USA’s Daniel Lee Wins Record-Breaking APT Manila Main Event After Being Down to 8 Big Blinds!

Following four starting flights and four more days of action in the Grand Ballroom of the City of Dreams Manila, Asian Poker Tour’s largest main event in the Philippines has crowned its champion in Daniel Lee from the United States. San Francisco native Lee outlasted a record-breaking field of 1,081entries and overcame South African pro Edgar Antezana in the  heads-up of the PHP 85,000 APT Manila Main Event, claiming a career-high PHP 15,060,000 (~$256,020). In addition to the top prize, he took home the glorious 24K gold lion APT Main Event trophy.

Lee has been cashing live tournaments since 2006 and had just $99,288 prior to this career-defining victory in this APT Manila Main Event. This marked his career’s first APT title and overall fourth live title. He now has over $355k in live tournament earnings after the victory. Lee has several APT cashes to his name.  Earlier this year in May, he finished 5th for KRW 6.3 million ($4.6K) in Event #48: NLH Bounty and then followed this up with a final table score in Event #33: No Limit Hold’em for TWD 330,700 ($10,474) at the APT Taipei Poker Classic 2024.

“It feels so surreal. I’ll be honest, I got pretty lucky.” – said stunned Lee after his first APT win.

Talking about his heads-up match against  Edgar Antezana, one of the biggest poker pedigrees at the table from South Africa, the  eventual winner said, “I think heads-up I didn’t play it that well, but in the end we ground it out and persevered and came away with the victory.”

2024 APT Manila Main Event Quick Recap 

Boasting the largest guarantee in a poker tournament in the Philippines’ history with PHP 100,000,000 (~$1,700,000), the main event ran from October 31 – November 6 and drew a record field of 1,081 entries (639 unique), making it the largest event in the country’s history. A total of 159 players were paid out of the massive PHP 100,000,000 ($ 1,713,780). Among those who finished among the top 60 finishers were several notables, including Lester Edoc (39th for PHP 371,000), and Renniel Galvez (47th for PHP 316,000), along with Jordan Westmorland (28th for 427,000), James Mendoza (31st for PHP 427,000), Joonhee Yea (41st for PHP 316,000), Joey Weissman (45th for PHP 316,000) & Abraham Ceesvin (55th for PHP 316,000).

Several Indians competed in the tournament, but only Rishi Mehra could make it to the money, finishing (94th for PHP 222,000) – his first cash of the series as per the hendon mob database.

 2024 APT Manila Main Event Final Table Action 

The final day of the prestigious event saw nine players return to battle it out for the coveted title and the lion’s share of the PHP 100 million (~USD 1.7 million) prize pool. Lee started the final table as chip leader but was down to just eight big blinds before staging a remarkable comeback and eventually taking the tournament down against Antezana in heads-up.

With everyone at the final table guaranteed at least PHP 1,345,000 (~USD 22,865), everyone was battling it hard to get pay jumps. In the start, the action was a little and it took one hour for the first elimination to occur in South Korea’s Kim Jaejoong who lost a flip with ace-king against pocket sixes of Gab Yong Kim. The next player to fall was New Zealand poker pro Vincent Huang who jammed his ace-five into John Costiniano’s Big Slick to exit in eighth place.

Daniel Lee, who began the final table with the lead, got off to a rocky start, but Constiniano immediately found smooth sailing and rose to the top in stacks. After sending Huang, he busted bracelet winner Renji Mao whose  pocket fives could not improve against Costiniano’s pocket jacks, ending his run in seventh place.

During six-handed play, Lee was down to just eight big blinds but managed to double up through Sandagdorj Munkhbaatar to bounce back in the game. From there was no looking back as he went on to eliminate Gab Yong Kim (6th), Ferdinand Lu (4th), and Munkhbaatar (5th) to take a huge chip lead into the three handed play.

In the final stages, South Africa’s experienced poker pro Edgar Antezana made it to the heads up play against Lee with a slight lead, after busting Filipino runner Constiniano (3rd). A deal was reached with the final two players deciding to chop off PHP 3,000,000 off first-place money to flatten the payouts. The heads-up lasted for about two hours with the lead shifting back and forth several times. Eventually, it all ended when  Antezana called off Lee’s shove with Qc 7c against the eventual winner’s Kh Js. The 9d Ad 4h flop ran out safe for Lee. The turn 4c was no help to Antezana. The river Jc eliminated Antezana in second place for PHP 13,850,000 (~$235,450). This career-high score moved Antezana to14th place on South Africa’s All-Time Money List.

  2024 APT Manila Main Event Final Table Results 

The Asian Poker Tour (APT) Manila has been running since October 28 and today marks the final day of the 11-day series boasting over ₱170 million (~$3 million) across 109 events.

Keep following PokerProNews for the latest updates and results from APT Manila 2024!

Image and hands courtesy: APT