The final events of the Season XIV schedule for the World Poker Tour are underway in Hollywood, FL, as the WPT Seminole Hard Rock Poker Showdown opened its doors for Day 1 action on Friday. After the spinning turnstiles quit rotating, a previously unknown Steven Hensley emerged as the leader of a sizeable pack of players.
It seemed almost a given that there was going to be a crowd for this event. As the first of three tournaments that are going to be held by the WPT on the grounds of the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Hollywood over the final two weeks of April (the $10,000 Seminole Hard Rock Poker Finale and the Monster WPT Tournament of Champions, an invitational event with a $15,000 buy in, will wrap the schedule), the WPT threw the doors open and the rules out the window. Offering unlimited rebuys (in a $3500 tournament) until registration closed after Level 8, the players naturally flooded the tournament floor at the Hard Rock. By the end of the first level of play, 649 entries were on the board and the crowd was still flowing into the building.
As one of the last two chances for a player to qualify for the Tournament of Champions, there were plenty of players who have yet to taste a WPT championship vying for the title. Such players as Mike Leah (fresh off his excellent work with the Paris Aviators in the Global Poker League), former World Champion Ryan Riess, Shannon Shorr, Matt Stout and WPT Player of the Year contender Cate Hall were all in attendance. There were also some members of the WPT Champions’ Club on the felt looking to get their games in shape, with defending L. A. Poker Classic champion Dietrich Fast, Jonathan Little, Taylor Paur and Aaron Mermelstein all taking a seat at the Hard Rock.
The numbers in the tournament would only continue to increase as the afternoon wore on. After Level 2, the tournament clock showed 764 entries and, after Level 3, 833 entries were registered. The 1000 entry level was cracked at the close of Level 6, with 1004 entries on the clock, and ended up pulling in 1222 entries by the time registration closed at the start of Level 9. The resulting $3,910,400 prize pool will be divvied up by the top 153 players who survive the deepest in the tournament, with the eventual champion taking home $669,161.
There are a host of notable names, however, that will not be a part of the chase come Saturday afternoon. Matthew Waxman, the last (?) WPT World Champion Asher Conniff, Curt Kohlberg, Tristan Wade, Matt Salsberg, Jessica Dawley and Little (among many others) will all have some time to reflect before potentially taking a shot at the Finale, which starts on Sunday.
Hensley was the man on Friday, however, powering his way to the top of the leaderboard as the only player over 300K in chips. In one of the final hands of the night, Hensley got fortunate in flopping a set of deuces over his opponent’s pocket eights to take the hand and get to 397,000 in chips. He will need that type of fortune to continue if he is to wade through the 488 players that will come back to action for Day 2 on Saturday:
1. Steven Hensley, 398,500
2. David Farber, 290,000
3. Jonathan Jaffe, 265,000
4. Sam Panzica, 241,800
5. Craig Varnell, 214,500
6. Ryan Tepen, 210,600
7. Kevin O’Donnell, 206,200
8. Michael Laake, 201,800
9. Ryan Laplante, 199,400
10. Wendy Freedman, 197,400
Lurking under the Top Ten are such names as Fedor Holz (185,600), reigning World Champion Joe McKeehen (176,300) and Marvin Rettenmaier (168,700).
Action at the Seminole Hard Rock Poker Showdown will continue at noon on Saturday, when it is possible that the money bubble will pop. It all leads to the crowning of the next champion on the WPT, which will be Wednesday night in sunny Florida.
Some players work on Friday and can’t play Friday at noon I always play Saturday at noon but they took that away this year for whatever reason so I’ll just play World Series of Poker and not play WPT anymore good job Hardrock