Recapping the action from Sunday afternoon:

Hellebuyck wins Ladies’ Championship

The $1,000 Ladies’ Championship just finished as Vanessa Hellebuyckmade quick work of Sidsel Boesen in heads-up play. Hellebuyck wins the specially designed ladies’ WSOP bracelet along with $192,132, with Boesen earning $118,897 for her runner-up finish. Timmi Derosa, fiance of veteran pro Lee Watkinson finished third for $74,389. Team Pokerati Asia member La Sengphet finished in 7th for $22,278. Full results and Nolan Dalla’s tournament report will appear later over at wsop.com.

Dutch Boyd looking for second bracelet

The $2,500 Limit Holdem 6-max field is down to a final table of six as they take a one-hour dinner break. Russ “Dutch” Boyd is the current chip leader with 745,000. He’s followed by Albert Minnullin (696,000), Brian Meinders (635,000), Al “Sugar Bear” Barbieri (305,000), Domenico Denotaristefani (282,000) and Art (formerly known as Julian) Parmann (219,000).

Batista leads 1k NL day 1b field

A field of 1,358 registered for day 1b of the $1,000 No-Limit Holdem has completed six levels of play as the survivors are currently on dinner break. In total, 3289 signed up for this tournament with the top 342 making the money, with the winner earning a cool $503,389. Less than 600 players remain this evening, with the current reported chip leader being Chad Batista with 38,000. Notables with a healthy stack include Eric Froehlich (23,000), Brandon Cantu (15,500), Michael Binger (14,000), Isaac Haxton (9,500) and Robert Varkonyi (8,300). Play will end halfway through level nine, mirroring the day 1a field, with those still having chips combining at 2:30 Monday afternoon.

Dempsey flush with chips in 10k Omaha 8

James “Flushy” Dempsey is looking for his second bracelet of the WSOP as he leads the remaining 73 players with 224,000 in chips as the $10,000 Omaha Hi/Lo 8 or Better World Championship field returns from dinner break soon. Some of the notables with a decent stack include Sammy Farha (220,000), Chino Rheem (194,500), Eric Baldwin (130,000), Phil Hellmuth (98,000), and Matt Glantz (81,000). The field makes the money when 27 remain, as they’re scheduled to play ten levels or reach the final table.

Follow all the results and updates over at PokerNews or wsop.com.

I’m not sure who these guys are — I think it’s Robert Varkonyi and Rutherford B. Hayes — but they embarked on their annual scooter ride to the WSOP:

Only 1800 miles, 7 bottles of Absolut, 3 cases of All In Energy Drink and 27 sets of tires/shocks to go…..

Perhaps surprisingly, I haven’t seen either of these two guys at a final table. (But would love to know how their trip turned out.)

As you may or may not know, Dr. Pauly skipped town for a few days to go “see a band” (WTF?) … That left Benjo and me to report on the final table of the Champions Invitational: Tom McEvoy beats Dan Harrington and Robert Varkonyi to win himself a Corvette and, of course, the plausibly coveted Binion Cup … providing him sellable items should he ever need a little bankroll stimulus. And we hear about Phil Hellmuth’s oddly graceful 10:1 hands-shaken to hands-played ratio as he, like Pauly, makes an early but not-so-unexpected exit at the WSOP … temporarily derailing an Angry Frenchman’s plans to stage a potentially violent coup.

Tao of Pokerati at the 40th WSOP
Las Vegas, NV

Episode 11.14: Early Exits
5:00
[audio:tao/TaoPokerati_WSOP_ChampsInv_14.mp3,tao/TaoPokerati_WSOP_Outro_Benjo.mp3]

Brought to you by Phish Coventry and psilocybin.

Finishing up business from Monday night before moving on…

The $1,000 NL Holdem Stimulus Special finished at 3am today with 50 players returning at 1pm to play down to a winner. The chip leader is Robert Comegys from Grand Prairie, TX with nearly 1.2m million in chips. Danny Fuhs is close behind, with notables such as Eric Mizrachi, Lee Watkinson, Dan Heimiller, and Jonathan Aguiar far down the leaderboard. More details will be available in my PokerNews recap later today. Today’s event is scheduled to be the first of over 20 WSOP final tables to be streamed online this year. The scheduled 2pm final table will be pushed back at least a few hours, depending on how fast play is today. Updates on Pokerati during the day today.

The $1,500 Pot Limit Omaha event finished their Day 1 with 81 players remaining, the exact amount needed to reach the money. Jason Mercier, best known for his success on the European Poker Tour, is the chip leader with 227,000 in chips, over 60,000 more than second placed Matt Humphrey. Other notables who’ve made the money include Eric Froehlich,, Dario Alioto, Josh Arieh, An Tran, Warren Karp, Shannon Shorr, Robert Mizrachi, and Kirill Gerasimov. Those players and many more return at 2pm today to play down to a final table.

The $10,000 Seven Card Stud World Championship ended after eight levels with 101 of its remaining 142 entrants remaining. High-stakes cash game player David Oppenheim emerged as the chip leader, with veterans “Miami John” Cernuto, Nick Frangos, Danny Robison, and Steve Zolotow helping make up the top 10. Others who’ll be looking to work their way up include Eli Elezra, Todd Brunson, Eric Drache, Erick Lindgren, Andy Bloch, Cory Zeidman and Phil Ivey. They also return at 2pm to play down to their final table.

The one event that was able to conclude Monday was the WSOP Champions Invitational as Tom McEvoy, the 1983 Main Event winner, knocked off Robert Varkonyi, the 2002 Main Event champion to win the first Binion Cup along with a 1970 red Corvette.

The preview for today’s events:
More…

The $1,500 Pot Limit Omaha event started at noon today, and it appeared they were competing with the two Day 1’s of the $1,000 NL Holdem Stimulus Special in terms of winnowing the field in a hurry. As the players go on their dinner break, just 198 players remain from a starting field of 809. There’s a chance that the field will be able to make the money, as 81 players will get paid, with first place taking down just over $237,000. The 75% reduction of the field in the PLO event is greater than the 67% decimation that hit the $1k NL event this past weekend. The early leaders appear to be Jason Mercier and Jesse Rios, both over 70,000 in chips. Other notables still with a chance: Josh Arieh, Amnon Filippi, Shannon Shorr, David Sklansky and Andy Black.

In games where you use two cards, the $1k Stimulus Special is on their dinner break, with play scheduled to end at 3am with the belief that a final table will be close at hand. Zach Melaney appears to be the chip leader (260,000). Notables near the top include J.C. Tran (200,000), Jonathan Aguiar (140,000), Steve Sung (90,000) and Will “The Thrill” Failla (76,000).

The WSOP Champions Invitational is currently three-handed as Tom McEvoy, Robert Varkonyi and Dan Harrington are playing for the Binion Cup and 1970 Corvette. Probably not the final three the ESPN cameras were hoping for, but that’s poker for you.

The $10,000 7 Card Stud World Championship drew a smaller than expected field of 142, down 16 from last year. However, plenty of poker’s elite still make up the field such as: Phil Ivey, Greg Raymer, Tony G, Barry Greenstein, David Singer, John Hennigan and Chau Giang. Updates on all of these events can be found at www.worldseriesofpoker.com all night.

A few recaps while several tournaments are on their dinner breaks:

The 40th Annual $40,000 NL Holdem final table has 4 players remaining. Greg Raymer, Vitaly Lunkin, Isaac Haxton and Dani Stern make up the final four to take home nearly $2m and the first open gold bracelet of the WSOP. Ted Forrest, Noah Schwartz, Lex Veldhius, Alec Torelli and Justin Bonomo were eliminated earlier today from the final table.

Speaking of Raymer, the WSOP Champions Invitational got underway earlier this afternoon. 20 of the 25 surviving champions accepted their RSVPs to be filmed under the bright lights of the ESPN cameras. Within the first orbit, 2006 winner Jamie Gold was the first player eliminated, while 2003 winner Chris Moneymaker watched his 10,000 chip stack dwindle erode before he finally busted. Raymer was able to get a couple of hands in before returning to the $40k final table. Six more one-hour levels or until the final table of nine return Monday afternoon.

More recaps on the next page:
More…

One of the first “big” WSOP events will be the special, invitational Champions tourney … a non-bracelet freeroll for all previous main event champions, which will be one of only four televised ESPN events. This made-for-TV No-Limit Hold’em brouhaha — where players are competing for a shiny trophy and a red Corvette — should give the old-dog pros a chance to remind the 21st century WSOP millionaires who’s really boss … and the Varkonyis and Golds and Yangs a chance to say, “Hey, I didn’t just get lucky, Doyle Biznatch!”

27 players are eligible … and almost all have pre-registered. Bobby Baldwin ’78 has RSVP’d in the negative. But there’s one interesting name on the list of non-confirmeds* — well actually there’re five, but one of these is not like the others … in fact, as a member of the WSOP PAC, he’s probably on Jeffrey Pollack’s speed dial:

Mansour Maltoubi ’90
Hamid Dastmalchi ’92
Russ Hamilton ’94
Noel Furlong ’99
Chris Ferguson ’00

None of these are holdouts, from what we’re hearing … just MIA. (Though we’re not so sure the WSOP is looking that hard for Russ, because they could always give his invitation to Layne Flack.)

Wicked Chops is on the hunt for them here.