APPT Cambodia 2023: Gokul Raj, Vishal Ojha, Amit Kaushik & Vinay B Score in Guarantee-Crushing NagaWorld Kickoff

As major poker festivals like the record-shattering APT Taipei and Poker Dream Manila are now in the books, the APPT Cambodia 2023 has begun, again registering a significant Indian field.

The Asia Pacific Poker Tour is visiting the Kingdom of Wonder in Cambodia at NagaWorld Phnom Penh for the second time. The 11-day festival will host 38 tournaments from May 5 to 15.

The first featured event of the series, Event #1: NagaWorld Kickoff, has found a winner. Guiyang Wang, the captain of the Chinese International Poker Team (CIPT), stormed past a field of 346 players in the two-day-long tournament, winning his maiden PokerStars Spadie trophy and a career-best $20,615 in prize money.

Wang was on the ball during the entirety of the tournament as he bagged the Day 1A chip lead and followed his dominant run throughout Day 2, finally defeating William Bolton (2nd for $13,109) after a gut-wrenching to-and-fro heads-up match!

In his winner’s interview, Wang said, “I am the captain of CIPT and I took the burden and responsibility today and played very hard to try to win this event for us. During heads up, our stacks sizes kept shifting so I strategized and played the button aggressively. I am very happy to win it, I will go celebrate with the team and have hotpot!”

Four well-known Indian regs were among the 52 players entering the final day of the tournament, namely Gokul Raj (26th for $835), Vishal Ojha (27th for $835), Amit Kaushik (49th for $550) and Vinay B (52nd for $550). However, all of them busted before the final table was formed.

The $50K GTD NagaWorld Kickoff sounded off the action on Friday, May 5. The $350 buy-in event attracted 346 entries across three starting flights, more than double the advertised guarantee, with the prize pool touching $105,720.

Final Table Results (USD)

1. Guiyang Wang – $20,615
2. William Bolton – $13,109
3. Daoxing Chen – $9,504
4. Sirahei Chudapal – $7,707
5. Armon Van Wijk – $6,121
6. Eric Wasylenko – $4,694
7. Yuwen Pan – $3,446
8. Emil Ukalaev – $2,495

Takaaki Arai (Won Event #2: Turbo Re-Entry for $2,695), Khayal Abbasov (Won Event #4: Freezeout for $3,026), Xixiang Luo (Won Event #7: KO Bounty Turbo Freezeout for $5,087), and Hyunkyou Park (Won Event #8: Win The Button Re-Entry for $2,003) are the other side event winners at the series.

The first PokerStars Shard trophy of the series is now in play, as the $100K APPT National kicked off its first starting flight on Sunday.

Day 1A of the $800 buy-in APPT National registered 74 runners, and 13 hopefuls advanced to Day 2. Korea’s Minwoo Kang, with a 451,000 stack, had the best run. India’s Amit Kaushik also featured among the survivors, bagging 65,500.

Day 1B started at 1 PM (local time) today, May 8, and notables like the inaugural APPT Cambodia Main Event champion Alex Puchalski, defending APPT National champion Seong Min Lee, WSOP bracelet winner Abhinav Iyer (who has flown out from Taiwan), Taiwanese pro Nevan Chang, Vietnamese pro Le Ngoc Khanh, and Australia’s John Perry are reported in the mix.

Keep following PokerGuru for more updates from the APPT Cambodia 2023!

Content & Images Courtesy: So Much Poker