Main Event Excitement Begins on WSOP Day 36

It started on Thursday, November 4.

It is the main attraction of the annual World Series of Poker in Las Vegas, also known as the Big Dance, the World Championship, or just “the Main.” Technically, it is the WSOP 2021 No Limit Hold’em World Championship Main Event. It is a freezeout – no reentries! – with a $10K buy-in. It offers six starting flights, 120-minute levels, and starting stacks of 60K chips.

The first of those six flights got underway on Day 36 of the 2021 WSOP at the Rio in Las Vegas. We’ll start with the recap of that action and then cover the basics of other bracelet tournaments playing out at the Rio as well.

Event 67: WSOP Main Event

The first of the six starting flights brought more than 500 players into action with their $10K buy-ins…or lammers from satellite play. And the WSOP Main Event was officially underway.

It is not easy to compare flight numbers from the 2019 WSOP because there were only three flights then, whereas there are six flights this year. Those three 2019 flights delivered 1,335 players in 1A; 1,915 in 1B, and more than 5K in 1C. With late registrants, the final number for the field came in at 8,569 players. Clearly, the last of the starting days will tell the full story.

For now, we have the Day 1A information packed into a cozy chart:

2021 WSOP Main Event bracelet presented by @Jostens
Will it be yours ? pic.twitter.com/jWzWWczUSv

— WSOP – World Series of Poker (@WSOP) November 4, 2021

Event 60: $50K Poker Players Championship

Five players remain. That’s what we said yesterday, too. However, we mistakenly assumed that the tournament would play to a winner the following day. Instead, the tournament took a break today and will allow those final five players to meet again on Friday, November 5. They will then play for the win, the bracelet, and the famous Chip Reese trophy.

Event 63: $500 Salute to Warriors NLHE

The final day of this tournament played down quickly. Day 3 brought just nine players back into action, and they started with some quick eliminations of short stacks. Original chipleader Bradley Rogoff departed in third place, and Eric Zhang went into heads-up against Guy Hadas with aggression. It didn’t take long for Zhang to win his first bracelet in the first WSOP event he ever played. He told PokerNews about playing poker as a hobby:

“It’s a dream come true! I remember as a kid watching the World Series of Poker and the victory of Chris Moneymaker in the Main Event. I always loved poker, but I only started playing a couple years ago, mainly cash games, not really tournaments. But the WSOP is always a very special occasion, and I took some time off work because I really wanted to come here. … I’m going to remember this forever, and I’ll definitely come back next year to play more events.”

Eric Zhang tops 1,738 entrants in the $500 SALUTE to Warriors NLH event to earn $102,465 and his first WSOP bracelet.
📸: @hayleyocho https://t.co/3Ec4UDRNVI pic.twitter.com/BldtJpklD4

— WSOP – World Series of Poker (@WSOP) November 5, 2021

Event 65: $1K Mini Main Event

The one-tenth version of the actual Main Event is the mini one, and more than 3800 entries pushed the prize pool just over $3.4M. Day 2 on Thursday started with more than 280 players but thinned that number to just 16 by the dinner break.

After Farid Jattin busted in 11^th place for $35,308, two tables combined into one. And when Peter Cross exited in tenth place, the official final table began. Erkut Yilmaz was the first to go in ninth place, followed by James Morgan, David Tuthill, and ultimately Matthew Jewett. The staff stopped play at that late point in the evening with five players remaining.

Event 66: $10K PLO Hi-Lo 8-or-Better Championship

This poker pro-filled crowd started Day 2 by ending registration and setting the prize pool. Once the money bubble burst, Joe Hachem was the first to exit in 32^nd place for $16,077. Other notables who followed included Robert Mizrachi, Nick Schulman, Roland Israelashvili, Matt Livingston, Felipe Ramos in 23^rd place for $18,841, Leif Force, Matt Vengrin, Niklas Astedt, Marco Johnson and Ben Yu in 14^th place for $22,513. The final dozen bagged their chips and will return on Friday to play for the win.

Day 1A Main Event Highlights

One of the main highlights on the first flight of the Main Event was a certain godfather in the field. Doyle Brunson hadn’t played the Main Event in nearly a decade, and he had only played the Super Seniors tournament thus far earlier in this series. He played well and will return next Tuesday to put his 151K chips back into play.

Last year, the WSOP Main Event played mostly online, with final tables in Las Vegas and Rozvadov and the ultimate finale in Vegas. Damian Salas of Argentina won it, so he returned to the Rio this year to defend his title. However, he busted a few hours into the action.

There was a bit of a kerfuffle at one point in the evening. PokerNews reported that the Las Vegas Metro Police Department ordered the Rio Convention Center to go into lockdown mode for a period of time. Apparently, a person ended a car chase in the Rio Convention Center’s parking lot, where police discovered a suspicious item in his vehicle.

It is unclear if the suspect was affiliated with the WSOP or its players in any way. The PD spokesperson said the incident was not related to the WSOP, but Johnnie Vibes tweeted that he witnessed a person wearing a WSOP lanyard tackled and arrested by five undercover officers.

Just saw a guy with a WSOP lanyard get tackled by 5 undercover on break of WSOP main event. The placed him under arrest and emptied his pockets. No idea if he was staff or why they arrested him. Intense.

— Johnnie VIBES (@JohnnieVibes) November 5, 2021

To end on a happier note, photographer Hayley Hochstetler captured some great pictures of the women playing in the Main Event. While they remain a very underrepresented demographic in tournaments like this, their presence is noted and appreciated.

https://twitter.com/hayleyocho/status/1456359291338649600?s=20