$570 Deep Stack No Limit Hold’em
Level 1: 25/50

The last flight of the $1,000,000 Guarantee Event 5 is underway and there is little drama about reaching that goal. The first five flights drew 1,987 player leaving it just short of the guarantee with one to go. Every entry will now push the prize pool over the $1,000,000 mark.

Players tonight will set down to 20,000 stacks and play 30-minute levels. Late registration and unlimited re-entries are available until the start of Level 9, approximately 10:30 this evening, and they won’t stop until the end of Level 14.

The guarantee has been hit but now we’ll see how far over it goes.

$570 Deep Stack No Limit Hold’em
Level 13: 1,000/2,000/300 Ante

Play is back underway after the break and we will return shortly with the leaders and notable counts.

$570 Deep Stack No Limit Hold’em
Level 12: 800/1,600/200 Ante

Players are off on their final break of the flight with less than 200 remaining in the field. They will return and play two more levels before the survivors bag up their chips and return tomorrow.

$570 Deep Stack No Limit Hold’em
Level 12: 800/1,600/200 Ante

As Level 11 comes to an end, there are about 215 players remaining from the 603 entries in Flight 5E. That means the average chip stack is about 56,000 (35 big blinds) as they begin Level 12.

Here are some notable counts from around the field:

Kyle Sorel  –  365,000  (228 bb)
Andre Rakusa  –  185,000  (115 bb)
John Dolan  –  128,000  (80 bb)
Eric Afriat  –  78,000  (48 bb)
Tony Ruberto  –  76,000  (47 bb)
Blake Purvis  –  66,000  (41 bb)
Robert Panitch  –  63,000  (39 bb)
Deborah Farmer  –  59,000  (36 bb)
Harry Eisenberg  –  57,000  (35 bb)
Marsha Wolak  –  53,000  (33 bb)
Chance Kornuth  –  38,000  (23 bb)
Angelo Miele  –  36,000  (22 bb)
Sebastien Girard  –  33,000  (20 bb)
Benjamin Zamani  –  12,000  (7 bb)

$570 Deep Stack No Limit Hold’em
Level 10: 500/1,000/100 Ante

At the last break, the two chipleaders were both seated at Table 10, with Patrick Hughes (127,700) in seat 9, and Andre Rakusa (126,900) in seat 1.

Rakusa returned from break about 15 minutes late, but once he took his seat, he made it count by getting it all in against Hughes for the biggest pot of the day so far.

Hughes and Rakusa reraised each other back-and-forth preflop until Hughes was all in with A-A against Rakusa’s Q-Q. (Rakusa had taken the lead by this point.) The board came clean for the first four cards, but a Q on the river gave Rakusa a set to win the pot and eliminate Hughes from the tournament. Ouch.

Patrick Hughes  –  Eliminated

That catapulted Rakusa into a big chip lead, but he lost some of it a short while later against WPT winner Tony Ruberto.

With the board showing on the turn, Ruberto made the bet 10,900, and Rakusa called. The river was the , Ruberto moved all in for 13,900, and Rakusa thought for a bit before he called.

Ruberto showed to win the pot with a full house, deuces full of jacks, and Rakusa mucked.

Tony Ruberto  –  65,000  (65 bb)
Andre Rakusa  –  182,000  (182 bb)

As Level 10 comes to an end, there are about 288 players remaining in the field. Action will continue this afternoon until the end of Level 14, when the survivors will bag up for tomorrow’s Day 2.

The sixth and final flight for this event begins today at 6:00 pm, with registration open until about 10:30 pm.

$570 Deep Stack No Limit Hold’em
Level 9: 400/800/100 Ante

A scan of the field during the break revealed seven players with at least 100,000 in chips, creating the top of the leaderboard from the second break.

1.  Patrick Hughes  –  127,700  (159 bb)
2.  Andre Rakusa  –  126,900  (158  bb)
3.  Greg Lehn  –  123,800  (154 bb)
4.  Adam Golden  –  115,000  (143 bb)
5.  Adamastor Santos  –  109,400  (136 bb)
6.  Julio Padilla  –  106,300  (132 bb)
7.  David Baxter  –  102,700  (128 bb)

While Patrick Hughes holds the chip lead, his position isn’t great as he has second-in-chips Andre Rakusa on his immediate left. However, Rakusa didn’t return from break until halfway thru Level 9 (missing about 15 minutes of action). With more than 150 big blinds in his stack, Rakusa can afford to take extended breaks if he’d like.

$570 Deep Stack No Limit Hold’em
Level 9: 400/800/100 Ante

It was a close race but the players pushed the number of entrants over 600 for the penultimate flight of Event 5. The morning shift drew 603 to the field bringing the combined total for five flight to 1,987.

Current chip leaders will be posted momentarily.

$570 Deep Stack No Limit Hold’em
Level 8: 300/600/75 Ante

Players are on the second break of the day while tournament staff color up the quarters. It also leaves just 15 minutes to register or re-enter, players can also surrender their stack now and buy back in.

There are 592 on the board so 600 entrants for 5E is a real possibility.

$570 Deep Stack No Limit Hold’em
Level 8: 300/600/75 Ante

Throw 500 plus people in one ballroom and it can get loud. The two main topics of conversation so far seem to be the huge crowd today, Michael Dunn’s huge chip lead (684,500 from 5B), the 19-inning Red Sox/Yankees affair, and The Masters. They play a little poker in between those discussions.

The clock shows 575 in the game at the start of Level 8 giving them 30 minutes plus the break to add to that score.

$570 Deep Stack No Limit Hold’em
Level 6: 200/400/50 Ante

The talk early in the day was how quickly the $1,000,000 guarantee would be hit during the final flight this evening, now everyone is wondering whether we’ll get there this afternoon.

There are 550 entrants at the start of Level 7 with registration still open for more than an hour. It’s not likely we’ll hit the magic number before then but there very well could be more enough players pre-registered for 5F that it is merely a matter of semantics.

Some big names are beginning to roll in this afternoon including Noah Schwartz, David Diaz, and Amanda Musumeci for another go ’round.