$400 No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
$200,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 1:  100/100 with a 100 ante

The first multi-flight event on the Tampa Poker Classic is already a success and tonight we will hit the first milestone. The first two flights drew 418 entries to leave it only 180 away from pushing the prize pool over the $200,000 guarantee.

The $400 buy-in tournament should easily get that in Flight C and leave a lot of room for growth with Flights D and E on Friday and Saturday.

Players start with 20,000 stacks and the first 14 levels last 30 minutes going up to 40 from Level 15 till the final table. Late registration and unlimited re-entries are available until the start of Level 9 at 10:30 pm.

Play will continue in Flight C until only 10% of the field remains and those players will advance to Day 2 on Sunday at 11 am in the money.

• $200,000 Guaranteed Prize Pool
• Players begin with 20,000 in chips
• Levels 1-14 last 30 minutes; Levels 15+ last 40 minutes
• Late registration/re-entry available until start of Level 9 (10:30pm)
• Day 1 will end when 10% of the field remains
• Event 2 Structure Sheet

Chip counts through Flight A

$400 No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
$200,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 13:  1,500/3,000 with a 3,000 ante
Players Remaining:  42 of 243

Flight B is back underway with only 42 players remaining and close to breaking another table. They will play two more levels before the next break and blinds go to 40 minutes starting with Level 15.

We have another new big stack in the tournament with Onder Ekinci building a nice castle. He dragged a late pot and returned to 348,500 out front for the lead.

$400 No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
$200,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 12:  1,500/2,500 with a 2,500 ante
Players Remaining:  48 of 243

Another break is rolling around not long after Flight B dropped down to the last six tables of the day. They still have to work their way down to 25 players but they can see the end on the horizon.

$400 No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
$200,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 11:  1,000/2,000 with a 2,000 ante
Players Remaining:  63 of 243

The Flight B field seems to be dropping at a faster pace than we saw for Flight A but it is destined to slow here before too long. There are 63 players at eight tables with less than half of them set to reserve a seat on Sunday.

Among those still in the game we found MT Tawfik, Marie Harrell, Jason Block, David Moses, Anthony Askey, Caleb Piderit, Rodney Turvin, and Ricardo Eyzaguirre to name a few.

$400 No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
$200,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 10:  800/1,600 with a 1,600 ante
Players Remaining:  112 of 243

The counting is complete and Flight B of TPC Event 2 drew 243 entries to push the combined total at 418 for the tournament so far. They put more than $140,000 towards the $200,000 guarantee and it will surpass that number in tonight’s flight starting at 6 pm.

Flight B will continue to play down this evening until only 25 players remain to advance to Day 2 on Sunday at 11 am in the money.

Chip counts through Flight A

$400 No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
$200,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 9:  600/1,200 with a 1,200 ante
Flight B Entries:  242

The second break has come and gone and registration closed for Flight B with an unofficial 242 entries. Tournament staff are seating the last stragglers and we will have the official numbers as soon as they are available.

We have a new leader in the room. Ivan Poroslay sits with the biggest stack after break with 157,500 and Tuan Nguyen is the only other player over 150K with his 150,700 putting him solidly in second place.

$400 No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
$200,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 8:  500/1,000 with a 1,000 ante
Flight B Entries:  236

Level 8 is coming to an end which means we are about ready to close registration on this big session. They will take a 15-minute break, tournament staff will color off the black chips, and we will close the book on Flight B when they return.

$400 No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
$200,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 7:  400/800 with a 800 ante
Flight B Entries:  208

While walking among the tables, we found David Moses back with us and one of those visitors we come to expect when we throw a big series. He already owns a Tampa trophy after winning the Winter Poker Open Main Event in 2019 and going for another.

Moses also picked up his first WSOP Circuit ring at our sister room in Coconut Creek but went really big this past autumn. He journeyed to Vegas for the delayed World Series of Poker and picked up a cool $888,888 for winning the $888 8-Handed Crazy Eights WSOP bracelet. That’s a lot of eights.

$400 No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
$200,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 6:  300/600 with a 600 ante
Flight B Entries:  191

We expect to see a lot of visitors make a trip for the $200,000 guarantee Championship next weekend but we’re seeing some come to town early for the big Event 2 field.

Among them, we found Roberto Bendeck, Ricardo Eyzaguirre, and father/son duo Eric and Caleb Piderit rolling into town from South Florida.

$400 No Limit Hold’em (Re-Entry)
$200,000 Guaranteed | Structure
Level 5:  300/500 with a 500 ante
Flight B Entries:  170

We have a nice group in the poker room today, all trying to run up a stack in Flight B. There are 170 entries so far with four levels and a break to jump into the game.

Patrick Lovely is the early frontrunner, pushing his 20K starting stack up to 93,800 to lead the field after four levels. But there’s still plenty of time to catch him with only 10% of the field making it through to Day 2.