Throughout the past few days, the list of potential APPT Cebu winners has dwindled from 158 to 9.
Here’s a little glimpse of those players occupying our final table.
Seat 1
This 47-year-old poker pro will start tomorrow with 371,000. Sim Jaekyung has only been playing poker for four years but has already gotten several cashes throughout Asia.
Jaekyung nearly made another APPT final table back in 2010 when he finished 10th in APPT Manila and recently finished 15th in APPT Seoul. Jaekyung is now back on home soil and is a step closer then he’s ever been to the title.Â
Jaekyung had a tough tournament but a double up through Jim Collopy helped turn it around. The chips went all-in on a nine-four-three flop and Jaekyung held king-nine to Collopy’s seven-four.
Seat 2
Seat 2 of the final table belongs to a South Korean-New Yorker who likes to be a boss, Hyunshik Yun.
Yun started playing poker at the age of 20, playing with friends and using sugar bags instead of money. Now Yun is 27 and HKD 100/200 games are his new sugar. Aside from the rushes of poker, which include New York home games, Yun likes to wakeboard.
This makes it no surprise that the beach here in Cebu was one of Yun’s favorite parts of the tournament. One of Yun’s luckiest moments of the tournament has been during flips. He’s won a few to get here and will need to win more to win tomorrow.Â
Yun will start the final table second in chips with 528,000.
Seat 3
Anthony John Wright is 45-year-old foreign exchange trader from Sussex, UK and has been having a good time here in Cebu. Wright has enjoyed the hotel and outdoor activities around town, including seeing whale sharks in their natural habitat.Â
Wright has been playing for 10 years and usually plays NLHE tournaments online. While he has made a few final tables online, this is his first live, major final table. For his final table debut, Wright will start with 412,000, a place he was able to get to after doubling against a busted flush draw.Â
Seat 4
Seat four is occupied by our shortest stack and tallest player, 25-year-old Michael Allmrodt. Hailing from Selm, Germany, Allmrodt is a student who’s been playing poker for 5 years. During that time, Allmrodt has specialized in playing $2-$30 satellites and his biggest highlight was the NAPT stop in Los Angeles.
Now Allmrodt is in an APPT and has made the final table. Allmrodt will start the day as our short stack with just 34,000. Allmrodt survived a bubble in part due to a spot where he folded pocket 7s where he usually would’ve called.
Aside from poker, Allmrodt enjoys the beaches, drinks and women. Allmrodt is also a fan of Danny McDonagh.
Seat 5
Daniel Spence is the only chip leader of the previous three days to make it to the final table. This hot oiler operator from Thuder Bay, Ontario — where, like many Ontarians, he enjoys to hunt and fish — will start tomorrow with an even 450,000.Â
Spence has been playing poker for the majority of his life. He’s currently clocking in at 36 and has been playing poker for 20 of those years. He’s mostly played and learned with friends and this is his first major tournament.
Spence has enjoyed how friendly the players have been and he really enjoyed when he doubled up with aces against kings.
Seat 6
We have a 32-year-old Swedish businessman from Linkôping over on seat 6. Magnus Karlsson has been playng poker for 19 years. He started playing home games with friends but has since moved up to $5/10 NLHE.Â
Aside from this event, Karlsson mostly plays cash games and cashed in the Bahamas for $40,000. Now Karlsson has a big stack in another event with polite people and good weather. Karlsson will start tomorrow with 221,0000, a stack he wouldn’t have had if he hadn’t held queen-jack and hit quad queens against a full house.Â
Seat 7
Our final table chip leader and Day 3 destroyer, James Collopy, will take up our seven seat with 605,000. The 24-year-old pro from Washington DC started playing poker 10 years ago as a troubled youth learning from his brother. Collopy has now cashed for more than $2 million online and $700,000 live.
Collopy has been traveling the world playing poker since Black Friday and recently won his first WSOP bracelet in the inaugural WSOP APAC last month.Â
A plane brought Collopy to Cebu and counterfitting pocket tens by turning jack-six into quads helped bring him to the final table. He did not make the final table by making seven royal flushes.Â
Aside from gambling, Collopy likes to surf and travel. He also likes to gamble though. Collopy has enjoyed the comped pit game and voucher system in APPT Cebu and hopes they’re replicated around all PokerStars Events.Â
Seat 8
Andrew Nguyen qualified to Cebu and then “bluffed a Singapore guy in a big pot” to make it to the final table. Now the 24-year-old self-employed player from Milpitas, CA is starting the final table with 316,000.
Nguyen learned to play poker in college from his roommate 6 years ago and now normally plays $2/4 PLO all the way up to $25/50 PLO. During this time, Nguyen has experienced lots of ups and downs in poker.
One of those biggest highlights was losing 65 buy-ins at 10/20, playing just one table. But now Nguyen has been running a bit better and has made the final nine. When Nguyen isn’t playing poker he enjoys playing Defense of the Ancients 2, but now that he’s in Cebu, he’s been enjoying the nightlife in Mango Square, “all day, every day.”
Well, except for when he’s pokering.Â
Seat 9
Timo Kohijoki is taking the final seat of the final table. This Turkish salesman might only be 36, but he says he’s had 70 years of poker experience.
During those decades of poker playing, learning and winning, Kohijoki’s says his biggest influence has been Aor Aun. Kohijoki frequently plays small tournaments and NL 100, making his final table here in Cebu the highlight of his poker career.
Kohijoki is starting the final table with 148,000 and will enjoy tomorrow regardless of what happens. Kohijoki has been enjoying the weather and enjoys to scuba dive, making Cebu the perfect location.Â
For live updates on the final table, check out the APPT Cebu live-updates page.
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