Poker tour unwraps 1st season tomorrow

MANILA, Philippines - The Philippine Poker Tour kicks off its inaugural season in Metro Manila tomorrow with a guaranteed prize fund of P10 million spread out in 10 monthly tournaments nationwide.

The five-day event will be held at the Metro Card Club (Metrowalk) in Pasig City. The other monthly venues of the circuit are in Pasay, Cebu, and Davao while satellite tournaments will also be played in Angeles, Cavite, Biñan and Marikina.

A guaranteed prize of P1 million will be staked in each of the 10 monthly stages.

PPT founder Jojo Allado said the inaugural season will culminate in the Final Table of Champions in March next year where leg winners will get a chance to vie for a seat to the 2013 World Series of Poker in Las Vegas and compete alongside international poker greats.

The P700,000 package for the grand champion consists of a round trip plane ticket to Las Vegas, hotel accommodation, pocket money and the $10,000 buy-in money for the WSOP main event.

Aside from boosting the development and promotion of poker as a mind sport in the country, the PPT, according to Allado, aims to realize the dream of having a Filipino world poker champion.

“If we could produce grandmasters in chess, I don’t see any reason why we can’t likewise excel in poker which only recently has been recognized as a mind sport,” he said.” I believe the talent is there just waiting to be tapped.”

The monthly legs have an affordable buy-in of P5,500 for each of the three starting days. Day 1B will allow re-entries of players eliminated in Day 1A, while Day 1C will allow re-entries of those busted out in either Day 1A or Day 1B. Players will have a starting stack of 20,000 with blind levels running up every 60 minutes.

Resorts World Manila will host the second leg on June 21-25 while the third stage will be held at the Let’s All In Poker Club in Pasay on July 25-29, to be followed by Resorts World Manila again in August, the Metro Card Club on Sept. 20-24; and back at Let’s All In Poker Club on Oct. 25-29. Cebu will host the November tournament at Waterfront and at Metro Card Club in Cebu in December then at Metro Card Club in Davao in February.

For details, visit www.thephilippinepoker tour.com and the PPT Facebook Fan page.