The 10-day poker festival at the Atlantis Resort in the Bahamas is the much-anticipated opener to the poker season and things got off to an impressive start with a record and big-name heavy field for the $100k SHR.
With unlimited rebuys until the start of Day 2, the total prize pool has yet to be finalized but with 57 entries so far it looks to be a doozy.
Of those 57 entries 10 were re-buys, making for 47 players to hit the felt in total. Thirty-seven of those made it through to Day 2. One of the re-buyers, Gruissem, made the most of his second bullet to take the overnight chip lead with 771,500.
Close behind Gruissem is veteran pro Scott Seiver with 729,000 and high-roller specialist Dan Shak with 650,000, but with more rebuys to come and a truly elite field it's still anybody's game.
Ivey, Marchese, Mercier and Esfandiari Just Few of Big Names
Just a few of the marquee names to hit the top 10 after Day 1 include Tom Marchese, Vivek Rajkumar, Jason Somerville and Eugene Katchalov.
Also chipping up on Day 1 were Phil Ivey, Jason Mercier, Antonio Esfandiari, Bertrand "ElkY" Grospellier, Vanessa Selbst and Jonathan Duhamel.
Among those to bust and rebuy already are Daniel Negreanu, Tom Dwan and Isaac Haxton.
Busting out twice already were Bryn Kenney and British businessman Paul Newey. Phil Hellmuth has also busted and is yet ro rebuy.
2011 Super High-Roller champ Viktor Blom tweeted he won't be in the Bahamas to defend his title as he's "made more than what he cashed for last year" in the past three days on Full Tilt Poker.
Action picks up tomorrow at noon from the Atlantis Resort; follow the live updates on the PokerStars blog.
The top 10 in chips heading to Day 2:
1. Philipp Gruissem 771,500 2. Scott Seiver 729,000 3. Dan Shak 650,000 4. Tom Marchese 638,500 5. Vivek Rajkumar 608,500 6. Jason Somerville 604,500 7. Nick Schulman 580,000 8. Steve O'Dwyer 527,500 9. Eugene Katchalov 514,500 10. David Sands 505,500Visit www.pokerlistings.com