Yates: Irish Amateur Champion

The APAT Irish Amateur Poker Championship held at the Fitzwilliam Club, Dublin, was the third event of APAT’s third season, once again sponsored by BlueSquare.com. Including alternates, 144 runners took part with a prize pool of £10,800. Included amongst the runners were past APAT Champions Darren Shallis, Tim Magnus, Steve Redfern, Jason Jones and Michael Paterson.

Play and the pace of exits in the early stages were noticeably quicker than in previous APAT National events. Andrew Tracey took a hit early on when his Kings were cracked by flopped Quad threes and as play continued after the dinner break a series of big hand confrontations were to shape the chip counts at the end of the day. Brian Yates, already with a large stack, found Aces against similarly chipped Steve Bayliff’s Kings. Paul Garnham found Aces against Ace-King and then Yates again was in action. Seeing a spectacular Q-Q-6 flop holding Q-6 against and opponent holding K-Q. Yates lost a little ground near the end when losing a race with AK versus Andrew Tracey’s Queens to double Andrew up and put him right in contention as play closed.

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At the end of Day One chip leaders were as follows:

Brian Yates 99,100
Ben Dixon 95,300
Andrew Tracey 80,900
Sean Kenny 79,500
Paul Garnham 71,300

Play at the start of day two began with blinds of 1500-3000/200 and 29 players remaining. Six players departed in the first level and the main beneficiaries were Brian Yates and Brian Murphy who found Aces when Michael Patterson had Kings the same hand. Darren Shallis eliminated Sean Kenny when he raised with Queens, Kenny re-raised on the steal all-in and Darren’s hand held up.

King: Bronze Medalist

Elsewhere Paul Garnham was hugely unfortunate. Brian Martin pushed all-in in late position with J9 and Paul found Aces in the blinds. The 8-10-Q flop though was decisive, and knocked him out. As we moved into the money positions Brian Yates moved into a commanding position with a third of the chips in play when his Kings four-flushed to eliminate Nick Newport whose AK had flopped an Ace. Joint chip leader was Brian Murphy, finding a succession of pairs against small pairs to make considerable progress. Also moving through the field were Richard King and previous winner Steve Redfern, though Redfern was to lose a race that eliminated him on the final table bubble.

The final table line up was as follows:

1 Richard King from Bradford 116,700
2 Brian Murphy from Dublin 226,400
3 Will Young from Wrexham 153,000
4 Andrew Tracey from London 48,000
5 Brian Yates from Walsall 429,700
6 Martyn Sharp from Cannock 70,300
7 Brian Greene from Dublin 125,000
8 Ben Dixon from Oxford 156,400
9 Darren Shallis from Newport 88,300

First to exit the final was Ben Dixon whose Queens were outdrawn by Brian Murphy’s A10 on a 10-10-5 board. Short-stacked Martyn Sharp was next, knocked out by Richard King when having to move in before the blinds passed through him. In seventh was defending Champion Darren Shallis, who lost a 60-40% versus Yates, A10 v KQ, rivered.

Tracey: Fifth Place

Will Young left in sixth, losing most of his stack on a steal and then knocked out by Richard King. Andrew Tracey had recovered from running Queens into Aces with eleven left and had done well to rebuild through the final by picking the right spots and situations. Despite getting his money in ahead in the key spots with five left he was outdrawn three times to depart in 5th.

By this stage Yates and Murphy were commanding chip leaders ahead of King and Greene. In a family pot four handed Yates then flopped bottom set against Greene’s flopped top pair and flush draw. Bottom set held and Brian Greene was out in 4th.

Three handed play took over a level as the deep structure afforded plenty of play. Eventually Yates’ pocket eights on the button collided with King’s A9 in the blinds in a Race situation. Eights held, King exited in third and Yates took a 6:1 chip lead into a heads-up with Brian Murphy.

Heads Up was brief. Murphy took A8 against Yates KJ. Yates flopped two pair to win him the tournament. Thus Brian Yates became the APAT Irish Amateur Poker Champion 2009 winning 3400 Euros, a seat at a GUKPT event and the Championship Trophy. With the addition of this title, Brian has achieved a unique double, having won the APAT Welsh Online Championship earlier this year.

The event will take place at the Fitzwilliam Card Club in Dublin on May 30th & 31st, starting at 2.30pm on each day.  Players will start the event with 10,000 chips on a 45 minute clock.  The winner will receive a National Title, significant cash prize, Challenge Cup & Gold Medal and a seat at a Grosvenor UK Poker Tour main event.

CLICK TO ENTER:    £75.00

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A list of players who have currently bought in, and players who have been given an option to buy in following transactional issues, can be found in the APAT Forum.

With the Player of the Year race only having three live events remaining, all the leading participants were present as they battled for the exciting prize, entry into the PokerStars.com sponsored WPT Caribbean Adventure Tournament in early 2008.

Play began at 2.30pm on the first day and early chip leaders included Dave Compton and Bob Taylor, Taylor being paid off with Quad Kings in a 16,000 pot on the second level to move to 26,000 with the blinds still 50-100. Also more than doubling their chip-stacks early on were Stephen Bayliff and Jim Owen. Local qualifiers Scott Prendiville and Neil Murphy were looking solid and Matt Doyle benefitted from flopping a flush against a set to move ahead.

Aisling Collins, one of over twenty ladies in the field, then eliminated Dewi James with AA versus KK to move towards the head of the field. Rankings leader Mark Donnelly then had a rush, moving to 45,000 with a double-up with a set of jacks on the flop against a set of twos and David Jones from Telford became the first player over the 50,000 mark with set over set and then a flopped straight against a missed nut flush draw with Donnelly progressing to chip leader at the dinner break.

Moving into contention as Day One moved towards a close were Patrick Tochel, Brendan Hartnett, Paul Townsend and John McGill but the leader was Donnelly, taking out a succession of shorter-stacked players until the last level when his aggressive style saw him lose chips. Instead David Jones from Yorkshire was paid off with top set against top pair whilst the likes of Tochel, previous finalist Steve Lacy and Des Farrell gathered menacingly behind.

At the end of Day One 20 players advanced to the second day with the chip leaders as follows:

David Jones 135,500
Steve Lacey 113,500
Doc Farrell 112,000
Martyn Sharp 112,000
Patrick Tochel 110,500

Play from 20 down to the final table was brisk as with blinds at 2,000-4,000
stacks needed to consolidate before a lot of play was seen. Stephen Hourie from Dublin knocked out two players in one hand with 17 left when four-flushing the nut flush on the river, King of Spades in his hand.

Sadly for him Mark Donnelly bubbled in 10th, though still securing valuable player of the year points whilst the key pots occurred with 12 players left. Patrick Tochel got into a raising war on a K xx flop, unraised, with KQ versus Steve Lister’s KJ. It held through the streets to make him chip leader. Meanwhile Brendan Hartnett found AA facing a short-stack all and Martin Zaffky’s push all-in with AK, and it held to send him to the final second in chips.

The final table line up in seat order was as follows:

David Jones from Leeds 197,000
Patrick Tochel from Glasgow 367,000
Brendan Hartnett from Brighton 245,000
Stephen Hourie from Dublin 123,000
John McGill from Dublin 103,000
Jacques Keift from Galway 119,000
Paul Townsend from Witney 189,000
Doc Farrell from Dublin 108,000
Brendan Byrne from Dorgheda 80,000

Blinds beginning at 4,000-8,000.

First to depart was Stephen Hourie, AQ versus Townsend’s 88 all-in pre-flop. In eighth was John McGill, with what he hoped was live cards against a bigger stacked big blind: Townsend again. Doc Farrell was in 7th trapped by David Jones when hitting a King top pair on the turn but Jones had flopped trip Queens already and checked trappily. In sixth Brendan Byrne’s attempt to ladder short-stacked ended against Townsend (K3 versus A2)

Six handed Brendan Hartnett ran 99 into Kieft’s QQ, no help to leave him with 3 big blinds left before he staged a remarkable recovery quadrupling his chip stack against the odds. At this stage Townsend, Kieft and Jones were moving ahead around the 400,000 chip mark against Tochel, 250,000 and the trailing Hartnett.

When Hartnett doubled through Jones with KK versus AJ he had over 200,000 again and it was once more a five horse race for the title. Two hands later Hartnett’s KK held up against Townsends’ QQ to complete a remarkalbe recovery: 30,000 to 380,000 chips in one level. When after a quiet level he had AA hold on against the flopped flush draw of Jones he rose to a 600,000 chip leader, knocking Jones to the felt.

With Tochel and Jones now shortstacked the irrepressible Bendan Hartnett continued to lay waste to his opponents. First he knocked out Tochel in 5th AQ versus K9 all in pre flop and then Jones A8 versus Q8, both blind on blind battles.

Three handed the payers reached the medal positions with chip-counts as follows:

Brendan Hartnett 720,000
Paul Townsend 420,000
Jacques Kieft 390,000

Three handed did not last long as Hartnett took AJ against Townsend’s K 10, flopping a Jack with all the chips in pre-flop to enter heads-up with a big chip lead (2 to 1). Brave play by Townsend, clearly going for the win and the EPT seat but losing out on his gamble.

For a long time the Heads Up battle was even, with comparatively few pots but with Kieft gradually clawing his way back to parity by virtue of greater re-raising aggression. The key hand occurred in an unraised pot with Kieft flopping top two pair, Hartnett turning the straight and the board pairing on the river to give Kieft full house over straight and a big chip lead. Hartnett recovered slightly, flopping trips and being paid on the river.

The final hand saw Kieft take 33 against Hartnett’s KQ all-in pre flop. The 33 held to make Jacques Kieft the Irish Amateur poker champion, winning £3,000 and the EPT Season Four Seat.