A total of 36 entrants filled the poker room today in Day 1b of the RGPS $600 Main Event at The Atlantis Casino and Resort in Reno, Nevada. By the close of registration the number remaining had shrunk to half of that size and as the dust settled it was just five that advanced from this flight to secure a piece of the $150,000 prize pool.
Thomas “Tesla” Tran ended up with the largest stack as he put 395,000 into the bag at day’s end. With $172,878 in lifetime cashes all around the Nevada/California area, Tran is no stranger to deep runs in poker tournaments. He secured a slew of cashes from the most recent RGPS stop in Thunder Valley and today he found himself on the right end of a massive flip with Steven Friedlander towards the end of the day which propelled him to his newest RGPS cash. With the second biggest stack between the two flights so far, he looks to utilize his massive stack to do some damage on Day 2.
Day 1b Chip Counts
| Place | Player | Chip Count |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Thomas Tran | 395,000 |
| 2 | Matthew Betti | 318,000 |
| 3 | Greg Gilbert | 186,000 |
| 4 | Daniel Van | 116,000 |
| 5 | Derek Stark | 65,000 |
Sitting behind him is Matthew Betti who ended his day with 318,000. While Day 1a was not going Betti’s way, he spent the majority of Day 1b as one of the bigger stacks in the room. Towards the end of the night he eliminated two players to bring the field down to the bubble and then burst it himself to give him one of the top five stacks so far in the tournament. He sits in fourth place(effectively third) on the NAPT player of the series race and is the first player in the top five to secure a couple more points from the main. It will take some doing to overtake Janet Moore and Joey Gargiulo as they hold a near 30 point lead on him, but he has at least closed some of the gap in the exciting points race.
Greg Gilbert (186,000), Daniel Van (116,000), and Derek Stark (65,000) were the other survivors of the flight today and each one will be looking for their first RGPS ring. Others were less fortunate as Julie Cornelius, Joey Gargiulo, Joseph Mussat, and Steven Friedlander all fell short of finding a bag. They will have ample opportunity tomorrow to play the following flights and find a bag.
Play ended with 24:32 left in Level 14 with blinds at 4,000/8,000 with a 8,000 big blind ante. This will be the time and place that the players will return to on Sunday October 13th at 12:00 pm unless another flight ends earlier than this. Stay tuned to PokerNews for all updates on the RunGood Poker Series Main Event at The Atlantis Casino in Reno, Nevada.
