Home / Poker News March 2009 / National Heads-up poker championship Day 1 report
National Heads-up poker championship Day 1 report
Posted by: James Carter. - Sun, 2009-03-08 18:26
Day 1 of the NBC-sponsored National Heads-up Poker championship was a parade of big poker names and respect-worthy poker skills. Everyone who’s anyone in the world of live poker was there, as well as a few online qualifiers looking to make a name for themselves.
Paul Wasicka, Ted Forrest, Joe Hachem, Jerry Yang, Greg Raymer, Chris Ferguson, Doyle Brunson, Chris Moneymaker and Jamie Gold were all there.
The only ex Heads-up Poker Champion to be eliminated on Day 1 was Chris Ferguson, but other big names who haven’t yet had the opportunity to book a championship also headed to the rail.
Day 1 was broken up into 4 flights as the field of 64 fought 32 heads-up battles to halve the number of contenders right away. The 4 flights of players were named after the 4 poker suits. The hearts gang got off to a lighting fast start as the first 8 match-ups came to a conclusion in under an hour and a half.
Allen Cunningham was the first to fall at the hands of Sammy Farha, followed by Eric Seidel who was eliminated by John Phan. Peter Eastgate took care of Andy Bloch and Eli Elezra sent Johnny Chan to the sidelines.
Howard Lederer fell to Erick Lindgren, and Clonie Gowen got eliminated by Jerry Yang. Jamie Gold fell too, followed by JC Tran.
The winners of the diamond bracket were: Kenny Tran, who will be matched up with Jennifer Harman on Day 2, Phil Laak, David Openheim, Gus Hansen, Huck Seed, Glen Chorny and Brad Garrett.
The clubs bracket was probably the toughest one. Daniel Negreanu was among the survivors as well as Dario Mineri. The two will do battle on Day 2. Scotty Nguyen will play fellow survivor Ted Forrest. Phil Ivey will play Vanessa Rousso and Don Cheadle will do battle with Paul Wasicka.
The spades bracket saw Phil Hellmuth advance. He’ll play against Jaffrey Ishbia on Day 2. The other survivors and their match-ups are: Tom Dwan vs Barry Greenstein, Ilari Sahamies vs Bertrand Grospellier and Gabe Kaplan vs John Juanda.
Joe Hachem, Mike Sexton, Gavin Smith and Chris Ferguson were among the losers of this flight.
