Until today, Jason Somerville hadn't played any poker since before the pandemic. He opted to make his return by late registering on Day 1a, and recently he got his stack of 47,500 all in preflop against a big-stacked opponent.
Jason Somerville:
Opponent:
Somerville was behind but the dealer delivered a reprieve as the flop paired his ace. Neither the turn nor river changed a thing and Somerville stayed alive.
John Racener raised from early position and Joe McKeehen defended his big blind to see a flop.
McKeehen check-raised to 9,000 after Racener continued for 3,500 and Racener called. Once the fell on the turn, Racener moved all in and McKeehen quickly folded.
On Friday, the highly-anticipated $10,000 buy-in, $10,000,000 GTD Wynn Millions got underway. The first of three starting flights attracted 263 runners, but after 10 levels of play, approximately 90 remained with Peter Braglia bagging chip lead with 321,500.
Others to bag big stacks were Cliff Josephy (317,000), Joseph Cheong (301,500), Alex Foxen (295,500), and Jerald Saeman (280,000), who round out the top five. They were joined by Jason Koon (236,500), Vanessa Kade (168,000), Dan Smith (160,000), Ryan Riess (121,500), Chance Kornuth (113,500), Jason Somerville (105,500), Tony Dunst (90,500), David Peters (81,000), and Nick Schulman (74,000).
Of course, not everyone was fortunate enough to advance to Day 2. Among those to fall were Andrew Lichtenberger, Brock Wilson, Jared Bleznick, Chris Brewer, Frank Funaro, Erik Seidel, Maria Konnikova, Shaun Deeb, Kristen Bicknell, 2020 WSOP champ Damian Salas, and GGPoker Ambassador Daniel Negreanu.
Negreanu actually busted the tournament twice, which was somewhat of a surprise given he doubled in Level 1 after making quad queens. However, his hot start cooled as he busted his first bullet in Level 2 in a particularly brutal hand.
There was four-way action that saw a flop and Nitis Udornpim continued for 1,500. Negreanu raised to 5,500 and all three opponents called bringing the turn.
Action was checked to the player in middle position who fired out 1,600 and Negreanu raised all in. Action folded to Udornpim who came over the top and isolated.
Nitis Udornpim:
Daniel Negreanu:
Negreanu was ahead after flopping a set of fives but a completed the board on the river, giving Udornpim a better full house and sent Negreanu to the rebuy desk. His second bullet didn’t go any better and he exhausted his single re-entry per flight option two levels later.
The good news is that he and others have a chance to try again as there are still two more starting flights to go with Days 1b and 1c at Noon local time on Saturday and Sunday respectively. PokerNews will be on-site to capture all the action throughout the six-day long tournament, so be sure to tune in all weekend long into next week.