It’s already been a record breaking year for poker in Macau. In January, the 20th running of the Macau Poker Cup came within a whisker of cracking the 1,000 player mark for the first time, with 995 taking part to beat the old record of 891 by more than 100.
Two months later, the Macau Millions attracted an enormous field of 1,804 – well above the previous mark of 1,329 set in 2011.
And now it’s the turn of APPT Macau to make a stand. The eighth running of this popular stop on the Asia Pacific Poker Tour got underway at City of Dreams on Wednesday and after Thursday’s second flight the final figures showed 494 runners – up from 388 players 12 months ago.
It’s not an all-time record – 575 took part back in 2011 before poker’s “Black Friday” and the PokerStars LIVE Macau team’s struggles to find a permanent home for the room bit into player numbers – but with 106 more players than last year there is no doubt poker is back on the rise.
A total of 60 players will make the money this weekend with the winner of APPT Macau taking home HK$2,776,000. We’ll bring you all the final table and winner details early next week.
