The action is still hot in Grand Prix Canada, but with play winding down in Day 2, attention now turns to the $5,000 + $300 partypoker Million North America. There’s an online Day 1 being held on partypoker right now, and tonight was the first in a series of 5 Phase 1 tournaments in the event.
Phase 1 tournaments are one of the principle innovations in partypoker LIVE events. A Phase 1 tournament is a little like an event satellite, and success gives players a seat in Day 1 of the Million North America – but it’s also a little different, in that players who succeed in a Phase 1 carry their stack forward to the big event. The average stack at the end of a Phase 1 event is the same and the starting stack in a Day 1 – but individual players may have more or less than the 1 Million chip average.
All in all, Phase 1s represent a great new way to play your way in to a big tournament for a small buy-in. Tonight’s Phase 1, for instance, had a buy-in of just $275. It attracted 118 entries and 32 re-entries, and each started with 50,000 tournament chips. It will play down until 5% of the field remains – 8 players – when the average stack will be almost exactly 1M chips. At that point the Phase 1 will end and each of the remaining players will carry their final stack forward to the Day 1 of their choice.
Here are some photos of the field tonight:
