The 2024 World Series of Poker $10,000 Main Event No-Limit Hold’em World Championship, famously known as the WSOP MAIN EVENT, shattered records with a roaring 10,112 player turnout. After several days of intense poker, including four Day 1 flights, two Day 2 flights, and a Day 3, the bubble finally burst on Day 4. This brought a wave of excitement as the remaining 1,518 players were guaranteed a piece of the $94,041,600 prize pool. Rapid eliminations followed, and by the end of play, only 464 players remained to advance to Day 5.
Navigating to the top of the chip counts was bracelet holder and first ever WPT World Prime Championship winner, Stephen Song, with 190 bb bagged. At his heels was four-time bracelet champion Adrian Mateos from Spain with 180 bb.
Biao Ding Ranked 5th In Chips
For the 87 entering Asian players, it was a brutal day. Two missed the money while another 55 were stopped to cut down the contingent to just 28 players. Still in the running for the life-changing world title and $10,000,000 top prize is China’s Biao Ding who continued his strong run to climb up the rung into 5th rank with a comfortable 171 bb stack. Biao Ding has had much success in the Triton Poker Super High Roller Series events and has yet to make a deep run in 2024 WSOP events. Maybe this is the time. Other Chinese huge stacks were Wai Kit Lo (114 bb) and Yake Wu (112 bb).
America-based Chinese player Tony Ren Lin is also very much in contention with 77 bb. Not too far behind are Ma Li (59 bb),Dian Shi (55 bb), Xuangui Wu (50 bb), Hongru Zhang (43 bb), Jingwei Guo (38 bb), and Yuan Yuo (26 bb.)
Jangkyu Lee, Danny Tang, Kavin Shah, Nevan Chang Among Asian Contenders
Jangkyu Lee has been the player to watch from South Korea. Entering Day 2 in the top 10, Lee maintained his big stack through Day 3 and bagged 110 bb at the end of Day 4. Another advancing South Korean was Sangwon Ko with 34 bb.
Hong Kong poker pros / bracelet winners Danny Tang and Anson Tsang will continue their big hunt. Tang is on the average with 58 bb while three-time bracelet winner Tsang needs to do some work with 21 bb. Fellow Hong Kong player Ivan Hon Cheong Lee will also be returning with a healthy 41 bb. Lee has already cashed six times this series. Wherever he places, he will have earned his largest WSOP payout.
Only two players from India found a bag, Kavin Shah (89 bb) and Tarun Goyal (46 bb). Both players have been impressive since the start. Goyal was one of the top stacks at the end of Day 2 and Shah laddered up high in Day 4 and is well on his way to surpassing his 446th finish at the 2017 Main Event.
Japan once had over 50 players into Day 2, that has now trimmed to just 6 players vying for the title: Hiroki Nawa (72 bb), Tasuko Maruo (40bb), Tomoki Matsuda (32 bb), Ryoh Hasegawa (26 bb), Kyosuke Nagami (25 bb), and Takumi Matsumoto (19 bb). Bracelet winners Naoya Kihara and Shiina Okamoto along with high roller Hiroyuki Noda were among those that failed to advance.
There is still hope for Vietnam with Quang Pham as the lone flag bearer through to Day 5. He is in good shape with 53 bb. For Taiwan, only four remain led by the highly decorated Nevan Chang with 70 bb. Chang has been running hot at the series with multiple deep runs that includes near bracelet 3rd place finish. Close by is Chi Jen Chen with 63 bb. While most of Chen’s accomplishments are on home soil, he is revered as one of Taiwan’s best. Joining Chen are Haoshan Huang (53 bb), and Kuan Yu Lin (39 bb).
*Day 5 is now underway. Stay tuned for the next update.
Tricia David
Tricia David has long experience as a recreational poker player and has been covering poker events since 2010 for numerous outfits in Asia. She spent one year working part time with Poker Portal Asia then became editor and lead writer for all event coverage of the Philippine Poker Tour (PPT). Under the PPT, she overlooked content for their website, and produced live updates on all their events. In addition, she served as the live and online events website content writer for the Asian Poker Tour. Currently, she does live events reporting in Asia for online news site Somuchpoker and is also one of their news contributors.
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