Adda52 Team Pro Kunal Patni Leads All Flights So Far with 975K

Photo:  Day 1G Chipleader Kunal Patni

Day 1G of WPT500 Las Vegas comes to an end with 28 players remaining, and the chipleader is Adda52 Team Pro Kunal Patni with 975,000 in chips, enough to put him ahead of the chipleaders of all six previous starting flights.

Patni recapped his day for us. “I had a pretty good day actually, I started pretty well. When the average stack was 51k, I had 300-plus at that point in time. Crushing the table. Then I got into a hand where I lost ace-jack to ace-king for a big pot, and then I lost a huge hand with kings to ace-deuce. One guy rivered a straight. And then I got to 150k, and then kept grinding. Got into a huge pot again, and there was a three-way all-in. I had kings against ace-king and ace-jack, and the kings held for me. I came back from there, went down a little bit again. And towards the end of the day the last hand was kind of sick. I was chipleader at the table, somebody opened, and I flatted him. The flop is king-king-nine, and I had pocket nines. The other guy had ace-king, so that’s always nice.”

Looking ahead to Day 2, Patni added, “It’s obviously helpful coming into Day 2 as the chip leader. But I’ve seen some of the players that are there and they are really good, so I’m sure we’re going to have a tough field now. To tell you the truth, the field when you start at the beginning of the day is kind of soft, but I’m sure Day 2 will be a much tougher field.”

Today was the seventh of nine starting flights, and with 544 entries it increases the tournament total to 2,191 and counting, with 112 players surviving to Day 2 so far. The tournament has already surpassed its $1 million guarantee, so tomorrow’s two flights have a shot at increasing it to over $1.5 million.

Tonight play ended around 1:10 am with 32:23 remaining in Level 20, with blinds at 5,000-10,000 and a 1,000 ante. When play resumes on Day 2, the blinds will roll back to about 13 minutes remaining in Level 18 (3K-6K), because that’s the earliest that any flight has finished so far.

Here are the official chip counts for the 28 survivors from Flight 1G:

1.  Kunal Patni  –  975,000  (163 bb)
2.  Aaron Young  –  740,000  (123 bb)
3.  Andre Sa  –  657,000  (110 bb)
4.  Sam Simmons  –  518,000  (86 bb)
5.  Steve Firestone  –  481,000  (80 bb)
6.  Mark Bergman  –  467,000  (78 bb)
7.  Tony Dunst  –  451,000  (75 bb)
8.  Ronald Tregillis  –  368,000  (61 bb)
9.  Eli Loewenthal  –  330,000  (55 bb)
10.  Scott Ryder  –  325,000  (54 bb)
11.  Gus Flores  –  279,000  (47 bb)
12.  Payman Arjang  –  277,000  (46 bb)
13.  Ruben van den Eshof  –  244,000  (41 bb)
14.  Kainalu McCue-Unciano  –  209,000  (35 bb)
15.  Kevin Buck  –  193,000  (32 bb)
16.  Greg Steinberger  –  175,000  (29 bb)
17.  Anonymous  –  174,000  (29 bb)
18.  Allano Gaviolla  –  173,000  (29 bb)
19.  Larissa Bushman  –  168,000  (28 bb)
20.  Ben Brown  –  141,000  (24 bb)
21.  Mikal Smith  –  126,000  (21 bb)
22.  Joseph Drory  –  120,000  (20 bb)
23.  Alyssa Pittman  –  107,000  (18 bb)
24.  Scott Forrest  –  104,000  (17 bb)
25.  David Golder  –  102,000  (17 bb)
26.  Jamil Abreu  –  91,000  (15 bb)
27.  Royce Allen  –  86,000  (14 bb)
28.  Bryen Goolspy  –  81,000  (14 bb)

And here are the 41 players who were eliminated inside the money on Day 1G:

29th:  Frank Kopasz  –  $1,200
30th:  Dennis Longoria  –  $1,200
31st:  Oscar Morales  –  $1,200
32nd:  Keith Kwazar  –  $1,200
33rd:  Jin Jeong  –  $1,200
34th:  Mel Weiner  –  $1,200
35th:  Ken Murphy  –  $1,200
36th:  Gene Lee  –  $1,200
37th:  Caufman Talley  –  $1,200
38th:  Vance Lee  –  $1,200
39th:  Richard Thomas  –  $1,200
40th:  Barry Smith  –  $1,200
41st:  Alexandre Moreau  –  $1,200
42nd:  Stacey Nutini  –  $1,200
43rd:  Denis Ethier  –  $1,200
44th:  Laurent Polito  –  $1,200
45th:  Kenny Lay  –  $1,200
46th:  Juan Ramirez  –  $1,200
47th:  Joshua Broadway  –  $1,200
48th:  TM Williams  –  $900
49th:  Denis Murphy  –  $900
50th:  Andrew Meas  –  $900
51st:  Maya Antonius  –  $900
52nd:  Yury Gulyy  –  $900
53rd:  Italo Palao  –  $900
54th:  Rick Garvey  –  $900
55th:  Nicholas Christodoulides  –  $900
56th:  Donald Williamson  –  $900
57th:  Mark Larsen  –  $900
58th:  J.J. Liu  –  $900
59th:  Javier Mateos  –  $900
60th:  John Agnos  –  $900
61st:  Hui Wang  –  $900
62nd:  Kevin Gerhart  –  $900
63rd:  Fabrizio D’Agostino  –  $900
64th:  Christopher Falanga  –  $900
65th:  Mia Liu  –  $900
66th:  Andrew Luker  –  $900
67th:  Shane Born  –  $900
68th:  Michele Schell  –  $900

The final two flights will be played tomorrow (Monday) at 11:00 am and 7:00 pm, and they will be turbo flights with 20-minute levels. Registration remains open with unlimited re-entries for 2 1/2 hours (1:30 pm for Turbo Flight 1H and 9:30 pm for Turbo Flight 1I). Day 2 begins on Tuesday, July 4th at 2:00 pm, and the nine-handed final table begins on Wednesday, July 5th at 2:00 pm.

Stay tuned to WPT.com for continuing coverage throughout WPT500 Las Vegas.

Photography by Joe Giron / PokerPhotoArchive.com