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It was described on Twitter by some as the weakest starting day of the 2021 World Series of Poker Main Event so far, but with former champions Hossein Ensan and Qui Nguyen, as well as previous runner-up finishers Erik Seidel and Tony Miles, day 1c had its fair share of notable names!
Another 600 hopefuls started out on their Main Event journey, with 433 still in by the end of a long day at the Rio in Las Vegas, that number including online crushers Niklas “Lena900” Astedt and Joni “bustoville” Jouhkimainen, as well as the Greenwood brothers, Sam and Luc.
The third of six starting flights had its big-name casualties too, with Shannon Shorr making an early exit, getting the last of his chips in on the turn with a raggedy paired ace...
♦ ♥ ♣ ♠
Shannon Shorr: A♠ 3♥
Joseph Sanders: A♣ 7♣
Flop: A♦ 8♣ 7s
Turn: 2♣
River: 6♣
Four-time bracelet winner, Josh Arieh, was involved in an interesting hand en route to a day 2 appearance, having to call an all-in after missing his opponent’s shove and going three-way to the flop...
♦ ♥ ♣ ♠
Flop: J♠ 10♠ J♦
Arieh apologised for “slow-rolling” and stated: “It's really shocking what I have,” before turning over..
Arieh: J♣ J♥
Both his opponents revealed big slick, but the unnamed big blind had the...
Player X: A♠ K♠
...and was drawing to a Royal Flush. The run out...
Turn: 8♥
River: 8♣
...was enough to send both opponents to the rail, and Arieh had turned his 60k starting stack into 154,100 by the end of the day.
Aleksandr Shevlyakov bagged the chip lead, with a chunk of that coming courtesy of the following hand in which he cracked Susan Choi’s pocket kings.
♦ ♥ ♣ ♠
Choi: K♠ K♦
Shevlyakov: 9♦ 8♦
All the chips unsurprisingly went in on the flop...
Flop: J♠ 10♠ 7♥
...and Choi’s Main Event was over when the cards ran out...
Turn: 6♣
River: 6♠
"So sick," was Choi’s comment as she left according to the live reports.
Day 1c Top 5 Chip Counts
| 1 | Aleksandr Shevlyakov | 392,600 |
| 2 | Dylan Nguyen | 252,400 |
| 3 | Suk-Kyu Koh | 237,900 |
| 4 | Matt Glantz | 236,000 |
| 5 | Veselin Dimitrov | 235,000 |
...and some of the more notable chip counts of the day:
- Qui Nguyen 143,800
- Hossein Ensan 84,000
- Ted Forrest 79,600
- Tony Miles 53,800
- Erik Seidel 38,700
- Sam Greenwood 27,200
