Vietnam’s Mai Bien clinched his first ever APPT title at the NagaWorld Kickoff Event after overcoming Filipino pro Mike Takayama at heads up. Bien claimed a live tournament career high $15,709 and captured the coveted spade trophy. Bien is on fire this year with four titles under his belt. This was his first outside of home turf. You can read up on Bien’s latest victory via the Live Updates or the brief recap below.
The Asia Pacific Poker Tour Cambodia 2022 opened on November 3 at the Grand Ballroom of NagaWorld Phnom Penh with the NagaWorld Kickoff $50K GTD drawing in the crowd. 299 turned up over three qualifying heats to send the prize pool soaring to $78,308. 46 players secured themselves a piece of the pot and also a seat to the final day.
The player everyone needed to measure up to was overall chip leader Mike Takayama who resumed his Day 1B performance by sending multiple players out of the running early. One of Takayama’s most memorable hands was calling Quoc Huy Phan on the river with just King-high. Takayama proceeded to enter the final table as chip leader.
Final table
It was at the final table where Mai Bien came into radar. As Vietnam’s last hope, he dodged the rail numerous times starting with a runner runner straight to double up through Takayama. This earned him the lead which he used to pressure his tablemates until he ran into a big hand that sent him plunging to 16 BB. It was against Takayama again with 
top pair no good against Takayama’s 
straight on the flop.
A few busts later, the pair would meet again with Bien cracking Takayama’s aces with a straight on the turn. Bien went on to finish Eike Soren Strub (6th) and Yu Qi Zhao (5th) while Takayama cleaned out Dhanesh Chainani (4th) and Adrien Franck Berger (3rd) to bring about heads up.
Takayama was ahead though briefly as Bien resumed his aggression. He grinded down Takayama, taking down consecutive pots that rarely reached the turn. After nearly an hour of heads up, Bien eliminated Takayama with 
flush crushing 
on a final board 
.
Buy in: $300
Guarantee: $50,000
Entries: 299
Prize pool: $78,308
ITM: 46 players
Final table payouts
| 1st | Bien Mai | $15,709 |
| 2nd | Mike Takayama | $9,695 |
| 3rd | Adrien Franck Berger | $7,267 |
| 4th | Dhanesh Chainani | $5,881 |
| 5th | Yu Qi Zhao | $4,636 |
| 6th | Eike Soren Strub | $3,540 |
| 7th | Renniel Galvez | $2,600 |
| 8th | Koen Breed | $1,911 |
| 9th | Namhyung Kim | $1,566 |
NagaWorld Kickoff full payouts
JEUNGU SEO comes from behind to win the Hyper Turbo
25 took interest in the Hyper Turbo with only the top five earning a piece of the $4,365 pot. At three-handed, Jeungu Seo was trailing David Koy and chip leader Hua-Wei Lin but after two fast double ups, he found himself up top. The first hand was 
spiking the Queen on the river to beat Koy’s 
. The next, he outdrew Lin with 
both finding partners to beat 
.
With Lin’s stack down to 4 BB, she was all in with King-Queen offsuit, Seo called with King-Nine offsuit, the Nine paired on the river to send her out in 3rd place. To decide the trophy winner, Koy and Seo flipped for it. Seo’s luck continued, shipping it with 
full house over Koy’s 
.
Buy in: $200
Entries: 25
Prize pool: $4,365
ITM: 5 places
| 1st | Jeungu Seo | $1,615 |
| 2nd | David Koy | $1,113 |
| 3rd | Hua-Wei Lin | $709 |
| 4th | Raju Jaruplavath | $513 |
| 5th | Panitan Poopadsri | $415 |
WEI JIANG wins the PLO Bounty
The PLO Bounty drew 32 entries at $500 each for a prize pool of $10,768 and a bounty pool of $3,200. Late game rush for Wei Jiang sent his stack from the runt to top dog. Jiang defeated Stanislav Safonov at heads up to collect five bounties totaling $500 plus the $3,662 first prize.
| 1st | Wei Jiang | $3,662 |
| 2nd | Stanislav Safonov | $2,530 |
| 3rd | Namhyung Kim | $1,615 |
| 4th | Tuomas Olavi Urtti | $1,238 |
| 5th | Dengshan Lin | $969 |
| 6th | Luke William Spalding | $754 |
APPT Cambodia 2022 – full schedule
Stay tuned to Somuchpoker for all the action as we bring you updates from start to finish.
Links:
Inaugural APPT Cambodia 2022 underway
APPT Cambodia 2022 Opening ceremony and Day 1 winners
APPT Cambodia 2022 Guarantee breached!
APPT Cambodia 2022 Mike Takayama leads the Kickoff
Get ready for APPT Cambodia – 2 days away
Huge turnout anticipated at APPT Cambodia
Full schedule and tournament structures
PokerStars LIVE announces Inaugural APPT Cambodia
APPT heads to Cambodia
Tricia David
Tricia David has long experience as a recreational poker player and has been covering poker events since 2010 for numerous outfits in Asia. She spent one year working part time with Poker Portal Asia then became editor and lead writer for all event coverage of the Philippine Poker Tour (PPT). Under the PPT, she overlooked content for their website, and produced live updates on all their events. In addition, she served as the live and online events website content writer for the Asian Poker Tour. Currently, she does live events reporting in Asia for online news site Somuchpoker and is also one of their news contributors.
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