Florencio Campomanes wrote a new page in Filipino poker history last night by taking down the illustrious Red Dragon Main Event for ₱13,815,070 (US$270,183), his biggest tournament score up to date.
The first Red Dragon Main Event hosted in Philippines saw 669 entries which built a whopping ₱64,244,070 (US$1,271,367) prize pool. The event guaranteed the top 81 finishers in-the-money spots.
The top 9 players who played in the event’s final table were ensured of a handsome pay day of at least ₱1,221,000 ($23,879).
Notable players who didn’t make it to the final table but were able to cash were local tournament hero and previous platinum pass winner Mike Takayama (80th – ₱ 206,000), Day 2 chip leader Hwany Lee (51st – ₱ 257,000), 2019 APPT Korea Main Event Champion Park “Sparrow” Cheung (55th – ₱ 231,000), and local tournament specialist Alexis Lim (34th – ₱ 308,000).
Final Table Action
China’s Xijie Sun held a significant lead over the field at the start of the final table. He came in with over 130 big blinds (6,550,000) in his stack and a 2-to-1 chip advantage over Campomanes who was second in chips at that time. Campones trailed with 66 big blinds (3,305,000) and Zejin Shen (China) was third in chip count with 46 big blinds (2,300,000). Tao Chen (China) was the table’s short stack with 16 big blinds (810,000) while the rest of the finalists started with workable stack sizes ranging from 25 to 33 big blinds.
The slew of eliminations started with tournament legend Andres Korn (Argentina) being sent to the rail in 9th place by Sun . Martin Stausholm (Denmark) was eliminated in 8th shortly after he shoved king-six in the small blind against Gerardo Lubas’ (Philippines) big blind who held ace-five. Yufei Hui (China) was the next casualty of the final table after he made a gutsy 20 big blind shove with a pair of Tens only to be looked up by Campomanes’ pair of Aces.
A few hands after, Campomanes delivered a devastating blow to Sun’s massive chip stack when the latter decided to bluff-shove into Campomanes‘ flopped trip threes.
Sun was left with two big blinds and it was Tetsuro Tomita who carried out the killing blow sending him to the rail in 6th.
Lubas was next to go after he three-bet shoved ace-five from the small blind against Shen’s button “steal”. Unfortunately for Lubas, Shen woke up with the top of his range and snap called with Queens.
Lubas took home ₱2,730,000 ($53,391) for his 5th place finish. Despite being the shortest stack at the start of the final table Chen was able to impressively maneuver his way for a 4th place finish. He was eliminated when his ace-five of spades was overpowered by Tomita’s pair of sevens on a queen-king-five-three-nine run out. Chen claimed ₱4,015,000 ($78,522) for his 4th place finish.
The tournament continued three-handed with Campomanes possessing over 85% of the chips in play while Tomita and Shen had to work with what was left. At this point the two players that were at a disadvantage had about 3 or 4 million which would be the case for the next 40 minutes of tournament play.
The three-handed action ended when Campomanes called off Shen’s three-bet jam with king-queen. Shen got it in good with ace-nine but a brutal king on the turn ended his tournament run. Shen bagged ₱5,300,000 ($103,653) for his third place finish.
Heads up started with two attempts to discuss a possible deal. However, both arrangements did not work out for the parties and so heads up play continued with no deal.
Tomita showed signs of life after doubling up twice. However, his strong efforts to become the Dragon Slayer came short when he called off Campones’ shove with queen-eight only to be met with the latter’s’ pair of tens.
The run-out came nine-king-seven-nine-ten giving Campones’ a “rivered” boat which ended the iconic tournament.
Final Table Results
1 – Florencio Campomanes (Philippines) – ₱13,815,070
2 – Tetsuro Tomita (Japan -) ₱8,557,000
3 – Zejin Shen (China) – ₱5,300,000
4 – Tao Chen (China) – ₱4,015,000
5 Gerardo Lubas (Philippines) ₱2,730,000
6 Xijie Sun (China) ₱2,088,000
7 Yufei Hui (China) ₱1,735,000
8 Martin Stausholm (Denmark) ₱1,445,000
9 Andres Korn (Argentina) ₱1,221,000
Florencio Campomanes’ Incredible run at Okada
Five months ago Somuchpoker covered the first APPT hosted in the new PokerStars Live home in Manila, Okada, where current Filipino Dragon Slayer Florencio Campomanes emerged as the Main Event Champion. That was his biggest career score at that time.
Talking with Somuchpoker in an interview, Campones said “So sick, it has been 13 years. I’ve been playing since I was 18 when I was underage. At this point, it wasn’t about the money anymore. It was really about the relief of winning. Even when we chopped at heads up, the feeling didn’t change for me. I just wanted to win it so bad.”
Five months after his monumental title win at the APPT Main Event, Campomanes was back in Okada for some action at the Red Dragon Manila Series .
It was the start of a fantastic run where he came in second at the ₱500,000 Super High Roller, won the prestigious platinum pass at the Main Event Day 2 flip out and became the series’ Main Event Champion.
Talking to PokerStars blog Campomanes explained “Well I’m not touring Asia, I might do World Series, and obviously EPT Barcelona or at least most of it, because I’m there anyway. I’m still officially retired.”
Stay tuned with Somuchpoker for the 2020 Red Dragon Manila festival wrap up.
