Saturday’s final Day 1 flight for the $3,500 World Poker Tour Playground Championship split the field between the auxiliary tent and the Poker Room on the third floor. The field grew to 434 entrants with 168 advancing and Connor Daynard leading the field with 435,500 to Sunday’s Day 2.
Giuseppe Corapi (401,000) and Jeffrey Reardon (388,500) form the chase pack. Lynn Phan (240,000), Vinny Giuliano (223,500), and Patrick Tardiff (204,500) also finished near the top of the counts.
Lynn Phan returns near the top of the counts on Sunday. Bad beat hits after second flight
The cash game action has tested the Playground with so many players in town. They’ve had games running at virtually every stake on Saturday and about an hour after Day 1B wrapped up two players hit the bad beat jackpot. Chad Whittaker lost holding quad kings to Aymen Rhammaz's royal flush to take the bulk of the $964,731 prize.
Day 2 field takes shape
Familiar faces like Tim Rutherford, Hassan Hussein, Tanupat Punjarojanakul, and Eric Afriat punched their ticket to Day 2. Joining them at the bottom of the counts are Howard Feingold, Kevin Rabichow, Frederic Normand, and Eliot Hudon.
WPT champ Fred Normand is on to Day 2. The event drew 806 entrants across three flights and a total of 287 players will return for Day 2 at 11:00 am. Players still have until the start of play on Day 2 to register and drive the prize pool past the $2.59 million already generated.
The 287 returning players have another ten 60-minute levels scheduled for Day 2. Then on Day 3, levels start at 60 minutes but when the field is down to 40 players they will move to 90 minutes. They’ll remain at 90 minutes until the six-handed final table where they go back to 60 and for heads-up they’re trimmed to 30 minutes.
Connor Daynard will wake up on Day 2 with the overall chip lead. Top Five Chip Counts
| Rank | Player | Chip Count |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Connor Daynard | 435,500 |
| 2 | Giuseppe Corapi | 401,000 |
| 3 | Jeffrey Reardon | 388,500 |
| 4 | Adam Cader | 383,500 |
| 5 | Jackson Oniske | 379,000 |
All photos courtesy of World Poker Tour - Alicia Skillman
