A dramatic day at the felt saw plenty of big names make the cut on Day 1c of the WSOP Main Event as 600 players battled down to 433 survivors. As in previous days, plenty of the early action saw big names having to battle for their place in the later levels, let alone the next day.

Shevlyakov Takes Big Lead after Dramatic Day 1c

Russian Aleksandr Shevlyakov Grabs Overall Lead in Main Event
With Day 1a – 1c having now taken place, a total of 1,968 players have now sat down in this year’s WSOP Main Event. From that number, only 1,392 remain in with a chance of scooping millions of dollars by winning the most-coveted WSOP bracelet of them all.

It is Russian player Aleksandr Shevlyakov who has the chip lead not just on Day 1c but in the WSOP Main Event overall after an astonishing day at the felt saw him bag up 392,600 chips, a lead he has from players such as Dylan Nguyen (252,400), Suk-Kyu Koh (237,900), Matt Glantz (236,000) and Veselin Dimitrov (235,000), all of whom complete the top five Day 1c stacks.

Surviving or Crashing Out

From the start of the day of Day 1c, some of poker’s finest found themselves fighting for their lives. Niklas Astedt was down to just 10,000 chips from his 60,000 starting stack early on, but after a double-up with pocket queens when all the chips were in the middle against on a flop of [8c4d3s], the Swedish online superstar rallied and ended the day on 49,300 chips.

Others to scrape through included Tony Miles (53,800), Sam Abernathy (40,500), Erik Seidel (38,700), and Sam Greenwood (27,200), who saw his brother Lucas Greenwood bag up close to four times that amount with 106,900).

However, while those luminaries survived, others would fall. All of the following players will have to wait until 2022 and possibly a different location to become world champion, with Andrew Frankenberger, Tony Dunst, Jonathan Dimmig, Bryce Yockey, Eric Hicks, Jonathan Dokler, and Shannon Shorr all crashing out on Day 1c.

Other Big Names Thriving

Elsewhere in the event, some players who have already enjoyed a very strong World Series were flourishing. Josh Arieh has already got two WSOP bracelets to his name from the 2021 series and four in his lifetime, but his pivotal hand was possibly the most dramatic of all on Day 1c.

When Arieh tried to put in a raise pre-flop, he was forced to call a shove worth over 25,000 chips with . On the flop of , he looked in amazing shape to win the hand. However, despite being against one player who was drawing dead with , the other player held and was one card away from what would have been a Royal Flush for the ages.

Arieh faded both turn and river, however, with an eight on each street giving him a massive stack and the current second-placed player in the WSOP Player of the Year race bagged up 154,100 chips.

The 2019 WSOP Main Event champion Hossein Ensan (84,000) also made Day 2, albeit not with quite as many chips as stars such as JC Tran (175,400), Qui Nguyen (143,800) or Pete Chen (99,700).

With Day 1d looking like it will be the busiest day of the WSOP Main Event so far, there’s plenty more action to come across what could be a dramatic few days as three final Day 1 flights conclude the opening day, giving us an idea of exactly what will be on the line in 10 days’ time.

WSOP 2021 Event #67 $10,000 Main Event Top 10 Chipcounts:

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
6. Itay Bin Mergy – 233,100
7. Travis Preng – 232,800
8. Daniel Barry – 230,600
9. Andrew Gilmore – 224,600
10. Howard Arotsky – 215,600

Ryan Leng took time out from what have been an intense few weeks at the felt to justify his play in a curious hand from yesterday’s battle with Dan Cates for the Poker Players Championship title. Leng, who has a win and two runner-up spots this WSOP alone, still found time to be self-critical after that amazing run up the POY leaderboard.

(1/many) Lots of people are talking about that fold vs Jungle, so I want to address a few things:
First, to the people who sent me supportive messages saying things like “keep your head up” and “we all make mistakes”, y'all are the best. I have so much love for all of you.

— Ryan Leng (@RyanLeng9) November 7, 2021

While finally, despite being happy with his Day 1a stack, poker legend and 10-time WSOP bracelet winner Doyle ‘Texas Dolly’ Brunson is refusing to get carried away with his chances… yet.

After the 1st day in the WSOP, the talk is I'm going to win the main event. It's like I told Mori, I only have to win 60 million more.😂😂😂

— Doyle Brunson (@TexDolly) November 6, 2021

Doyle gets the final word, too, as he responded with a very encouraging message when discussing selling action on Pocket Fives in 2022.

“Get hold of me next year and let’s make a deal for the entire WSOP.”

Doyle Brunson playing a near-full ticket in a World Series of Poker? We can’t wait already.