$1,650 Tampa Poker Classic Main Event
$300,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 11: 500/1,500 with a 1,500 ante
Day 1A Players Remaining: 26 of 74

Flight A dropped down to three tables with nearly three hours left in their day. We should get down under two tables before the night is through and everyone is trying to advance to Day 2.

Joseph Orsino is still in the mix after having a good run at the tables yesterday. He finished 18th out of 287 in the $570 Deepstack tournament and immediately jumped into the $300 Pot Limit Omaha 8/Big O tournament. There Orsino made the final table and finished seventh for two payouts in one day.

$1,650 Tampa Poker Classic Main Event
$300,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 11: 500/1,500 with a 1,500 ante
Day 1A Players Remaining: 28 of 74

Flight A is shrinking and they are close to hitting three tables. James Kerr did his part to put them a little lower when he sent Denis Cyr to rail. He’s over 150,000 and in contention for the end-of-day lead.

$1,650 Tampa Poker Classic Main Event
$300,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 10: 500/1,000 with a 1,000 ante
Day 1A Players Remaining: 36 of 74

Main Event Flight A players are back from dinner and registration has closed. The first session drew 74 entries to put it $111,000 on the way to the $300,000 guaranteed prize pool with two more huge flights to go.

There are six more levels remaining in the day, with a break in the middle, and survivors will bag up for a Day 2 return on Sunday.

$1,650 Tampa Poker Classic Main Event
$300,000 Guaranteed | Structure
End of Level 9: 400/800 with a 800 ante
Day 1A Entries: 73

Level 9 expired and players in the Main Event are on a one-hour dinner break. There are currently 73 players in the game putting the prize pool at unofficial $109,500. Registration and re-entry will close when play resumes at roughly 6:30pm.

Mark Radcliff leads on break with 177,000 followed by Karl Manouchakian with 153,000 and Chris Boyle’s 150,000.

$1,650 Tampa Poker Classic Main Event
$300,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 9: 400/800 with a 800 ante
Day 1A Entries: 71

Another Florida local is in the Main Event game here at the Tampa Poker Classic. David Prociak has long crushed Seminole Poker events with eight career wins. On any given tour, few are as accomplished as Prociak is in Florida. His wins in Florida have predominantly been in Hollywood, but Prociak has experienced Tampa success, too.

It was during the December 2017 Winter Poker Open when Prociak scored an outright win in a $350 Deep Stack tournament ultimately good for more than $40,000.

Prociak has a tough table draw here in the early Main Event flight with last night’s third-place finisher Brian Arbaugh on his direct left.

$1,650 Tampa Poker Classic Main Event
$300,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 8: 300/600 with a 600 ante
Day 1A Entries: 69

Wally Maddah calls Seminole Hard Rock Tampa his home and he’s making himself at home here in the Poker Classic Main Event. It was a rough start, taking a huge hit to his stack early, but he’s battled back a bit and settled in to it at his table.

There was recently a modest pot of about 7,000 and Maddah fired 1,500 into it. The button thought for a moment, then called turning over a pair of kings. Maddah tabled kings as well and the pair chopped it up for no blood. A small one slipped away from Maddah as his stack sits at roughly 20,000 from 30,000 starting.

$1,650 Tampa Poker Classic Main Event
$300,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 7: 300/500 with a 500 ante
Day 1A Entries: 64

Another break is in the books and another batch of big stacks are emerging. Jason Goldman is making the most of this opening day of play in the Seminole Hard Rock Tampa Poker Classic Main Event. From a starting stack of 30,000, he has over 80,000 and is crushing Table 15. Goldman, a Florida regular, likes this pricepoint having cashed $1,650s in Hollywood, Immokalee and Tampa.

The clock currently shows 64 entries in the action putting the prizepool just south of six figures.

$1,650 Tampa Poker Classic Main Event
$300,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 6: 200/400 with a 400 ante
Day 1A Entries: 58

Karl Manouchakian’s participation in this $1,650 buy-in, $300,000 guarantee comes as a surprise to no one. The Tampa area pro is one of the room’s biggest supporters — and one of its biggest earners. A huge of his quarter-million in lifetime scores came right here in Tampa. Most notably, he won a huge re-entry event during the 2016 WPTDeepStacks-Tampa and ultimately donned Player of the Series honors.

The Seminole Hard Rock Tampa Poker Classic Main Event is expected to draw a bunch more notables and some new faces as play moves into the weekend installment.

$1,650 Tampa Poker Classic Main Event
$300,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 4: 100/200 with a 200 ante
Day 1A Entries: 53

The first break’s a wrap and the day’s fourth level is almost done. The clock now shows more than 50 entries in the Thursday play and it’s Chris Dombrowski that’s amassed one of the biggest stacks.

Dombrowski, who hails from Dade City, Florida, is a gold bracelet champion and owns more than 80 career reported cashes. At present, he’s flirting with 70,000 chips here in Tampa and has doubled up and then some during the early play.

$1,650 Tampa Poker Classic Main Event
$300,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 2: 100/100 with a 100 ante
Day 1A Entries: 33

The Thursday morning crowd is slowly getting its legs as the Seminole Hard Rock Tampa Poker Classic Main Event Day 1A clock shows 33 entries midway through Level 2. It’s a modest start in the big buy-in event and registration and re-entry are open all the way until 7:30pm to give the field time to grow much bigger.

We will touch base with the field and look at a few of the chip leaders following the first break.