The top professional poker players with Asian heritage are aiming for nothing less than the top prize at the upcoming Asian Poker Tour Philippines leg this coming May 27th to June 1st.
Korean-born Steve Sung, Vietnam-native Quinn Do and Vietnamese-American Nam Le are all hoping to be the last man standing at the finals table of the first leg of the 2008 Asian Poker Tour to be held at the Dusit Thani Manila Hotel. The three poker pros of Asian-descent will duke it out with over 400 other pros for a chance to win the first prize chunk of the guaranteed prize pool of US$ 1 million.
Korean-born Steve Sung has been playing in major live tournaments for several years now since turning pro. While still lacking a major tournament title, he has been a top placer in several WPT and WSOP events, his best finish being second place in the recent 2008 Bay 101 Shooting Star WPT Championship. Before playing live tournaments, Sung has been an avid online poker player under the moniker ‘MuGGyLiCiOuS’. To date, his total poker winnings amount to over $1.4 million.
Quinn Do decided to play poker full time in 2004 after his time at the University of Washington and after dabbling in the restaurant business. Since turning pro, Do has been a regular at major live poker events and has won a WSOP Gold Bracelet at the 2005 WSOP Limit Hold’em Event. Other notable finishes by the Vietnam-born Do include a 2nd place finish at the Bellagio Challenge Cup Championship in 2005 and most recently, a 2nd place finish at the 2008 LA Poker Classic WPT Championship where he went home with $909,400.00. Quinn Do’s total poker winnings to date are close to $2 million.
Vietnamese-American Nam Le is only twenty-five years old but is already considered by many to be a major threat at live tournaments. He already has a couple of first place finishes under his belt – the 2006 Bay 101 Shooting Star WPT Championship and the 2006 Scotty Nguyen Poker Challenge II, as well top place finishes in several WSOP and WPT events. His most recent finish was 4th place at the 2008 LA Poker Classic WPT Championship where he earned $411,770.00. Le’s total winnings to date exceed $4.3 million.
While Sung, Do and Le are favourites to win the top plum at the Asian Poker Tour, they will face stiff competition from other poker pros, most notably, Filipino poker players who are expected to perform well on their native soil. Filipino poker players are expected to make up a third of the total number of entrants to the biggest poker event to hit Manila.
If neither Sung, Do and Le take home the APT Championship title in Manila, they will have three other chances to try this year as the APT moves to Macau in August, Seoul in October and Singapore in December with each event still guaranteeing a prize pool of US$1 million.
Poker players joining the APT Manila leg can register online at www.asianpt.com or at the venue until May 28 before the start of the day’s games.