After a successful festival in the Philippines, which saw Filipino pro Lester Edoc triumphant in the Main Event, the Asia Poker League is now hosting its second event of the year in the up-and-coming Vietnamese poker market.
The organizers teamed up with Pro Poker Club. The club saw a record-breaking APT Kick off Vietnam event last January, which attracted over 664 entries in its Main Event.
The APL Road Series Vol. 2 Vietnam started on May 25th and will continue until June 4th. Several winners have already claimed victory in the side events, but so far only one Vietnamese player has found a path to success.
Sean Chua wins the Warm Up event
157 players paid the VND 5.5M ($242) buy-in for the Warm Up event creating a prize pool of VND 761,450,000 (33,544$). Top 30 finishers were in the money.
Rubin Labroo and Meerat Kumar represented India in the final 9, but they quickly fell in 5th and 9th place, respectively. Singaporean, Sean Chua managed to best the field and take home the title. After a two-way deal with Minh Khanh (2nd), he lifted the trophy and took home VND 185,520,000 ($8,173).
Warm Up – Final Table Payouts
Entries 157 – VND 76,1450,000
1 – Chua Kok Chun – Singapore – 185,520,000
2 – Minh Khanh – Vietnam – 140,000,000
3 – Anh – Vietnam – 68,351,000
4 – Day Lam – Vietnam – 53,302,000
5 – Rubin Labroo – India – 45,687,000
6 – Dinh Cong Dai – Vietnam – 38,073,000
7 – Truong Ken – USA – 28,935,000
8 – Vinh Pham – Vietnam – 18,275,000
9 – Meerat Kumar – India – 12,945,000
Team India takes down two events
Lead by Vikram Verma of India Poker Pros, a large contingent of Indian players came to Vietnam. The Warm Up was a mere appetizer as the Indians continued to dominate the festival and placed first in 2 events.
Divesh Thapar took a hefty VND 94,164,000 ($4,148) for first in the KO Bounty. The event had 122 entries creating a prize pool of VND 351,360,000 ($15,478).
Adarsh Jayappa won a sizeable VND 112,499,000 ($4,956) first prize in the VND 4.4M Super Deepstack Turbo (103 entries), surpassing Pasi Hainanen from Finland, a regular face at the Asian Poker Tour circuit who took a humble VND 78,769,000 ($3,470) for his second-place finish.
Vietnam takes a title
Four days into the tournament, Vietnam wins a title on home turf. The No Limit Holdem Turbo 1 saw 51 entries paying the VND 4.4M Buy-In creating a total prize pool of VND 197,880,000 ($8,717). Trang Hung Manh defeated India’s Kamal Ajmeera Anik to take home the first prize of VND 61,343,000 ($2,702). Only seven players were in the money.
Other side events:
- Takenouchi from Japan won the VND 6.6M Deep Stack event for VND 168,953,000 ($7,443) besting a field of 120 entries.
- In the Pot Limit Omaha 1 event, Richard Mari from the UK collected VND 66,203,000 overcoming 39 entries. The event showed 5 in the money with a prize pool of VND 189,150,000 VND ($8,333).
- Norway’s Kiel Ovedyb won 50,925,000 VND ($2,243) in the VND 5.5M No Limit Holdem 1 event. He won heads-up against the tough Korean pro SJ Kim, who took VND 30,555,000 for his efforts. The event saw 21 entries with three players paid.
Up to next
The Main Event is still underway with a few more side events and a VND 25,000,000 ($1,102) High-Roller starting on June 2nd. Vietnamese players still have a chance to catch up to their foreign counterparts and keep a massive sum within their borders.
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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