The World Poker Tour is going “old school”this weekend, harkening back to the days when tournament poker was “may thebest man win” and you actually had to think about your actions! The WPT’syearly stop at the Commerce Casino for the 2020 WPT L. A. Poker Classic hasdrawn out the players once again as the turnstiles spun heading into the tournamentarena. After the initial day of battle Demo Kiriopoulos, who has been on a runof late, holds the chip lead as Day Two looms.
$ 9,500 + 500 No Limit Hold'em - WPT L.A. Poker Classic (LAPC) Main Event: Final table to be played at HyperX Esports Arena in Las Vegas on April 2, 2020 Sun 1 Mar $ 2,140 No Limit Hold'em - 6-Handed (Event #63) Canada Kristen Bicknell: Mon 2 Mar $ 2,140 Pot Limit Omaha (Event #64) Russia Maksim Pisarenko: Mon 2 Mar.
- A total of 490 entries were made in 2020 World Poker Tour L.A. Poker Classic $10,000 buy-in no-limit hold’em main event, creating a prize pool of $4,727,550. After five full days of tournament action, the field has been narrowed down to just six players left to battle it out for the title and the top prize of $1,000,000.
- I'm back in LA and ready for my first Poker Tournament of the YEAR! Turns out 202 is year of the Rat and I'm most DEFINITELY going for the CHEESE!
La Poker Classic 2020 Winner
Do You Remember When?
The WPT LAPC is a throwback to the waythat tournament poker USED to be played. There are no multiple Day Ones of play,there’s no “re-entry” into the tournament, you put up your $10,000 andliterally let the chips fall where they may. The players seem to desire thisformat as, through Day One on Saturday, 461 players stepped up for battle. Theone current change to tournament poker that WPT Executive Tournament DirectorMatt Savage has kept for the WPT LAPC is late registration, which will go onuntil the end of Level 11 this afternoon (approximately 3:30PM Pacific Time).
Starting with 40K in chips and facing eight,one-hour levels of play, the players didn’t want to waste a minute on thesidelines. When the call to “shuffle up and deal” was made, 227 players hadalready taken their seats on their personal patches of felt. This includedseveral top professionals including Kitty Kuo, Shaun Deeb, Maria Ho, KristenBicknell and WPT Champions’ Club members Dylan Wilkerson, Dylan Linde and LeeMarkholt.
While these players battled it out, asteady stream of players continued to flood the tournament battleground. AsLevel 3 of the eight planned on the day started, 362 players had stepped up withtheir $10K and dreams of grandeur. Defending champion David ‘ODB’ Baker was oneof these who joined the fray at this time, joined by Ryan Laplante, Anton Wiggand Baker’s fellow Champions’ Club member Aaron Van Blarcum.
Joseph Cheong either wasn’t into the freezeoutformat or had trouble adjusting his normal game to the LAPC format. He was partof the crowd who came in after Level 3, but he only lasted two and a half ORBITS(that’s roughly 23 hands, folks) before busting out in his one and only chance.‘Sublime’ tried to keep it light (maybe?), Tweeting to his followers:
Plenty of Carnage, Plenty of Success
Cheong wasn’t the only person to fallvictim to the “one and done” format for the WPT LAPC. Julien Martini, CordGarcia, Aaron Mermelstein, Nick Pupillo, Jean ‘Prince’ Gaspard, James Calderaro,Harrison Gimbel, Anthony Zinno, Andrew Lichtenberger, Andy Frankenberger anddefending GPI Player of the Year Alex Foxen all would find the exit before theend of the Day One action. But that didn’t mean there wasn’t plenty of successout in the crowd.
Kiriopoulos, who made the final table of the WPT Fallsview Poker Classic last month in defense of his 2019 championship before finishing in fifth place, steadily climbed his way through the field. Kiriopoulos admitted to the WPT Live Updates crew that he’s “playing really well,” as represented by the 255,600 in chips that he’s accumulated through the first eight levels of Day One. Much like that event in Fallsview, however, Kiriopoulos will have some serious competition amongst the 271 players that will come back to the felt (plus any late regging stragglers):
La Poker Classic 2021 Schedule
1. Demo Kiriopoulos, 255,600
2. Jordan Cristos, 210,300
3. Levon Khachatryan, 208,100
4. Danny Wong, 202,300
5. Kazuhiko Yotsushika, 192,400
6. Matthew Leecy, 183,200
7. Dylan Linde, 178,400
8. Ryan Laplante, 176,000
9. Yen Dang, 165,800
10. Barry Hutter, 163,700
Lurking down the leaderboard are such players as Matas Cimbolas (163,000), Matt Affleck (143,700), Upeshka De Silva (139,800), and “blast from the past” Ted Forrest (135,200).
The 271 players today still don’t know what they’re playing for as late registration is open until the conclusion of Level 11. This should guarantee that the field will crack the 500-player mark and ensure that the prize pool will crack the $5 million mark (last year’s event reached 546 players). There will be an extension to the time of the levels, too; instead of the one-hour levels of Day One, Day Two will feature five, 90-minute levels before play concludes for the night. By this point, we should have all the info on the prize pool, the number of players paid and what the eventual champion will walk away with, expected to be a million-dollar payday.