High Society Has Big Day1a for $10k Guarantee

High Society Poker Club launched its first tournament last night, and it was a huge success, attracting 40 players who made for a Day 1a prize pool of $4,950. 

Miguel Ruelas sits atop the leaderboard with a commanding chip lead of 702k (starting stack is 15k). 5 other players from yesterday’s Day 1a will be joining Ruelas on Sunday for the Final. 

For me, there was no way I could miss a $10k Guaranteed prize pool (a true guarantee, not an ‘El Paso Guarantee’ with min players required) that was also guaranteeing $5k for first place for a $50 buy-in ($75 with fee and dealer appreciation). Apparently, many other El Paso poker players agreed. I also know Taylor and Aldo know what a good poker tournament looks like, so I felt confident it would have a good structure and it did (I believe there are other managing partners but not sure who they are). Some players at my table were mildly complaining that the blinds were going up too fast (15 mins), but considering it’s a $50 rebuy tournament, most players and I agreed it was just fine, especially with a starting stack of 15k and 100-100 blinds to start. 

Club manager Taylor Stinson was kind enough to speak with me about why he thought the tournament had such a successful Day 1a. “The staff. Everyone executed on the floor and in the box, and the days leading up to yesterday, I’m very thankful to them for that. We really wanted to put on a tournament that would appeal to everyone, from the freeroll tournament players to the highrollers. We thought guaranteeing a $5k first place prize for a $75 buy-in would do just that,” replied Stinson in a phone interview. 

I pointed out that the prize pool may go over $20k if the other Day 1s look like yesterday, and asked how that would affect first place. “I need to verify the percentage we are going to assign, but probably something like 28% for first. We are probably going to keep first place closer to $5k and instead raise the payouts for the other places. But we are going to see what the final pool prize is before making the final decision on payouts. We also are guaranteeing everyone who makes it to Sunday a payout,” Stinson said. 

Even though I personally played terribly yesterday, I was still very impressed with the atmosphere of the tournament. There were a lot of positive comments from players all the way around. Even though Day 1b hasn’t even started yet, I have a strong feeling High Society will be setting the bar for poker tournaments here in El Paso. Day 1b starts today at 6pm. Day 1c and 1d will be held on Friday and Saturday. Finals on Sunday. Good luck players.