Friday, July 4, 2008

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2008 WSOP Day 36: Garnering a lot of chips

Mark Garner tops the leaderboard after Day 1a of the 2008 WSOP Main Event.

By Sarah Polson

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, gather around for a tale of bravery, a tale of heroics and a tale of heartbreak. It's the story of the first Day 1 of the 2008 World Series of Poker Main Event.

The numbers for Day1a were slightly up from the 2007 Main Event. When the official count was finally released, 1,297 players had come out for Day 1a compared to 1,258 in 2007.

However, with three more Day 1's and registration open through the first two levels of Day 1d on Sunday, it's a long wait to find out how many players in total are going to show up this year. If the first day is any indicator, the 2008 WSOP Main Event could be on track to have a bigger crowd than last year.

Among the brave souls taking on the first day of the Main Event on Thursday was Mark Garner, who ended the day as the chip leader. Though he's not a player at the forefront of poker fans' minds, Garner is no stranger to the WSOP.

Garner cashed in an event in 2005 and cashed deep in the Main Event in 2006 in 25th place. He's also made the final table of two different World Series of Poker Circuit events. He cashed in ninth place in the 2007 WSOPC Grand Tunica main event and placed sixth in the 2008 WSOPC Tunica main event.

By the end of Day 1a, he was sitting atop the 636 remaining players with $194,900 in chips.

Filling out the top 10 in the chip count after Day 1a are:

Name	Chip Count
Mark Garner	194,900
Brandon Adams	176,450
Kellen Hunter	155,200
Stefan Mattsson	154,275
Patrick Fortin	145,275
Jeff Frerichs	138,025
Soren Peterson	135,475
Adam Hudson	127,750
Wayne Brown	124,575
Todd Rebello	123,925

A couple of other familiar names who broke the $100k mark after Day 1 are Kido Pham and Mark Vos. Svetlana Gromenkova had built a considerable chip stack during the day as well, ending with about $94,000 for the day.

One example of how the 2008 Ladies World Champion built her stack came in a hand where she and another player saw a flop of T 4 2. Implementing a check-raise move, Gromenkova checked the flop to see her opponent bet $700, and raised it up to $2,000.

After her opponent called they saw the turn bring the 5. Both players checked and the river brought a 6. This time Gromenkova bet and the second player called, turning up K T. However, Gromenkova turned up 5 4 for two pair and the pot.

Some other prominent survivors of Day1a include Chau Giang, Darrel Dicken, Jamie Rosen (check out his interview), Joe Beevers, Toto Leonidas, Blair Hinkle, Billy Baxter, Ted Lawson, John Hennigan, Vince Van Patten, Susie Isaacs, Noah Boeken, Jimmy Fricke, Thomas Wahlroos and Barry Greenstein.

There were several former champions who played on Day 1a: Bobby Baldwin, Berry Johnston, Dan Harrington and Scotty Nguyen. Unfortunately only Nguyen made it through the day.

A couple of celebrities were spotted at the tables as well on Thursday. Jason Alexander and Ray Romano were both trying their luck. Alexander hit the rail eventually, but Romano made it to the end of the day with a fairly healthy stack of $61,025.

Showing some decent poker knowledge, during one hand Romano took on Justin "Red" Phillips. Phillips had made it $1,050 pre-flop from the button, and after the small blind called, Romano protected his blind.

After the flop came A T 9, the players checked it around to see a K hit on the turn. Romano bet $1,000, getting a flat-call from Phillips, and the small blind folded.

The river brought a 3, and Romano fired out another $5,000. Phillips took some time to think and then finally made the call, perhaps just to see if he was right since he asked "Queen-jack?" as he made the call.

Romano showed that lady luck also loved him, revealing Q J for the straight and raking in the pot.

The players who made it through the day on Thursday will have a few days to rest up and prepare before taking on another day of poker. Day 1b will get started today at noon, and the weekend will include two more Day 1's before all the players get a break on Monday. Day 2a will get started on Tuesday.

Keep up on all the action in the 2008 WSOP Live Tournaments section.

Related Articles:

• 2008 WSOP Day 35: Lights, camera, action
• 2008 WSOP Day 35: Daneshgar, Graham grab wins

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