The Season XVI WPT Borgata Poker Open Championship kicked off Sunday at Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The first of two starting flights in the $3,500 buy-in poker tournament attracted a field of 283 entries, and it was Trung Pham (pictured) who emerged as the chip leader to finish out the day. Pham amassed a stack of 327,300 and will be the player to catch going forward.
Pham picked up a large chunk of chips when he knocked out two players in Level 7 with the blinds at 300-600 with a 100 ante. Pham opened the action with a raise to 1,600 before Johanssy Joseph made the call in position. The player on the button reraised all in for 14,200, and action folded back to Pham. He reraised to 27,800, but that didn’t deter Joseph, who five-bet all in for 61,700. Pham would make the call with the 
, but he was in a world of domination as the player on the button held the 
and Joseph had the 
.
The 
flop didn’t have much in it for Pham, but he turned flush and straight draws with the 
coming off. The river completed the board with the 
to give Pham a straight and shockingly send his two opponents to the rail.
With that pot, Pham vaulted to more than 200,000 in chips before going on to close out the day with 327,300.
When Pham returns for Day 2 on Tuesday, he’ll have a hefty stack of 327 big blinds to work with. A group of 131 players advanced out of Day 1a.
A couple other notables to bag solid stacks of the opening flight were Allan Rabinowitz with 207,500, Joe Elpayaa with 181,600, and Erik Cajelais with 169,900. Cajelais is a three-time WPT final tablist with total live tournament earnings in excess of $3.3 million.
Looking ahead to Monday’s second starting flight, three players will be competing that we’re excited to talk about.
ClubWPT.com qualifiers Richard Seale and Jonathan Burnham will be in action, having qualified for the chance to compete in this event via the World Poker Tour’s subscription-based online poker site ClubWPT.com. Maria Krebs, winner of the PlayWPT Why I Love Poker contest, will also be in action. The PlayWPT Why I Love Poker contest was conducted in partnership with TruScribe.com with the goal to find personal stories from WPT fans about why they love poker and how the game has impacted their lives.
The players in Monday’s starting flight of the Season XVI WPT Borgata Poker Open Championship will play the same eight one-hour levels before bagging and tagging for the night. With a big $3 million guarantee on the event, it is much expected that the field size will be wall to wall with more than 1,000 players total. Since Season VIII of this tournament, the season Olivier Busquet won, the WPT Borgata Poker Open Championship has attracted more than 1,000 entries.
Not only will the winner take home the lion’s share of the prize pool, but he or she will walk away with the prestigious WPT Champions Cup, a luxurious Hublot Big Bang Steel watch, and a $5,000 membership to JetSmarter, the official private jet company of the World Poker Tour. The winner will also take home an estimated 1,400 points in the Hublot WPT Player of the Year race for Season XVI. You can read more about the fast and furious Hublot WPT Player of the Year race by clicking here.
Day 1b action will kick off at 11 a.m. ET from Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa in Atlantic City, New Jersey, and you can find all the coverage you can handle right here on WPT.com.
Photography by Joe Giron / PokerPhotoArchive.com
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