Here are the final chip counts for Day 1a of the Main Event – Event 9 of the Playground Winter Festival.

There were a total of 179 entrants in this first of two starting flights in the Main Event. 52 of these players have qualified for Day 2 on Sunday, March 8th at 12pm.

Note that these are unverified player-counted chip counts. All chips have been sealed in bags until they return to play on Day 2.

[eztable width=”100%” colwidth=”35%|35%|30%” colalign=”left|left|right”]
First Name,Last Name,Chip Count [attr sort=”desc”]
Serge,Pouliot,”369,500″
Shawn A,Martell,”258,700″
Amirmasoud,Babakhani,”253,500″
Gabriel,Vezina,”214,000″
Mathieu,Parent,”206,600″
Shane,Flewelling,”195,500″
Jordan, Miraglia,”189,200″
Giovanni,Massa,”183,000″
Nicolas,Bastien,”179,100″
Dominique,Prefontaine,”157,000″
Denis,Scott,”151,500″
Jonathan,Poissant,”150,000″
Jason,Duval,”146,800″
Jamey,Allen,”146,200″
Jean Louis,Forino,”135,800″
Mackenzie,McDonald,”126,000″
Samuel,Chartier,”115,900″
Garen,Galanti,”115,700″
Jonathan,Brule,”113,500″
Troy,Hamilton,”110,800″
Alex,Fortin Demers,”110,400″
Anthony,Khoury,”108,400″
Quyen,Dao,”98,000″
Danny,Lauzon,”97,800″
Norman,Doucette,”94,000″
Chris,McClung,”91,000″
Sean,Windover,”88,400″
Guy,Chateauneuf,”88,000″
Ben,Menache,”83,300″
Osman,Soubra,”77,000″
Kevin,Dawe,”75,900″
Marie-Pier,Simard,”63,800″
Stephen R,Smith,”61,300″
Stephen,Baker,”61,000″
Jacques,Iza,”58,200″
Hiyaw,Gebreyohannes,”55,200″
Mario,Lepine,”49,000″
Joey,Silver,”49,000″
Johnny,Mazzaferro,”45,700″
Sergio,Vigano,”44,600″
Carter,Swidler,”42,300″
Daniel,Belisle,”41,900″
Hubert,Paquet Moisan,”41,600″
Tony,Stratopoulos,”39,100″
Geri,Casey,”35,700″
Matthew,Brunskole,”35,500″
Levi,Stevens,”34,700″
Bill,Germanis,”32,000″
Patrick,Atallah,”26,600″
Jean-Philippe,Piquette,”26,300″
Sebastien,Beaulieu-Amyot,”24,900″
Dominic,Champagne,”20,300″
[/eztable]

Play has now moved into level 13, which is the last level to be played today. There are currently 62 players still in the action over 7 tables (play is 9-handed), but there are several short-stacked players left, so there’s a lot of action left to come in the final 40 minutes.

We’ll post final chip counts for the day about an hour after the conclusion of play tonight – and then tomorrow morning at 11am, the whole process will start again for Day 1b.

Starting level 11 of the 13 to be played tonight in Day 1a of the Main Event, there are quite a few players who have managed to build up truly impressive stacks. First among all of the players remaining – by a big margin – is Serge Pouliot, whose big hand we wrote about a few minutes ago.

1. Serge Pouliot – 264K
2. Gabriel Vezina – 198K
3. Norman Doucette – 186K
4. Mathieu Parent – 165K
4. Jean Louis Forino – 165K
6. Shawn Martell – 162K
7. Amir Babakhani – 156K
7. Nicolas Bastien – 156K
9. Jamey Allen – 143K

We missed the entire hand, but a small buzz went around one end of the Tournament Hall and a small photo was sent our way as Noeung Troeung lost a hand holding quad fives – he was beat by quad eights.

Here’s the photo Jean-Philippe Piquette sent of the final board and hands:

We just witnessed a huge hand on table 50 which has most likely vaulted the winner into the chip lead in today’s flight of the Main Event.

We arrived at the table preflop as Serge Pouliot’s all-in bet was being counted on request of the next player to act, Brian Wang. It turns out that Serge had just over 74K, and Brian just flat called from the cutoff. The button and blinds all folded, and action was back on the initial raiser in the hand, Debra Ann Holman (who had open raised to 5K to get this all started).

At first, Debra Ann wasn’t sure that the action was on her, and when this was clarified, a few seconds later Serge called time – though not enough time had yet elapsed for the dealer to administer a 60-second clock. Debra Ann wasn’t happy, though, and she said, “just for that, I’m going to call too” – and pushed her whole (shorter) stack in the middle.

With all action completed, the players tabled their hands:

Debra Ann:
Serge:
Brian:

Any doubt as to the result was extinguished almost immediately on the flop, which was followed by the turn . This renewed some of Brian’s hopes for the hand and he pleaded for a Queen, but it was not to be as the safe fell on the river.

Serge didn’t quite triple, but he increased his stack to just about the 200K mark, which puts him among the chip leaders so far.

Players are on a break while tournament staff removes the green T25 chips from play, and we have a new leaderboard.

1. Gabriel Vezina – 176K
2. Brian Wang – 175K
3. Shawn Martell – 161K
4. Jamey Allen – 149K
5. Jason Duval – 131K
6. Jonathan Brule – 124K

There are still 4 full levels to be played tonight, so the final leaderboard for Day 1a is far from being settled!

We’ve recently passed the half-way mark here in Day 1A of the Main Event, and 15 tables remain in action. Christopher McClung is starting to accumulate chips, and is now sitting on roughly 60,000. George Caragiorgas is continuing his strong start, and is nearing the 75,000 start, while Kevin MacPhee slipped a little down to just over 50,000. Rayan Chamas has made his presence felt, and is quickly climbing the leaderboard, sitting on just shy of 100,000. Michael Malm has recently joined the field, and has collected a few pots in his short time at the tables.

Photographs from level 7: 

A total of 179 players have registered for Day 1a of the Main Event in the Playground Winter Festival, which means there’s a chance – although small – that there will be an overlay tomorrow! Experience suggests that Day 1b attendance will be stronger than today, but nevertheless, it’s going to take 321 entries to meet the guarantee.

In any case, this tournament is a great value for players. With over a hundred satellite qualifiers in the field (and many of those have yet to play), and not an overwhelming number of pros in the field, anyone with some skill, some desire, and at least a dash of luck could find themselves in a position for a great pay day.

There are another 7 levels of 45 minutes each to be played today, after which time the surviving players will count, bag, and seal their chips to return for Day 2 on Sunday. Play in the tournament, which started 10-handed, has moved now to 9-handed play. Tomorrow will also start 10-handed and move to 9 handed when the tournament director deems it possible.