$5,300 Buy-In Championship No Limit Hold’em $10 Million Guaranteed (Re-Entry)
Level 1: 25/50

A couple hundred people are randomly assigned a seat in the tournament area, a mixture of mostly local grinders with a generous helping of poker professionals. Sometimes you get unlucky.

Most tables are six-handed at the start of the play to balance out newly registered players so they don’t all end up seated together. Five players saw the first hand at Table 51 and two of them must be asking what they did wrong. Former WPT final table participant Alex Outhred already had his seat locked up before WPT Season XI Player of the Year Matt Salsberg and wizard Mike “GoLeafsGoEh” Leah arrived to take the 2 and 3-seats.

“They’ll break our table early,” Outhred promised the other two.

Other early entrants include two WSOP Main Event winners, Carlos Mortensen and (technically) defending champion Ryan Riess were in the room early.

$5,300 Buy-In Championship No Limit Hold’em $10 Million Guaranteed (Re-Entry)
Level 1: 25/50

Flight 1B of the 2014 Seminole Hard Rock Poker Open $10 Million Guaranteed Championship is about to get underway. The first flight on Thursday drew 334 entrants with the next two days promising to be much larger. Nearly 200 players were registered before the ballroom doors even opened and the room is staffed for a major run to the tables.

Just 98 players survived from 1A to bag chips for Day 2 with poker pro Jared Jaffee leading the way with 462,800. Other big names moving on include former November Niners Ben Lamb, John Racener, and John Dolan.

Players begin with 30,000 stacks and 40-minutes levels until the dinner break following Level 9. Late registration/re-entry will close at the start of Level 10 when the hour-long levels kick in.

Players are taking their seats and cards will soon be in the air.

Ready to get this #SHRPO #10Milly @shrpo today! #1bulletclub #wouldntthatbesomeshit #LFG #RedlocksPoker & #TeamPokerJoker #pokerjokergear

— Redlocks (@zachtax) August 29, 2014

5k in couple hours @shrpo !!! so excited to play this event!!!!!

— Natasha Barbour (@natashabarbour) August 29, 2014

$5,300 Championship NLH $10 Million Guaranteed (Re-Entry)

End of Level 13: 800/1,600/ 200 ante

Flight A players kind enough to tweet their end of night chip counts (don’t forget #SHRPO):

Brian Hastings 184,000
Carlos Loving 158,900
Blake Bohn 122,400
Matt Stout 122,000
Dan Buzgon 106,000
Paul Belzano 95,000
Bart Hanson 68,300
Victor Sbrissa 54,000
Cliff Goldkind 47,900
David Paredes 47,000
Matt Affleck 17,200

$5,300 Championship NLH $10 Million Guaranteed (Re-Entry)

End of Level 13: 800/1,600/ 200 ante

The first of three starting flights for the $10 Million Guaranteed Championship event is done and dusted.  Many big name players came and went today as 334 entrants took to the felt.

Among those who went are Todd Terry, Chris Moorman, Ian O’Hara, Justin Zaki, Chance Kornuth, Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi, and Vanessa Selbst.  We expect to see most of these again tomorrow for Flight B, which gets underway at 12pm.

After 13 levels of play, there were 98 players remaining to bag up chips.

Some notables bagging include

Bob ‘Uncle Krunk’ Panitch 198,300
John Racener 187,000
Anthony Zinno 169,500
Josh Arieh 167,500
Nick Schulman 98,000
Jason Mercier 90,500
Joe Cada 82,200
Blair Hinkle 69,400
Mohsin Charania 45,600

Joe Reddick accomplished what he set out to do, although in a different way.  With about 30 minutes left to play, he shoved ~50k with T7 because he “didn’t want to bag a short-stack”.  He ended up shipping a double across the felt, but won a small side pot and was left with only 2,600 chips.

By the time they bagged up for the night, Joe had run that 2,600 chips up to 81,000!  So he set out to bag a bigger stack and ended up getting there, albeit via a different route.  When he returns on Sunday for Day 2, he will have 40 big blinds (blinds 1k/2k/300 ante).

A fresh batch of players (plus many firing a second bullet) will fill the Ballroom Friday afternoon, so stay tuned to SHRPO.com for all the action!

$5,300 Championship NLH $10 Million Guaranteed (Re-Entry)
Level 13: 800/1,600/ 200 ante

Chip leader of Day 1A – Jaffee

2nd in chips for Day 1A – Farber

Players have bagged and tagged their chips for Day 2 on Sunday, starting at noon. Here are the top chip counts for tonight, with Jared Jaffee the Day 1A chip leader and David Farber finishing up 2nd in chips. Jaffee will receive a $5K bonus for ending his Day 1 as chip leader, and Farber will get $2,500 being the runner up.

Jared Jaffee 462,800
David Faber 364,100
Ben Lamb 275,700
John Dolan 272,900
Roddy Boling 263,000
Daniel Weinman 231,000

$5,300 Championship NLH $10 Million Guaranteed (Re-Entry)
Level 13: 800/1,600/ 200 ante

On a board showing , we see David Tiffenberg on the button raise to 19,100 after facing a bet of 7300 from his opponent in seat 9. The player in seat 9 then tanks for quite some time, and asks for a count before deciding to make the call. Tiffenberg turns over for the nuts, broadway on the turn. Seat 9 then mucks his cards, muttering his frustration under his breath. Tiffenberg now has about 143K (89bbs).

The floor just announced that players will play 7 more hands before we bag and tag for the night.

$5,300 Championship NLH $10 Million Guaranteed (Re-Entry)

Level 13: 800/1,600/ 200 ante

After the player in seat 5 raised, Timothy ‘TK’ Miles flatted, only to have Joe Reddick shove from the big blind.  Seat 5 shoved and TK was happy to get his chips in the middle.

Joe: T7 off
Seat 5: 99
TK: KK

Board:   J T 8 4 2

TK’s pocket Kings were good for a triple up to ~150k.  Joe, who shoved because he didn’t want to bag a short-stack, won a small side pot and was left with 2,600.  The player in seat 5 was felted.

$5,300 Championship NLH $10 Million Guaranteed (Re-Entry)

Level 13: 800/1,600/ 200 ante

If you read the fine print on the structure sheet all the way to the bottom, you will see that the chip leader and player second in chips at the end of each starting flight will earn a bonus.

The player who bags the most chips at the end of each starting flight will get $5,000 and the player who bags the second-most chips will get $2,500.

Right now, Jared Jaffee is the chip leader with 450,000 and he’s distanced himself from the rest of the field.  David Farber is his closest competitor with about 295,000.