Poker Stories: Patrik Antonius

Poker Stories

Patrik Antonius started playing online poker in 1999, and was almost immediately competing at the highest-stakes available. The Finnish pro then broke out on the tournament circuit in 2005, winning an EPT main event and finishing second in the WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic for $1.04 million. Although he has always preferred cash games to tournaments, the former tennis standout and model has still managed to rack up $12 million in live tournament earnings during his career, including the $3.1 million he banked for finishing runner-up at the 2018 Super High Roller Bowl China.

Antonius is perhaps best known for his success in nosebleed-stakes cash games, and holds a number of records. In 2009, he won the biggest recorded pot in online poker history, scooping $1.376 million in a hand of pot-limit Omaha against Viktor 'Isildur1' Blom. In fact, Antonius was involved in four of the top 10 hands ever, and also has the record on the TV shows Poker After Dark and High Stakes Poker. At the end of 2020, the 40-year-old was nominated for the Poker Hall of Fame.

In an effort to help grow the game that gave him so much, Antonius has co-founded FLOP (First Land of Poker), an app that connects the poker community all over the world and allows them to find games and other players. The all-in-one platform features chat, learning tools, and even a session tracker. Download the app for free today on either the Android Google Play store or Apple iOS.

Highlights from this interview include growing up in Finland, moving from tennis to poker, winning a tournament on his first trip to the casino, building a bankroll with relentless aggression, magazine sales to modeling, military or jail, playing in the biggest games, record-breaking pots, cash games over tournaments, what makes someone worthy of the Poker Hall of Fame, being an ambassador for the game, six-figure sports bets, high-stakes golf with Phil Ivey, being 'the Brad Pitt of Poker,' and steak cravings.