Late last month, Vinicius Steves (pictured), who is known on PocketFives as jason132008, took second place in the PokerStars Sunday Warm-Upand bagged $61,000. That week’s tournament had 2,585 entrants and the first place player, proh1t, earned $81,000. Steves explained, “It’s a very important tournament, even more so for my buy-ins, and to get two great results in it make me very excited.”

He final tabled the Warm-Up last December for $50,000, meaning he’s scooped over $110,000 from the tournament in the last four months. The scores are the largest of his poker career. “Poker is a game of constant evolution,” he pointed out. “The secret is always adapting to new trends.”

Steves maintained that the second time final tabling the Warm-Up was more straightforward than the first, as he was more prepared and had a larger stack to work with. “I have not yet thought about what to do with the money,” he said. “I prefer to keep focusing on poker. The great advantage when winning is that I can play my A-game almost all the time.” Accordingly, you’ll see him move up in buy-ins right away, although the jump in stakes won’t be large.

He is one of almost 2,000 PocketFivers with PLB scores from Braziland is ranked #27 among the group. Steves is the top-ranked player in the Brazilian municipality of Governador Valadares and said of poker in his homeland, “The game is growing in popularity here. More and more people have become interested in the game. I’m very excited about this growth because poker is something I find fascinating.”

Steves tends to rail his Brazilian friends and other countrymen at the final table. He told us, “Brazilians are going to continue to do very well. It makes me very happy whenever I see Brazilians at final tables. I am very happy and always cheering, but there are still many people who are ignorant about poker and think it’s the same as any other game.”

He is approaching $330,000 in career online tournament winnings and has already passed 1,100 tracked in the money finishes. He has come a long way since getting his start at a friend’s house. “I didn’t even know the rules. It was taught to me at the time and it turned out that I won, which made me very excited. My game has been elevated to the level it it’s at right now over the last year, which was when I started learning from Yuri Martins (pictured), which has really helped. To be able to work with him has been incredible.”

Martins, of course, is one of the top-ranked Brazilians and a former #1 player in the PocketFives Online Poker Rankings. He’s currently #19 in the world and has $4.6 million in career online MTT winnings.

Before poker, Steves was an engineer, but said, “With the amount of time required in poker to study and play, I ended up locking the course and now intend to finish. Poker is what I like to do; it is my job and my hobby.” He also tries to work out as often as he can.

Steves closed by saying, “I did not expect to reach the level I have so fast. Surely this is something that will further motivate me, and I am always looking for great results. I wish to thank Yuri Martins, Luciano Holland, and Gustavo Kamei, who are the people who have helped me be more competitive. Thank you also to my teammates and to all who support me.”

Visit PocketFives’ Brazil poker community to see who else is making waves from the South American nation.

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