There were many fine Challenge Matches at Derby City this year. If you tired of straight tournament play you could always walk upstairs and watch two guys going head to head.
Some of the notable matches included John Schmidt dropping $18,000 to Richie Richeson. Schmidt came back the next night to play one hole with Danny Smith. Smith gave Schmidt a 9-8 spot and could not beat it as Schmidt won $10,000 from him that evening.
Then there was the ring game. Skyler Woddward, Richie Richeson, Mike Delawder, Danny Smith and Billy Thorpe all ponied up $2,000 apiece in a winner-take-all format. Styler Woodward wound up pocketing the ten grand.
In one match that got real interesting John Hennigan and Dennis Orcollo locked up in a back-pocket 9-Ball game for $10,000. When they got to double hill there they decided to start again and raise the stakes to $30,000. Several hours later Hennigan walked away with the cash.
And we had a marathon match. Chris Gentile and Danny Smith probably had no idea they would be playing for 26 straight hours before they could reach an outcome. They began at Midnight on Thursday night and at one point Gentile was down $9,000. But they kept playing until Saturday morning at 2 AM and Gentile had turned the tide in his favor to leave the table with $9,000 in his pocket.
