On the final weekend of March, Hungary’s Charlisgore8made the final table of the PokerStars Sunday Million and bagged $57,000. It was his largest tracked cash to date by a factor of three, passing a $20,000 haul in the Sunday Storm last year.

He entered the Sunday Million final table short-stacked in eighth place. After one person had been eliminated, Charlisgore8 was dealt A-5 under the gun and had eight big blinds. He shoved, got a taker who had K-J suited, and his hand held for the critical double-up. From there, he told us, “There were a lot of all-ins from the short stacks, but they always doubled up, which was not so good for me.”

Five-handed, Charlisgore8 had 11 big blinds and shoved from the cutoff with A-4 suited. The small blind called with K-Q suited and drew out for the win. Nevertheless, Charlisgore8 still took home almost $60,000 for a few hours’ worth of work.

As far as his plans for the money, Charlisgore8 said he’ll “grind and keep grinding,” adding that he’ll allocate some of the funds to live satellites and small-stakes MTTs. He’s accustomed to playing four or five EPT Mini Main Events each year, which have €1,000 buy-ins, and so will continue playing those, albeit with a little bit less pressure.

“My mother always cheers for me,” Charlisgore8 explained when asked how his friends and family view his poker career. “My girlfriend cheers for me too. I think my friends think it is interesting, but they don’t know much about poker.”

He has played full-time since last October and was an engineer prior to that. “I’m happy now,” he said. “My family and friends support me, which is good when I’m on a downswing.” He has $545,000 in tracked online tournament winnings across 1,797 in the money finishes, an average of $303 a pop.

He got started in poker after his brother told him about online freerolls. Charlisgore8 liked card games his whole life, so it seemed like a no-brainer. And as he put it, “I was student, and students always need money.”

Charlisgore8 is the 23rd ranked player in his home country of Hungary (pictured), which is #21 worldwide in PocketFives’ Country Poker Rankings with a combined PLB score of its top 20 players of 65,965 points. It’s in between Malta and Finland on the leaderboard and home to almost 1,600 registered PocketFivers.

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Image courtesy SouthDacola