The 2011 World Series of Poker is definitely not feeling any aftereffects from Black Friday, considering the field sizes have not just been good thus far; they have been sensational! The $500 Casino Employee tournament saw a huge increase over last year’s field; the $25k Heads-Up Championship drew 128 players bestowing on it the honor of being the largest prize-pool ever for a Heads-Up tournament; and event #3, a $1,500 Omaha 8 tournament, produced the largest turnout in the history of the event.

A total of 925 players registered for the event –besting last year’s mark by more than 100 entrants and narrowly beating the 2009 record of 918. Amongst the entrants were a slew of poker’s biggest names looking to win an early bracelet like Daniel Negreanu, Erik Seidel, Phil Hellmuth, and Tom Dwan. After a long day of action just 210 players had chips to bag at the end of the night with Canadian Guilaumme Rivet leading the way with 71,200 chips.

Here is a look at the Top 10 chip counts heading into Day 2 of the tournament which is scheduled for 3 days:

1. Guilaumme Rivet – 71,200
2. Andy Seth – 61,700
3. Gary Bolden – 60,000
4. Richard Monroe – 59,900
5. Cary Falk – 59,800
6. James Dempsey – 58,900
7. Francesco Barbaro – 58,800
8. Sorel Mizzi – 56,400
9. Michael Jensen – 46,000
10. Humberto Brenes – 44,000

Tags: Aftereffects, Attendance Record, Barbaro, Black Friday, Daniel Negreanu, Erik Seidel, Falk, Heads Up Tournament, Heads-Up Championship, James Dempsey, Leading The Way, Michael Jensen, phil hellmuth, Prize Pool, Seth, Slew, Sorel Mizzi, Tom Dwan, world series, World Series of Poker

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