The 2012 WSOP has finally reached the main event. The 10 day event kicked off on Saturday the 7th of July with the first of three starting days and attracted 1,066 players, which according to WSOP.com "was a 19% increase from last year’s opening session". The main event has a buy-in of $10,000 and after the first day's session only 657 players remained. Among the known players that were kicked out during the first day of event 1A were the 12-time gold bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth, the 1993 champion Jim Bechtel and Joe Hachem who got his only bracelet after winning the 2005 main event.
The chipleader after the first day is William John who managed to get a good start; 100,000 chips a head of the second placement which is held by Gerardo Lubas who cashed $8,920 from this year's event #46. The top ten standings from Day 1A is:
1. William John - 266,700
2. Gerardo Lubas - 165,825
3. Daniel Strelitz - 164,125
4. Dane Lomas - 157,600
5. Cary Katz - 154,850
6. Benjamin Pollak - 144,200
7. Chance Kornuth - 141,775
8. Jonathan Cuevas - 141,675
9. Jared Okun - 141,350
10. Eric Kurtzman - 136,900
