Back to the Felt: APT Philippines 2014 Opens Today at Resorts World Manila

Anticipation is high when the Asian Poker Tour Philippines 2014 kicks off today at the Resorts World Manila as a large number of players not only from Asia but also from around the world are expected to attend the eight-day poker festival scheduled from April 30 to May 7.

Eleven events are on tap this week including the APT Philippines 2014 Main Event with a $2,700 buy-in scheduled to start on May 4 (Saturday) for Day 1A.

The 10 side events have buy-ins that ranges from a low $120—the opening NLHE Re-Buys + Add-On tournament on April 30 (Wednesday)—to the high-stakes game on May 1 (Thursday) for the very popular High Rollers event.

Additionally, there will be daily satellite tournaments leading to the main event and players have a chance to get into the big one for as little as $150 (super satellite) to $300 (mega satellite).

Lloyd Fontillas, APT’s tournament director is confident that they’ll duplicate or surpass the expectations in this event after an excellent turnout in the last one, the APT Asian Series Cebu 2014.

“For me, I consider APT Philippines my favorite stop because this is where Jeff Mann (APT Chief Executive Officer) named me as TD. This marks my 4th year as TD for the APT. Being here brings back so many memories in how we developed APT as a team to what it is today.”  Fontillas said.

For the record, last year’s APT Philippines 2013 Main Event drew 98 players in Day 1A and 105 players in Day 1B. Meanwhile, APT smashed records in Cebu where 299 runners joined the main event for the largest-ever attendance for any APT Asian Series event.

The highest-ever number of entries for an APT Philippines Main Event is at 316 set six years ago in 2008, when the APT held the inaugural event.

The other side event on Wednesday is the Ante Up for Charity with a buy-in of $150 at 7:00 p.m. Two satellite tournaments are also set at 3:00 p.m. and 6:00 p.m. Go to the APT Philippines 2014 Event Schedule page for more details.