Neil Arce Wins APT Philippines Main Event

The Asian Poker Tour Manila was hosted at the Dusit Thani Hotel and the first stop for 2009 and featured seven events including a charity tournament to get things under way on January 27.  A field of 262 players showed up to take part in the $2,500 no limit hold’em main event which began February 1 and produced a prize pool worth $635,000 and a top prize of $185,000 to the winner.

At the final table were professionals Liz Lieu and Casey Kastle along with Arce and Steve Yea.  Arce made a strong showing throughout the event and finished Day 1A with the chip lead and the third largest chip stack going into the final table.  The first two hands of the final table brought two eliminations with Arce eliminating Kim Tae Hyung into ninth place ($12,000) on the first hand and Kastle taking out Vesa Leikos in eighth place ($16,000) on the second hand.  Next on the elimination trail was Liz Lieu who went home in seventh place ($22,000).

Two more players quickly fell victim to Yea, Ron Kluber went out in sixth place ($30,000) and Susame Toge in fifth place ($36,000).  Arce then stepped up to eliminate the next victim when he took out Cucurel Didier in fourth place ($46,000).  Kastle won a couple of pots early against Yea and Arce but his stack began to dwindle down to 133,000, likely prompting his decision to go all in preflop with A-K.  Arce called him down with A-6 and the board ran J-6-5-10-3 knocking Kastle out of the tourney in third place ($70,000). 

The chip count going into heads up action was very tight with Yea holding 1,570,000 and Arce with 1,050,000.  Arce quickly took the lead after only a few hands and used it to his advantage.  The final hand came with Arce raising to 100,000 preflop and Yea reraising to 300,000.  Arce then was prompted to move all in with Yea quickly making the all in call.  Yea turned over Ad-Kh and Arce flipped over Ks-Qs.  The board then came 7h-6c-4c-Qh-6h, eliminating Yea in second place ($100,000) and giving Arce the win.  This was Arce’s second career cash, he finished in 35th place in last year’s Asian Poker Tour Philippines main event.