Upeshka De Silva (134,400), Jason Mercier (127,100), Faraz Jaka (125,800), last year’s champion Jake Bazeley (121,600), Michael Mizrachi (116,900), Matt Salsberg (116,000), Russell Thomas (114,500), and Chino Rheem (113,000) are among the notables to survive Day 1B in the upper echelon of the chip counts.

Late registration and re-entry closed at the start of level 7. When all was said and done, there were 421 entries for Day 1B, which brought the total field size to 760 and generated a prizepool of $2,432,000. That easily surpasses the $2 million guarantee on the prizepool.

When the final hand was dealt, there were only 165 players remaining in Day 1B. 118 players survived Day 1A’s action, meaning 283 will come back on Sunday to play into the money and move one step closer to the final table. The top 72 spots will earn at least a min-cash of $7,053, but the winner will take home $564,227. Complete payout information can be found here.

Berkey will come back on Day 2 third in chips behind Brian Hastings and Alexander Villa. Hastings finished Day 1A with 403,800 and has the overall chip lead heading into Day 2. Complete chip counts will be posted later tonight.

Day 2 kicks off on Sunday at noon and SHRPO.com will have complete coverage of the day’s action.