They consisted of John Phan , Hassan Habib , Dan Heimiller , Surinder Sunar , Randy Jensen and David Williams !

We start with 5000 in chips and get to take the second 5000 any time in the next 3 levels which are 90 minutes each then you automatically get them .

The table was playing fast , first hand i played i lost 800 , i had a great hand TJ KQds , flop was T J A rainbow , David checked , i bet pot , he called , turn was a K , both checked , river an A , David bet 600 , i passed and showed the nut straight , he showed his Aces full .

I then got AA KQss in the SB , i raised to 100 , got three callers , flop was 7 T J with my nut flush draw , i checked , Dan bet 400 , one caller and obviously with a top wrap and nut flush draw i called , turn a 6 , i checked , Dan bet 1600 , the other player , i think it was Celine Dions husband called as did i , river an A , i have the nuts and bet 2200 all in , Dan calls for 1850 and CD's husband passed , Dan had 89 as expected and thought i was bluffing .

The last hand in this level i was on the button with AQ 9Tss , flop was T 7 4 with my nut flush draw , John bet 550 and i reraised 2000 , all passed to John who called , turn was a 6 , he went all in , his hand was AJ 65 , he missed as Q of spades made my nut flush , i was now already up to 18,900 and with blinds going up to 25 50 there was no way i wasn't going to do better than the $5000 where i had spent most of the day short stacked .

In the second level i got moved and spent a while passing and learning the table , i only played one hand but it was a key hand , there was a raise and one caller , in the SB i had AA 64ds in spades and hearts , i reraised pot and got three callers , flop was T high all spades , i bet pot 4700 , two passed but the third started to count his chips , has he got top set and thinks i have the bare A or even better has he slow played KK and has the second nuts , is he going to call or raise , i got my answer , he reraised all in for a total of 16,000 , this is the best feeling in poker , i called and he turned over the K flush !

I finished the level top three chip leader in the tournament with 34,925.

In level 3 i again could take my time and only won one good pot , i limped with AA 95ss . Paul Maxfield raised on the button , i called , flop was 2 3 9 , i checked , Paul bet 550 , i raised pot and Paul called , turn was the Q of my nut flush , i bet pot and Paul called for his last 1600 , he still had his 5000 add on ticket , he had 44 59 , a 4 was no good to him as it made my straight , the river i hit my flush , i finished the level with 51,175

Our table got broke and i was now again with David Williams who had a slight chip lead on me , i was intending to avoid him and take on everyone else until this happened , David makes alot of small raises , two called and in the BB i called with AT J3ss , flop was T 5 7 , all checked , turn a J , i checked , David bet 2000 , to me i reraised to 5500 , he called , i put him on AK QJ , river was an 8 , i checked , he bet 8000 , pot was 29,000 , this was an important decision , i thought through the betting and decided he can't have Q9 for the straight so why bet , the only answer was he had QQ and therefore could represent the straight , i called with my top two pair , he had AK QQ , i finished the level with 64,750 .

During level 5 i had another important call , Derek Baxter raised and i flat called with KK 93ss , flop was J 8 5 all hearts , i had the K flush , we both checked , turn was an A , Derek checked and i bet 750 , he then reraised to 2000 , i had seen him raise preflop three times , twice he showed AA , i decided he most likely had them again but if he had the A of hearts it could be bare , i called , river was a blank and Derek bet 7000 , i decided to go with my original read and called saying i think you've got the bare A , i showed my K flush and Derek did indeed have AA with the bare A , another increase in chips to finish the level with 74,950 .

I was now clear chip leader in the field and they decided to break our table , with one level to go i was happy to sit back , i knew the average was around 25,000 and i had treble . My new table consisted of Barny Boatman , Huck Seed , Tommy Grimes , Peter Costa on my immediate left and second chip leader with 65,000 and Barry Greenstien with 45,000 .

For the first hour i passed every hand then i finally found one to play , i limped in behind Tommy with A8 8Tds in spades and diamonds , Barry on the button raised to 1500 , both of us called , flop was 4 J Q with two spades , my nut flush draw and a 9 or a K for a straight , Tommy and i checked and Barry bet 4000 , Tommy passed , i called , at this time i assumed he had a straight draw or an overpair with a flush draw , turn was an A , i checked , Barry bet 12,000 , i thought for a while and decided he either had made the nut straight or he had the blockers , ie KK with the K flush draw , with so much in the pot and the fact he still had 28,000 i decided to call , it was posible my Aces were winning and i dtill had my original outs or i needed a K to tie or the perfect card a non pairing spade , river was the 2 of spades giving me the nuts , now against an average player i would probably bet here about half their stack but if Barry had the nuts on the turn with the bare K i get nothing , however if he thinks i called on the turn with the same straight and he has now made his K flush if i check it he may bet , i checked , he counted his chips and finally bet 17,500 leaving around 11,000 , i now need to extract the remainder , i looked at the flop as if to say , is he bluffing me with the bare K when we both have the straight ? then i seperated the 17,500 to call and counted the rest of my chips as if to make it look as though if i called and was wrong how much would i have left , i then said raise and doubled his bet , he now said to me " you think that long with the nuts" trying to get a read , by now several players have come over as this is a huge pot , i stare at the pot , i had probably taken 2 to three minutes to raise putting enough doubt into his mind that i was bluffing with the bare A , but would he call ?

Eventually having counted the pot and his remaining chips he called , now bear in mind the average chips for the next day was 27,000 but the blinds were only 200 400 so he still had over 20 times the big blind , as he pushed his chips in he said " nuts is good " , i nodded my head and went mm and knowing the spades were on top flipped up the 8 then the A .

As he left the table some of the players congratulated me on my play and others said why didn't he just check and showdown the second nuts , who knows , i now ended the first day massive chip leader with 118,900 but there are two more days to go .