HomePASAY CITY, Philippines – From over a hundred aspirants the soldiered on from the Day 1 qualifiers or opted to do a late registration in Day 2, the Asian Poker Tour (APT) Championship played down to the Final three tables and in the process burst the Money Bubble while (Event #19) the Deep Stack Turbo crowned a champion and (Event #18) the opener of the 2-Day Pot Limit Omaha (PLO) tourney played out at the Grand Wing Casino, Newport World Resorts here.
With the total entries reaching 242 and the guaranteed prize pool climbing to a whopping PhP180,150.00 (US$316,100.00), over a hundred runners battled to reach the ITM zone–which was eventually on the radar deep into the night.
After almost an hour in Hand-For-Hand, the Bubble Boy was Japan’s Yosuke Nazakawa when he decided to shove into a raised pot featuring Great Britain’s Alex Lindop and Kunal Patni of India. It was Lindop who ended up making the call.
Nazakawa was dominated when he showed A♠ 7♠ against Lindop’s A♣ 9♠. The Flop came: A♥ J♥ 6♦ while the Turn was an A♦ . With numerous chop outs in the offing, the River was a 3♠ awarding the pot to Lindop and sending Nakazawa to the rail for good in 26th place.
However, it was later revealed that Nazakawa availed of an option indigenous to the APT in “Bubble Protection”–wherein the player pre-registers and is at his seat when the first hand is dealt. As a result, Nazakawa gets his buy-in back by virtue of being “staked” into an event of the same value in a future APT series.
Yosuke Nakazawa (JPN) is “Bubble Protected” Bubble boy
Eventually, former APT Player of the Series (POS) Vamerdino Magsakay of the host nation busted out in 25th and the final three tables were formed, putting a halt to Day 2’s competition.
William Teoh of Malaysia took the chip-lead into Day 3 with 1,392,000 while Filipino Duroy Gopez is not that far back with 1,387,000. Lindop sits at third with 1,037,000.
Day 3 begins tomorrow (September 17th) at exactly 1:00PM (UCT+8) and will have 30-minute delayed Featured Table Livestream beginning 1:30PM anchored by Canadian YouTube sensation Greg Liow of “Greg Goes All In” who was joined in the booth today by APT President Neil Johnson. Guest broadcasters were APT High-Roller king Flo Campomanes and Hong Kong’s Ray Chiu (after he had busted out from the Championship).
Meanwhile, Jason Wong of Singapore emerged victorious in the PhP8.8K Deep Stack Turbo by defeating the Philippines’ John Matsuda in the Heads-Up finale.
Jason Wong (SGP) takes down the first DST of this series
Wong picks up his first ever win (and cash) in the APT for PhP283,000.00 (US$4,935.00) while the upcoming Matsuda settled for PhP188,600.00 (US$3,289.00). Japan’s Katsuhito Kawai finished in third for PhP131,000 (US$2,286.00).
Tomorrow (September 17th) the Final Day of the 2-day PLO championship shares the same starting time as Day 3 of the APT Championship, along with (Event #20) the 2-day PhP165K (US$2,877.00) 2-day High-Rollers while (Event #21) the PhP2M GTD (US$34,874.00) Monster Stack kicks off at 2:00PM followed by the second PhP8.8K Deep Stack Turbo (Event #22).
This series is heading into the homestretch so take advantage of these final opportunities to be part of APT history.