thorladen: Player Update: February 2009

This is thorladen's first ever major live title. Picture courtesy of Poker Listings.

It seems there is no stopping Steve Weinstein at the moment.

The man known as ‘thorladen’ online has been crushing MTT’s for years but he has been lacking a major live tournament title – until now.

On January 29th the New Yorker took down the Borgata Winter Open Main Event ($3,000 NLH) for the biggest score of his career – $658,405. Weinstein fought through 1,016 other runners to claim a prize which far surpasses anything he has achieved – and how did he feel after this moment of ectasty?
“I had a lot of big blinds and it seemed like the tournament went smoothly. I kept getting chips without a showdown” he told Pocket Fives. Just another day in the life.

Weinstein wasn’t even planning on playing in the tournament when he arrived in Atlantic City – he was going to prepare for a national bridge tournament until his wife encouraged him to play. He also had some interesting strategy tit-bits to share with P5’s after the final table: “People focus on averages and the place they’re in, but the key is the number of big blinds you have. I focus on having a shove stack and a re-shove stack. People dwell way too much on what their stack is relative to the average.”

This isn’t the first time ‘thorladen’ has taken down a major score in recent months – in November ’08 he emerged victorious in the PokerStars ‘Sunday 500’ for a cool $91,250 (the likes of Ben Fineman & Anthony ‘holdplz’ Spinella were also at the final table).

Check out the Pocket Fives appreciation thread from his victory here, with the likes of Steve ‘gboro780’ Gross, Scott ‘SCTrojans’ Freeman & James ‘P0KERPR033’ Campbell all quick to praise – Campbell wrote that “I sat with Thorladen on day 3 and he played flawlessly, as I continued to fold everyhand.  He is a flat out stud and a great person.  Very nice to meet you Steve and congrats on a great score!  Well deserved.”

Congrats to thorladen – there is no doubt a result like this has been in the pipeline for a long time and this could well be the springboard to further live success.