The first two legs of the WPT Asia Swing may have been successful but Vietnam, now that’s shaping up to be the biggest yet. The inaugural WPT Vietnam kicked off another thrilling day of games with winners crowned amidst a packed house of Main Event attendees at the Pro Poker Club. We’ve got those highlights for you below.
250 runners for Day 1B of the Main Event
A strong showing of 202 players came out for Day 1B of the Main Event with the enticing VND 8 BN Guaranteed herding them all in. Out of that crowd, 48 fired a second bullet to bring the total entries to 250. This more than doubled Day 1A’s 105 turnout.
Trickling in throughout the day were some of the biggest names in the Asian circuit: Yohwan Lim, Huu Dung Nguyen, Soo Jo Kim, Raghav Bansal, Dang Van Hien, Tzai Wei Phua, Danny Tang were just some of the players at the scene.
For several, it was a solid day at the felt. Zarvan Tumboli amassed 177,000, Natalie Teh racked up 166,500, Norbert Koh continued his hot run in the country bagging up the second largest stack of 307,000, and for local player Nguyen Thai Duong, he outshined with 315,500.
For some though, the day had its difficulties. WSOP bracelet winner Mike Takayama was among the fallen, his stack took heavy beating when Hieu Ngo rivered quads to dust his full house. Luckily for all the railbirds and the latecomers, there is still one more starting day to jump in with Day 1C taking place on Sunday, September 30.
After 14 rounds at the felt, Day 1B closed with 61 players remaining. Full chip counts can be found in the live updates post.
Pham Bao wins the Bounty Event
The newest champion emerged with Vietnam’s Pham Bao defeating fellow countryman Tran Phuong at heads up. Pham claimed the VND 142,440,000 first prize plus an additional VND 24,000,000 in bounty rewards.
The two-day Bounty Event drew in 132 runners for a prize pool of VND 504,240,000. 17 players earned a piece of the pie with only 9 advancing to the final day. Yik Yin Chiu marched in as the leader and eventually bowed out in 3rd place. As for Pham, his victory was more than just a title at the series, this catapulted him to second rank in the WPT Asia Swing Standings.
Final 9 payouts
1 – Pham Ngoc Quoc Bao – VND142,440,000
2 -Tran Phuong – VND90,130,000
3 -Yik Yin Chiu – VND53,450,000
4 – Dang Van Don – VND32,780,000
5 -Tegnelia Steven – VND24,960,000
6 – Nguyen Hai Trieu – VND21,180,000
7 -Mason Rosenberg – VND18,400,000
8 – Thuan Thanh – VND16,140,000
9 – Nguyen Tien Thanh – VND14,240,000
WPT Asia Swing Standings
WPT Asian Swing standings is a cumulative points system based on a player’s performance throughout the series. Currently in the lead is Yisha Chen with 120 points. Eight players share second rank each with 100 points. Winner of this race will receive a paid package and Main Event seat to WPT India in November.
You can view the standings below (Top20):
| Player | Points |
| Yisha Chen | 120 |
| Endo Shingo | 100 |
| Takagi Yosuke | 100 |
| Choon Tong Siow | 100 |
| Hirata Yuki | 100 |
| Valeriy Pak | 100 |
| Nobuyuki Komori | 100 |
| Kim Dong Tran | 100 |
| Ngoc Quoc Bao Pham | 100 |
| Kimura Taro | 90 |
| Mochizuki Hiroyuki | 90 |
| Yutaka Nakamura | 90 |
| Tsugunari Toma | 90 |
| Tomoyasu Arai | 90 |
| Huy Cuong Do | 90 |
| Phuong Tran | 90 |
| Tien Thanh Nguyen | 90 |
| Lehec Killian | 80 |
Louis Hartwell
Graduated in Media Communication at the University of Lausanne, Louis Hartman is a co-founder of somuchpoker.com. He began his career in Cambodia as freelance journalist. In same time he was making his living by playing poker every night at that time. Intense learner, he read dozens of poker strategy books to improve his skills during many years. With a strong interest about poker "behind the scene" in Asia and his communication skills, Louis launched Somuchpoker in 2014.
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