Haxton Leads The Way Into Day 2
Day 1 of the Super High Roller event at the 2012 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure has come to an end here at the Atlantis Casino and Resort. A field of 30 came to play and after two players (Bill Perkins and Jonathan Duhamel) opted to re-enter, an official 32 entries generated a prize pool of $3,136,000 with a first-place prize of $1,254,400. After eight levels of Day 1 play, Isaac Haxton leads the remaining 18 players with 1,240,000.
Haxton got off to a great start as he jumped out to the early chip lead during Level 2. The blinds were 1,200/2,400 with a 300 ante and Viktor "Isildur1" Blom kicked off the action with a raise to 2,600 from the hijack. Haxton was in the small blind and three-bet to 10,500, but that didn't stop Jonathan Duhamel (in the big blind) from four-betting to 24,200. Blom bowed out, but Haxton had other ideas. He five-bet to 42,200, leading to Duhamel six-bet shoving for about 205,000. Haxton called with 
and won a race against Duhamel's 
when the board ran out 
. That hand gave Haxton about 530,000, more than double the 250,000 starting stack.
Haxton further increased his stack towards the end of the day when he busted Justin Smith. From the hijack, Smith opened to 10,000 at the 2,000/4,000/500 level. Haxton three-bet to 30,000 from the small blind, and upon seeing Smith four-bet shove for about 246,000, he was happy to call with 
and chips to spare. Smith held 
, but was unable to hit the 
board. That gave Haxton about 930,000 en route to his finishing the day with 1,240,000.
Among those who will not be returning on Day 2 is defending champion Eugene Katchalov. After Yevgeniy Timoshenko four-bet all in with the bigger stack, Katchalov opted to call for his tournament life with 
. Timoshenko was ahead with 
and held through the 
board. Also failing to make it through Day 1 were Matt Glantz, Shawn Buchanan, Philipp Gruissem, David Benefield, Terje Augdal, Alexey Repik, Bill Perkins (twice), Sandor Demjan, and Masa Kagawa.
Here is the Day 2 table and seat draw:
| Table | Seat ? | Player ? | Chips |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | Jason Mercier? ? | 514,000? |
| 1 | 2 | --empty-- ? | — |
| 1 | 3 | Galen Hall ? | 380,000 |
| 1 | 4 | Isaac Haxton ? | 1,240,000 |
| 1 | 5 | Bertrand "ElkY" Grospellier ? | 112,000 |
| 1 | 6 | Tom Marchese ? | 158,000 |
| 1 | 7 | --empty--? | -- |
| 1 | 8 | Viktor "Isildur1" Blom | 875,000 |
| 2 | 1 | Scott Seiver ? | 365,000 |
| 2 | 2 | Daniel Negreanu ? | 346,000 |
| 2 | 3 | Erik Seidel ? | 753,000 |
| 2 | 4 | Chance Kornuth ? | 444,000 |
| 2 | 5 | ?--empty-- | -- |
| 2 | 6 | ?Humberto Brenes ? | 609,000 |
| 2 | 7 | ?--empty--? | -- |
| 2 | 8 | ? Mike McDonald ? | 577,000 |
| 3 | 1 | Dan Shak ? | 182,000 |
| 3 | 2 | --empty--? | -- |
| 3 | 3 | Yevgeniy Timoshenko ? | 174,000 |
| 3 | 4 | Jonathan Duhamel ? ? | 729,000 |
| 3 | 5 | Will Molson ? ? | 164,000 |
| 3 | 6 | Sam Stein ? | 344,000 |
| 3 | 7 | --empty--? | -- |
| 3 | 8 | David Sands ? | 47,000 |
Play resumes at noon local time tomorrow, so be sure to keep it here at PokerNews for all of the exciting action!