'Philip_Ward' Leads at the End of Day 1b of the partypoker MILLION North America

The day began with 11 entries and eventually progressed to 15 total, ending with five players on this final online starting day for the partypoker MILLION North America Main Event. Most players began with different stacks, some over a million and some under, since they qualified from one of the Phase 1 tournaments. Five players entered directly, either by paying CA$5,000/$4,000 directly or via satellite. This massive guaranteed prizepool of CA$5,000,000 is the biggest in Canada's history of live poker events, boasting a guaranteed prize of at least CA$1,000,000 for the winner.

The player with the most chips tonight was Philip_Ward who bagged just under four million after getting off to a hot start. He held a commanding lead for much of the day and finished strong. Hot on his heels was samygold13, finishing with 3,452,000 chips, ending the day by winning multiple hands in a row after play tightened in the last level. The shortest stack was Edoiler, bagging a little more than the starting stack with 1,360,000 chips. Online legend, Timothy 'RandyB0bandy' Ullmer found himself in the middle of the pack with 1,890,000 chips on his second attempt online after busting Day 1a last week. Finally, arguably the most decorated player to find a bag was David 'JeanClaude1970' Peters, finishing with 1,710,000 chips. Peters fired two bullets last week, but found some success today. The biggest surprise of the day was maria_emelia, who appeared to be a direct entry starting with 1,000,000 chips but ended up blinding out after clearly having missed the tournament today.

Other notable players who did not make it through included Thomas 'raidershabsjays' Taylor, Rodney 'number_10' Ramalho, and Rami 'phenom11218' Hammoud. Fortunately for Hammoud, he managed to bag a healthy stack on online Day 1a, carrying over about 3,600,000 to Day 2 on May 7th.

Now that online Day 1a and Day 1b are complete, the two live starting days will be held on May 5th and 6th in beautiful Montreal, Canada at the ever-popular Playground Poker Club. While blinds ran for 24 minutes online, live entrants will play 60-minute levels on Day 1, and blinds will increase to 75 minutes on Days 2 and 3, and will jump up to 90 minutes on the final day. Players have the ability to enter up until the end of the second level on Day 2 on May 7th and can play as many flights as they wish, carrying over the biggest stack if they bag chips more than once.

Stick with the PokerNews team for live coverage throughout this event, with live updates gearing back up on May 4th for the $10,300 High Roller and then on May 5th for the first live starting day at Playground Poker Club.