The two starting flights are complete for the $1,675 WSOP Circuit Main Event at Planet Hollywood.
Friday's Day 1A flight generated 260 entries, and another 610 joined Saturday's Day 1B to bring the total field to 870 across both. That creates a prizepool worth $915,000 to be shared by the final 63 players.
Francisco Fragoso bagged up the big stack of 272,000 chips to set the pace after Day 1A, and his lead was surpassed during Saturday's session. Valentin Vornicu finished Day 1B with 300,000, with the overall chip lead heading into Day 2.
Top Five Chip Counts:
1. Valentine Vornicu - 300,000
2. Francisco Fragoso - 272,000
3. Sean Yu - 259,000
4. Matt Berkey - 258,000
5. Daniel Park - 234,000
Gold Bracelet and gold ring winners littered the field with two bracelet winners in the top five counts alone.
Sean Yu who sits in third place in chips overall is a bracelet winner, and a three-time victor on the Circuit, as well, including this event in 2016.
Anthony Marquez (217,000) Jared Jaffee (145,000), Ben Zamani (141,000), Barry Hutter (75,000), and Ankush Mandavia (65,000) Eric Baldwin (55,000) Mohsin Charania (52,000) and Nipun Java (43,000) are among the other bracelet winners who advanced through the Day 1 flights.
Former WSOP Main Event Champion Ryan Riess is also in the hunt with 131,500 chips himself, followed by the likes of Joe Cheong (213,000), Eddy Sabat (202,000), Darren Rabinowitz (96,000), and Bob Mather (94,000).
As for Circuit heroes, one needs to look no further than 10-time ring winner Valentin Vornicu (pictured). The California standout is tied for the Circuit's all-time wins lead, and he's put himself in a good position to chase down another title. Vornicu was way out in front of the Day 1B field for most of the day. He ended the day with the overall chip lead with 300,000 chips.
Francisco Fragoso, who bagged the chip lead in flight 1A is looking to improve upon his twelfth place finish and the WSOP Circuit Main Event at the Bicycle Casino. Kristy Arnett who finished fifth in that event is still in the mix with 42,500.
The husband and wife duo Tim (111,000) and Ness Reilly (88,500) will also be looking to add some hardware to their household.
These notables will be fighting it out on Sunday as well as some circuit ring winners such as Brett Murray (180,000), Dylan Wilkerson (176,500), Jesse Yaginuma (118,000), and two-time winners Wendy Freedman (67,500) and Kevin Calenzo (41,500).
Players that were not fortunate enough to make it to the end of the day include Kurt Jewell, Matt Stout, JeWook Oh, and bracelet winners David “ODB” Baker, Kevin MacPhee, Ryan Laplante, Larry Wright, Chris Wallace, Scott Clements, Mike Wang, and Ben Yu.
The 113 players who survived the starting flights will return to action Sunday for 10 more levels of play. Blinds will be 1,500/3,000 with a 500 ante when play resumes, putting the average stack just north of 35 big blinds.
Only the final 63 players will finish in the money, so bursting the bubble is first up on the day's to-do list. A min-cash is worth $2,992 and the top prize of $192,152 will go to the eventual champion. On top of that, the tournament’s winner earns a gold ring and a berth in the prestigious Global Casino Championship where they’ll compete for a WSOP bracelet.
Day 2 begins at noon local time.
Day 2 Chip Counts | Day 2 Seat Draw