Brett Parise
Early this morning American college student Brett Parise beat 254 players to take home the title of the inaugural event of the PokerStars Asia Pacific Poker Tour, just under US$180,000 and a seat to the APPT Grand Final in Sydney.
Brett, a 22-year-old Californian student, qualified for the tournament for free on PokerStars, winning his tournament entry, flights and accommodation. Currently studying Political Science in California, today Brett graduated from online poker amateur to world-class Poker Star.
“It’s so exciting to become the APPT’s first ever champion, especially as I won the trip and my seat in the Manila APPT event from a free tournament online at PokerStars,” commented PokerStars APPT Manila champion Brett Parise. “This gave me not only a great opportunity to test my poker skills, but also to visit Asia and experience this totally different culture. It was also an awesome bonus to take down my first professional poker title in front of my mother who was also able to come as part of my PokerStars package.”
The tournament kicked off with an astounding field of 255 players from more than 30 countries, creating a prize pool of almost US$600,000. The tough field included three of the top Team PokerStars players: 2005 World Champion Joe Hachem, multiple World Series of Poker bracelet winner, Daniel ‘KidPoker’ Negreanu, and Vanessa Rousso, one of the most successful female players in the world.
The final table lasted for more than eight hours, with the players’ skills being tested to their limit. The last two players fighting it out were Brett Parise and Thai resident Ira Blumenthal. The final hand saw Brett with a pair, the 10 of spades and the 10 of diamonds, dominating Ira’s Jack of hearts and five of hearts. The first three community cards were the King of spades, the Queen of spades and the 9 of clubs, giving Ira eight chances of making a straight to win the hand. When none of those eight cards fell to the felt, Ira’s chances fell to the floor. The King of hearts on the turn and the 9 of hearts floating down the river clinched the premiere title of PokerStars APPT Champion for Brett Parise.
The final table was truly international: Brett from the USA; local Filipino Derick Hernandez; Tokyo native Sato Kazuhiro; Israeli PokerStars’ qualifier Maor Federling; Dutch PokerStars’ qualifier Bas van Liere; Australian professional player Van Marcus; Swedish businessman Roger Spet, who resides in Malaysia; American Thai resident Ira Blumenthal; and American Nicholas Bamman.
From Manila, the PokerStars APPT travels to South Korea on September 27th, when the $2500 buy-in no-limit Texas Hold’em tournament will be held at the Sheraton Walkerhill Hotel and Casino in Seoul. This will be the first international poker tournament on mainland Asia.
The Grand Final of the tour will be played in Sydney, Australia, at the beautiful Star City Casino from December 13-16.
Satellites to qualify for APPT tournaments are available on PokerStars.com with buy-ins starting from as little as US$22 dollars. PokerStars.net will also be running free qualifying tournaments for every event so that, like Brett, any poker player around the world will have the glorious opportunity to compete on the tour without ever spending a cent.
The final standings and monies earned in US dollars are as follows:
$179, 775 Brett Parise (USA)
$113,858 Ira Blumenthal (Thailand)
$62,921 Nicholas Bamman (USA)
$44,940 Van Marcus (Australia)
$35,955 Maor Feldinger (Israel)
$26,966 Roger Spets (Malaysia)
$20,974 Bas van Liere (Netherlands)
$14,981 Sato Kazuhiro (Japan)
$11,386 Derick Hernandez (Philippines)
10 – 12 $8,390,
13 – 16 $5,993
17 – 24 $4,794
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