Poker in Cebu

There are some significant differences between poker tournaments and chess. Both attract about 50-100 players per tournament although chess accommodates more children as players below 21 are not allowed to play in poker clubs. There are however more lady poker players than chess. There are also more foreigners playing poker,mostly Koreans,Japanese.Americans and Europeans.. Poker tournaments are played ,almost daily, with bigger prices . Although chess most often have sponsors, poker rely mostly on registration fees. There are 5 poker clubs in Cebu. I am not familiar with Tulip Club in Mactan. All are licensed and regulated by Pagcor. Diamond Poker Club ,beside the Grand Convention Center, only have cash games. These are P10/20 blinds with a minimum buyin of P200 and maximum P1,000; P20/40 blinds with a minimum of P1,000 and maximum P10.000 and P25/50 with a minimum of P2,000 and maximum P20,00. Bad Beat jackpot is now P3.7 million. Metrocard in Mandaue feature some unique tournaments and prizes. In their cash games,they have some special prizes like P1,000 for losing with pocket aces, P2,000 if you have a hand of four-of-a-kind, P3,000 for straight flush and P5,000 for royal straight. Metro also have a freeroll (no buyin) every Tuesday and Thursday at 4pm followed by a 25k tournament with a buyin of P500. Every Monday,Wednesday and Friday they have a 25k tournament. On Sundays they have a 20k tournament. Tomorrow.Saturday there is a 200k tournament at 5pm. Allin Poker Club at Waterfront Lahug in the casino area now has a Bad Beat jackpot of P2.8 million.Every Tuesday they have a no limit turbo with a buyin of 1k and knockout bounty with a buyin of 1k +300 every Thursday.Both tourneys start at 630pm. They are now planning to hold a P2 million tournament. Oriental Poker Club in Parkmall,Mandaue is also active. Bad Beat is now P376,789. On June 1-3 at 2pm they have a 400k tournament with a buyin of P3,200 +300 and the final table on June 4. They also have a turbo satellite for this big event every Tuesday,Wednesday and Friday and also daily from May 28-31 at P300 at 2pm. On May 30 they have the Casino Filipino heads up challenge with a buyin of 2k+200 at 5pm and on May 31 it is a30k pot limit Omaha with buyin of P500+50, also at 5pm. Bad Beat happens when a player holds at least a fullhouse aces and tens and gets beaten by quads or straight flush. The loser gets 40% while the winning hand gets 20% and the rest is shared by the all the players equally in the table. Aside from live, majority of the Cebuano players also play poker on the internet. It has been mostly responsible for the dramatic increase in the number of poker players worldwide, now numbering an estimated 300 million.. Deep Blue Our kiddie chess player and journalist KC Morala sent in this report: “NM Merben Roque walked off with the champion title in the DeepBlue Chess Tournament held in SM Cebu last May 22-23. The champ drew his 5th round match with Rhenzi Kyle Sevillano, an incoming sophomore in USC, and achieved victory on the rest of his games, including that vs FM Anthony Makinano and NM Richard Natividad. Half a point behind him, Rommel Ganzon nabbed 2nd place, having recovered from his defeat in the 2nd round with Allan Pason and winning the next five rounds, including the fifth game with third-placer Sevillano of 5.5 pts. The latter had shown a mind blowing feat of straight wins on the first four rounds, facing head-on the veteran players of Cebu. Making up the rest of the top-ten winners were FM Makinano, Natividad, Peterson Sia, Eden Diano, Pason, Bonn Tibod, and Diego Claro.” boypestano@gmail.com,www.chessmoso.blogspot.com