WSOP Day 1A: PartyPoker players enjoy early success

By Simon Young

About 1,300 players started today’s charge for glory, but despite the super-slow structure – the slowest in WSOP Main Event history after three levels were added in the early period – players have been falling on the Rio battlefield at an alarming rate.

But for every broken body heading for the exit, one warrior is stacking the rewards of his kill.

Michael Berger: his stock is rising 

I’m pleased to say that two PartyPoker players are joining the early pacesetters. Germany’s Michael Berger had around 36,000 at the end of level two, not, he says, thanks to a massive pot, but thanks to steady accumulation.

Michael plays the stock markets back in Bavaria, so he knows a thing or two about risk and reward. Right now, his chip portfolio is nicely on the up.

Doing even better is PartyPoker qualifier Vartan Ohannesian, from Sweden, the proud owner of more than 40,000 chips. We’ll try and find out more about how he got them.

Vartan Ohannesian  sits with 40,000

Meanwhile the gaming expo has opened at the Rio, and all spectators are directed through the hall before they can make it to the Amazon Room to watch the poker. The expo is full of leggy lovelies who seem to be in competition for the tightest trousers or shortest skirts. Some, it seems to me, seem to be more or less in their underwear alone. I noted this purely for journalistic reasons, obviously.