The Asia Pacific Poker Tour may be on summer hiatus but the APPT team is hard at work getting things ready for the exciting second half of Season 9 which begins in a month’s time.
Here’s a look at the remaining poker festivals this season:
July 30-Aug 9: APPT Manila hosted by PokerStars Live Manila
Aug 28-Sep 13: Macau Poker Cup 23 hosted by PokerStars Live Manila
Oct 8-20: ANZPT Melbourne hosted by Crown Melbourne
Oct 30-Nov 15: 2015 Asia Championship of Poker hosted by PokerStars Live Macau
APPT MANILA (#APPTManila)
THE VITALS
• PHP 50,000 (USD $1,100) Main Event
• 14 Official Asia Player of the Year (APOY) events
• 2014 Main Event had 260 players and PHP 11,349,000 prize pool
• 2014 APPT Manila poker festival totalled 558 players and PHP 15,940,980 in prize money
• Counts towards the 2015 GPI Asia-Pacific Rankings & 2015 Asia Player of the Year
OUTLOOK
The Philippines’ leg of the APPT has travelled to several cities and venues but may very well have found a permanent home in the brand new PokerStars LIVE poker room located at the City of Dreams Manila integrated resort.
Take a look at the 11-day schedule and it’s abundantly clear that Season 9 will absolutely obliterate the numbers from last year with nearly triple the tournaments at hand. In fact, it would surprise no one if the upcoming APPT Manila goes down as one of the biggest poker festivals ever held in the Philippines.
APPT Manila kicks off on July 20 with the PHP 10,000 Warm-up event which comes with a PHP 3 million guarantee. The PHP 200,000 High Roller is one of the new highlights and takes place on August 9.
2014 APPT Manila winner Thanh Ha DuongTHE VITALS
• HK$12,000 (USD $1,550) Red Dragon Main Event – HK$5 million prize pool guarantee
• 17 APOY events
• MPC22 Main Event had 987 players and HK$10,339,812 prize pool
• MPC22 poker festival totalled 3,883 players and HK$27,571,268 in prize money
• Counts towards the 2015 GPI Asia-Pacific Rankings & 2015 Asia Player of the Year
OUTLOOK
The Macau Poker Cup is arguably the most beloved poker series in the Far East and the Red Dragon trophy is one of the most recognizable pieces of hardware in the game of poker.
Historically, the summer edition of the MPC has fewer players than the first installment of the calendar year. However, last year the organizers reduced the number of annual MPC poker festivals from three to just two. The January vs. August figures were nearly identical with only a 4% drop off in total player numbers.
MPC22 – which took place in February this year – set record highs for the series in both players and prize money. So basically…it’s going to be HUGE once more.
Besides, the legendary Red Dragon event there are plenty of highlights on the 17-day schedule; most notably, the HK$6,000 Baby Dragon event (1m GTD), HK$5,000 Megastack (500k GTD), HK$20,000 NLH (1m GTD), and the HK$80,000 High Roller.
MPC 22 winner Yuguang LiTHE VITALS
• AUS $2,300 (USD $1,800) Main Event
• Schedule TBA
• 2014 Main Event had 516 players and AUS $1,032,000 prize pool
• 2014 ANZPT Melbourne poker festival totalled 2,939 players and AUS $1,809,900 in prize money
• Counts towards the 2015 GPI Asia-Pacific Rankings & 2015 ANZ Player of the Year
OUTLOOK
Last season, Melbourne broke the 5-year ANZPT record to become the tour’s biggest event ever since Sydney set the mark back in 2009. While the official schedule hasn’t been released yet, you can expect more of the same that made ANZPT Melbourne a smashing success in 2014.
2014 ANZPT Melbourne winner Edison NguyenTHE VITALS
• HK$100,000 (USD $13,000) Main Event – HK$15 million prize pool guarantee
• 13 APOY events, 15 ACOP Title events (aka ‘Spadies’)
• 2014 Main Event had 291 players and HK$27,092,100 prize pool
• 2014 ACOP poker festival totalled 2,960 players and HK$116,703,419 in prize money
• Counts towards the 2015 GPI Asia-Pacific Rankings & 2015 Asia Player of the Year
OUTLOOK
Question: How many poker festivals in the world, that feature a USD $10k+ Main Event, can boast an annual increase of +32% in player numbers and +137% in prize money?
Answer? One. The Asia Championship of Poker (ACOP).
The 2015 ACOP is quickly becoming a must-play event on the global poker circuit and it’s easy to see why. There’s life changing money at stake with more than USD $15 million awarded in 2014 and that prize money total is sure to increase as the poker festival enters its fourth year on the APPT.
Don’t be fooled into thinking it will be easy though. The big money also attracts the biggest names in poker making the Spadie trophy one of the most prestigious in the game. It’s hard and if you have one of these trophies sitting on your mantle then go ahead and brag away…you’ve beaten the best!
The recently updated 2015 ACOP schedule can be found here.
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