Julio Aquino and Tommy Kennedy
The Poison tours latest event was held at Stroker's in Palm Harbor, Fl.
Saturday's $1000 Added amateur event would have some new faces in the finals and also at the top of the ranking list after this event. Jim Sandaler was proving to be the man to beat as he would make his way to the hotseat match with wins over Bobby Livrago 7-4, Coot Smith 7-3, Dave Ross 7-4 and then a strong 7-0 win over Jimmy Thoms to get to the hotseat match. The hotseat match would also see a new face with Miami's Raymond Linares showcasing his skills with strong wins over Bill Mitchell 7-4, Mike Delawder 7-5, James Adams 7-1, Wesley White 7-4 and then a 7-2 win over Richard Knight to make his way to the hotseat match to play Sandaler. With both players playing strong pool on the day this match would prove to be no different with Sandaler squeaking out a 7-6 win to capture the hotseat.
Mike Delawder was proving to be a handful on the one loss side after a 1st round loss he would go onto win 6 matches on the bounce before running into Richard Knight who would take him down with a strong 5-2 win to leave Delawder in 4th spot. Knight would then come up against a determined Linares who would take this one 5-3 to leave Knight in a very respectable 3rd place. The final would guarantee another new winner on tour. Sandaler now had the chance to win his first event on tour and also the opportunity to go into number one on the Amateur ranking points list. Sandaler would do just that with a strong 8-3 win to take his first event and leave Linares with a very respectable 2nd place finish.
Payouts.
1st, Jim Sandaler $550
2nd, Raymond Linares $400
3rd Richard Knight $300
4th, Mike Delawder $200
5th-6th, Lincoln Seiffert, Jimmy Thoms $120
9th-12th, Todd Anderson, Dave Ross, Billy Moses, Wesley White, $50
Sunday's $1000 Added open event would see a strong player field show up with Tommy Kennedy would prove once again to be the man to beat as he would make his way to the hotseat with some very hard fought wins over Justin Hall 7-6, Jerry Troisi 7-5, Richie Richeson 7-6 to get to the hotseat match, The hotseat match would pit him up against Last season player of the Year Julio Aquino, Aquino made his way there with strong wins over Jeremy Aurswald 7-4, Dave Ross 7-6, Rich Bailo 7-1 and then a strong 7-5 win over Donnie Mills. The hotseat match would see Kennedy come out like a man on fire and take the first 6 racks to put him on the Hill, Aquino would dig deep and take the next 4 racks before Kennedy would close it out 7-4 to capture the hotseat and almost guarantee himself the Player of the year Title with 2 events left. Raymond Linares would try making a run at the finals with strong wins over George Saunders 6-5, Tony Crosby 6-5 before taking a loss to Richie Richeson to finish Tied in 5th, Richeson would then go onto beat Mills before being eliminated by Julio Aquino to finish 3rd. Aquino would set up a revenge final match with Kennedy. The final was very similar affair to the Hotseat match with the former US Open Champion proving he still has all if not more skill than ever to take his 4th title in a row which is a tremendous achievement with the amount of high caliber players showing up for the Open.
The Poison Tour would like to thank Jose Del Rio Stroker's room owner and his staff for hosting a fantastic event. We would like to thank our sponsor and all the players for making these events happen. Our next event will be at Uncle Waldo's in Daytona Beach, Florida on June 5th-6th. Come try the new line of poison cues out we will have some demo cues fro every one to try. We Look forward to see you there visit www.poisonpooltour.com for more info.
1st, Tommy Kennedy $520
2nd, Julio Aquino $380
3rd, Richie Richeson $280
4th, Donnie Mills $200
5th-6th, Trevor Braymore, Raymond Linares $80
7th-8th, Tony Crosby, Louis Altes $60
