Kokubo Tomonoshin, who also won the $80,000 first prize during the baccarat tournament at the casino in September last year, maintained the lead during the fifth and fourth hands in the last heat with 20,200 chips.
He dipped to second place in the third and fourth hands before finally regaining first place during the final chip count.
Winning the $26,000 second prize was Shimizu Misako, a first -time participant who was also the only female player who made it to the finals. Park Jong Ho went home with $10,000 for placing third, followed by Nam Hyung Seok who won $4,000 for placing fourth.
Fifth to 10th place winners who won $1,000 cash each were Du Yun Feng, Ikegaya Katsuhisa, Lee Gwang Su, Imai Kyohei, Lee Jun Mo and Suzuki Junichi.
Casino manager Tim Blythe said he was very glad of another successful tournament.
“I guess that we met our expectation in terms of the number of players. We thank our patrons and hope to see them in our future tournaments,” Blythe said.
Casino marketing and promotions manager Chell Funtanar said the tournament started with 121 players for the preliminary rounds on Saturday afternoon. Fifty-five made it to the semi-finals on Sunday afternoon which was trimmed down to 10 at the final table.
Funtanar said she was happy to see a lot of casino regulars and a fair share of newcomers who played over the weekend.
The entry fee for the tournament was $1,000 inclusive of airfare, two-night accommodation, meals, and cocktail drinks at the casino.
The next tournament will be on the second weekend of September.
