Asia Pacific Poker Tour Macau Comes To An End

Poker News - September 2nd, 2009 - Written by Glen

The Asia Pacific Poker Tour in Macau has come and gone, giving one player his first win ever, both in the main event in the tour, and sending Johnny Chan home with an upsetting second place in the high roller event. A young Irishman named Dermot Blain won the main event, taking home a prize of $541,072 dollars. Chan, while taking second place to one Vladimir Geshkenbein, still managed to be sent home with a prize of $154,400.

Dermot Blain managed to fight through 429 other players, culminating in a first time cash out for his land based poker career. Blain, a PokerStars player, ended up eliminating Mike Kim in heads up play. Kim entered heads up with a meager 920,000 chips, especially meager when sized up against Blain's 7,390,000. Blaine sat at the final table with barely 500,000 chips, mounted a supurb come back, and trounced Kim within four hands of heads up play. Blain forced Kim to shove his stack in the middle of the table, and the combatants turned out their pockets. Blain showed a KD TH, while Kim had a TD 9C. Kim's only hope was for a nine or a straight, being that Blain's ten had removed one of his outs, and a ten dropping would give the pot to Blain.

Then dropped the flop. AS TC 3C hit the board. A flush was in site for the Korean Kim. The ten stacked the chips toward Blain, but there were still two cards to go. The river hit, showing a JS. The possibility of the flush had gone out the window, as had the straight. Adding insult to injury, the river turned over what could have been the final piece of Kim's straight puzzle. It was an 8S, giving Blain the win.

Daoxing Chen had taken third place, walking with $239,327 dollars.

The high roller event was a shot run, but WSOP star Johnny Chan couldn't steal the win. The 11,000 buy-in event ended with Chan and Geshkinbein facing one each other in heads up play. In less than an hour, the event was over. Only sixty four entrants had participated, dwindling the field to the final two in a nearly no time at all. Chan had walked into the final showdown with 1,098,000 chips, while Geshkinbein started with 4,590,000. Just as in the Main Event, both contestants ended up with a similar hole card. This time, however, it would be Chan's QD 8S against Geshkinbein's KD 8C. Chan limped in from the button, and Vladimir checked. The flop hit the table, exposing 8D 6S 5C. Geshkinbein checked, then Chan wagered 125,000. Vladimir pulled the check-raise, pushing all in from this position. Chan called, and both players exposed their hands. A 7S dropped on the turn, then a KS dropped on the river, giving Vladimir Geshkinbein a win over a player who is regarded world-wide as one of the best. $266,690 would go to Geshkinbein, while Chan took home the aforementioned sum of just over $154,000.

The next part of the APPT will take place in Sydney Austrailia, early in the month of December. The tournament will sport a $4,920 buy-in, and 750 players will be allowed to compete.

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