Berger Bags Huge Chip Lead on Day 1b of HPT Golden Gates
Ten hours of play and 15 levels are complete and all chips have been bagged for Day 1b of HPT Golden Gates $1,100 Main Event. After Day 1a drew 82 entries, today’s flight saw 128 join the fun with 18 players remaining when play concluded.
The big story for the day was David Berger, who bagged a whopping 628,000 to finish as the clear chip leader, head and shoulders above the rest of the field. Berger had chipped up to around 300,000 and was already one of the chip leaders when play resumed from the final break of the night before winning two massive pots with pocket aces, holding against top pair with a straight draw and later against ace-king in an all-in preflop situation. From there, he continued to build until play finished for the night.
Second in chips is Michael Sherry, who also led a charge at the end of the evening, building his stack from around 200,000 to its finishing point in the last two levels of the evening. Sherry bagged a stack of 357,500, also above Day 1a chip leader Greg Geller’s 336,000. Other players to finish in the top five include 2015 WSOP Main Event third place finisher Neil Blumenfield (320,500), Keith McCarthy (283,000), and Joel Verbeck (246,500).
There were also a handful of notable players who did not advance, including Ben Keeline, Matt Grisham, Brian Leitch, Chris Moon, and 2019 WSOP Main Event 39th place finisher Dapo Ajayi.
In total, 35 players have advanced to Day 2 on Sunday. Two more starting flights remain, with the next one upcoming Friday at noon local time. Come back to PokerNews for more coverage as the tournament continues.