The Full Tilt Online Poker Series culminated last Sunday with a $500 buy-in, $1.5 million guarantee NLHE event. Just like every other tournament in the series, Full Tilt exceeded their guarantee when 3,217 players showed up for the Main Event. The event brought out the top internet talent, as well as the full slate of Full Tilt pros and many live pros. In addition to tournament specialists, the big prize pools and prestige of the FTOPS drew cash game pros, especially to the main event. Two of those cash game pros ended up heads up for the big money. They happened to be Pocketfivers traheho and Boosted J, who finished first and second respectively.

In fact, four registered Pocketfivers made the final table of the Main Event. Pocketfiver Raoeoiku playing as Coinflip finished 8th which was worth a healthy $28,953. Brian “Tsarrast” Rast finished third. He was the chip leader for much of the latter stages of the tournament, including most of the final table, so I’m sure he is disappointed with his finish, but a payday of $112,203 will certainly ease the blow.

But what of the big winners? In one of those peculiar twists of fate which seem to follow poker players everywhere Boosted J and traheho, who know each other well from the high stakes cash game scene, exchanged equal percentages with over a hundred players to go. There was one catch- the chop was only good if, and this is a big if, they ended up heads up. “It was kind of a joke. You know one of those things you say, like ‘If I win the lottery I’ll buy you a car’,” said taheho about the early “chop” of the tournament. A few hours later they were at the final table and the joke was turning into reality.

First both traheho and Boosted J had to outlast some tough competition, including Brian “Tsarrast” and Robert “Miss Lulu” Williamson III. As the tournament wore on and Tsarrast emerged as the chip leader, the inevitable speculation about his identity began on the boards. Rumors that he was Aaron Kanter were floating around before Thorladen and SBRounder stepped in and confirmed that he was Brian Rast. Both players expressed respect for his game.

Perhaps the most troublesome opponent for both traheho and Boosted J at the final table was their own internet connections. Both players suffered disconnects that lasted for 20 minutes at a time. Robert Williamson III also seemed to disconnect and other players may have as well. Traheho had this to say about his connection woes:

“It was so frustrating, but maybe it worked out for the best. I was on the phone with a friend while I was frantically trying to figure out my internet when I picked up AJ to a raise. That’s when I used up all my time because I was really thinking about repopping there. I’m probably ahead there, but if my internet wasn’t out, maybe I go broke with AJ. It was like that all night, things just seemed to be going right for me.”

Things were indeed going right for traheho, but even though he said, “every time I made thin calls, it went my way,” in the end skill won out and he took home a much deserved win. He had this to say about the feeling of taking down a major, “I’ve been playing for 4 years now and I’m really excited to finally get a big win. It sounds stupid, but it’s not about the money, I’m just really psyched about the win.”

You may be wondering about the chop, and if they played it out or just pushed. Rest assured that Boosted J and traheho were both playing for the win every second of the tournament. Not only were they playing for bragging rights, but when reality set in and they found themselves heads up they left 10k on the table for first. When they were both looking at paydays over 200k, it might not seem like much, but 10k is 10k.

When asked about the final hand (AK vs AQ) traheho had this to say, “We play each other tough all the time in cash games. On that last hand, his AQ is way ahead of the range that I am repopping him with there, so it didn’t matter if we were playing for 10k or 100k, we probably get all in anyway.”

Traheho spent the last several weeks in Australia. He went down for the Aussie Millions and liked it so much that he stayed. In his words, “Melbourne is seriously the best place ever. I grew up in Orange County and it’s a great place, but this place is so sick.” He has been playing online in between enjoying the beach and the club scene that Melbourne has to offer. He is also coaching a buddy of his from back home on how to play poker. They are actually pitching a documentary/reality show about poker. Traheho just missed the TV table in Aruba last year and he plans to play in several upcoming EPT events, so it will be interesting to see if we see him on TV first as a poker player, or a producer/poker coach.

The view from Down Under

Boosted J came in second in the main event to his friend traheho, but along with his final table in event number five he came out on top of the FTOPS leader board. The Player of the Year for the FTOPS doesn’t earn him much more than bragging rights, but it does give him an exclusive custom avatar on Full Tilt, which for a business minded young man like Boosted J, that is a an opportunity in and of itself. He already has his own logo, and plans to launch a website soon, leveraging his poker success and popularity online into future business ventures.

When Boosted J was a senior in high school he was in a head on collision with a car, and he was on his motorcycle going about 40mph. That misfortune was what led him to poker. I am sure he would have preferred to skip the horrible accident, but life is funny that way. He had this to say about the experience, “I was in a wheelchair for 4 months and lost my job as a grocery bagger. I deposited the last $50 I had and one of my friends started teaching me limit hold’em. I started at 2 cent/4 cent and I worked it all the way up solidly.”

In an amazing display of discipline, Boosted J turned his initial $50 deposit into $1100 playing strictly Limit, .02/.04, .05/.10, all the way up to $1/$2 before he made the switch to NL.. “My bankroll was basically at standstill around $1,000 because I had to take out $650 for expenses each month, and even though I was 8 tabling $1/$2, I couldn’t get anywhere, so I decided to try No-Limit.” In September of ’05 he began playing .25/.50 NL, and “it was ridiculously easy to make money.”

Most of the big pots came from hitting hands and getting paid off, until Boosted J moved up past $2/$4 NL, when he “started to run people over.” He was playing a very loose-aggressive style, which made him very popular among the online rail birds. Then in August of ’06 things took a turn for the worse. He had been moving up steadily, always practicing good bankroll management, but his lifestyle was suffering.

“The games on Party seemed to be best in the middle of the night, so I turned almost exclusively nocturnal. I got up at 7pm and played until 10am when I would crash. During that time I began to miss a lot of meals. I went from weighing 155 to 128, and I began to get anxiety attacks all the time. I was a mess.” Unfortunately Boosted J continued to play through the worst of it, and his trademark loose-aggro style went off the charts. He was playing 50% of his hands and raising or re-raising 40% of the time. While he felt he was still playing most hands well, it’s just impossible to sustain that level of aggression and be profitable. “It was just pure spew,” he said of that rough couple of months.

Boosted J was able to turn things around for himself and quit playing the all night sessions. He is now back to a healthy weight and a more “reasonable” preflop aggression (according to Pokertracker) of closer to 30/20. He is also staying away from the biggest games until his bankroll can support them. “You won’t see me playing 200/400 PLO, at least not anytime soon,” he said, but when asked about his huge cash in the FTOPS main event he was almost blasé. “I’ve won and lost over 100k in a day before. It’s all the same.”

Boosted J and traheho are two internet cash game kings who proved that they can hack it with the big boys when it comes to tournament play. Neither of them have plans to start grinding MTTs online, since cash games are so juicy right now. Alec “traheho” Torelli is off to Europe in a couple weeks to see if he can take the EPTs by storm, but until then he plans to enjoy Melbourne. Torelli says this of his plans, “I barely ever take time off, but I think it is good for my game. Last summer I took two weeks off and when I came back I felt like I was playing some of the best poker of my life.” He currently plans to play the EPTs in Poland, Ireland, and Monte Carlo. Given his recent success in tournament play, we may be hearing more from trahehosooner rather than later.

Pocketfives wishes them both the best of luck.