WSOP Event #42: Less Than Half Make It Through Day One

Event #42 of the World Series Of Poker is a very special tournament. Called 8-Game, the type of poker will rotate over eight variants, switching every eight hands: 2-7 Triple Draw, Limit Hold'em, Omaha-8, Razz, Stud, Stud-8, No Limit Hold'em and Pot Limit Omaha. With so many games to play, the first players to take their leave didn't even make it through a complete rotation.

Unlike H.O.R.S.E, this mixed game event has a No Limit and a Pot Limit game which dramatically increase the initial pace. Tom Koral was amongst the first to go when he shoved his KK on a 789 flop - and was called by JT for the flopped straight. Turn and river didn't help and he was out before reaching the PLO orbit.

The contrary was true for Gavin Smith. In the round of Omaha, he was able to scoop a huge pot with a ten-high straight and rose up to more than triple the starting stack, now 23,000 in chips. Jason Somerville, Greg Mueller, Dustin Sitar and James Van Alstyne had also caught a good start with early stacks of over 10,000.

Phil Ivey was amongst the first eliminations of the second rotation. In the round of 2-7 Triple Draw, he had to muck to Victor Ramdin's 97542 and was severely short-stacked. On the next hand, he was all-in and lost to Mike Wattel's seven-low. All the while, a lot of other big names were still in the running: Daniel Negreanu (pictured left), Jason Potter, Brock Parker, Michael Binger and David "Chino" Rheem were all doing rather well.

When the last late comers had finally taken their seats, the total number of participants was set at 412 - which is quite high for such an exotic event. The total prize pool grew to almost a million and with $947,600, 40 places are to be paid - the first place being worth $241,637. Eli Elezra wouldn't be around to fight for it, as he busted in a round of Razz.

Phil Hellmuth just barely managed to avoid the same fate when he tripled up in a round of Omaha-8. With his double-suited A742, he managed to complete the wheel on the K25T3 board, bringing himself back up to 6,600. He wasn't able to build on that, though, as he put all his chips in on a TT5 flop - only to muck when one of his opponents flipped over a backdoor nut-flush.

In the end, 154 of the 412 players made it through the first day and will come back for the second trial tomorrow. The pace should then pickup considerably as the blinds will start to turn even the Limit game variations into lethal area for the short stacks. Amnon Filippi won't have to worry much about that; with his 90,000 chips he is the dominant chip leader, with almost double of Steve Billirakis' chips on second place. Andy Black follows closely and the rest of the top ten are all to be reckoned with, too.