After four days of intense tournament play, the APT Asian Series Cebu Main Event at the All in Poker Club has ended and the champion is Day 2’s chip leader Singaporean Tan Tai Zheng. In just two hands of heads up play, Zheng eliminated England’s Samad Razavi to claim the PHP 3,623,000 first prize winnings plus the championship trophy.

Zheng came into the final table as chip leader with over a million in chips. He faced elimination several times, but was able to overcome the challenges. This was especially true during the heads up round where both he and Razavi were all in on the first hand with a board showing 8-8-9-6 . Zheng held 6-4 of diamonds for two pair but Razavi had a flush with K-3 of clubs. Then a stunning river card of 8 had Zheng crush Razavi’s flush with a full house.

The next hand ended the tournament with Zheng making a flush with his A-8 of diamonds  on a board showing 9(s)-Q(d)-3(d)-J(d)-6(c)  ousting Razavi’s A-7 off suit .

February 6, 2012 – The final table of the APT Asian Series Cebu Main Event is set and leading the 10 players who will be returning tomorrow is Singapore’s Tan Tai Zheng. He sits on a massive 1,005,000 stack, followed by Bernie Ho with 885,000 chips and the rest of the pack much further behind. 

Players had to deal with some tough conditions at the event, specifically the ongoing aftershocks of a 6.8 earthquake that hit central Philippines in the early afternoon. After seven hours of play, the bubble finally burst with Edwin De Jong and he was followed to the rail by Brian Lovett, Abhishek Goindi, Kim Min Soo, Wyngard Brillo and Team PokerStars Pro Bryan Huang. 

February 4, 2012 – The All In Poker Club saw 116 players join the action for Day 1A of the APT Asian Series Cebu PHP 50,000 Main Event. This figure almost broke last year’s total field of 126 players in just the first day of the event alone and will rise dramatically when Day 1B’s numbers come in.

Australian Alistair Duff currently leads the 40 players who survived the day. He sits on a stack of 128,500 and is joined at the top by Mark Bastinen on 123,900 in chips. Both are well clear of the next highest stack of Bobby Cheong, from Singapore, on 79,400.

Duff also cashed in yesterday’s APT Asian Series Cebu High Rollers side event for PHP 353,000 and knocked out Mike Takayama on his way up the ladder today. With A(s) A(c), the flop came A-5-9 and Takayama had paired his ace holding A(h) 4(h) . He called Duff’s reraise on the flop and when the turn came a 4(s)  both players got all their money in with Takayama drawing dead to Duff’s set.

Other notable players to hit the rail included Ivan Tan, Victor Chong, Sangeeth Mohan, Juicy Li, Michael Marvanek, Linh Tran, Cindy Wang and Team PokerStars Pro Bryan Huang, Jay Tolon and Jojo Tech.

The final table payouts were:

1. Arnius Galinskas (Lithuania) PHP 538,900

2. Wyngard Brillo (Philippines) PHP 277,200

3. Eric Chen Wei Shyong (Singapore) PHP 122,200

4. Abishiek Goindi (India) PHP 87,800

5. Hubert Ortega (Philippines) PHP 70,600

6. Kang Dong Woo (Korea) PHP 53,400

7. Teo Shi Wei (Singapore) PHP 36,200

8. Mars Espera (Philippines) PHP 32,700

9. Michael Cho (Korea) PHP 31,000

10. Renato Labadan (Philippines) PHP 29,100 

Michael Marvanek has clinched his first APT title after winning the PHP 108,000 buy-in APT Asian Series Cebu High Rollers. Marvanek defeated runner-up Ivan Chev Tabucal at heads up to score PHP 1,168,000 in prize money. 

A field of 28 players bought into the event to create a total prize pool of PHP 2,716,000. Among those taking to the felt were Ivan Tan, Victor Chong, Brian Lovett, Cindy Wang, Florencio Campomanes, Mike Takayama, Sparrow Cheung, Mark Segal and Team PokerStars Pro Bryan Huang.