$40,000 Event Day 1: PokerNoob And Morgoth Out
The first day of the special $40,000 event is finished. Team PokerStrategy.com player Tobias " Pokernoob" Reinkemeier and PokerStategist Florian "FA_Morgoth" Langmann have unfortunately been eliminated.
This special $40,000 buy-in event, held to commemorate the 40th year of WSOP, generated a prize pool of $7,718,400, breaking the record for the highest non-Main Event prize pool. This record was previously held by the 2007 $50,000 H.O.R.S.E. World Championship, where 148 players entered the field and created a prize pool of $7,104,000.
The format for this event was also quite special, as players started with 120,000 in stacks and had to pay antes straight from the first blind level on. The first level was set at 200/400 blinds and a 50 chip ante.
The hand that brought down was when the blinds were 500/1,000. Eric Lindgren raised preflop and decided to push with his stack of 19,000 chips. An unknown opponent called, while Lindgren folded. Holding A-6, could not defeat his opponent's A-9 as he received no help from the board and he was eliminated in 172nd place.
pokernoob was also sent to the rail, after getting into a confrontation with the current chip leader Bruno Fitoussi. On a board of 
, pokernoob bet out 30,000 in a 50,000 pot, only to be raised all-in by Bruno Fitoussi. After thinking for 10 minutes, he made the call, holding 
for a set of eights. However, Fitoussi turned 
for the higher set and the nut flush draw. The river brought the 
, which meant that it was all over for our player, who busted in 105th place.
jonathanlittle was also unable to survive Day 1, busting in 181st place because of two critical hands.
In the first hand, Lex "RaSZi" Veldhuis opened from early position to 4,000, which Gavin Smith and a few others called. jonathanlittle who was in the BB re-raised to 15,000 and Veldhuis put in another raise making it 25,200 total. jonathanlittle came over the top once more and moved all-in with pocket kings, but unfortunately for him Veldhuis called with pocket aces and the board brought no help for Little who was now shortstacked.
Soon afterwards, jonathanlittle is caught in a similar situation, as he moved all-in preflop with pocket queens, only to be called by Veldhuis' pocket kings which managed to hold up. You can read more about his performance at the $40,000 event on his RaisyDaisy Blog.
Below you can find the top 10 players at the end of Day 1:
| World Series Of Poker Event #2 - Day 1 |
||
| Rank | Name | Chips |
| 1st | Bruno Fitoussi | 812,500 |
| 2nd | Chris Moneymaker | 805,000 |
| 3rd | Emil Patel | 615,000 |
| 4th | Lex Veldhuis | 606,500 |
| 5th | Justin Bonomo | 570,000 |
| 6th | Michael DeMichele | 550,000 |
| 7th | Kyle Wilson | 520,000 |
| 8th | Brian Townsend | 512,000 |
| 9th | Alan Sass | 440,000 |
| 10th | Matthew "adz124" Marafioti | 415,000 |
