Day 1b Wraps Up, Neilson on Top
Another day of action from Sydney has wrapped up here at the Star City Hotel & Casino for the 2010 PokerStars.net APPT Grand Final.
Today's field only drew 68 players. That's down from yesterday's 75 and not really the type of field you'd expect to see for the Grand Final given the big numbers it's put up in the past years. Last year, 109 players came out for Day 1b. Knowing that makes the number from today seem even smaller.
Joining action today were former APPT Sydney champions Grant Levy and Martin Rowe. Former APPT Macau champion Eddy Sabat was also in the field today. The biggest name though belonged to a member of Team PokerStars Pro. That player was none other than world champion Daniel Negreanu. He's not the only WSOP bracelet winner that played because newly minted bracelet winner Simon Watt also played. Negreanu wrapped up the day with 57,400 and Watt with 59,200. Here's a few of the other notables counts at the end of the day.
| Player | Chips |
|---|---|
| Daniel Neilson | 164,100 |
| Aaron Tran | 147,200 |
| Grant Levy | 92,900 |
| Jay Kinkade | 82,500 |
| Eddy Sabat | 79,200 |
| Andrew Hinrichsen | 64,000 |
| Brendon Rubie | 46,700 |
| Martin Rowe | 24,100 |
Leading the way is Daniel Neilson as you can see by the counts above. He had a great day on the felt as did Aaron Tran, who finished up in second place on the leader board. At the end of the day, 39 players remained who will be moving on to Day 2.
The final start day, Day 1c, kicks off tomorrow at 12:30 p.m. local time. It should easily be the largest of the starting days and should include the Hachem brothers, Tony and Joe, Chris Moneymaker, Jeff Lisandro, Tyron Krost, James Obst and Jarred Graham. It's going to be another great day of poker and you can bet that PokerNews will be bringing you all of the action from the floor! We'll see you then.