Antonio Esfandiari is the Chip Leader, But it was Michael Phelps That Stole the Show.
The Bellagio's Festa al Lago tournament makes its return to the World Poker Tour after taking 2007 off for renovations to the Fontana Lounge.
Day 1a hosted 153 players a little more than half of the 290 players needed to break the prizepool for this event. (This is due to the increased buyin from $10,000 to $15,000)
The two big stories of the day were Antonio's massive chip lead and the appearence from Olympic gold medalist Michael Phelps.
Phelps has mentioned in interviews that he loves the game and would like to start playing in big money poker tournaments and when he showed up during the third level of play the tournamnet nearly came to a stand still. With Phil Hellmuth as his guide Phelps was introduced to top pros such as Doyle Brunson, Johhny Chan, Phil Ivey and Daniel Negreanu.
Everyone players and poker fans alike clamored to get Phelps autograph or have a photo taken with him. If Phelps decides to enter the tournament on day 1b this will be his first major tournament.
Once Phelps left and things got back to business the big pot of the day belonged to "Antonio Esfandiari" and Canadian November Niner "Scott Montgomery". Scott got all his chips in the middle with K9 after seeing a six high flop and a nine on the river, figuring that Antonio had a smaller pair but Antonio was quick to call as a 9 made a set of nines for him and sent Montgomery home. At this point Antonio was already one of the chip leaders and was now way out in front with a massive chip stack of 313,000.
One Canadian born player is in the top ten after day 1a and it is none other than the beautiful Jennifer Tilly. Jennifer is third in chips with 195,050 after days end.
The tournament average is at 68,000 chips after day 1a and here are the top ten players:
1. Antonio Esfandiari 313,000
2. Nicholas Sliwinski 209,800
3. Jennifer Tilly 195,050
4. Jeremiah Vinsant 184,575
5. Andrew Robl 173,450
6. Johannes Van Til 151,000
7. Jason Mercier 145,500
8. Joe Sebok 142,050
9. Johnny Chan 138,000
10. Masaaki Kagawa 123,150
Other Canadian notables are:
18. Daniel Negreanu 99,325
84. Greg "FBT" Mueller - 26,575
This will be a great tournament that is filled with the poker elite and hopefully some Olympic glory. Check in tomorrow as we will be updating this tournament to let you know how are Canadian Poker players are doing.