Every player has his own unique story of how he got started in the game. Whether through freerolls, low-stakes tournaments, or a massive flash in the pan, each player built his bankroll in a different way. For Poland’s debesciak69, an initial run online didn’t go so well, but an affinity for freerolls kept him involved and eventually led to a win in an iPoker iPOPS $135 No Limit Hold’em event during the last weekend of April, a cash that was worth $34,000. The iPOPS series played out on sites like WinnerPoker.

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“I did sports betting and found some free deposit poker site,” debesciak69 told PocketFives when asked about his first foray into the game three years ago. “I lost everything, but really enjoyed the game and kept going in freerolls. Then, I built my bankroll in micro-stakes sit and gos and, since June of last year, I have been playing full-time.”

He is the top ranked player in the Polish city of Rzeszow and defeated a field of over 1,700 players in the iPOPS kickoff tournament on April 28. He was the lone member of PocketFives to grace the final table and said that he was really pleased with the score, but the day as a whole could have been a lot juicier.

“I got knocked out of the Warm-Up with two tables left,” he said of his exit in 14th place from the PokerStars Sunday tournament for $3,100. We asked for a rundown of how the iPOPS tournament went in general. He responded, “I was pretty deep from the start. I was top 10 when there were 200 players left, and at the final two tables, there were a lot of players under 10 big blinds, so the game was very easy.”

Last December, debesciak69 trumped the field of the $50,000 Turbo Mega Deep on 888 Poker and banked $13,000. What’s a Polish player to do with his newfound riches? “Maybe use it on a holiday,” debesciak69 speculated. “And I don’t have to play satellites for mid-stakes SCOOP events now.” He plans to play many of the mid-stakes No Limit Hold’em SCOOP events in the ongoing series on PokerStars that ends on May 26.

Before poker, debesciak69 was studying Information Technology, but ultimately decided not to finish school. He is a member of the Poland pokercommunity and told us that the game isn’t viewed too kindly: “In Poland, we are generally thought of as criminals. I think mostly young people play poker here. The best players in Poland are under 30 years old. You can play poker in casinos, but the tax rate is about 30% and there are only tournaments, not cash games.”

In order to get his poker fix, debesciak69 visited Prague in March and is headed there again next month. In the meantime, he wanted to send a shout out to “all Polish players and my friend Karol, who railed me until the end of the tournament.”

Speaking of players in Poland, the nation is #4 in our Country Poker Rankingsand has a total PLB score of its top 20 players of 97,471, comfortably ahead of the 94,841 of Brazil, but still well behind the 112,756 of the United Kingdom. There are over 530 registered Polish PocketFivers and the nation’s top ranked player is Olorion, who can be found at #53 worldwide.

By the way, if you don’t already have a WinnerPoker account, you can sign up through PocketFives’ links and make a deposit of at least $30 before the end of the day on Sunday to get a free, all-new fitted PocketFives cap, a $20 instant bankroll on top of your deposit, and one free month of PocketFives Training with the sign-up fee waived, a $65 value. Just use the code PF30 when you sign up! Get started here.

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