Isaac Haxton is an early casualty from today's field after committing all of his chips on a flop of . Haxton held for the nut flush draw but his opponent was holding for two pair. The turn brought the to end the hand with the on the river rubbing salt into the would as Haxton make an early exit.
Today's field features plenty of big name pros including Phil Laak, Mike Matusow, Kevin Saul, Jennifer Tilly, Jeff Madsen, Alex Jacob, Lee Watkinson, Jon Little, Clonie Gowen, Hevad Khan, Erica Schoenberg, Joe Sebok, Roland de Wolfe, Dmitri Nobles and Beth Shak.
Of course today is also Father's Day here in the US so we wish a Happy Father's Day to all of the dads out there - whether playing today or watching our coverage from home.
An eerie hush has dropped across the Amazon Room as the music and pre-game hype ends and the players get down to business. The riffling of chips is the only sound to be heard!
Welcome to the Rio once again for our coverage of Event 29: $3,000 No-Limit Hold'em. We should have a large field here today with players starting out in three different sections of the Amazon Room.
The players are just taking their seats with play scheduled to get started in about five minutes time! Stay tuned to our coverage of all the live action!
At noon on Sunday from within the Amazon Room, action begins in Event #29, $3,000 No-Limit Hold'em. This is the only $3,000 NLHE event of the 2008 series, upping the price a bit from the big-field $1,500 and $2,000 events.
Shankar Pillai won this event in 2007, besting 826 other entrants and collecting $527,829.