Duhamel, the 2010 WSOP Main Event champ, is one of 71 players who made the trek to Macau for the first-ever GuangDong Asia Millions (GDAM) and the trip is paying off so far as he bagged up 6,080,000 for the Day 1 lead.
Taking advantage of his two HKD $1m (USD $130k) re-buys after busting once, Duhamel used his new double stack well to take a slight edge on a stacked field of 51 pros remaining heading into Day 2.
Haxton, Dang and Cheong Among Chasers
Drawing in an elite lineup of foreign grinders to mix with a field of local businessman, the GDAM prize pool of USD $15.4 million is officially the second-biggest ever created according to the PokerStars blog.
With 71 unique players and 54 total rebuys, the first-place prize ballooned to $4.46 million and the top six will all take home seven-figure paydays.
Chasing Duhamel at the top of the counts for their share of the massive pool are notable pros Isaac Haxton (5,658,000), Sorel Mizzi (5,649,000), Di Dang (4,104,000) and Joe Cheong (4,052,000).
Dan "KingDan" Smith, JC Alvarado, Max "altifc" Altergott, Mike "Timex" McDonald, John Juanda, Gus Hansen, Greg Merson and Bertrand "ElkY" Grospellier are just a few of the other big names still in contention.
Deeb Runs into Straight Flush
Among the unfortunate Day 1 bustees were Erik Seidel, Mike "SirWatts" Watson and Shaun Deeb, who suffered the brutal fate of running the nut flush into JC Alvarado's straight flush.
Follow along with the live stream from the PokerStars City of Dreams right here on PokerListings until the champ is crowned. The top 10 in chips after Day 1:
The payouts:
1 - $34,600,000 HKD ($4,464,516 USD) 2 - $24,500,000 ($3,161,290) 3 - $16,100,000 ($2,077,419) 4 - $12,525,000 ($1,616,129) 5 - $10,200,000 ($1,316,129) 6 - $8,300,000 ($1,070,968) 7 - $7,150,000 ($922,581) 8 - $6,000,000 ($774,194)Visit www.pokerlistings.com