$25,500 High Roller No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
Level 4: 400/800 with a 100 Ante
Entries: 68

Players are back in their seats following the first break and dealers are dealing to blinds of 400/800 with a 100 ante. The clock shows 68 entries to this point with an unofficial prize pool of $1,700,000. Leading the way is Olivier Busquet with a stack of 216,000. Next up is Nghi Tran with 197,000.

Here’s a look at some of the counts:

Olivier Busquet – 216,000
Nghi Tran – 197,000
Grayson Ramage – 160,000
Scott Seiver – 125,500
James Calderaro – 98,000
Chance Kornuth – 58,000
Jason Mercier 49,500
Eddie Ochana – 29,500

Others in the event include Ari Engel, Jonathan Little, Aditya Prasetyo, Justin Bonomo, Joe McKeehen, Ryan LaPlante, Jerry Wong, John Racener and Ian O’Hara.

$25,500 High Roller No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
Level 3: 300/600 with a 75 Ante
Entries: 63

Olivier Busquet is one of the early chip leaders following a heads-up pot versus Dietrich Fast. The flop was out and it laid . Busquet checked and Fast bet 1,200. Busquet called.

The turn fell the . Busquet checked again. Fast bet 4,000. Busquet called again.

It was time for the river and it fell the . Busquet checked a third time. Fast reached into his stack and pulled out a bet of 9,000. Busquet nearly beat him into the casually plopping a chip in the middle.

Fast: for a pair of twos
Busquet: for two pair

Olivier Busquet – 231,500
Dietrich Fast – 62,000

$25,500 High Roller No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
Level 2: 250/500 with a 75 Ante
Entries: 61

With Ant Zinno as the tournament’s newest player, the clock shows 61 entries. That puts the prize pool at an unofficial $1,525,000 well beyond the $1,00,000 guarantee.

Late registration and re-entry are available until about 11:45pm.

$25,500 High Roller No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
Level 2: 250/500 with a 75 Ante
Entries: 56

Table 9 was the site of Erik Seidel’s 150,000-chip pot and was recently the site of James Calderaro’s elimination. The player on the best end of the action is Nghi Tran in Seat 2. He’s turned his 100,000 starting chips into over 200,000 and is in great position early.

Nghi Tran – 225,000

$25,500 High Roller No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
Level 1: 200/400 with a 50 Ante
Entries: 52

Erik Seidel was one of the most recent entries into the game as he took his seat late in Level 1. After some confusion that first saw him pull up a chair at the wrong table, Seidel arrived at his proper table only to see a misdeal. After all was sorted out, Seidel was in the big blind facing a cutoff raise from Nghi Tran and a call on the button from James Calderaro. Seidel raised to 5,000 and Tran promptly three-bet to 16,100. Calderaro folded and Seidel called. They were heads up on Seidel’s first hand of the day.

Flop:

Seidel checked. Tran bet 16,100 again and Seidel called.

Turn:

Seidel checked again and Tran followed suit.

River:

Seidel checked a third time. Tran assembled a bet of 48,700 and slid it forward. Seidel was reluctant.

“Alright. Show me quads,” he said as he called.

Tran couldn’t show quads, but he could show for aces-full. Seidel mucked and his starting stack took a big hit.

Nghi Tran – 200,000
Erik Seidel – 19,100

$25,500 High Roller No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
Level 1: 200/400 with a 50 Ante
Entries: 43

Dietrich Fast claimed the Seminole Hard Rock Poker Showdown Super High Roller title just a few days ago and parlayed his big score into an entry in today’s High Roller. He’s been active in a few pots early, most notable raising to 1,000 from the cutoff only to see Stephen Chidwick three-bet to 3,000 from the button.

The flop was and Fast checked. Chidwick bet 2,300. Fast called.

The turn fell the . Fast checked again. Chidwick bet 7,000. Fast came along for one more and the dealer finished the board with the . Both players quickly checked and Fast’s pocket sixes were second best to Chidwick’s pocket jacks. Despite surrendering the pot, Fast owned just over starting stack.

Dietrich Fast – 110,000

$25,500 High Roller No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
Level 1: 200/400 with a 50 Ante
Entries: 36

Cards went in the air for the $25,500 Seminole Hard Rock Poker Showdown High Roller just moments ago and the event is off to a strong start already. With 36 entries, the $1,000,000 guarantee is all but guaranteed to be bested. Last year, this same event kicked off with 24 entries and saw the final tally sniff the 100 mark before the field settled in at 94.

Late registration and re-entry in this year’s installment are available until 11:45pm.

$25,500 High Roller No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
Level 1: 200/400 with a 50 Ante

There are four tournaments on schedule with buy-ins of $10,000 or higher and today brings the third of those. We’ve already crowned a Super High Roller, the $10,000 WPT Finale is playing down in the other room, and the $15,000 WPT Tournament of Champions starts on Friday.

Today we have the $25,500 High Roller featuring a $1,000,000 guaranteed prize pool and two-day format. Last year the guarantee was more than doubled and we very much expect the same thing today.

The tournament kicks off at 2pm in the rearranged ballroom with a lot of chips and slow structure. Entrants start with 100,000 out front and the tournament will run 40-minute levels until the final table, then they will switch to 90 minutes per. Late registration is available till the start of Level 13 at 11:45pm with unlimited re-entries during that time.

The tournament will continue will continue to play until only eight players remain and they will bag up their chips for a return tomorrow for Day 2.

It will be a tournament full of top pros and local grinders, battling it out for a huge six-digit payday.

• $1,000,000 Guaranteed Prize Pool
• Players begin with 100,000 in chips and 40-minute levels
• Late registration/re-entry available until start of Level 13
• Day 1 will end when 8 players remain or Tournament Director discretion
• High Roller Structure Sheet

$25,500 High Roller No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)

@ChancesCards @shrpo Registration is now open for a $2,625 highroller single table satellite first come first serve!

— Tony Burns (@TDTonyB) April 4, 2017

$25,500 High Roller No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)

As per usual for the high buy-in players, Seminole Hard Rock catered the $25,500 High Roller event. Waiting to greet each of the roughly 100 expected participants is a spread of food lined up just outside the lounge.

Among the offerings are roast beef sandwiches, hot soup and homemade blueberry muffins and chocolate chip cookies.