- $15.4m in total prize money, with 71 entrants and 54 rebuys.
- Second largest prize pool outside of the United States.
- The 51 remaining players play down to a final table today.
It takes a very special event to keep the top professional poker players from crossing into the borders of Nevada during the World Series of Poker and it looks like that’s exactly what the GuangDong Ltd Asia Millions (GDAM), presented by PokerStars, is: A six-figure rebuy event at the City of Dreams in Macau on the other side of the world from the action at the Rio.
Some of the biggest names in the game of poker bought in, some more than once, for the steep price of HK$1,000,000 (approximately $130,000) just for the chance to play for a piece of what become a $15.4m dollar prize pool. The first place awards over $4.4m, making GDAM the 12th largest first place prize in tournament history, and the tournament boasts the 2nd largest prize pool ever outside of the United States.
There were 71 individual entrants at the start of action on Day 1, and 54 rebuys (each was allowed a maximum or two at any time in the first four levels). Of those 71, 20 of those hit the rail and 51 return today to play down to a final table.
Although most of the entrants to the invite-only tournament were members of the Guangdong junket, a list of familiar names sit atop the chip count leaderboard: In the pole position is 2010 WSOP Main Event Champ, Jonathan Duhamel followed closely by sponsored PokerStars teammate Issac Haxton. Third in chips is the familiar name of Sorel Mizzi. Online beast Di Dang is also sitting top 5 in chips.
The tournament will play down to a final table today. Eight places pay—a “mincash” is over $770,000—and the top six win million dollar prizes.
Updates of GDAM are available on PokerStars’ blog, with live streaming coverage courtesy of PokerStars.TV.
