The $10,000 buy-in World Poker Tour (WPT) Finals kicked off yesterday at Foxwoods Resort Casino, with the final table commencing on Friday. As far as prize pool is concerned, an official figure has not yet been released. However, entry, and thus prize pool, has grown successively every year that the WPT has taken place. Last year's finals generated a $6.7 million pool, which give us a general idea of what to expect from this year's competition.

With the mushrooming growth of poker, player fields at major tournaments often have to be split in two, as hosting venues do not have space to house such expansive competition. Such is the case with the WPT Finals, for which day one of competition is actually taking place over the course of two days, day one-a and day one-b, with half of the player field playing on each day. At the end day one-a, which started with 410 players, competition was reduced to 14 tables, seating approximately 118 players in total. Some major players, including Michael Gracz, Evelyn Ng, Mike Caro, John Phan, as well as defending champion Tuan Lee, busted out on day one-a.

Chip count at the end of the first half of day one-a put Lyle Berman, CEO of WPT Enterprise's parent company, Lakes Entertainment, at the top, with Mark Seif finishing the day in second place.

Source:  Poker777 Staff

Monday, 14 November 2005