October 05 2012, Donnie Peters

Day 1a of the 2012 PokerStars.com European Poker Tour Sanremo Main Event came to a close on Friday with the first flight running through eight 75-minute levels of play. It was a long day on the felt, but one that was filled with plenty of action. Erion Islamay was front and center for much of the chip exchanging. He finished with 162,300 in chips and has assumed the position of early chip leader.

The first starting flight peaked at 320 players, which meant for quite the crowded tournament space at Casino Sanremo. Scattered in amongst the tables were plenty of top pros including those representing the host, PokerStars. Jonathan Duhamel and Marcin Horecki were two of the Team PokerStars Pros in action on Day 1a, but both of them failed to advance.

Duhamel fell to Walid Bou-Habib after losing a flip for his tournament life in the last level of the night. Duhamel was all in preflop with and up against Bou-Habib’s . The flop, turn and river of kept Bou-Habib’s sevens in the lead, and Duhamel was eliminated.

Not only was the end of the night cruel to Duhamel, but also Scott Seiver. His elimination was a bit more brutal than Duhamel’s as Seiver got his money in on the board with versus his opponent’s . All Seiver needed to do was dodge an eight or a queen in order to stay alive, but the smacked on the river and that was it.

Other notables eliminated throughout Day 1a were Shannon Shorr, Dominik Nitsche, Ilan Boujenah, Arnaud Mattern, Joao Barbosa, Mohsin Charania and Anton Wigg.

On the other side of the coin, Michael Ferrell (146,600), Matt Salsberg (135,200), Mustapha Kanit (120,600), David Peters (111,400) and Lorenzo Sabato (109,500) were a few of the notables to bag up bunches of chips. They’ll be back for Day 2 on Sunday along with Team PokerStars Pros Victor Ramdin, Jude Ainsworth, Ana Marquez and Jason Mercier.

Day 1b will commence at 1400 CET (0800 ET) and PokerNews will be right back on the floor providing all the live updates. Be sure to check back then as the second, and final, starting flight gets down to action.

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November 20 2011, Paul Oresteen

Day 1 of the World Series of Poker Circuit Harveys Lake Tahoe Main Event is in the books after two starting flights. The first flight saw 224 players take to the felt and the second flight had 97 entrants for a total of 321 runners. Of those, only 184 players will return for Day 2. Ron McMillen (143,400) leads the field overall and the second flight’s chip leader was Mark “P0ker H0” Kroon with 92,400.

Moving on to Day 2 are Matt Keikoan (120,000), Sam Barnhart (80,400), Gary DeBernardi (43,000) and JC Tran (26,400).Notables who played but aren’t advancing on to Day 2 are Mark “Pegasus” Smith, Tahoe Andrew, Drew Caseri and Joe Mongkol-ua-aree.

McMillen earned a giant portion of his tournament-leading stack in a hand where he called two players who moved all-in. He had them both covered and the board ran out . One player held for flopped trips, the other held pocket threes for a flopped full house and McMillen held pocket sixes the bigger full house.

Keikoan flew under the radar for most the day, not finding our attention until Level 8, mostly due to being seated close to the gorgeous Annie LePage. Keikoan broke the century mark when found trip eights against an opponent’s pair of aces.

Tran’s early levels in the tournament couldn’t have been better for the two-time WSOP bracelet winner. He ran over his first table, chipping up to over 50,000 before the first break. His day didn’t continue that way, however and at the end of the night, he bagged just over the starting stack.

Kroon busted early in the first flight but then returned for a much more successful second flight. He put on a one-man show in the second flight, entertaining all the tables around him within earshot. At one point he attempted to convince his table that this was his first tournament and only minutes later he began a sentence with, “When I won my second bracelet…” (Editor’s Note: Kroon doesn’t have any WSOP bracelets.)

Day 2 gets under way promptly at 1200 PST (2000 GMT) on Sunday and the players will play 14 levels, or until a final table of nine, whichever comes first. Follow all the WSOPC action live on Pokernews.com.

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