The HK$100 million guaranteed prize pool attracted the biggest names in poker, with the likes of Phil Ivey or Fedor Holz.
The guaranteed prize pool has already been surpassed after 58 entries were made at the Babylon Casino in Macau Fisherman’s Wharf. As the registration will remain open until Day 2, we can certainly expect additional players to join, or already busted participants to re-join the competition.
Given the size of the buy-in and the venue, it was no surprise to see the high number of participants, nor the average skill level – the world’s best players showed up to play some cards. Team Partypoker’s Isaac Haxton is currently leading the field, with a chip stack of 11,170,000, followed by his good friend, Justin Bonomo, who accumulated 8,895,000 chips. Spaniard, Adrian Mateos is waiting for the next day in the third position, he has 8,660,000.
Other than them, there are still several high-stakes crushers left in the field. Daniel "Jungleman12" Cates has a comfortable stack too, the nosebleed stakes cash-game specialist has 7,635,000, while Dan Smith will return to the tables with 7,070,000.
27 players remained at the end of the first day from the original 58, so the pace of the game is pretty fast. The biggest name of those who already busted was obviously Phil Ivey. The living legend can rarely be seen nowadays, as he prefers the sky-high-stakes private cash games to the high-roller tournaments.
However, since Ivey spends most of his time in Macau, it’s not as shocking to see him entering a tournament, especially with this amount of money on the line. His longtime friend and peer in the big games, Patrik Antonius even took a selfie with him.
#shrbowlmacau Me 3MIL, @philivey 1.2MIL @ikepoker 4.8MIL and Chinese LiveStream https://t.co/AHbWMqZ9Ik #enjoytheride pic.twitter.com/bPZBBhL83e
— Patrik Antonius (@Patrik_Antonius) 2018. március 20.
Each of the remaining four tables are filled with the sharpest poker minds. The seatdraw for Day 2 looks like this:
It is yet to be seen if Ivey decides to re-enter the tournament. Follow the live stream here!
