With just about an hour to go in play on Day 1 of Event #13: $1,500 2-7 No-Limit Lowball Draw, Phil Hellmuth knocked out a player to give him 55,000 and an almost certain Day 2 seat.
The action started when a player raised from middle position and Hellmuth was in the big blind.
Hellmuth leaned over and pointed at his opponent's remaining stack.
"Is that all you have left?" he asked. "I'm gonna raise."
Hellmuth put out 5,000 and his opponent called. Hellmuth stood pat with . His opponent showed and drew a to pair and was eliminated.
Event 13: $1,500 No-Limit 2-7 Lowball Draw attracted a total of 266 entries and at the end of ten levels it is Alex Foxen leading the remaining 50 players ahead of Day 2 which kicks off at 2 p.m. Wednesday.
A star-studded field was expected, and the railbirds were not left disappointed, with James Obst, Jared Bleznick, Daniel Hiraman and Chris Bjorin returning from their Mixed Triple Draw final tables yesterday, along with some major names from the world of mixed games including Benny Glaser, Paul Volpe, Shaun Deeb, Jason Mercier, and Randy Ohel.
Bleznick, Naoya Kihara and Tom Schneider all held the chip lead, before Foxen muscled his way to the top of the leaderboard, and bagged up a stack of 147,850 to take into Day 2.
Big names such as Billy BaxterBarry Greenstein both bust shortly before the end of the day, but there is still a whole host of big names left in the field including Phil Hellmuth (46,000), Anthony Zinno (51,450), Benny Glaser (56,000), Frank Kassela (35,500) and James Obst (25,575).
With 40 players making the money, the bubble is expected to bust fairly quickly on Wednesday, ensuring all players a min-cash worth $2,271. However, all 50 will be setting their sights a little further at the $89,151 and a WSOP gold bracelet that awaits them up top.