After four 12-hours' elimination rounds, the world champion of the second annual World Series of Mahjong was crowned by Ho Kwok-Hung from Hong Kong.
The second-annual World Series of Mahjong yesterday entered final stage at the Wynn Macau , where 32 mahjong players, out of the original 302 contestants from 15 countries, battled in the fifth round this morning.
While Hong Kong natives Tong Kam-Wing and Lam Ho-Nam settled for the runner up and second runner up respectively, followed by Japanese player Shigeru Aono.
The 34 year-old world champion, had never thought of winning the competition before, and believed that he just had a lucky hand at the final round.
At the sixth round, he was selected by the computer system to play on stage, which made him nervous.
He was also not familiar with the automatic mahjong table, he dropped and illegally exposed his tile to the other players when he was drawing.  During the last two hands of the final round, he beat Japanese player Shigeru Aono, who had been leading in the first few hands of the round. Eventually, the 34 year-old  became the world champion who scored 180.38 points.
It awarded him with USD$500,000 prize pool and HK$150,000 champion’s necklace.
First runner-up Tong Kam-Wing, a 58 years old who is currently retired. He had been in leading positions throughout the final day of the tournament.
Last year, he also participated in the first World Series and ended up in the 32nd position with US$5,000 prize money. This year, he returned to the tournament with eight family members, including his son and daughter who did not make it to the final round.
The 58 year-old was awarded US$150,000 for the runner up prizes.
The second runner up, Lam Ho-Lam is a student from Hong Kong. The 22 year-old university student is the youngest among the top four players.
He graduated from the Faculty of History at Hong Kong University, and is studying education at the Chinese University in Hong Kong at the moment.
The student took home with second runner up prize of USD$80,000.
On the other hand, the 52 year-old Shigeru Aono is an entertainment industry researcher from Japan. He has been playing mahjong for 35 years, and had participated in different mahjong competitions in mainland China.
He settled in the fourth place and won US$50,000.
Yu Xiao-ping, Taiwanese celebrity and second-runner up of the 2007 World Series, battled alone at the tournament today.
Yu was dropped from the fourth position at the fifth round to the eighth position at the seventh round. Although she could not make her way to the final round, she still won USD$15,000.
 Hong Kong players continued to dominate the World Series this year, followed by players from Taiwan and Japan.
The average scores for this year were higher than that of last year, while the tournament duration was relatively shorter, so the players were less exhausted.
The World Series of Mahjong was launched by World Mahjong Limited in 2006, and the tournament gathers top mahjong players from all over the world to vie for the enviable title of “World Mahjong Champion” and the biggest prize money – US$1.0 million – in the history of mahjong. Details about the event – registration, rules and regulations, etc – are available on the official website  at www.world-series-mahjong.com.