Zeligman Tops Day 1b and Saout Leads the Pack After Day 1c in 2022 UKIPT London £1,100 Main Event
The return of the United Kingdom and Ireland Poker Tour after a hiatus since November 2016, commonly known as the UKIPT, has been a success story for live and online poker giant PokerStars. Taking place at the iconic Hippodrome Casino in the heart of London, the festival already produced strong numbers leading up to the marquee 2022 UKIPT London £1,100 Main Event and the final two starting days pushed the total attendance to 645 entries.
Only 128 players remain in contention for the £619,200 prize pool and the top 95 spots will get paid at least £1,684. The UK's Alexander Zeligman topped a field of 297 entries on Day 1b as the former theatre near Leicester Square was pushed to the limits of the capacity. After the completion of 13 levels of 50 minutes each, Zeligman led 57 survivors with a stack of 397,000.
Antoine Labat's late surge propelled the Frenchman to a stack of 347,000 while Tim Slater follows right behind with 343,000. Above-average stacks were also amassed by James Rann (310,000), Andy Wilson (258,000), Tom Hall (228,500), and Henrik Hecklen (199,500).
Three PokerStars ambassadors jumped into the action but just one of them made it through in Benjamin Spragg (104,500), while Steve Enriquez and Ramon Colillas were both eliminated. The PokerStars Senior Twitch & Ambassadors Associate Brandon Nguyen (91,000) and brand staff member Ido Alon (87,500) were more fortunate and navigated their way until the bagging and tagging process at the end of the night while Nick Walsh was among the early casualties.
Some of those that fell on the wayside were Terry Jordon, Gary Blackwood, Oliver Price, Andrew Christoforou, Belarmino De Souza, Stephen Woodhead, Kevin Williams, Mark Gardner, Ian Bradley, former professional football player Steve Watts, Jamie Burland and David Lopez Llacer.
Jordon, well-known for his ability to run up a big stack in very quick succession in competitions all over the UK, made the headlines for bowing out quickly on the first bullet and then soaring to a big stack on the second bullet. This included a remarkable triple knockout in which he called the all-ins of three shorter stacks with five-four suited and flopped a straight. However, Jordon was eliminated prior to the next break as his wild roller coaster ride came to a frantic end.
PokerStars Live at the Hippodrome Pro found no fortune on Day 1b either. He failed to get there with ace-king in a three-way all-in and the re-entry thereafter was not crowned by success either.
Another high profile casualty on Day 1b was two-time WSOP Main Event finalist Antoine Saout. His overbet shove with a straight draw only to get called by the flopped straight of Tim Slater. However, as fate would have it, Saout ran the hottest by some margin in the final turbo flight and bagged up 343,500 chips on Day 1c to pull ahead of Slater by a single chip.
Out of a field of 156 entries, only 40 players advanced and Lorenc Boci finished a distant second to Saout with 227,000, followed by Robert Boon (217,500), Joshua Boulton (212,500), and Paul Hizer (210,000).
Other notables to advance were Santiago Plante, Paresh Doshi, Arthur Conan, £2,200 High Roller champion Jack O'Neill, Ryan Mandara, Alex Goulder, Sylvain Loosli and David Docherty. Steve Enriquez used the final hallelujah and claimed 113,500 to his name for Day 2.
2022 UKIPT London £1,100 Main Event Starting Days
| Starting Day | Entries | Survivors |
|---|---|---|
| Day 1a | 191 | 31 |
| Day 1b | 297 | 57 |
| Day 1c | 156 | 40 |
| Total | 645* | 128 |
*includes one no-show of an online qualifier
With all three starting days wrapped up, only 128 players still have chips at their disposal and they will return at noon local time on Saturday, April 9, 2022. As of the penultimate day, all levels last 60 minutes each and Day 2 will aim to play down to the final table with at least ten levels scheduled.
The returning blinds will be 1,500-3,000 with a big blind ante of 3,000 and the money bubble won't be far away when the cards go back in the air. As usual, the PokerNews live reporting team will be on the floor to provide all the action from the Hippodrome Casino in London.