Sharpe Holds Massive Chip Lead as 133 Players Advance to Day 2
The 2012/2013 World Series of Poker Circuit continued on Saturday with Day 1 action from the Horseshoe Council Bluffs, which is in Iowa just across the Missouri River from Omaha, Nebraska. Day 1a and 1b both played out and completed twelve 40-minute levels of play, with the former flight drawing 234 runners and the latter 128 for a total of 362 players��a nearly 25% attendance increase from the year prior. A combined 133 players (89 from Day 1a and 44 from Day 1b) managed to survive to Day 2, with Scott Sharpe and his stack of 289,500 leading the way.
��I ran good,�� Sharpe told PokerNews after he bagged and tagged. ��Coolered a few people to be honest.�� Sharpe, who has finished runner-up in two previous WSOP Circuit events, was modest when asked how it felt to bag up the chip lead. ��Long way to go still, but I��m very excited for tomorrow."
On Day 1a, Kelly Cortum got some of his chips in Level 7 (200/400/50) against local pro and circuit regular Drazen Ilich. It happened on a 
flop when Cortum bet 3,000 from the small blind and Ilich raised to 6,500 from the cutoff. Cortum reraised to 12,000, Ilich called and the two saw the 
turn. Cortum moved all in for Ilich's last 24,000 and Ilich simply said, "You got it," before folding. Cortum claimed that he had flopped a set.
While it took 12 levels for Cortum to amass his Day-1a-leading stack, it only to Scott Sharpe seven levels to surpass it on Day 1b. In Level 7 (200/400/50) Sharp became involved in a massive four-way all-in pot that saw him and another player each holding 
. Another player held 
, while the player with the best hand had 
. The 
flop put Sharp and his counterpart out in front, and they'd end up chopping the pot after the appeared on the turn followed by the 
river. That pot boosted Sharp's stack to 150,000.
In Level 9 (300/600/75), a big hand took place that saw Sharpe get richer. It happened when Eddie Blumenthal opened and an unknown player in Seat 1 three-bet to 7,500. Sharpe then opted to move all in from the button and put the pressure on his opponents. Blumenthal thought long and hard before calling off for around 45,000 with , Seat 1 did the same with the 
, but both players were behind the of Sharp. The ten-high flop, which contained two spades, made things interesting, as did the turn, but the 
blanked on the river and Sharp scored the double elimination to chip up to 185,000.
Others who fell on Day 1a included Larry Ormson, Arkady Tsinis, Rex Clinkscales, Jason Mayfield, Kat Bowen, Bernard Lee, Mitch Schock, Tripp Kirk, and Mark ��P0ker H0�� Kroon. All of those players opted to re-enter on Day 1b, but only the first four from that list made it through to Day 2.
While many fell, a laundry list of notables are still in contention. They include the defending champ Scott Stanko (19,500); the all-time WSOP Circuit ring winner Alex Masek (27,400); the all-time WSOP Circuit leader for most cashes Doug ��Rico�� Carli (43,000); the Brothers Hinkle, Blair and Grant (46,200 and 78,500); five-time ring winner Ari Engel (63,000); and WSOP bracelet winner Robert Cheung (92,500).
Day 2 is set to kick off at noon CST. Registration is open up to the start of play, which means official numbers won��t be available until Sunday afternoon. Of course PokerNews will be on hand to bring you all the live updates from that event, so be sure to follow along.