$350 Ultimate Re-Entry No Limit Hold’em
Level 6: 200/400/50 Ante

We have more than a few out of town grinders with us today and Ralph Massey is one of the more successful of our visitors. His list of credits include a WSOP Circuit ring (plus two WCOP-C runner-up results) and $360,000 in career earnings. Massey is one half of a tough poker playing family with brother Aaron.

He’s quietly grinding a table which won’t break today so he can get comfortable as he tries to build on his starting stack.

$350 Ultimate Re-Entry No Limit Hold’em
Level 5: 150/300/25 Ante

Flight C moved over 300 entrants and right now they are chasing Jason Johnson at the top of the counts. He started with 15,000 but he nearly quadrupled that to 59,000 before the first break.

Popular local regular Nancy Thomas is his closest competitor followed by Kip Deloria, Ira Silverman, and Joseph Villaci rounding out the top five.

Top and notable stacks:

Jason Johnson – 59,000 (197 bb)
Nancy Thomas – 51,750 (173 bb)
Kip Deloria – 51,350 (171 bb)
Ira Silverman – 49,400 (165 bb)
Joseph Villacci – 47,450 (158 bb)
Luke Brereton – 46,900 (156 bb)
Damien Simon – 44,950 (150 bb)
Nigel Murray – 32,475 (108 bb)
Jeff Kessler – 30,025 (100 bb)
Ory Hen – 27,050 (90 bb)
Scott Efron – 26,500 (88 bb)
Brandon Byars – 25,000 (83 bb)
Cheri Beatty – 19,800 (66 bb)
Ralph Massey – 14,625 (49 bb)
TJ Shulman – 14,450 (48 bb)

$350 Ultimate Re-Entry No Limit Hold’em
Level 4: 100/200

Flight C is on the first break of the day and people are slowly making their way out of the ballroom. The field seems a little mellow in the early hours but things should pick up after they take a breather.

We’ll start tracking down the early leaders and see who pushed their 15,000 starting stack the highest.

$350 Ultimate Re-Entry No Limit Hold’em
Level 4: 100/200

Damien Simon is another in the field looking to pick up some bonus Ultimate Re-Entry money. But unlike Jeff Kessler, he’s ok with the stack he moved forward yesterday. Simon is already guaranteed to come to Day 2 with 173,000 (above average stack) so he can try to build a bigger stack or move what he can forward for the cash.

Flight C moved over 240 entrants in Level 3 and we’ll be closing on 300 before the first break.

$350 Ultimate Re-Entry No Limit Hold’em
Level 3: 75/150

The Ultimate Re-Entry format provides a unique opportunity, a bit different than your standard multi-day event. We have a handful of players back in action today despite already bagging up chips yesterday.

Jeff Kessler is one of those players and he’s trying to earn a bonus $2,500 for advancing another stack forward to Day 2. He finished Flight A with 73,000 but would like a little more ammunition, in addition to the cash, to battle it out on Monday.

Kessler closed out 2015 on a nice run, making back-to-back final tables during the Fun in the Sun series in the last week of the year. He’d probably be ok with making the Ultimate Re-Entry final table as well.

$350 Ultimate Re-Entry No Limit Hold’em
Level 2: 50/100

Flight C moved into the second level of the day as the entrant count closed in on 150 in early action. That number puts the Ultimate Re-Entry over $300,000 in prize money and it seems all but certain we’ll hit the guarantee before the night is through.

Ory Hen is with us again today after failing on his bullet(s) in yesterday’s flights. He’s looking for some better results today and ready kick off 2016 much like he did 2015.

Hen is the reigning Seminole Hard Rock Poker Player of the Year thanks to a handful of tournament titles and plenty of final tables. He picked up where he left off and earned another trophy in the massive-field Event 5 during the Seminole Hard Rock “Rock ‘N’ Roll Poker Open” less than two months ago.

$350 Ultimate Re-Entry No Limit Hold’em
Level 1: 25/50

The ballroom is open on a Friday morning as the 2016 Seminole Hard Rock Lucky Hearts Poker Opens heads into the weekend. We have nothing on our main agenda except to keep pushing the player count higher in Event 1.

The $350 Ultimate Re-Entry tournament drew a huge crowd of 912 entrants in yesterday’s first two flights to put us more than halfway to the $500,000 guaranteed prize pool with six more flights remaining.

Chad Freedman (pictured) bagged up an impressive 639,000 in the morning session to put him in the clear lead but there will be plenty of players pushing through the weekend trying to catch him.

Everyone in the opening flight will sit down to 15,000 stacks and play 30-minute levels throughout the day. Late registration and unlimited re-entries are available until the start of Level 13 at 5:45pm.

We will begin to see players take advantage of the unique re-entry rules and attempt to bag up another stack after already moving on to Day 2. Anyone bagging a second (or third or fourth etc) will receive $2,500 and keep their biggest stack on Day 2.

Cards are about to fly and it’s time to see how close we get to the guarantee before the end of the day.

$350 Ultimate Re-Entry No Limit Hold’em
Level 17: 5,000/10,000/1,000 Ante
Players Remaining: 41/412
Average Stack: 150,000 (15 bb)

Jean “Prince” Gaspard had a tumultuous end to his day, but thanks to him the field has reached the money.

After slipping to about 180,000, Gaspard scored the final elimination of the day. A short-stacked player raised all in from under the gun for 30,000 and Gaspard three-bet to 60,000 from the button, chasing out the blinds. The UTG raiser tabled , ahead of Gaspard’s .

However, the board ran out , giving Gaspard kings full of jacks to win the pot and chip back up to 222,000.

$350 Ultimate Re-Entry No Limit Hold’em
Level 16: 4,000/8,000/1,000 Ante
Players Remaining: 44/412
Average Stack: 140,000 (18 bb)

After surrendering the chip lead to tablemate Jason Young (who has about 340,000), Jean Gaspard slipped to about 200,000 before scoring an elimination.

Action folded to the player in the cutoff and he shoved for 62,000. Gaspard called from the big blind with , leading his opponent’s . The board came down , giving Gaspard jacks and sevens to win the pot and chip back up to about 275,000.

$350 Ultimate Re-Entry No Limit Hold’em
Level 15: 3,000/6,000/1,000 Ante
Players Remaining: 54/412
Average Stack: 114,000 (19 bb)

Jean “Prince” Gaspard (pictured) has taken the chip lead with 54 players remaining, sitting on a stack of roughly 350,000. On the other end of the spectrum, Loni Harwood recently busted in her quest to bag a second stack, though we suspect she’ll give it another shot in subsequent flights.