We thought it would be a good idea to check in with Eastgate now that the fog has cleared. Here's how he's feeling today.

by Peter Eastgate

As some of you might know, I managed to do pretty well last week in the Pokerstars.com European Poker Tour London Poker Festival Main Event. The event with a big name had an even bigger field. I finished second out of 730 player which made me £530,000.

When you do not win, you lose--even when you finish second. This is the way most poker players feel, and this goes for me too.

Psychologically I am over the 'loss'. Sometimes you make the wrong decision like I did on the last hand of the tournament, where I moved all-in with A9 and get called by Aaron Gustavson's AQ. [Read about the hand in the EPT London Season 6 report].

In the unbearably clear light that is called hindsight, I could have done differently, but when I analyze the play, I still feel that it was the right thing to do at that time. He could have had a worse ace or a pair smaller than 9's, or he could have folded a slightly better hand, at which time my move would have been great. It is a thin line between looking bad and brilliant.

I have thought a little about what I could have done differently. Should I have limped on the button instead of playing aggressive? Possibly, but in poker there are often times many strategies that can be successful in the same situation. Sometimes you pick the right one and you win, other times you don't.

I would rather focus on the positive. For most of the tournament I made the right decisions. Not to forget, even though my financial situation is taken care of due to my big score winning the WSOP, I won £530,000!

I know a lot of poker players are caught up in winning trophy's and titles. To me the title means very little, I play poker for the money and because I like the complexity of the game. If there should still be doubters, then it was nice to show them that the WSOP was not a fluke.

I am very pleased to have made another deep run in a big tournament and made the final table. I have gone deep in six live tournaments now, finishing better than top 30. Four times I have made the final table, with two wins and a second, a result I am pretty pleased with.

When playing a tournament, it is important to get on a rush later in the tournament. It is not important to be chip leader in the early going. I have found that I do best coming from behind in these big field tournaments.

The second place finish has made me want to play more tournaments and has had a positive impact on my motivation to play poker. My motivation has not always been there since winning the WSOP. Last summer in Las Vegas it was not there and I should not have played in many of the tournaments. It was not until defending my title in the Main Event that I found myself motivated to play poker. But with the deep run there and this second place finish, I feel I am really motivated.

Unfortunately, I was not all that motivated to play the day after my second place finish. I played in a heads-up tournament in London and still feeling blue from my 'loss' heads-up to Aaron Gustavson, I played some terrible poker. I lost to Vicky Coren in the first round. I had played for 5 straight days and heads up the day before for more than £800,000. This tournament had a $10,000 buy-in, 32 players and money for the top 8, which is a too flat pay-out structure for my taste.

My next stop is EPT in Warsaw, then I go to Tallinn and PokerStars Baltic Festival. If I have to be totally honest, I wish that the buy-in of 1,100 Euro for the Baltic Festival Main Event was a little higher, as I think 2,000 Euro would have been able to attract the same amount of players. I do think it is great that there is a tournament for those who cannot afford the high buy-ins that most other live tournaments have.

Luckily for me, there will also be a highroller event with a buy-in of 10,000 Euro, where I have heard that Tony G and his Russian friends will be participating. In any event, I am looking forward to spending some days in Tallinn with my fellow Team PokerStars Pros Johnny Lodden and William Thorson. I have heard that Tallinn is a nice place, so I am sure it will be a good trip.

Finally, it looks like I am going to Las Vegas for High Stakes Poker season 6 around the time of WSOP Main Event Final table.

Peter Eastgate is a member of Team PokerStars Pro and the reigning WSOP champion.

Handy, then, that on Team PokerStars Pro we have current WSOP champ Peter Eastgate, so we asked him to write down his thoughts on going deep in Vegas. As he scooped more than $9.1 million doing just that, then it may be best to read what he has to say...

by Team PokerStars Pro Peter Eastgate

A question I have been asked repeatedly is: "What is the best way, from a strategy perspective, to play the WSOP Main Event?" I think the WSOP Main Event is unique: the number of players is more than in any other big buy-in tournament and the quality of the players is also very varied.

A lot of recreational players play it, either through qualification online or because it is the tournament to play if you are going to take a shot at fame and fortune. This makes for a special tournament and, unlike a PokerStars EPT or a WPT event, it is very hard to come up with a pre-tournament strategy.

My personal strategy when winning the event last year was that I had no pre-tournament strategy! At a big event like the WSOP Main Event, there are so many unknown variables, such as table draw, quality of the cards dealt and, most importantly, the immediate emotional state of the other players at the table. You have to pay close attention to what is going on at the table - and how the other players are reacting to playing in such a big event.

It is very important to be in tune with your opponent's emotional state and base your decisions on how you feel he or she is feeling in any given situation.

The key to playing in a long and hard tournament like this is to find the balance between accumulation of chips, and maintaining your chips stack. Obviously, the best way to maintain a healthy chip stack is through accumulation, but it is important to keep in mind what kind of risks you are willing to take in order to accumulate chips. In last year's tournament I pride myself with the fact that I was only all-in (with the chance of losing my entire chip stack) two times. The reason this was possible was that the structure of the tournament is nice and slow.

I had an above average chip stack most of the tournament and I did not play many hands where I had a lot of chips invested in the hand pre-flop. I played a kind of small-ball strategy that has become very popular among some of the better professional poker players, which in essence is a strategy that tries to control the pot size. This strategy was not pre-determined, but was the best feasible approach considering my table draws.

I have spoken to several very good young professional tournament players, who told me that they had tough table draws, in that the overall level of aggression on their table was very high, thus creating a much higher volatility. I was very lucky that my tables were fairly soft, which allowed me to slowly chip up and control the pot size, since very few of my opponents played back at me.

It is also important to understand that no two people are the same. When playing a long and grueling tournament like the WSOP Main Event it is very important to know yourself and your habits. Some people like running 10K before they play; some people eat fruit or smoke a pack of cigarettes. You have to do whatever makes you the most alert and physically fit to withstand the pressure of the tournament.

To sum up, I do not think there is a correct pre-tournament strategy that will guarantee success. Take every situation and evaluate throughout the tournament what strategy fits best to the situation you are faced with. That way you will have the best possible chance of making it deep. Always think a couple of steps ahead when you play a hand. "What will happen on the river if I call the turn?" And: "What amount will my opponent likely bet?" But always remember that there will be more tournaments in the future and that putting too much pressure on yourself will make you more tense.

You need be relaxed to make the right decisions. Stay cool when the money and pressure increases.

Good luck with winning your PokerStars WSOP package - and then in the Main Event!

With great power comes great responsibility. With the WSOP main event bracelet comes 9.1 million dollars and the title of ambassador of poker. Aside from fame, glory, parties and public relation events, the World Champion is expected to do one thing: play poker. Today Peter Eastgate proved once again, that, yes, he can play poker.

Eastgate cemented his status as world champion in the PCA with a main event cash, and tonight winning the $5,000 side event. Peter's victory can be attributed to Bahamian weather. After leaving his room today Eastgate noticed that it was a bit too cloudy for his taste and decided to play the $5,000 side event. It turned out to be a profitable decision.

The event saw 273 entriesand had a first place prize of $343.000. When the final table was down to five, Eastgate already had an intimidating chip lead. Florian Langmann, who placed second in EPT London back in 2007, had the job of battling Eastgate heads up. If Peter's stack wasn't intimidating enough, his cards were; after getting all the money in pre-flop Eastgate showed pocket kings to Langmann's jacks. The board showed no mercy for Langmann. His jacks didn't win him the event, but did earn him second place and $184,300, a nice result for anyone.

Eastgate's kings earned him $343,000, adding to his already enormous live event winnings, now past the $9,500,000 mark. Oh yeah, he's 22 years old.

Eastgate's win not only further proves that he is a World Champion, it proves there's something in the Bahamas that makes PokerStars players run good. The High Roller and $2,000 side events were both won by Team PokerStars Pro. Now one of the PokerStars Six has taken down another side event and Team PokerStars Pro Alex Gomes has the chip lead for the Main Event final table. There may be something in the water--besides all the chlorine--but chances are it's because some of the best players in the world live and breathe PokerStars.

Photo Courtesy of Bluff Latin America--Ricardo Alfaro 

At just 22-years-old, Peter Eastgate is the youngest member of the November Nine and has his sights set firmly on the record books as well as the $9 million first prize. Eastgate is the second player from Denmark to make the final table of the World Series Main Event in as many years, bt more impressively Eastgate could supplant Phil Hellmuth as the youngest world champion of all time. Eastgate enters the final table fourth in chips with 18,375,000, but is known to be ultra-aggressive and he will look to pressure the chip-leaders while and bully the short stacks.

Eastgate, from Odense, began his poker career on PokerStars after graduating from high school, and has been playing professionally ever since. Despite not being a regular live player, he has already scored some impressive results on the live tournament scene, including a cash at the PokerStars EPT Copenhagen and a final table appearance at the Irish Poker Open in 2007.

He says that if wins the top prize, he will invest the money instead of splurging on expensive luxury purchases or living a crazy life. Outside of poker, Eastgate likes playing and watching sports, especially soccer.

Eastgate enters final table play 18,375,000 in chips.

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