Snoopy: A lot of our readers won’t be aware of you? Can you tell us a bit about yourself?
Paul Pham: I’m 27-years of age and work as a VIP Manager for an online cardroom. I’m French and come from Lyon, but have been living in London for the last three years. I currently live in Belsize Park.
Snoopy: How long have you been playing poker and what do you play?
PP: I learned about poker in 2004, I think, and really started to play in 2005, 2006. I play pretty much all of my poker online and am mainly a cash game player. I don't play live very often and have only played three tournaments so far. I only played this one because the structure was deep and it suited my game. I play $100 No Limit online, sometimes $200, but not higher than that.
Snoopy: How did you come to hear about this event?
PP: My friend told me about it. I wouldn’t normally play, but deep structures suit my style. I don’t really like playing full-ring, but if I have a deep stack, it's easier for me to run over.
Snoopy: Can you give us an overview on your tournament?
PP: Day One was a bit of a roller coaster for me. I got two outed for a bit pot early on, but came back this morning with a bit below average. I doubled up really quickly, but then lost a big pot. From there, I pretty much stayed about average for most of the time except on the last few tables where I opened up my game a lot more and picked off some spots, and received some hands as well. I got aces twice, and kings once in the space of two levels. I got close to one million just before the final 10 players, but then I lost kings versus aces, which set me back to 500,000.
Snoopy: And what about that epic hand with Giovanni Pennetta?
[On the hand in question, Pennetta raised to 85,000 preflop with 2h-2c and Pham called on the button with Jc-Jh. On the 5s-9c-4s flop, Pennetta led for 120,000, Pham raised to 290,000, Pennetta pushed and Pham called. The turn and river were bricks.]
PP: When we moved to the final 10, I was involved in a crazy hand against him. He was the other big stack at the time. We had a bit of history because at the start of Day Two, I four bet him with A-Q, he called me with nines and I hit a flush. Then after that I pushed him all in and he called me with J-T against my A-J and hit his 10. On the final hand, I thought he was trying to fight back again, which is why I made the call against deuces.
Snoopy: Who do you consider to be the toughest players that you came up against?
PP: There were a lot of strong players in the tournament. Daniel Laming was very good and gave me a bit of a hard time on Day One. So was Jack [McDermott] on my left. He’s a decent player and I managed to get lucky against him on the final table with A-J versus A-K.”
Snoopy: Did you have a strategy heading into the final?
PP: I had a big chip lead and I knew people were waiting to just move up the ladder, so I just took advantage of that. They were all about average, which was great for me, as they're unlikely to make a move without a premium hand, so there were a lot of good spots for me where I could pick up chips and grind them down.
Snoopy: Does this win mean we’ll be seeing more of you at the live felt?
I might play more live events after this, but it depends on the structure because I don't really like tournaments that much. I'm more of a cash game player, but if it's a good structure I'll play.