Matt Iles Leads After Day 1 of Event #34: $1,500 Split Format Hold'em
Day 1 of Event #34: $1,500 Split Format Hold'em attracted 873 players and created a prize pool of $436,050, which will be distributed to the top 92 players. After 10 levels of play, just 159 players remained in contention for the $250,483 first-place prize.
The scheduled four-day tournament is rather unique in its format. Day 1 was played out nine handed, while Day 2 will be six handed. From there, the final 32 players will be seeded into a tournament bracket based on their stack size and play heads up down to the final eight. Those players will then combine for the final table.
The Day 1 chip leader ended up being Matt Iles, who bagged 139,200. Others who survived were Jordan Young (123,500), Erwann Pecheux (96,300), Jamie Kerstetter (52,800), Martin Jacobson (27,500), Asher Conniff (23,200), and Huck Seed (13,300).
Of course not everyone was so lucky. Among those to fall on Day 1 were Antonio Esfandiari, James Woods, Andrew Lichtenberger, George Danzer, Joe Cada, and Paul Volpe.
Top 10 Day 1 Chip Counts
| Place | Player | Count |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Matt Iles | 139,200 |
| 2 | Jordan Young | 123,500 |
| 3 | Sameer Aljanedi | 116,000 |
| 4 | Jesse Rockowitz | 114,100 |
| 5 | Michael Michnik | 112,800 |
| 6 | Eric Rappaport | 99,900 |
| 7 | Erwann Pecheux | 96,300 |
| 8 | Jordan Smith | 90,800 |
| 9 | Matheus Schell | 85,000 |
| 10 | Isaac Kawa | 84,700 |
Day 2 will kick off at 1 p.m. local time on Wednesday.