2014 World Poker Tour Legends of Poker Day 1a: Bowie Sings with the Early Lead

August 24, 2014

Donnie Peters

The new season of the World Poker Tour kicked off on Saturday with the Legends of Poker at The Bicycle Casino in Bell Gardens, California. With an interesting "quantum reload concept," players have the option to reenter the following day or buy in on Day 2 for $10,000 to receive a stack of 60 big blinds.

Day 1a of the event attracted 156 entries, but just 52 advanced. Leading the way was Randy Bowie after he bagged up 217,800 in chips, thanks large in part to busting Chris Moorman in the last hand of the night. According to a tweet from Moorman, Bowie had KxKx and Moorman had QxQx in a 165,000-chip pot.

Plenty of notable players also advanced, including Owen Crowe (190,800), Matt Salsberg (187,700), Scott Clements (186,500), Ryan Riess (163,000), and Lee Markholt (149,200), while Mike Sexton (48,300), Brandon Crawford (38,600), Joe Tehan (30,600), and Todd Terry (25,900) finished on the shorter side of things.

As reported by the WPT Live Updates team, Riess, the 2013 World Series of Poker Main Event champion, busted two players towards the end of the night during Level 10 with the blinds at 500/1,000/100. On the first hand, it was Riess' A♥K♦ against his opponent's A♠10♣ with the board running out Q♥2♥2♦3♣6♥. On the second hand, Riess took his J♠J♣ up against an opponent's K♣10♠ with the board running out A♠4♠2♥2♠5♥.

Of those who busted out on the first starting day were Dan Heimiller, Freddy Deeb, Andy Frankenberger, Gavin Griffin, Vince Van Patten, Will "The Thrill" Failla, and Jordan Cristos, last year's champion of this event.

Cristos fell in Level 6 with the blinds at 200/400/50 to another former WPT champion, Mohsin Charania. Charania had opened to 1,000 from middle position, and Cristos moved all in for 7,000. After action folded back to Charania, he called with the Q♦Q♣. Cristos had the J♠J♥. The flop, turn, and river ran out 5♠4♦2♠9♣7♦ to send Cristos packing.