Tournament Poker was in the top gear this weekend at the Asian Poker Tour Finale underway at the APT Poker Room, Manila with the PHP 50,000 Main Event drawing 169 entries. A prize pool of PHP 7.5 million was generated with 71 players still in contention of the title after the two initial flights on Saturday & Sunday. Arunas Sapitavicius from Lithuania will take seat on Day 2 as the chip leader with a stack of 103,200. Adda52 Team Spades pro Kunal Patni is 12th in chip count with a stack of 76,850. Paawan Bansal will be accompanying him with a stack of 35,600 in the hunt of the APT Finale Title.
Day 1A of the Main Event on Saturday saw 79 runners ponying up PHP 50,000 and only 34 could survive after a battle of 8 hours at the poker table of APT Poker Room. Arunas Sapitavicius, the only player with a 6-figure (103,200) chip stack emerged at the top. Kunal Patni played the first flight but got eliminated early playing a hand against USA’s Gerald Casey. Both the players flopped a set and then went on to complete Full House on the river but Casey had 7♣ 7♦ against Patni’s 5♣ 5♥ on a board of J♣ 7♥ 5♦ Q♣ J♦. Another Indian in the Main Event battle, Paawan Bansal survived for Day 2 with 35,600 chips. Japan’s Iori Yogo (46,425) and Tetsuya Tsuchikawa (38,775) were among the notable surviving on Day 1A.
Read more news and updates of the Asian Poker Tour on OPN India.
Day 1B played on Sunday drew 90 entries including India’s Team Thrill pro Dhaval Mudgal while Kunal Patni who busted early on Day 1A took the 2nd bullet. Patni was on fire in the middle of the day and was the chip leader just before the dinner break. 38 players survived at the end of day’s play with Korea’s Jae Chul Chang at the top with 99,800 chips. Dhaval got eliminated just 20 minutes before the game was paused when John Tech holding J♦ 6♦ hit a Full House with J♠ 5♦ 6♠ Q♦ 6♥ on the table.
In the sides events played at 2015 APT Finale, Pang Kwong Yuen of Malaysia took down the High Roller OFC Pineapple tournament bagging PHP 190,000. Kwon Kim triumphed the Head Hunter event for PHP 258,000. Dhaval Mudgal played this bounty tournament but couldn’t make it to the money-list. He tweeted:
Busto AQ to A4. Obviously! @Thrill_India
— Dhaval Mudgal (@Dirtbagpoker) December 11, 2015
Maria Cristina Argao bagged the Ladies event title outplaying the 11 players in the tournament on Saturday. She took home PHP 29,100 in the top prize with the title.Dhaval Mudgal got unfortunate bubbling out the Open Face Chinese Pineapple Shootout 36 Max tournament on Saturday. This was the 2nd event of APT Finale wherein he bubbled; the first one was the charity event.
Won the first round of my shootout in close to 25 minutes Lol! @Thrill_India
— Dhaval Mudgal (@Dirtbagpoker) December 12, 2015
Bubbled after a 6 hour battle! @Thrill_India — Dhaval Mudgal (@Dirtbagpoker) December 12, 2015
Today the 72 survivors of the Main Event will return for the Day 2 action. In the side events, Pot Limit Omaha Hi and Deep Stack Turbo will be played.