Today is this author’s birthday. Yes, hold your applause and direct all gifts to the PocketFives business address. Two weeks ago, Mike Bartholomew (pictured), who is known as AAcademiKKon PocketFives, won the Full Tilt Poker Sunday Brawl for $25,000, defeating a field of nearly 600 entrants just two days before his birthday. We caught up with the Canadian to talk about his largest online tournament score to date.

PocketFives: Great job winning the Sunday Brawl. Tell us how you’re feeling about it.

Mike Bartholomew: It feels great. It’s my biggest online score to date, so it feels really good, especially the way it unfolded because I won it outright, whereas usually on Full Tilt, people will look at numbers because the pay jumps become significant.

Four-handed, I won a massive hand with K-K, had a huge chip lead, and two of the guys didn’t seem interested in even looking at the numbers, so we just played on. It went in my favor this time. I have been in a big downswing for the last year-and-a-half, so it feels awesome to finally feel as though I am gaining some momentum in the right direction.

PocketFives: Do you have any plans for the money?

Mike Bartholomew: Nah, no big plans really. I’m in the middle of some renovations on my house, so it’s nice to have a little extra cash for that, but other than that, it was just a nice early birthday present for me, as my birthday was two days after the Sunday Brawl.

PocketFives: It’s interesting that $25,000 is your largest single tournament score, yet you have $1.2 million in cashes. Do you play more volume?

Mike Bartholomew: That is kind of interesting. The first half of my MTT career, I was playing low- and mid-stakes MTTs with a few Sunday Majors tossed in, but for the last couple of years, I have been playing mid- and high-stakes. I’ve been playing pretty much all tournaments with the exception of a few that I just don’t think are great spots, but like I said, the last year-and-a-half has been a big downswing for me.

I have been making lots of deep runs in big tournaments, but just couldn’t get it done when it mattered. I have had many shots at bigger scores, but just haven’t seemed to run that well deep in tournaments. Lately, I’ve been winning a few more deep flips, so hopefully it’s a sign of good things to come.

PocketFives: How did you get started in poker originally?

Mike Bartholomew: I had never played poker until the third year of university when some guys from my hockey team would get together, have some beers, and play a $10 or $20 game. It started there and then some of the guys were talking about online poker, so I decided to check it out.

I took an immediate interest in the game, started playing more and more online, and then started playing live cash games at local casinos, which helped pay for a yearlong trip to Australia. I spent a fair bit of time in Melbourne while there, playing live cash to make some more money. When I got home, I got into online more, started playing tournaments, and qualified for my first big live event, the EPT Grand Final in Monte Carlo. That exposed me to the live tournament scene, which really interested me.

I also qualified online, and played in, the Russian Poker Tour in St. Petersburg and the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure in the Bahamas. All of those were amazing experiences.

I like the statistical numbers aspect of poker, the constant evolution of the game, needing to stay on top of the learning curve, the competition, and the flexible lifestyle it can provide.

PocketFives: We can tell you love traveling. What is the most memorable poker place you’ve been to and why?

Mike Bartholomew: Traveling is one of the best perks of poker and has allowed me to go to places that I may not have otherwise necessarily traveled to like Russia. The coolest place I have been with poker is Monte Carlo, Monaco (pictured). It’s an amazing place that I probably wouldn’t have been able to afford to travel to without winning a package and also because it was my first big live event.

I can’t forget to mention PCA too. I had such a blast down there for that week and it would be on the top of the list of tournaments and places to go back to for poker.

If you don’t already have a Full Tilt Poker account, sign up through the links on PocketFives to get $25 free and one free month of PocketFives Training when you make a deposit. Get started by clicking here.

Want the latest poker headlines and interviews? Follow PocketFives on Twitterand Like PocketFives on Facebook. You can also subscribe to our RSS feed.