Martin Rowe wins $1m Asia Pacific Poker Tour grand final in Sydney

Congratulations to local Martin Rowe for winning the Sydney leg of the AAPT. It mentions that he started playing poker at a local pub ... was he playing APL? Click on the title below to read the full story.

Martin Rowe wins $1m Asia Pacific Poker Tour (APPT) grand final in Sydney | The Australian

He started out playing in pub tournaments just three years ago, but 34-year-old financial analyst Martin Rowe is now $1 million richer after taking out the Asia Pacific Poker Tour (APPT) grand final in Sydney.

Mr Rowe, from North Sydney, finished king of the tour after a gruelling nine hours of competition on Sunday at Sydney's Star City Casino.

The tournament began on Tuesday with 477 players, but by Sunday only nine players, including seven from Australia, were left with chips on the table.

Mr Rowe said he was 'absolutely thrilled and a little bewildered'' to be $1 million richer.

'It feels great; it hasn't sunk in,'' he said.

'I haven't really made any decisions at all about how it's changed my life or what I'm going to do with it.''

Mr Rowe had been playing tournament poker for only three years when he entered a tournament at his local pub.

Poker credentials

So when all the poker books recommend that you play a strong, aggressive game ... how does a tight, conservative player fair in the world of free poker? Well, my game seems to be best suited to deep stack tournaments rather than small stack, quick blinds.

Your normal APL game is small stack, quick blinds, loose players, etc ... so I don't win too many actual games (I've won twice so far, both in the last few months). I do well, I regularly get on final tables and have a strong average (points) but I tend to place rather than take out the win.

Online free events are TOUGH. The play is erratic to say the least and you come up against all types of players and all different skill (or lack there of) levels.

My best performances in APL have been:

1. In a joint regional tournament (a few months ago) of about 150 players, I made final table with not too many chips and finished 8th.

2. I finished top two in a Lucky 13 regional tournament of about 65 players. I was just about out half-way through the tournament but rode a HOT streak of cards that chipped me up massively. In the space of 30 minutes I saw pocket 7's, pocket queens, pocket jacks, pocket aces and pocket kings and won with them all. Finishing top 2 won me a trip to Sydney including flights, accommodation and buy-in to play in an APL Pro Open (cash tournament).

3. Two quarters ago I won the Shafston venue which meant I had the most points over a 3 month period. I won a trophy and qualified for my first State tournament.

4. Yesterday I played in my second State tournament and out of 500 players finished 15th which won me $500. More about this in my next post.

Now, in online freeroll tournaments (on PokerStars), my best performances so far are:

1. I finished top 50 in a qualifying event (out of around 5000 players) that put me through to a World Series of Poker satellite. Competing against 14,000 other players I was very unlucky to get knocked out around 650th (the other guy was way behind when he called a second re-raise on the turn and he hit one of only 3 outs on the river).

2. I finished top 50 in a qualifying event (out of around 3000 players) which put me through to a satellite for an APPT event in Macau. There were more than 2500 players in the satellite and the top 100 would be paid (only $5 it turns out) ... I finished 70th.