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.

The Main Event’s first flight is on its second break of the day, and registration is moments away from closing. We will be back shortly with the final count of players for today. For the moment, here are the top stacks entering level 7:

1. Carl Laberge – 102,000
2. Jonathan Brule – 91,000
3. Nicolas Bastien – 89,000
4. Daniel Gagne – 84,000
5. Hubert Paquin-Moisan – 83,000
6. Jacques Iza – 82,000
7. Shawn Martell – 79,000
8. Kevin MacPhee – 78,000

Notable eliminations include back-to-back WPT Montreal final tableist Alexandre Lavigne, and local hero Ruben Perceval.

172 players have registered through 5 levels of play, and registration will remain open until roughly 4pm.

Photographs from levels 4 and 5:

Many of the players registering late for today’s Day 1a of the Main Event are stronger, more experienced players. Two more have just joined the action – Carter Swidler and Amir Babakhani.

Amir is best known for having won the first WPT Canadian Spring Championship here at Playground Poker Club in 2013, but he also final tabled the WPT Montreal the following year and came 9th in the WPT World Championship in 2013.

Carter’s most recent success was a very deep run in the 2015 PCA Main Event in the Bahamas – while simultaneously final tabling the Sunday Supersonic on Pokerstars!

Samuel Chartier and Jean-Philippe Piquette have both just taken their seats in the event. Samuel has over $1.8M in career live tournament earnings, including a 5th place in the most recent WPT Montreal, while Jean-Philippe is a Players Club member and has the distinction of having won two championship belts in a single festival in 2012. Both are professional players who are well known to everyone at Playground Poker Club.

As the field fills out today, some more interesting players have taken their seats. Here’s a sampling…

• Josue Sauvageau – Josue is a regular visitor for big events at Playground, and has had some top results over the years, including an 11th place finish in the 2012 WPT Montreal and a 5th place at the 2014 WPT at Fallsview.
• Ami Alibay – Ami is well-known to everyone at Playground and has devoted more than a year to his poker career after great success as an entrepreneur and nightclub owner in the Montreal area. Ami has has a lot of success over the past few years at events in North America and Europe, including a 2nd place finish in a High Roller event here at Playground Poker Club.
• Rayan Chamas – Rayan is primarily an online pro, but he has had a couple of notable live results as well, including a past final table visit in a $3.3K Main Event here at Playground Poker Club.
• Alexandre Lavigne – Alexandre only has results published from here at Playground, but they’re impressive results, including a final table visit in the 2013 WPT Montreal.
• Ruben Perceval – Ruben doesn’t have a lot of live tournament cashes on his record at Hendon Mob, but he’s very well respected among local tournament players. No one is happy to find themselves moved to his table when their table breaks.

The Main Event is on it’s first break of the day, and with only 3 levels completed, we’ve already lost 10 players so far. Here is a list of the early chip leaders, along with their approximate chip counts:

1. Nicolas Bastien – 76,500
2. Sergio Vigano – 72,000
3. John Zioulas – 61,500
4. Marie-Pier Simard – 60,500
5. Charles La Boissonniere – 58,000
6. Edward Hislop – 55,000
7. Hubert Paquet-Moisan – 54,500

Photographs taken during level 3: