Featured player: Patrik Antonius
- Filed under: -ANTONIUS-, FinddaGrind, High Stakes News, Luigi66369, Patrik Antonius, Player Profiles, Poker
- Date: Aug 26,2008
Player names: Previously has used the screennames ”FinddaGrind”, “CryMeARiver8″ and “Luigi66369″ on Full Tilt Poker, now plays under his own name. On the Microgaming Network Patrik is known as ”I Knockout U” and as “-ANTONIUS” on the b2b Network.
Patrik Antonius, a Finn from the city of Vantaa (located in the Helsinki metropolitan area), has become one of the leading poker players in the world. Patrik’s bankroll is counted in millions of dollars. At the poker tables Patrik is known by his aggressive playing style. He rarely ”tilts”, either.
Patrik is often seen in Las Vegas, where he regularly visits ”Bobby’s Room” at the Bellagio casino. Bobby’s Room hosts some of the biggest games in the world. Patrik has also won millions of dollars in the Internet games.
-Patrik Antonius with his old look
The collapsed dream of a professional tennis player
During his earlier years, Patrik had a dream of becoming a professional tennis player. At the end of his mandatory military service, the physical condition of his back didn’t allow him to continue with the pursuit of his dream. At the age of 11 Patrik had already become familiar with playing poker at the family backyard. The winnings were invested in candies at a local convenience store. Since then, the bets have grown…
While Patrik was suffering from continuous back pains, he found the Grand Casino Helsinki. Every Wednesday the casino hosted a 25 dollar buy-in No Limit Hold’em tournament and Patrik won one of those tournaments making 275 dollar earnings. At that time, the Helsinki Casino had only one cashgame, which was pot-limit Omaha with 2-2$ blinds. A lot of times Patrik took a shot at that game and went broke on several occations.
Patrik was experiencing downward spiral, where he won at home games and lost that money at the Helsinki Casino. Finally he got to take advantage of the home game lessons and started to win at the 2-2$ PLO games. Still Patrik was a rookie in the game, he didn’t understand the nuances of it, and was a complete outsider when it came to the odd mystery language of the players, with terms like “outs” and “ gutshots”. Later on those concepts became very familiar.
A 200 dollar deposit turned quickly to 20.000 dollars
Patrik learned poker by playing, not by reading. In the summer of 2002, he was winning consistently at the casino and the home games, allowing his bankroll to grow on a steady pace. All this was very exciting and new to the man. However, his bankroll shrunk substantially due to Patrik’s trip to Italy to learn the language and the Italian cuisine.
In January 2003, Patrik invested 200 dollars in Internet poker, and won 20.000 dollars in just two months. The thought of being able to play at any given time and at several tables simultaneously, was astounding. Patrik took a break from his studies at Helsinki Polytechnic to concentrate in playing poker.
At that time, Patrik played online poker 12 hours a day, 7 days a week. Several months of playing finally paid off, and his bankroll grew from 20.000 dollars all the way to 80.000 dollars. Patrik took shots at the bigger tables, when the games were going well, since he wanted to face the best online players and learn their winning tactics. Patrik learned a lot from the game that year.
Learning English in the USA
While the games at the poker tables were looking good, many of Patrik’s friends were playing tennis at various universities in the US. Patrik’s back started to feel better and he took upon the opportunity of traveling to USA to play tennis and learn the language.
During his time in the USA, Patrik studied English and played tennis during the daytime, and evening times he played poker in the IT classroom of the school. There was only a few hours of time left for poker every day, but Patrik’s run of cards was burning hot, and he managed to win 150.000 dollars at 50/100$ limit Hold’em games.
Patrik also played 5/10$ and 15/25$ PLO games and his bankroll was already up to 250.000 dollars. He also managed to won a ticket to a WSOP tournament, and was on his way to Las Vegas by the time the school ended.
Having spent six months in a small town in Virginia, Las Vegas felt like heaven to Patrik. Other players complimented Patrik’s games in Las Vegas, which boosted his self-confidence. After the WSOP tournament, Patrik flew back to Virginia, packed up and returned to Finland.
After his return, Patrik kept grinding in the online games and doubled his capital in just two weeks playing 200/400$ limit games. For the following two years Patrik played as much as he could.
Good times got better
In summer 2005 Patrik practically dominated live tournaments and the man was in flames! He won the Ladbrokers Scandinavian Poker Championship tournament in Stockholm and gained 66.261 dollars. He came third at EPT Barcelona and made 145.000 dollars. At EPT Baden he won again, which decorated his bank account with 343.000 dollars. The biggest victory came at the WPT tournament in Bellagio, where won just over one Million dollars.
Patrik moved to Las Vegas in January 2006. There he met Maya, and the couple quicky got engaged. Later on, Maya gave birth to a baby girl, and the parents named her Mila. Patrik is often seen in Bobby’s Room at Bellagio and at one point of the year 2007 he walked out of Bobby’s Room eight times in a row as a winner.
Residence in Monaco and joining team Full Tilt Poker
Patrik moved to Monaco recently, since he had missed Europe so much for several years already. This summer Patrik was invited to join the precious Team Full Tilt Poker - now you can find him playing at the biggest tables under his own name. He has even gotten a few of the biggest tables named after him.
-Patrik Antonius with his new look
Barry Greenstein’s analysis on Patrik
Barry Greenstein has seen only two rookies at Big Games, who have won at mixed games without playing other games first. The other is Patrik Antonius and the other is Phil Ivey. He, thus, compares Patrik to Phil Ivey, who is considered to be probably the best poker player in the world.
Barry Greenstein has a habit of making analysis on the high limit players at his web site. His analysis for Patrik Antonius is:
Aggressiveness: 9
Looseness: 9
Short-handed: 9
Limit: 7
No-limit: 8
Tournaments: 7
Side games: 8
Steam control: 5
Against weak players: 7
Against strong players: 7
Barry Greenstein’s funny story about Patrik
Barry was on his way from Las Vegas to Los Angeles and so were Patrik and Roland De Wolfe, too. Roland asked, if Barry would like to travel with them on a limousine to L.A. Barry wanted to show a good gesture and accepted the invitation and rode along. The limousine to Los Angeles costs about 700 dollars, Barry says. The boys had arranged a limousine from Bellagio and the driver was a nice stud player.
Half way through, the driver makes a stop at a Greek restaurant and Patrik tips him for the trip. Patrik hands him a stack of bills – worth of 1.900 dollars to be exact. Barry wanted to take part in the slightly absurd tip, too, and assumed that Patrik didn’t know how much is a proper tip.
Patrik didn’t ask Barry to pay his own share, but Barry offered 700 dollars from his pocket anyway. After all, Barry had often met foreigners who spent dollars like they grew on trees, only because the newcomers didn’t understand they value of the currency. So, Barry thought that’s what had happened with Antonius as well.
Barry told the guys that 1.900 dollars was a bit too much to give the driver. Roland commented that the limousine cost 1.700 dollars and thus they had only given a 200-dollar-tip. Afterwards it cleared to Barry that the driver had been tipped too little, and he then tipped 300 dollars more.
Patrik was surprised when Barry told him that the limousine drive to L.A. would have been available for free – a service that is provided to all high limit players. Patrik wondered why Roland hadn’t mentioned it… not that the limousine driver minded the lack of information, though!
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