Van Marcus lifts Champions trophy

By Ben Blaschke
08 December 2009

MELBOURNE pro Van Marcus became the first multiple APPT tournament winner after beating out a top quality field to win the annual Tournament of Champions at Star City.
Marcus – who won last year’s APPT Manila event for $162,857 – added another title to his resume last night with a dominant performance to earn $10,000 for his chosen charity ChildFund.
Although the Tournament of Champions is typically a light-hearted finale to the APPT season, the caliber of the field also ensures plenty of competitive spirit between the combatants.
This year’s event included former WSOP main event champions Joe Hachem and Peter Eastgate, 2007 APPT Sydney winner Grant Levy, recent APPT Auckland champ Simon Watt, this week’s APPT Sydney success story Aaron Benton, winner of The Poker Star Amanda de Cesare and Pokerstars pros Tony Hachem and Eric Assadourian.
“It’s always a bit of fun but for me with any sort of poker I like to play my own game, whether I’m playing for $1 or $1 million,” Marcus told Big Game Poker.
“I really wanted to win this for my charity and after coming third last year I knew I had to bring my A-game so that I could do some good.
“They were all good players, I played pretty well and things worked out in the end.”
Marcus’ win also topped off a successful year for the 26-year-old in which he reached two final tables at the Word Series of Poker – finishing seventh in the $5000 Pot Limit Omaha event for $55,687 then third in the $10,000 PLO World Championship for $278,409.
“They were pretty good cashes there,” he said.
“Unfortunately I didn’t win a bracelet but I’ll keep trying and hopefully I can do it next year.”
Marcus’ day began slowly yesterday but he stormed to the lead in a huge three-way pot against Levy and Assadourian in which he flopped a Royal Flush draw against Levy’s set of Jacks.
A third club on the turn gave Marcus the lead and the river blanked to cripple two of his rivals.
Eastgate, Benton, Levy and Assadourian were all early casualties and after Hachem and Watt fell in quick succession it was down to Marcus and de Cesare to fight it out for the title.
The key hand came when both players pushed all in on a J-9-4 flop.
De Cesare turned over J-10 for top pair but Marcus had flopped a set with his 9-9 and the contest was all but over.