competing with the real sharks: http://www.azbilliards.com/2000storya.cfm?storynum=5356 

Roy Steffensen said:Departure from Norway was at 0645 so I decided to stay awake all night playing pool. When I arrived in Schiphol Airtport in The Netherlands I had about 5 hours to kill before my flight to Manila.
For this visit to the Philippines I decided to bring my laptop with me, so I can easily add pictures to the posts here on AzB, I can watch movies and poolmatches, and I can use my excel-file to do stats on the matches I will play here. I could already use the computer at Schiphol AirportI started with watching a match from the 2003 World Pool Championship, against Efren Reyes and Fransisco Bustamante. Great play from both players, and it helped me through 1 hour, 40 minutes and 11 seconds.
The chairs at the quiet areas at Schiphol were quite comfortable, and I tried as hard as I could to stay awake, because I wanted to sleep on the plane instead. So to keep me awake I played BubbleBreaker on my phone, and a game on www.trendz.co.uk/game, which is very addicting. The purpose of the game is to beat a biker with a bat, and see how far you can make him fly. You got to try it, but don?t blame me when you?re addicted and can?t do anything productive but playing this game?
I didn?t get to sleep much at the plane, watched 3 movies, so when I arrived Sunday morning it was time for breakfast, check-in at the hotel and then a few hours of sleep. Slept for about 2 hours, so that?s all the sleep I had since Friday morning?
I texted Lolong, a local poolplayer: ?Hi Pangit. Mukha ba yan? 9-ball tonight? Love you my friend. Roy D?Fish?. Got a text back within 10 seconds, and I had a match planned for the night with one of the most laughable persons in Manila. He smiles and laughs all the time!
At One Side there was not much action going on, it was a quiet night, but everyone was talking about Monday?s big match. Dennis Orcullo ? Fransisco Bustamante race to 31 in 9-ball for 200 000 Pesos. Will try to keep you updated about this matchup!
Me and Lolong decided to play ?series?, which means 2 sets. If 1-1 in set, we will double the money in the third and last set. We played 9-ball, race to 7 for 1000 pesos. He fired away and didn?t miss a ball before it was 6-1 to him. I lost 7-2. In the next set I went from 1-0 behind to 6-1, and then managed to win 7-3. In the last deciding set for 2000 pesos he went up to 6-1 pretty quick. I tried my best, but failed and lost 7-5. Lolong played good, missed only 2 easy shots and scratched on the 8 once, and both the easy misses were after he had done all the hard work in the racks. I am sure we all can relate to that feeling, when we?ve just finished the hard shots and are faced with couple of easy shots and the focus is not 100 % anymore, because we are so revealed that we managed to get past the first part of the rack? That?s the only shots he missed.
After the match I went over to Pool Fusion, the other action room, just a couple of hundreds of meters away. Here I talked to the owner, who told me that Jeffrey De Luna will play a big money match here Monday against #3 in China. He also told me that Alcano recently lost 2 matches to Pagulayan in 10-ball for a total amount of 2 900 000 Pesos, at One Side. One set was for 800 000 pesos, and the other one for 2 100 000 pesos. In total about 65 000 $ in Pagulayan?s pockets, which is not bad at all for 2 money matches. (Edit: some people said the match was for 200 000 only, some said 2 million, and 1 more confirmed it was for 2.9. I don?t know what is correct, perhaps a local Filipino can educate us?)
Everyone here seems to be excited about the tournaments going on, and then especially the tournament in Cebu, the Manny Villar Cup 2nd leg. They all seem to go to Cebu for the qualifiers there, so it will be one hell of a field trying to get the last spots in the tournament of 64 players. Will be exciting!!!
Before I went to bed on Sunday I watched a 14 year old kid play series, 10-ball for 5000 pesos, race to 12 against a 20 + year old. The kid, nicknamed ?Monkey? had won the first set, and won the second 12-8 when I left. That kid impressed me with his shotmaking, his focus and his solutions. I taped half a rack of them before my battery on the cellphone died, and I will try to put it up on youtube during the next days.
For your information, it?s common to play matches for as low as 1000 pesos here. It seems very low for us from Europe and America, but for 1000 pesos you can for example get your hair cut 6 times, or you can buy almost 25 San Miguel?s at One Side. Rice for one month for a family costs about 1500 pesos, and monthly average salary is between 6000 ? 12000 pesos for people who works in restaurants and shops.
Roy Steffensen said:I went to One Side just to say hello, but when I opened the door I just heard the word "one pocket" being shouting out loud. It was Efren Reyes, in the table in the corner showing some shots to spectators, and I went over to him.
I said I only wanted to play very cheap, and he said 1000 pesos only, that's ok. He then said he had forgot what he gave me in handicap last time (10-5), and said "I saw you play, even this time, ok?". Haha. I just laughed and told him it was 10-5, and then he laughed and said no no no no, and offered me 10-6 and the first break. I didn't negotiate anymore, cause the action was so cheap.
The first set he played awesome, and he actually told me what he wanted to do and what he thought on some of his shots. It was pretty cool. At 2-0 he needed only 2 balls, but they were all up-table except 1, and he showed me the exact spot he wanted the cueball to end. I had no idea how he was going to put it there, but he cheated the pocket, hit maximum draw with lots of left spin. Managed to not hit the longrail, which I thought was impossible, and when the cueball finally hit the shortrail it changed direction so dramatically and went for the spot he had showed me. He got unlucky, and missed by a length of about a chalk's distance, and then behind a ball. He banked another ball instead. lol
Another memorable shot was after my break. It was a "perfect" break and he was scratching his head, and after thinking for a while he pointed with his cue how the 4-ball was gonna carom into 3 different balls, lying apart from eachother, and move them away from my pocket. He executed it almost perfect, missed the last ball by a hair, but the cueball went 4 rails and hide behind it. He then started to laugh really loud and say "magic". He was in a very good mood :-D
In the next 2 sets we played 5 games went to the last ball for both of us, which was quite entertaining. One game lasted for almost 30 minutes. In that game I tried for a crazy combination, and Efren laughed before I made the shot saying "all balls will move to my pocket". I managed to make the ball I aimed for, but Efren almost went roling on the floor laughing, because not one ball was on my side of the table. All 14 balls were close to his pocket, and 5 of them were so close it was almost impossible to get the cueball past them.
I stopped his laughing, cause I managed to move one ball at the time, keeping him in traps. He ended up with making 2 of my balls and deliberate foul 3 different times during the game, so at most he needed 12 balls.
After one of my shots where I 2-railed a ball, made it hang in the jaws, drew the cueball to the shortrail with lots of spin and made it spin behind 2 of his balls and freeze it, he just said "what is this???". I won that game, but lost the set 3-2 and the next 3-0 too, but they were all close, so felt good.
Alex Pagualayn didn't have a game with Wu tonight, looks like Wu backed out, so he ended up playing race to 32 in 9-ball against Dennis for 50 000. 2-0 to alex when I left. Django was at one table, Alcano on another one, so lots of action. I am done with pool tonight, so no updates on those matches :-(
Roy Steffensen said:I went to One Side just to say hello, but when I opened the door I just heard the word "one pocket" being shouting out loud. It was Efren Reyes, in the table in the corner showing some shots to spectators, and I went over to him.
I said I only wanted to play very cheap, and he said 1000 pesos only, that's ok. (
yobagua said:Roy can you give me some advice about bringing my laptop to Phillipines? Am I going to need an adapter? What do you log into? Any help would be appreciated.
Also any info about the Cebu tournament?
Roy Steffensen said:I bought an adapter for my laptop, it was really expensive. 24,95 pesos
JoeyA, I will try to play Lee Van if I get the chance! Did he give you handicap?
I just heard that Efren lost to a local guy yesterday, giving the wild 7 in 10-ball race to 25. Dennis Orcullo managed to win 32-30 against Pagulayan. The day before Dennis lost to Alcano in rotation, 15-13.
Yesterday Alcano had been playing a guy 10-ball race to 11, giving the wild 8. Plus Alcano had to use the mechanical bridge on all shots
Chris arrived from Norway today, so we will head for One Side tonight.
Sitting on a cafe outside One Side now, together with Lolong. We just bought him some coffee, and he is telling lots of jokes and laughing all the time.
Roy Steffensen said:At SM Mall in Cebu now, internetcafe 15 meters from the venue, so that's nice.
Yesterday evening there were still the qualifiers going, and around 50-75 spectators for the qualifiers.
After that we were invited to a place with 2 pooltables and lots of pokertables. Lots of the players in the maintournament were there, just chilling, some played pool and some played poker. Efren challenged me in one-pocket again, but I handed him Chris instead. Christ got 10-6, and Efren played AWESOME. It was a pleasure to watch, and Gomez went screaming hallelujah after some shots... hehe... Chris lost 10-0, 10- -1, and 10-1. Efren made the only ball in Chris' pocket too... hehe... Chris had a chance to bank a ball twice, that was his only oppurtunities, and Chris hanged the balls in the jaw both times...
I decided to try against Efren too, same handicap. I also lost 3-0, but once again I managed to get 2 of the games to the last ball. Tough luck playing Efren, he is just incredible... I asked Alex if he wanted to play Efren, and Alex just responded, "No, I am working hard for my money, one pesos at the time. I will not play Efren, he's only cheating, because he makes balls all the time"
Oh, by the way, since Alex lost 50 000, 32-30, in 9-ball against Dennis he challenged him for 200 000 in rotation race to 21. They played at Side Pocket in Quezon City, and Alex managed to win 21-20. Close race!!! Nice one Alex.
Anyway, getting ready for the tournament now. The maintournament will start in 1,5 hours. They have divided the players in 2 groups of 32. I have only got a copy of my group, which goes like this:
Alex Pagulayan vs Godofredo Ducanes
Carlo Biado vs Chris Johannessen
Warren Kiamco vs Johann Chua
Joven Bustamante vs Benjie Guevarra
Ronato Alcano vs Allan Abuhalim
Ramil Gallego vs Russian Petiza
Fransisco Bustamante vs Renemar David
Gandy Valle vs Manolo Tanasas
Lee Van Corteza vs Ronnie Aying
Jundel Mazon vs Elmer Haya
Dennis Orcullo vs Danny Otacan
Ricky Zerna vs Roberto Dy
Roberto Gomez vs Jomar Deocampo
Rodolfo Luat vs Benson Palce
Efren Reyes vs Aram Serquiano
Jharome Pena vs Roy Steffensen
I don't have the other group, but looks like all the top players came in this group...