Santiago Leads the Final 15 of Day 1a in Jamul Main Event
The first of three flights in the RunGood Poker Series $600 Main Event drew out a total of 119 entrants, over eight levels of registration. The crown jewel of the stop drew out many faces yet to appear this week at Jamul Casino in San Diego, California. After the dust settled, just 15 survived to guarantee themselves a piece of the $150,000 guaranteed prize pool.
Leading the way is Fernando Santiago, who ended his day with 639,000. Securing his second ever RGPS cash, from level 12 onwards it was Santiago who sat atop of the counts until the last card of the deck was dealt for the day. Hailing from San Diego, it was last year at Jamul Casino where Santiago won his first trophy with the Helix Poker Series. He returned to Jamul with a vengeance as he flirted with crossing the 700k mark multiple times today. He looks to utilize his massive stack to propel him to his first ring.
Rounding out the podium are a couple of familiar faces of Jamul Casino. Sitting in second holding 472,000 is Cody Blades, who ended the night by knocking out Noel Eicher. Having already made two final tables this week at the series, Blades is looking to capitalize on his momentum this week and better his 41st place finish from his last RGPS Main Event cash. Sitting in third place is the only former champion to advance, Nova Baghdasarian sits with 396,000 in third. It was three years ago now that Baghdasarian took home his Main Event title here at Jamul for $40,950 and now he sits in good position to make another deep run in this event. He looks to repeat the feat of Derrick Yamada and others, to dominate a stop and take home two main event titles.
Top 10 Day 1A Chip Counts
| Place | Name | Chip Count |
| 1 | Fernando Santiago | 639,000 |
| 2 | Cody Blades | 472,000 |
| 3 | Nova Baghdasarian | 396,000 |
| 4 | Derek Stark | 238,000 |
| 5 | Justin Muse | 219,000 |
| 6 | Tim Acker | 216,000 |
| 7 | Brett Feder | 210,000 |
| 8 | Allen Moheimani | 197,000 |
| 9 | Randy Shamo | 188,000 |
| 10 | Roy Dahl | 178,000 |
Fortune did not smile upon all today as many of the familiar faces fell by the wayside. Anastasia Knapp would not be able to find a bag this flight. She would join the sidelines with Rip Fritzer, Smriti Dewari, Anthony Bland, Conrad Simpson, Robert Fortuno, and two-time RGPS Jamul Main Event Champion Derrick Yamada. Each one of them eagerly waits for tomorrow to come, so they can have another shot at claiming the first West Coast main event title of this RunGood season.
Play ended with 16:45 left in Level 15, with blind at 4,000/8,000, with a 8,000 big blind ante. This will be the level the players will return to unless another flight ends earlier.
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