A pool explosion

The past month has been a renaissance of billiards, a gargantuan jump reminding the world that the best players on the planet are Filipino, male or female.

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Chezka Centeno battled Rubilen Amit for the Predator WPA Women’s 10-Ball championship (again). Django Bustamante leads a strong Team Asia to a dominating defense of the Reyes Cup against a powerhouse Team Rest of the World. Along the way, AJ Manas upended world No. 1 Fedor Gorst. Then all the stars gathered again for the ongoing Philippine Cup.

In November, the fourth season of the Amit Cup gets underway. After some tremendous struggles along the way, now there is an overabundance of women pool players knocking on the door to get in.

"In the beginning, we only had 24 players," recalls Amit Cup co-founder and tournament director Ren de Vera. "Now, there are so many inquiries, they've exceeded the maximum number for our chat group!"