A Weston man is the overall chip leader after two days of play in the World Series of Poker Main Event.

Amir Lehavot, 34, finished Day Two in Las Vegas late Wednesday night with 610,500 chips, tops among the 2,044 remaining players.

Lehavot was born in Israel and arrived in the United States at age 16. Before playing poker for a living, Lehavot worked as an engineer, specializing in design, he told WSOP officials. He lived in San Francisco before moving to Weston, and has the online poker handle of AmirSF.

The World Series of Poker is poker's most popular event, and ESPN tapes the play, edits it down and shows the action the rest of the year.

Lehavot recently started a poker website (with strategy content) at www.pokerwit.com. The site contains Lehavot’s comments about key hands he played at various times during the WSOP.

"It feels great. But I have played in a lot of tournaments and I know. There is a long way to go and it does not necessarily mean that much (to be chip leader) at this point. It's nice, but there is still a long way to go," he said on the site.

Lehavot has survived the opening days in two prior WSOPs, but failed to cash. He says his goal goes beyond cashing, and you can't blame him: First prize is $8.5 million.

"If I cash, it is really not life-changing for me," he said. "I am looking to go deep."

To get the whole field seated, "Day One" consisted of four separate days, each lasting about 12 hours; "Day Two" was held Tuesday and Wednesday, also for about 12 hours.
The players are off today and resume Friday.

Players started with 30,000 in chips, and Lehavot was down to 7,000 on Day One, before catching a card on the river when he was beaten to stay alive -- a "suck-out" in poker lingo.

He wasn't the chip leader most of Day Two, but 30 minutes before it ended, "I had a huge hand," he said, and gained 250,000 when he was dealt a pair of threes and then one came up on the flop.

"Most of my chips came from that one pot," he said.

Note: I did a quick Sun-Sentinel archive search and got nothing, and a Google showed a couple of minor cashes, and that he has patented two things. So, again, I'm at the mercy of the South Florida poker world: Anybody know him?