Day 1 of Event #43: $1,500 No-Limit Hold'em SHOOTOUT is on deck at 11:00 a.m. local time, giving players yet another shot at a WSOP gold bracelet.
This three-day event employs the familiar "shootout" format whereby players must win their tables to advance to the next round. In other words, win your table on you advance to Day 2!
Registration will close after three levels at approximately 1:15 p.m. Players begin the day with 7,500 chips playing 40-minute levels. There will be a 15-minute break every three levels. There is a 2,000-player cap on this event.
Last year's winner was Safiya Umerova, capturing her first WSOP gold bracelet and a first-place prize worth $264,046. She beat out a field of 1,050 entries, including defeating Niall Farrell heads-up for the title.
PokerNews has activated the My Stack App for this event, allowing you to directly adjust your chip counts in our live reporting blog using your iPhone or Android phone.
You can download the app for iPhone or Android now to get started. Then, create a new PokerNews account or update your current one to start updating your status immediately. Your followers can see all the live action that you're involved in.
Click here to download the My Stack app for iPhone, or click here to download the My Stack app for Android.
Keep following along as PokerNews brings you all of the live updates from this event.
There are many tables left, but lots of them have reached three- and four-handed play. Here is a look at some of the tables with notables still in contention:
Table 146: Sam Cohen (13,500) and Ravi Raghavan (33,000) are down to four players.
Table 150: Darren Rabinowitz (13,500) and Aditya Sushant (2,600) are two of four players left at their table.
Table 152: Igor Yaroshevskyy is battling four-handed and is grinding a stack of 13,600 chips.
Table 158: Mike Matusow sits on a short stack worth 5,500 but isn't down for the count with four left.
Table 159: Aaron Henderson has a big lead with 40,000 and they are down to just three players.
Table 163: Mukul Pahuja sits with 20,000 chips and is three-handed, with a good chance to win his table.
Table 167: Annette Obrestad (33,000) leads her table right now, and play is still three-handed.
Table 174: Dan Sindelar (19,000) and Linglin Zeng (23,000) are also down to four players.
Table 183: Daniel Wagner (20,000) and Andy Black (17,500) remain with three players left.
Jonathan Little limped in on the button, and Danny Suied raised to 3,000. Little paused for a moment and then slid forward a tower of chips, putting Suied to the test for his remaining stack worth 18,000. Suied quickly called.
Suied was at risk with , flipping against Little's .
The flop came , and it was looking fairly safe for Suied until the hit the turn. The river was the , and Suied was eliminated.
Little has now moved on to Day 2 tomorrow at noon with 65,600 chips and a guaranteed cash worth at least $4,837.
Tirza Sanders limped in on the button, and Cory Waaland checked his option.
The flop came , and Waaland checked. Sanders bet 1,500, and Waaland check-raised to 4,500. Sanders called. The turn was the , and Waaland led out for 6,200. Sanders moved all in, and Waaland called for about 14,000 total.
Waaland was at risk with for a pair and a straight draw, while Sanders held for two pair.
Day 1 of Event #43: $1,500 No-Limit Hold'em SHOOTOUT is in the books after 120 tables found their respective winner. A total of 1,025 players started today, and 120 of them are cashing for at least $4,837, but they will all have their sights set on the first prize of $257,764 and that gold WSOP bracelet.
The first player to secure his spot for Day 2 was Jose Ramos, knocking John Pires out with two pair. Wilson Darella made quads to advance through to Day 2 and was noticeably happy about this, cheering out loud from the middle of the room.
Other notable names advancing to Day 2 are 2016 November Niners Vojtech Ruzicka and Kenny Hallaert, 2011 November Niner Martin Staszko, and bracelet winners Kevin MacPhee, Carlos Mortensen, Kevin Eyster, and Chris Moorman.
Others were not so lucky. Govert Metaal was knocked out by Andrew Brokos, Cory Waaland by Tirza Sanders, Cate Hall by Alexandre Rivero, and Danny Suied by Jonathan Little. Sam Cohen, Mike Matusow, Annette Obrestad, Jonathan Tamayo and Tobias Peters also failed to win their heads-up battles.
Play resumes Friday at noon for all 120 players, so make sure to keep following all the updates here at PokerNews.