Paul McGuinness Wins WCOAP HORSE Championship

Forty-eight players participated in this popular Championship, now a mainstay of the World Championship Of Amateur Poker festival. Six thousand starting chips and a thirty minute clock with Limit variants of the various HORSE disciplines afforded plentiful play with the unfortunate first exit, APAT stalwart Gerard Smyth, not departing until well into the fourth level.

After over eight hours play the final table lien up was reached as follows:

1 Steve Redfern 24,800
2 Phil Mildon 23,100
3 Ben Burnhill 13,200
4 Andrew Duncan 23,400
5 Dave Howard 105,700
6 Paul mcGuinness 42,200
7 Andrew Macleod 41,900
8 Paul Robinson 13,300

Mildon and Duncan thus made their second Championship final tables of the WCOAP festival, with winning WCOAP team event captain Paul McGuinness following up his team’s triumph with another strong showing in his own right.

Ben Burnhill, Paul Robinson and Steve Redfern fell before the cash positions were reached. The minor cash positions were filled by Andrew Duncan, in fifth, and Philip Mildon in fourth.

Dave Howard knocked Andrew Macleod out in the bronze medal position to enter Heads Up with a commanding lead against his Welsh competitor.

There followed a titanic Heads Up battle. Several times over two hours Howard had McGuinness all-in with chances to win the title, and on each occasion McGuinness either doubled up or in Hi-Lo variants pots were chopped.

Once more McGuinness managed to bring the stacks to parity until the final hand, in seemingly innocuous Limit Holdem. Howard, with Six-Seven and McGuinness with Pocket Twos saw a flop of six-seven-two from which neither player was escaping. The flopped set held on for McGuinness and he won the event to cemenet a fantastic poker week for the Popular APAT North Walian and Captain of the Welsh team who were victorious in the World Amateur Team Championship earlier in the WCOAP.