Warm-up (5,000 PHP)

The biggest guarantee among the six events slated today at the Manila Super Series 22 had its first qualifying sortie launch as 175 entries were logged in (Event #3A) Warm-Up Flight A with 27 making it through to Day 2 in this PHP780,000 (~US$13,970) GTD event here at Pokerstars Live in Okada Manila.

Among the notable who saw action were Manila Megastack 16 High Roller titlist Niroshan Loganathan from Canada, Pokerstars Open runner-up Kai Danilo Paulsen of Norway, Australia’s Andrew Xu who took down the Super Deep title in Manila Megstack 22 and international campaigners Ronnie Hoffman of the Netherlands, Ireland’s Damien, and Filipino hopefuls in APPT National Open winner Alvir Inocentes, Manila Megastack 19 Super Stack titlist Lenart Ecarma, Manila Super Series 18 Superstack champion Chierro de Leon, and WSOP veteran Tony Abesamis.

The action was riveting from the get-go with the chip trading hands in a frenzying pace until Korea’s Han Seung Hyun came back from certain demise when he shoved his Q♥ J♥ on a Q♣ 8♦ 5♥ Q♠ board and was called by Filipino big stack Segundo Barte who tabled K♥ Q♦ . Han rivered the J♠ to improve to a full houise and claim the overall chip lead that he would not relinquish for the rest of the proceedings.

In the end, the bubble was burst by Japan’s Tomohiro Wada when his steal shove from the SB with 5♦ 4♠ was rewarded by a hit on the flop against the K♥ 7♦ of Cypriot Anastasios Pavlou to ensure that the 27 left would be guaranteed to be ITM.

Han’s stack of 461,000 is closely followed by Wada’s 418,000. Sitting in third is Inocentes with 337,000.

Day 2 is on Sunday at 12:00NN (UCT+8).

Meanwhile, Flight B commences tomorrow (June 7) at 5:00PM.

In a three-way all-in preflop situation, Taiwan’s Chen Chun Yuan tables A♦ K♣ dominating (and covering) his two opponents in Nguyen Van Dong An of Vietnam and Filipino Raymond Tiu who show A♠ 9♠ and A♣ Q♣ , respectively.

The flop, though, turns the tides as it comes Q♥ 6♣ 6♦ giving Tiu the lead. The turn is the T♠ rendering Nguyen dead in the water but the river is the K♠ , handing thw victory to Chen. The Taiwanese player KOs two adversaries and is just under thr 300,000 chip mark.

The action is folded to the D where Chen Chun Yuan of Taiwan opens for 1,500. India’s Naresh Thakker Karan 3-bets from the SB to 4,300. Chen proceeds to 4-bet shove for 15,500 and the move puts the Indian in the tank. After much deliberation, Karan opts to lay it down.