The marquee event of WSOP Paradise, the $25,000 Super Main Event, got underway in a huge way on Wednesday with 869 entries, the largest single flight for a $25,000 buy-in ever. The Day 1A number bodes well for the event reaching its lofty $60,000,000 guarantee, which will need 2,400 entries to hit the mark.
The day saw players from every walk of poker life: online qualifiers, satellite winners, WSOP Main Event champions, and a plethora of other big names, with many familiar faces throughout.
Main Event champs in the mix
The early goings were not friendly for a pair of former WSOP Main Event champions, as 2006 winner Jamie Gold and 2023 champ Daniel Weinman were both ousted within the first three levels of the day. Neither former champion re-entered, ending their Day 1A early.
At the other end of the leaderboard, another Main Event champion was consistently among the leaders. 2003 winner and Hall of Famer Chris Moneymaker avoided those apparently tumultuous early levels, and after entering just before 3:30pm, steadily made his way up the leaderboard, finishing the day with a top 30 stack of 2,775,000.
Other former Main Event champs to advance included Michael Mizrachi (2,620,000), Hossein Ensan (1,700,000), Ryan Riess (1,300,000), Joe Cada (1,130,000), and Greg Merson (725,000).
Negreanu fires away
Daniel Negreanu started the day in the $100,000 Triton Main Event, but after a disappointingly short day in that field, the Hall of Famer jumped into the Super Main Event, where he invested another $150,000, firing six bullets before finally bagging 1,105,000.
How many Mizrachis?!
The Grinder wasn't the only Mizrachi in the field, as the entire clan of brothers, along with Michael’s son, Paul, played Day 1A. By night’s end, it was the reigning world champion taking home family bragging rights for the flight with 2,620,000 chips. Eric was the only other family member able to find a bag, but he'll need an epic spin-up from half of a starting stack.
- Michael Mizrachi – 2,620,000
- Eric Mizrachi – 125,000
- Robert Mizrachi – did not advance
- Donny Mizrachi – did not advance
- Paul Mizrachi – did not advance
Onto Day 2A
The ten scheduled levels of play wrapped up shortly after midnight ET with 295 players bagging up for Friday’s Day 2A, led by Leonardo Song-Carrillo with 4,485,000. Players who didn’t advance on Wednesday will have multiple chances to re-enter, with Day 1B on Thursday, followed by Day 1C on Saturday and Day 1D on Sunday.
WSOP Paradise Super Main Event Day 1A chip leaders:
- Leonardo Song-Carrillo - 4,485,000
- Alejandro Ganivet - 4,430,000
- Bartley Dowling - 4,400,000
- Franco Spitale - 4,325,000
- Sean Suh - 4,210,000
- Rodrigo Sirichuk - 3,965,000
- John Barr - 3,950,000
- Ruben Suarez - 3,935,000
- Raoul Kanme - 3,850,000
- Christopher Nguyen - 3,805,000
*Complete chip counts available in the WSOP+ app.
