On a board of with roughly 3,000 in the middle, Frank Stepuchin checked from middle position.
His opponent in the hand was Damien Le Goff in the cutoff, and he bet out 1,400 and Stepuchin called.
Le Goff tabled his for king-high, and Stepuchin revealed his for second pair to collect the pot. Very short early in the day, Stepuchin needed that pot desperately.
Eddie Puia raised to 500 and Sarah Herzali three-bet to 1,500 from one seat over in the cutoff, which Puia called. On the flop, Puia checked and called a bet of 1,200 to see the turn, which went check, check. On the river, Puia made it 3,000 to go and Herzali called.
Puia turned over and Herzali won the pot with .
One table over, Tou Xiong limped in the dark and Sam Snead on the button raised to 1,200, Xiong then checked his cards and reraised to 6,000. Snead called to see a flop and Xiong checked, then called a bet of 3,000. On the turn, Xiong check-called another bet of 2,000 and they checked the on the river.
Snead revealed his and Xiong immediately said "Oh, you have it".
Snead replied with "I thought you had the six" and dragged in the healthy pot before heading into the break.
There was an under the gun open from Michael Rees and a call from Franco Mancini for 700 in late position, before Kimberly Frost upped it to 2,100. Rees folded quickly but Mancini seemed unsure and tanked for a minute or so before folding. Frost turned over before saying "if I didn't show you, you wouldn't have believed me."
Most players can only dream of getting as far as Michael Dyer did in the 2018 WSOP Main Event. The Houston, Texas resident took home a $3,725,000 payday for his third-place finish in last year's tournament, and he's back in the mix on Day 1b to try for another deep run.
Dyer followed up that seven-figure cash with another impressive finish in January 2019, taking down the $5,300 No-Limit Hold'em Event at the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure, netting $336,670.
Dyer comes into the Main Event looking for his third cash of the 2019 WSOP, having finished in the money in both the BIG 50 and Millionaire Maker events.