Last month, longtime PocketFiver Jamie pokerjamersArmstrong (pictured) finished third in a $215 No Limit Hold’em Eight-Max WCOOP event and booked a $141,000 score, his second largest all-time. He has almost $4.5 million in career winnings and was ranked as high as #3 on our site in 2011. Armstrong has been a member of the PocketFives community since 2006.

PocketFives: Congrats on final tabling a $215 WCOOP event. Tell us how you’re feeling about it.

Jamie Armstrong: I’m obviously very happy, but more so I feel a sense of relief. I had a rough WSOP. Then, WCOOP went about as badly as possible until that weekend. Sunday and Monday were my only winning days of the series. My confidence was pretty low and in tournaments it’s important not to second-guess yourself, otherwise you’re going to end up making a lot of bad decisions.

The field was pretty soft and the slower WCOOP structure makes it that much better. I honestly can’t recall everything from Day 1 because I had so many tables all day. I don’t think I’ve ever run as well as I did across all the tournaments I played on Sunday. I was not busting anything and it was insane.

PocketFives: Do you have any plans for the cash besides poker?

Jamie Armstrong: Not really. Mostly I’ll put it back into poker. I really need a new car, though, so I might consider that. My brother, sister-in-law, and 1.5-year-old nephew are moving to Germany for six months for work and I already have a trip planned out there with my mom for Christmas, but somehow I’ve never even been to Europe, so maybe I’ll extend the trip and travel around to some other countries.

PocketFives: How important was that $380,000 SCOOP score six years ago to your poker success? How did that change your career?

Jamie Armstrong: It was definitely a huge moment in my career. I never dreamed of winning that much money in a single tournament. I was backed by dipthrong (pictured) at the time, so after that I felt comfortable playing any tournament stakes online without backing.

I also started backing other people, which was fun for the sweats, but was also the most stressful thing I’ve ever dealt with. If I could go back in time, I definitely wouldn’t have done the same thing. dipthrong and I were backing like 20 people at one point, so either I’d avoid it entirely or stick to backing a smaller group of players.

PocketFives: Remind us how you got started in poker and why the game was interesting to you.

Jamie Armstrong: I started playing poker with my friends in high school for fun. We would play cash games with $10 in front of us. Then in college, I started playing online. BPV3 and crzysavage sent me transfers on PokerStars and PartyPoker. We started with some 10-cent sit and gos and then gradually built our way up to the $20 180-mans. Eventually, I got into tournaments where I was absolutely awful. It’s funny looking back on old hand histories from 2006.

The biggest contributor to my success was getting backed by dipthrong and Mr_BigQueso (pictured). I don’t think I ever would have been very successful without Mark’s help. He was always way ahead of the curve.

PocketFives: What else do you do besides poker? What else interests you?

Jamie Armstrong: I really enjoy golfing. I love all sports, but besides basketball it’s tough to go out and find a game to play. You only need one friend to play a round of golf. I’m terrible at the game, but it’s still fun for me. I’m trying to get better, but it has been a slow process. Maybe I’ll spend my winnings on some coaching.

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