Going over the Saturday afternoon excitement at the WSOP:

Boesen leads 1k Ladies’ Championship

Day 2 of the $1,000 NL Holdem Ladies Championship is down to 54 ladies, with newly signed member of Team Pokerati La Sengphet is the current chip leader with 296,000, busting Liv Boeree, who had been third in chips. Other notables in the field: Linda Johnson (104,000), Mimi Tran (67,000) and new Full Tilt pro Lacey Jones (32,000). Among those who’ve already made the money: Jess Welman, Maria Ho Jennifer Cox (Jan Brady in the Brady Bunch movies), and Bryce Daifuku, who has the “honor” of being last man standing. Former Pokerati writer Michele Lewis was knocked out just short of the money. Play will continue for six more levels or the final table is reached, whichever happens first.

“Tex” has Texas-sized lead in $1,500 PLO

2005 WSOP Main Event final tablist John “Tex” Barch leads the $1,500 Pot-Limit Omaha final table with four players remaining. Barch holds 2,025,000 in chips, while Trai Dang (830,000), Nenad Medic (765,000) and Klinghammer Thibaut (315,000) make up the remaining field returning from dinner break shortly.

Pietsch leading Stud final table

Christine Pietsch leads the remaining five players at the $1,500 Seven Card Stud final table with 610,000 in chips. Darren Shebell (471,000), Dan Heimiller (416,000), Owais Ahmed (216,000) and Richard Ashby (86,000) are looking to re-energize themselves on the dinner break in the hopes of overtaking the leader. Sorel Mizzi, who started as the chip leader at the final table, finished in 6th.

Meinders leading limit 6-max as bubble looms

The remaining 47 players in the $2,500 Limit Holdem 6-max event are returning from dinner break shortly, with the money reached with 36 players remaining. Brian Meinders currently holds the lead with 172,000 in chips. Notables looking to cash include: Chris Vitch (109,000), Rafe Furst (94,000), Michael Binger (85,000), Dutch Boyd (75,000) Phil Gordon (70,000), and Justin Bonomo (64,000). David “Bakes” Baker’s win in the 10k NL 2-7 Lowball event last night meant Bonomo won on his prop bets that a Panorama Towers resident would win a bracelet at this year’s WSOP.

Donkament #3 underway

Day 1a of the $1,000 No-Limit Holdem event drew a field of 1,931 this afternoon, with around 600 returning from their 90-minute dinner break. The reported chip leader is Alex Kamberis with 22,000, with notables Alex Jacob (15,000), David Sklansky (10,000) and Tom McEvoy (8,700) among the dinner break survivors. The field will either play ten levels or around 280 players left in today’s field.

10k Omaha 8 or Better Underway

The 5pm tournament today was the $10,000 Omaha Hi/Lo 8 or Better World Championship, which drew a field of 212 entrants. The top 27 make the money, with first place earning over $488,000. The early chip leader is Allen Kessler, taking his 30,000 starting stack to over 46,000 in early action. Among the numerous notables in the field, Scott Clements (41,800), Jennifer Harman (40,000), Mike Sexton (34,500), Matt Savage (33,000) and Tom Schneider, looking stunning in his Loudmouth Poker jacket (20,000). Eight levels await the field this evening.

Follow all the updates during the evening over at PokerNews and www.wsop.com

Wrapping up Friday night’s action, with two bracelets awarded in the overnight hours:

“Bakes” wins $10,000 2-7 NL Lowball

David “Bakes” Baker earned up his first bracelet, along with $294,314, in winning the $10,000 No-Limit 2-7 Lowball World Championship defeating Eric Cloutier heads-up. The event drew a field of 101 players, but over 40 had already won a WSOP bracelet, what should be the highest bracelet/entrant ratio of the WSOP this year. The full list of results and Nolan Dalla’s tournament report is available at wsop.com.

Buchman’s best in $2,000 Limit, Bracelt for ’09 November Niner

2009 November Niner final tablist Eric Buchman defeated Brent Courson heads-up in the $2,000 Limit Holdem event, earning $203,607. Full results and Dalla’s tournament report are up at wsop.com.

Ladies’ Championship moves to day 2

Day 2 of the $1,000 Ladies’ No-Limit Holdem Championship concluded after 10 levels with 136 remaining, with 117 making the money. The leader when play resumes at 2:30pm is La Sengphet with 148,500 in chips. Notables also returning include Linda Johnson (64,400), Liv Boeree (57,700), Evelyn Ng (55,200), Jess Welman (25,500), Maria Ho (21,500), Lacey Jones (15,500) and Michele Lewis (13,700). The full list of chip counts is now online at PokerNews. For those who wish tor real Pauly’s take, click here.

Queen Leads limit holdem 6-max

The $2,500 Limit Holdem 6-max event drew a field of 384 entrants, with 122 returning at 2:30pm for day 2. The top 36 will make the money with the winner on Sunday collecting $234,065. The chip leader is Alexander Queen at 74,400. Other notables near the top: Justin Bonomo (56,900), David “Not Bakes” Baker (51,200), JJ Liu (45,600), JC Tran (41,700), Vitaly Lunkin (31,200), and Andy Bloch (26,900). The full list of returning players is now available at PokerNews.

Medic looming large at PLO final table

The first of two final tables gets underway at 2:30pm Saturday with the $1,500 Pot-Limit Omaha final table:

Seat 1: Trai Dang – 500,000
Seat 2: Nenad Medic – 1,504,000
Seat 3: John “Tex” Barch – 546,000
Seat 4: Ashkan Razavi – 294,000
Seat 5: Tyler Patterson – 139,000
Seat 6: Blair Rodman – 272,000
Seat 7: Chris Hyong Chang – 195,000
Seat 8: Denton Pfister – 167,000
Seat 9: Klinghammer Thibaut – 366,000

Sorel soars to lead for stud final table

The $1,500 Seven Card Stud final table gets underway at 3pm, with this lineup:

Seat 1: Christine Pietsch – 194,000
Seat 2: Richard Ashby – 276,000
Seat 3: Pat Pezzin – 211,000
Seat 4: Dan Heimiller – 241,000
Seat 5: Jon Turner – 83,000
Seat 6: Sorel Mizzi – 435,000
Seat 7: Darren Shebell – 320,000
Seat 8: Owais Ahmed – 78,000

Saturday’s tournaments

The third $1,000 No-Limit Holdem tournament gets underway at 12pm with another 3,000+ expected over the two day 1’s. At 5pm is the $10,000 Omaha Hi/Lo 8 or Better World Championship, won last year by Daniel Alaei for $445,898 in defeating a field of 179.

Check out wsop.com and PokerNews to get updates, chip counts, videos and more from the WSOP.

Giving the details of Thursday night’s WSOP, with another bracelet awarded a few hours ago:

Jason Dewitt performs magic against Trickett

After a lengthy heads-up battle, Jason Dewitt outlasted Sam Trickett to take down the $5,000 No-Limit Holdem bracelet, earning $818,959. Trickett picks up $505,725 for the runner-up finish, with Jeff Williams third, good for $328,762. The full list of results can be found at wsop.com.

Bakes leads packed final ten in 10k NL 2-7 Lowball

Ten remain when the $10,000 No-Limit 2-7 Lowball World Championship resumes Friday afternoon with David “Bakes” Baker leading with 526,000 in chips. The rest of the field is full of big names, including Erik Seidel (280,000), John Monnette (238,000), John Juanda (225,000), Daniel Negreanu (223,000) and Andy Bloch (146,000). To follow the action and get chip count information, check out PokerNews.

Buchman, Matros at Limit Holdem FT

The final table of the $2,000 Limit Holdem final table features 2009 November Niner Eric Buchman is chip leader, which also has 2010 limit holdem bracelet winner Matt Matros as part of the 10-player final table. Here’s how they’ll be situated when play resumes at 2:30 this afternoon:

Seat 1: Matt Matros – 224,000
Seat 2: William Jensen – 326,000
Seat 3: Gary Bogdanski – 115,000
Seat 4: Eric Buchman – 453,000
Seat 5: Hansu Chu – 447,000
Seat 6: Flavio Ferrari – 373,000
Seat 7: Brent Courson – 240,000
Seat 8: Daniel Quach – 55,000
Seat 9: Steven Hustoft – 383,000
Seat 10: Matt Grapenthien – 254,000

Little looms large in PLO

Day 2 of the $1,500 Pot-Limit Omaha resumes at 2:30pm with Jonathan Little leading the 95 day 1 survivors holding the chip lead with 129,600. Some familiar names returning include Christian Harder (116,100), Nenad Medic (104,400), Peter Costa (70,400) and Scott Montgomery (57,000). The full list is available at PokerNews.

Seiver super in Seven Card Stud

After eight levels of play during day 1 of the $1,500 Seven Card Stud, Scott Seiver is the overwhelming chip leader (63,800) with 114 players returning at 3pm. The closest competitor is James Kadlec (40,500), with Carlos Mortensen (32,500), Chip Jett (27,000), Cory Zeidman (21,000) and Marco Traniello (19,000) some familiar foes also returning. The full list of chip counts will be online at PokerNews.

Friday’s Tournaments

Starting at noon today is the $1,000 Ladies’ No-Limit Holdem Championship. Last year, Lisa Hamilton defeated a field of 1,060 earning over $195,000 for the win. This event always leads to discussion about ladies’ events, from those who feel it helps get more women into poker, helping to grow the poker community. Those against the events feel it’s patronizing towards women and that it doesn’t really help grow the game, some prefer ladies’ only events instead of having to deal with the attitude some men have against female players. With the recent trend of men playing and winning ladies’ only events, as noted here and here, the question is if any men will try to enter this year’s event and be successful.

The $2,500 Limit Holdem 6-max, gets underway at 5pm. Last year’s winner was Brock Parker, who topped a field of 367, picking up $223,697.

Boys will be boys, and those of us in poker’s minority know this. The Wicked Chops entities made “hot girls” the norm for poker media, and the PokerListings guys have jumped on board with this gem, including comments about how their telephoto lenses are always “extended and ready.” Seriously, guys? Argh! But I’ve gotta be honest… The other side of that coin is that girls will be girls.

Believe it or not, there are some hot boys in poker who, with just a glance across the table, can make us drop our, ummm, chips. It is true that many of them, while looking good with their rock-hard abs and chiseled upper arms, do have poker “performance issues” (most of my hot boy picks didn’t exactly show positive results at the WSOP), but sometimes poker is hard! Even without final tables or gold bracelets, they still to stand out from the masses – at least 6 to 8 inches, I assume. Here are a few:

Chad Brown
Now that is what the gym is for. Not only is he in shape but he shows it off with his tight-fitting shirts. And he’s well-spoken and intelligent. Go on witcha bad self. Turn-ons: playing poker and traveling the world with wife Vanessa Rousso, donating to various charities, and working out.

Erick Lindgren
Not sure if he has rock-hard abs because his shirts aren’t tight enough, but he is athletic and good-looking. Best of all, he’s got a fantastic dry sense of humor. Turn-ons: playing poker tournaments, engaging in a little one-on-one on his home (basketball) court, and remembering reporters’ names (hi, Erick!).

Patrik Antonius
A list of hot boys would not be complete without Patrik, who likely was just born looking so amazing. His model good looks make everyone’s heads turn when he enters a room. Turn-ons: playing the highest stakes poker games in the world, living in Monte Carlo with wife Maya, and being a hot dad to his baby.

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Players to Watch

Negreanu

Wahlbeck

Johnston

Shinn

Turner

Flack

Boukai

Recapping the conclusion of Monday’s play… and looking forward at Tuesday’s action ready to get underway.

Foley Flies Home a Winner

Ray Foley, a business manager for Chrysler Financial, bested Brandon Cantu headsup to take down the $1,500 NL Holdem event early Tuesday morning, collecting $657,969 along with his first WSOP bracelet. Cantu was hoping to pick up his second, starting heads-up play and had Foley drawing to two outs in what appeared to be the final hand, but Foley caught a third ten on the turn to pass Cantu’s flopped pair of kings to take the lead. Foley’s Q-J outkicked Cantu’s J-7 on a jack high board in the final hand to send Foley, a resident of Northville, Michigan home the winner. Alex Jacob was the only other notable at the final table, finishing third.

Graham Cracks Russian, Wins PLO World Title

The $10,000 Pot-Limit Omaha World Championship was won by Matt Graham, coming back from a 9 to 1 chip deficit to win his second career WSOP bracelet. The other three previous WSOP bracelet winners finished 7th, 8th and 9th (Josh Arieh, Richard Austin and Barry Greenstein respectively).

Five Remain in 5k Shootout

The final table of the $5,000 NL Holdem Shootout is now set, and here’s how the players will be seated, each with 1,500,000 in chips when play resumes at 2pm PT:

Seat 1: Maxim Lykov – 900000
Seat 2: Danny Wong – 900000
Seat 3: Andrew Lichtenberger – 900000
Seat 4: Peter Traply – 900000
Seat 5: Nasr El Nasr – 900000

Turner Hopes To Turn It On Again

14 players remain in the $2,500 8-Game Mixed event with Jon Turner (469,200) the chip leader when play resumes at 2pm. Other notables returning: Adam Friedman (325,800), Layne Flack (283,400), former MMA fighter and bracelet winner Rami Boukai (137,700), and Jimmy Fricke (47,400).

Seniors Day 2

Lloyd Shinn of Dallas (86,500) leads the 397 players returning for Day 2 of the $1,000 Seniors NL Holdem World Championship at 2pm. Former WPT winner Eric Hershler (82,500) is in second. A few names stand out among the remaining players, such as Jerry Reed (38,500), former WSOP Main Event winner Berry Johnston (29,400), “Minneapolis Jim” Meehan (27,400), and Hall of Famer Barbara Enright (24,600).

Razzerific!

Day 2 of the $2,500 Razz has Warwick Mirzikinian the leader (59,400) of the 118 players returning at 2pm on Tuesday. The field started with 315 players, only 32 making the money. Notables also returning include: David Chiu (41,800), Kenna James (38,600), Ville Wahlbeck (35,300), Justin Bonomo (30,600), Daniel Negreanu (21,900), and Archie Karas (15,900).

Tuesday’s Tournaments

Another two tournaments on Tuesday, starting with the $10,000 Pot-Limit Holdem World Championship, won last year by Nenad Medic for almost $800,000 in a field of 352. The 5pm tournament is the debut of the $2,500 Omaha 8 or Better event. The WSOP Staff Guide projects a field of 370 for the 10k PL Holdem event, while in the $2,500 OHL, a field of 525 is projected.

A little late, but here’s the first half recap of Sunday’s action…

Naalden in Dutch for Bracelet

Marc Naalden went nearly wire-to-wire to victory in the $2,000 Limit Holdem event, as he held a large chip lead over the field, handing it over to Steve Cowley for a few hands when play got to heads-up, but then going on a rush at the end to take a bracelet home to the Netherlands, as well as $190,770.

Can Cantu Can Do?

The $1,500 NL Holdem event is down to ~80 players, and Brandon Cantu is the current chip leader with 530,000 in chips. Other notables remaining include Joe Bartholdi (390,000), Raymond Davis (342,000), Nam Le (125,000) and Alex Jacob (78,000). Play will end at the 3am deadline well short of the final table, so the remaining field gets to return at 1pm to play down to a winner.

May the Schwartz Be With Him

Noah Schwartz is the current chip leader (674,000) in the $10,000 Pot-Limit Omaha World Championship with 42 players remaining, only 27 getting paid. Jonas Entin (434,000), David Williams (359,500), Erick Lindgren (270,000), Nenad Medic (216,500), Padraig Parkinson (173,000), and Barry Greenstein (111,000) are some of the other notables who’ll be happy to reach the 3am deadline with chips.

Shootout at the Rio, 5k NL Version

A field of 280 is down to 30 in the $5,000 NL Holdem Shootout with the remaining players meeting at five tables of six players each to create a five player final table on Tuesday. Phil Ivey, Jean Gaspard, Joe Serock, Jennifer Harman, Neil Channing, Peter Feldman, John Monnette and Mark Teltscher are some of the returnees for day 2 at 2pm Monday.

All Mixed Up

The debuting $2,500 Mixed Event drew a field of 412 to play eight different games (HORSE, PLO, NL Holdem, 2-7 Triple Draw) with 335 players remaining. JC Tran appears to be the unofficial chip leader at 27,000, followed by Steve Billirakis at 26,000 and Sabyl Cohen-Landrum at 19,000. The players just returned from their dinner break to play another four levels before they do it all over again at 2pm Monday. More coming from me in the morning update, and check out Pokerati for other accusations of cheating, while www.wsop.com will cover the updates and other exciting stuff that’s not as controversial at the World Series of Poker.

The WSOP unofficially starts at 9am today as the Amazon Room at the Rio opens for registration, cash games and satellites before the tournaments begin Wednesday with Event #1, the $500 Casino Employees tournament. That’s as good a reason as any to do the preview for this year’s World Series of Poker, so here’s some things to look out for during the Series:

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First, some belated congratulations to the winners of the tournaments that started on Monday. The media tournament was won by Brett Collson of pocketfiveslive.com (he donated his $5,000 prize to the Wounded Warrior Project. The casino employees winner was Jonathan Kotula, who works at the O’Sheas casino on the LV Strip.

Day 2b of the Main Event started with almost 2,400 players looking to play again tomorrow for day 3. The dinner break started a few minutes ago, and about 1,400 players are still in action today as they finally got everyone into the Amazon Room at the Rio. The current leader appears to be Steve Lade, who has about 380,000 in chips. Notables near the top: Day 1c leader Hennig Granstad, Victor Ramdin, David Singer, a much slimmer Thomas “Thunder” Keller, Nenad Medic, Evelyn Ng and Chip Jett. You can follow all the action when they return around 8:45pm Vegas time at the WSOP website here.

More updates later…

What’s happening at the WSOP while waiting for the arrival of Phil Hellmuth and the UB Army at 2pm:

A little over half of the 1,928 that started play on Day 1c get to return on Wednesday to meet those who remained after five playing five levels on Sunday. Henning Granstad appears to be leader with about 228,000 in chips. Other notables near the top: David “Bakes” Baker, David Singer, Brad Booth, Evelyn Ng, Brian Townsend, Nenad Medic, and Jeff Madsen.

Today’s the final day for people to sign up for the Main Event, as registration closes at the end of Level 2, or at 2,700 entrants (whichever comes first). Over 2,000 have already signed up, and today’s attendance looks to be the highest for a Main Event in history (2,299 on day 1d in 2006 is the current record). At the moment, first place looks to take down about $9,000,000 when November rolls around, and about $850,000 would be given to each of the “November Nine”.

12:25 Update: Pauly is reporting almost 2,500 entered for today, pushing the total over 6,800 (2nd most in Main Event history). First place will pay over $9,600,000.

More updates during the day…

Recapping last night’s action, with an eye on what’s going on today:

As noted below, Scotty Nguyen takes down the $50,000 HORSE event, taking down almost $2,000,000, his 5th bracelet, and the first to have won the WSOP Main Event and the $50k HORSE event. Erick Lindgren’s 3rd place moves him into first in the Milwaukee’s Best WSOP Player of the Year race with just 2 tournaments left.

The $1,500 NL Holdem final table has been set, scheduled to start at 3pm. The two most notable names are two WPT winners, JC Tran and Joe Pelton, here’s how the rest of the table will look like:

Seat 1: Christoph Kohnen 293,000
Seat 2: Joe Pelton 1,093,000
Seat 3: Jesper Hoog 320,000
Seat 4: John Conroy 501,000
Seat 5: Robert Kalb 456,000
Seat 6: J.C. Tran 1,438,000 (his 3rd final table of the Series)
Seat 7: Chad Siu 185,000
Seat 8: Peter Nguyen 870,000
Seat 9: Rasmus Nielsen 2,998,000

Other tournament stuff on the next page:
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News from around the WSOP as you try to figure out what one can do with 21,000,000 Continental OnePass miles.

The poker action continues to accelerate Three tournaments will be in action today on Day 4 of the World Series of Poker. Starting at 12 noon is the $1,500 PL Holdem event, while at 5pm the $5,000 Mixed (1/2 Limit, 1/2 No Limit) Holdem event will commence. Last year, these two events drew 781 ($1,500 PL Holdem winner Michael Spegal) and 451 ($5,000 Mixed Holdem winner Steve Billirakis) and many will be watching to see if these numbers we’ll improve today.

At 2pm, the 447 combatants who made it past the minefield of Days 1a/b come back in event #2 ($1,500 NL holdem) to play down to their final table on Tuesday. Among the chip leaders include David “Gunslinger” Bach, Shane “Shaniac” Schleger, and Frank “Take That” Sinopoli. Others who’ve moved on to Day 2 include Perry Friedman, Kenny Tran, John Phan, Terrence Chan, Todd Witteles, and Gavin Griffin.

What happened yesterday:
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Results are in from Event #1. For some reason I thought Medic was an Arizonan — but turns out he’s a Serb now living in Canada.

Regardless, who knew such amazing action was going on? I think ESPN gets a hit with their first episode … and I gotta say, even though it was apparently all going down a tequila-bottle’s throw from the press box, I am looking forward to seeing how Nenad beat such an impressive field:

Official Report
Event # 1
Pot-Limit Hold’em
Buy-In: $ 10,000
Number of Entries: 352
Total Net Prize Pool: $ 3,308,800
May 30-June 1, 2008

Final Results:

1 Nenad Medic $794,112.00 Niagara Falls Canada
2 Andy Bloch $488,048.00 Las Vegas Nevada
3 Kathy Liebert $306,064.00 Las Vegas Nevada
4 Mike Sexton $248,160.00 Las Vegas Nevada
5 Amit Makhija $198,528.00 Brookfield Wisconsin
6 Chris Bell $157,168.00 Raleigh North Carolina
7 Patrik Antonius $124,080.00 Helsinki Finland
8 Mike Sowers $99,264.00 Thomasville North Carolina
9 Phil Laak $74,448.00 Dublin Ireland

Nolan Dalla’s official report below:
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Ed. Note: This post woulda been much more relevant and timely had it gone up yesterday, when it was written.

Despite slightly lower numbers, the WPT World Championship will still likely end up being one of the five biggest tournaments in the Milky Way this year … and Day 2 has just gotten underway. Pokerati would love to beyotch about not having access to the makeshift WPT TV studio at Bellagio to do our brand of non-chip coverage, but we’ve been invited to a WPT Party tonight with free food and booze, so we’re obviously all good with the status quo.

421 of 545 starting players remain … A few names that I’ll be paying attention to for various reasons, and where they stand in relation to their starting 50k chipstack include Carlos Mortenson (defending champ – 172,075), Tom Schneider (25,400), Clonie Gowen (93,975), Gregg Merkow (40,075), Nenad Medic (12,425), Rodeen Talebi (18,000), Ray Henson (89,550), and David Sklansky (41,050).

Click below to see how the whole pro-studded field shaped up as of noon-Pacific today, and click here to follow the action throughout Day 2.

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