Day 1b in the Books

The final Day 1 flight has come to a close at the 2011 PokerStars.net APPT Macau Main Event and it was an exciting day of play which did not disappoint. There were an impressive 306 players who turned out for eight levels of play today and by the end it was China's Sha Jun who bagged up the most chips with 169,400.

The combined Day 1 flights made for a huge 575-player field - a record setting amount of players for the popular APPT stop in Macau.

Of those players, there will be approximately 315 players returning for Day 2 and will be vying for their share of the HKD 15,552,600 prize pool.

While it wasn't quite the spectacle of Phil Ivey's return to poker in yesterday's Day 1 flight, there certainly wasn't a lack of big names taking to the felt as 10-time WSOP bracelet winner Johnny Chan joined the likes of Team PokerStars Pro's Nacho Barbero, Celina Lin, Bryan Huang, Vivian Im, Maxim Lykov, along with PokerStars Team Online, Randy Lew.

Of those players it was only Lin and Lykov who couldn't manage a Day 2 berth as PokerStars will be well represented in tomorrow's action as Huang returns as one of the chip leaders with an impressive 154,100.

Also returning for play tomorrow will be previous APPT champion Victorino Torres, Jeff Rossiter, Phil Willcocks and Terrence Chan.

Some of those who succumbed to the rail throughout the day were Jacky Glazier, Joseph Cheong, Brendon Rubie, Charles Chua and Julius Colman.

Day 2 is set to kick off at 12 p.m. local time as PokerNews will again be on the floor in the beautiful Grand Lisboa Hotel and Casino!