Sawadee-cup at Medalist Asia-International 2006 Dart Tournament, Bangkok

A wonderful, friendly, fun-filled, “eye-opener” event!

That was how one of the Singapore darters described the 2006 Medalist Soft-Tip Dart tournament held in Bangkok, Thailand on June 2-4. Held over a period of 3 days intensive morning-till-night playing, 12 Medalist darters from Singapore met with players from all over the world to pit their skills against each other and came home with trophies, cash winnings, new friends and lots of memories.

On the evening before the tournament started, the organizers, Medalist Asia, threw a big party for all the players called Players’ Appreciation Party. Though the party was meant to be held outdoors at the Hotel Montien Riverside, a heavy thunderstorm brought the party indoors. But the rain couldn’t put a damper on the party as there were food and drinks for everyone and we got to mingle with all the players for the first time. After the food and drinks, we were ushered into the tournament hall for the party.

At the doors into the hall, we were greeted by a group of pretty Thai ladies all dressed in their fine traditional costumes. Everyone who entered the hall received an orchid garland and a traditional Thai “sawadee-kap” greeting. Too bad there were no pecks on the cheeks :). More surprises followed when officials and players lined up on both sides to clap and cheer all the other players walking into the hall. It was as if we had already won just by being there! Apparently, this was the Medalist tradition of welcoming all the players.

In the Grand Ballroom, all the beautiful trophies were showcased on a raised platform, secured by railings. Made of ceramic, the large trophies glowed in an unusual shade of blue (5th prize), green (3rd prize) and white (1st prize). It would be very nice to bring some home…

The president of Medalist USA, Lee Peppard and the Thai Minister of Tourism gave opening speeches. A rock band then took to the stage to entertain the players while they mingle, eat and drink.

Soon, the thunderstorm ended and the party shifted outdoors again for an elephant ride show and fireworks show. The fireworks were shot from a boat on the Chao Phraya river (the hotel is located on the banks of the river). Being so near, it was an awesome sight to have the fireworks blow up right above you. Everyone ooohed and aaahed as the fireworks lit up the sky in a rain of starry lights. The fireworks finally ended after about 10 minutes with a firework sparkle sign that read “Medalist We Love Darts”.

Day One

The first day of the tournament started off early in the morning with an opening ceremony. Short welcome greetings were given by the Medalist officials in all the languages that were represented by all the various nationalities gathered in the hall. Some of them include Taiwanese, Hong Kong, Japanese, Indonesian, Malaysian, New Zealander, Spaniard, Americans, British and Australian. Paul Lim rounded it all off with “Have a Good Time and Good Darts!”

The games soon got underway in the Round-Robin hall, which was packed with 48 dart machines. There were a total of about 100 teams. Each flight was divided into groups of 5 or 6 teams. The top two winners of each group then proceeded to play in a knockout tournament within each flight. 2-3 teams were also “wild-card” drawn to proceed to the knockout round based on number of games won during the Round Robin. The top 2 teams for each flight then gets to play their final game up in the “pit”, which is actually not a pit but a raised platform in the center of the hall.

As the majority of the players were Japanese, there were Japanese speaking officials on hand to assist the players. There were also many interesting things to look and see including the high fashion of darts-wear, which ranged from mini-skirts and 4 inch high heels to Kimono suits and traditional clogs. The Japanese also had innovative spare tips holder fashioned from the bulls-eye and stylish leather dart pouches.

It was almost 7.30pm when the first Singapore player reached the finals and got to play up in the pit for the AA Flight. Shaun Chng and his Japanese partner Kiyoshi Nishitani were marched up to the pit with everyone lined up to give them high fives and good luck slaps accompanied by the loud, Sylvester Stallone’s “Rocky” type of music. Their opponents were 2 talented young Japanese players. It was a close match but the Japanese team managed to throw more consistent bulls that were on target almost all the time and in the end, they got to take the white trophy home. Still, it was a good, first day of victory for the Singapore team as a total of 4 teams won trophies or prize monies.

Day One Winners
Player	Flight	Position	Total Prize (US$)	Trophies
Shaun/Kiyoshi	AA	2nd	$1500	2
Vinson/Roger	AA	Joint 9th	$200	0
Shin/Morgan	B	Joint 5th	$260	2
Haris/Marcus	C	Joint 9th	$140	0

Day Two

Day 2 began with a promise for more glories, as there were Women’s double and Grandmasters events. We also met Lucky Newbury, who was the 2 times AA Flight World Champion. He gave us tips on how to stand and throw and shared his admiration of the Asian players who already have the correct stance and throw and would likely take the world darts championships by storm soon.

“Why are soft tip darts more difficult?” asked Lucky. “Because you stand 3 inches further from the soft-tip board than a steep tip board and because there is no room for error", explained Lucky."Playing soft-tip will improve your steel tip because after you practice on a steel tip's soft-tip board and then, stand 3 inches nearer to the cork board, all of a sudden, you feel the bull is right in front of you. The other reason is, as the bulls-eye is slightly bigger in soft-tip, your opponent has an equally easier chance of getting the bull, so you have to be more perfect and more consistent in all your throws without any room for error.”

I really had a first hand opportunity to confirm his explanation because the Grandmasters event was held on that night. Only the best players got to be invited to participate.

The Grandmasters Finals was an exciting and thrilling match between Paul Lim and a top Thai steel-tip champion. In a game of the Best of the Best, no errors can be made in every dart thrown. Consecutive “Hat-Tricks” (3 bull-eyes) were thrown by both players and whoever misses one single bull will probably lose the game. It was best of 5 games to win and both players had to draw out their best effort to level the game at 2-2. In the end, Paul Lim had a better strategy in the Cricket game to triumph over the Thai player. It was a awe-inspiring match to watch for the Singapore players and was the most-talked about match afterwards.

At the end of the 2nd day, there were indeed more glories for the Singapore contingent. We had participated in 7 events and won 5 of them.

Day Two Winners
Player	Flight	Position	Total Prize (US$)	Trophies
Shaun/Kiyoshi	AA	Joint 5th	$380	2
Vinson/Roger	AA	Joint 3rd	$750	2
Shin/Morgan	B	Joint 3rd	$500	2
Shin/Annie	Women's A Double	Joint 3rd	$250	2
Annie/Simon	C	Joint 9th	$140	0

Day Three

This was the final day of the event. Although everyone was a little tired by now, we were still keen to win more trophies and to better the previous day’s performance. The thoughts of soothing massages for the aching muscles helped to perk everyone up. In any case, there were ready masseurs just outside the hall to rub the aching muscles of the players for a small fee.

A TV crew from the local national TV turned up to interview some of the players and to telecast live the finals of the Double AA finals, fought between a Japanese team and a Thai team.

In between the games, Paul Lim held a players’ interview on stage and persuaded a Japanese darter and his girlfriend to come up and answer a few questions. After a few questions, the man suddenly turned around, got on his knees, took out a large triple diamond-studded ring and asked for her hand in marriage! How did I know it was large? Because you can see the glitter from 10 meters away! Everyone was taken by surprised and cheered for the couple when she accepted. And yes, the interview was a setup. What a way to propose!

The last day of the tournament finally ended in the late evening and almost everyone in the Singapore contingent had won prizes. We took home a total of 13 cups and more than US$5000 cash prizes. it was, indeed, a sawadee-cups experience for everyone.

Day Three Winners
Player	Flight	Position	Total Prize (US$)	Trophies
Shaun/Kazuhito	AA	Joint 5th	$380	2
Vinson/Roger	AA	Joint 5th	$380	2
Matthew/Joe	A	Joint 9th	$100	0
Shin/Morgan	B	Joint 9th	$140	0

As Shaun described, “Walking into the tournament hall for the first time was the most memorable experience for me. It was as grand, if not better, than the World Darts Federation Championship.” The event had indeed given lots of excitement to the players and opened our eyes to the world of soft tip darts.

How the players felt about the event was best summarized by Morgan’s immediate request “Sign me up for next year’s event!”

You can view more pictures of the tournament in the photo gallery.