Event #2 of the 2012 World Series of Poker (WSOP), a $1,500 No Limit Hold’em tournament, saw its field cut from 2,101 players to just 239 on Monday. The winner of the first open gold bracelet event of the 2012 WSOP will walk away with $517,000 and the top 216 players will finish in the money, meaning we’re just a few eliminations away from the bubble. London’s Sadan the_snail03 Turker (pictured) leads the way with a stack of 158,100 after Day 1, but several brand name poker pros are on his heels.

Turker will be seated at Table 426 to open play on Tuesday, where he’ll join John Juanda, who has the fourth largest stack at the table at 60,700. Turker finished second in a $1,000 No Limit Hold’em event last June for $377,000 at the WSOP after surviving a field that was nearly double the size of Event #2, so he has plenty of experience to draw from. The action picks up again on Tuesday at 1:00pm local time in the Amazon Room, where Turker’s quest for his first bracelet will resume.

Jason treysfull21 Mercier (pictured) is also still alive in Event #2 and holds a stack of 41,900, good for the 90th largest tally. Mercier had a rousing end to Day 1 as, according to PokerNews, his chip stack swelled from 8,000 to 48,000 in one level. Mercier doubled up with Q-10 against A-K and then stacked even more chips after flopping aces-up against tens-up.

Mercier was quite peppy on Twitter, where he shared a recap of his first day at the 2012 WSOP: “Made Day 2 of the $1,500 NLHE somehow… Got crippled to 400 chips in first orbit today. Yet somehow I finished w 42K #anotherdayattheoffice.” He added that his energies would be focused on capturing bracelet #3 today: “Had to unreg the $3K HU PLO/NLHE … Don’t think 2 tabling is a good idea in this format. $1,500 Stud8 at 5 pm if I bust Day 2.”

JP MavFishKelly (pictured) also survived to see Day 2 of Event #2 and has a stack of 43,100, the 83rd largest total on the leaderboard. Kelly, a two-time bracelet winner, doubled up an opponent after his 7-5 of diamonds could not outdraw A-Q. He’ll be seated alongside several familiar faces at Table 439 on Tuesday, including Andrew luckychewyLichtenberger and Paul badpab2 Foltyn.

You’ll recall that Phil Hellmuth finished as the runner-up in three WSOP tournaments in 2011. Looking to exact revenge this year, the “Poker Brat” will come armed with 44,600 in chips to Day 2. He scooped a sizable pot on Monday with pocket fours against pocket jacks after the money went in pre-flop. Hellmuth hit a set on the flop and then faded a jack on the turn and river for the win.

Earlier in the day, PokerNews invoked the phrase “crazed giggle” to describe Hellmuth’s demeanor in a hand after his opponent hit a runner-runner straight with sevens against Hellmuth’s tens: “‘Sorry buddy… got the straight,’ said Hellmuth’s opponent. Hellmuth buried his head in his arms and didn’t surface for a full few minutes. When he did, we were expecting to see a face of pained anguish, but instead it was a crazed giggle.”

As we said at the top, nearly 90% of the field of Event #2 was eliminated on Day 1. In that group was Tristan Cre8ive Wade, who ran pocket threes into pocket eights on his final hand. Before the tournament started, Wade succinctly Tweeted, “Most likely playing in @WSOP every day starting today. I’ll Tweet if I get deep in something. #RunGoodPlayBetter.”

Here are the top ten chip stacks in the $1,500 No Limit Hold’em event entering Day 2:

1. Sadan the_snail03 Turker: 158,100
2. Eli Elezra: 155,900
3. Ryan Snickles: 142,400
4. Brandon Cantu: 130,100
5. Peter Campo: 125,500
6. Michael Lee: 109,200
7. Nicholas noctus Verkaik: 105,600
8. Thad Mitchell: 99,700
9. William Ryan: 95,300
10. Elliot Shmukler: 95,200

The final table of the tournament will pay out as follows:

1st Place: $517,725
2nd Place: $322,294
3rd Place: $224,029
4th Place: $161,345
5th Place: $117,921
6th Place: $87,231
7th Place: $65,377
8th Place: $49,621
9th Place: $38,106

We’ll keep you posted on the latest 2012 WSOP news right here on PocketFives.