Sanchez Tops List of Players Headed to Day 2 in Vicksburg

Head to PokerNews.com to keep up with the action for this HPT Main Event from Vicksburg, Mississippi.

Day 1b of the HPT Ameristar Vicksburg $1,100 Main Event saw 90 entrants battle it out to attempt and advance to Day 2 along with the ten players that made it through on Day 1a. After fifteen levels of play, Sley Sanchez managed to bag up 652,000, almost 300k more than his closest competitor, to take the overall chip lead into Day 2.

Sanchez started building a stack early in the day, as he managed to double up his 30,000 starting stack in the first few levels. Sanchez then dropped down to under starting stack just before registration closed, but a double KO in Level 10 helped propel him back up the counts. Sanchez then went on a tear through the final few levels, closing out his night by taking the last of David Lee's chips to seal up his chip-leading stack.

Hannah Guthrie (380,000) and Yousef Saleh (315,000) were the only other players to crest 300k, while Jason Riesenberg(296,000) and CT Hoffecker (256,000) round out the top five. The rest of the advancing field includes Kip Jones (227,000), Corey Harrison (198,000), Jaron Bailey (116,000), Shomari Williams (115,000), Morgan McBrayer (74,000) and Nolan Burton (72,000).

Phil Gilreath and John Cressend fought valiantly through the day, but were knocked out in the final seven hands of the evening to leave us with eleven players returning from the Day 1b flight. Others unfortunate enough to fail to advance to Day 2 include Dustin Stewart, Marco Moran, David Brooks, Arthur Holloway, Gavin Munroe, Jared Ingles, Rebecca Campbell, Harinder Chawla, Larry White, Tara Snow and Henry Friedler.

The remaining 21 players will return at Noon on Sunday, August 11th, to play down to the televised Final Table of nine. Action will start at Level 16 (2,000/5,000/5,000) and levels will continue to be forty minutes in length. The final eighteen players will make the money, with the following payouts: