Whilst no poker day is alike their pattern is somewhat formulaic and set in stone. The blinds rise, players depart and someone ends the day as chip leader having accumulated significantly more than what they started with. But whilst today was the same, it was also different. You can read on below to find out who did well, who did less so and what to expect tomorrow but, the headline news arrived late on Day 1D and had nothing to do with the checking, raising and folding going on at the felt.
Yes, we're talking money here, which is the way we keep score in poker after all. When late registration closed and the numbers were totted up it was established that 1,026 players had entered the UKIPT5 Nottingham Main Event. Together they created a prize pool of exactly £1,000,000. Those riches will start getting dished out to the top 151 finishers tomorrow - during level 15 or 16 is our educated guess - but the big bucks won't be divvied up until Sunday. The biggest slice of the pie stands at a massive £182,000 - only twice on the UKIPT has anyone won more - a final table appearance will lock up £17,320, whilst a min-cash will swell your coffers to to the tune of £1,760. Not a bad return considering many satellited in for far less. You can see the full payout structure here.
Today was by far the busiest start day with 494 players showing up, a further 63 fired a second bullet meaning Day 1D surpassed the total for the three prior start days on its own. The general rule of thumb is that the bigger the field the bigger the chip leaders stack will be but that half-baked theory proved incorrect today as today's chip leader finished with fewer than the 205,900 Alex Harriman accumulated on Day 1C and the 190,900 Max Ladbrooke bagged on Wednesday.
Nonetheless Remi Wyrzykiewicz ran his stack all the way up to 189,600 to lead. The 24-year-old multi-table tournament player from Poznan, in Poland is rapidly growing in stature in both online and bricks and mortar environments. "I'm just starting out on a live career," he told us at EPT11 Malta last month. The Pole pipped Seun Oluwole who finished on an impressive 176,800 by the time play ended. For 26-year-old Oluwole, who works in IT within foreign exchange, it was a welcome return to the tour. Oluwole was a regular face during Seasons 2 and 3. "I chose work over poker," he said. "I really miss poker though, I'm very much a recreational fish these days." That may be but he put his day's progress down to 'doing what he used to do'. He'll be hoping he continues in that vein tomorrow.
But of course Wyrzykiewicz and Oluwole wasn't the only ones to set themselves up for a run at the money as Jamie O'Connor (173,200) Hui Jin (169,000) and David La Ronde (168,100) also stacked them high today and will be back tomorrow in good spirits.
As will Team PokerStars Pro Jake Cody, it was third time lucky for Cody today as he misfired on Day 1B and Day 1C but got a bullet to hit the target today. His stack of 17,300 might equate to fewer than 11 big blinds but he was still smiling at the end of play. "I'm still in the mix," he said with a grin.
So too is Leo Margets, the Spaniard had a topsy-turvy day but will return with 32,900 - a touch over 20 big blinds - and will be looking for her maiden UKIPT cash tomorrow.
Unfortunately Liv Boeree would not be so lucky. She was looking set fair until the final level of the night when an opponent ran a river bluff on her in a weird spot. "What bluffs can he have there?" she said. That left her short and she exited on the last hand of play.
She joined a long list of exalted poker stars on the rail as only roughly 211 of the 557 who entered today survived: John Duthie, Dara O'Kearney, Max Silver, Owain Carey, Fergal Nealon, David Lappin, Craig McCorkell, Ian Simpson, Kelly Saxby, Brett Angell, Willie Tann, Ben Heath, Rick Trigg, Ivan Luca, Jude Ainsworth, Jack Ellwood and Super-middleweight World Champion boxer Carl Froch were just some of those knocked out today.
But plenty of poker powerhouses lived to fight another day, a selection of notables and big stacks are listed below. A full list of survivors will be available here before play starts tomorrow and we'll also upload the Day 2 seat draw to the blog before play starts.
Diego Gomez, 167,000
Cesar Santons, 162,000
Stephen Bean, 159,900
Mick Graydon, 118,400
Neil Raine, 115,300
Robert Tinnion, 110,900
Alex Goulder, 109,000
Jason Beazley, 78,200
Dara Davey, 75,000
Ludovic Geilich, 74,100
Tim Davie, 69,400
Jason Tompkins, 68,100
Ryan Spittles, 58,800
Marcel Luske, 55,300
Tomasz Raniszewski, 39,000
Marc Convey, 35,300
Alan Gold, 33,400
Charles Chattha, 15,100
You can catch up on all today's action here and here, we'll be back at noon tomorrow to cover: the inevitable start of day two carnage, the tense bubble period, the post bubble bust out bonanza and the march to the final table. For now though goodnight.
All photos are copyright of Mickey May