Last month, Felipe BarakyTavares (pictured) finished third in the PokerStars Sunday Warm-Up. While many players would be excited to find $47,000 sitting in their laps, Tavares wanted more, telling PocketFives, “It could have been better. I had an edge over the other two guys, but it went like that, so I’m fine. In poker, we’re only really satisfied with first place.”

This is Tavares’ second biggest score, trailing only a $79,000 hit for final tabling the Sunday Million in June. Therefore, he has been on a record pace as of late and plans to spend much of his newfound bankroll on the poker tables: “I believe I can still have $30,000 swings, so the best investment I can make right now is on myself.”

He also plans to sink some of his poker money into the live felts, specifically the EPTand WSOP. Why would he venture into the live world? Money, of course. He said, “These series are very huge. You don’t see such large guaranteed prizes online often.”

As we said, the Brazilian, who calls the town of Manhuacu home, took fourth in the Sunday Million two months ago for almost $80,000. “I felt I was ready and was deserving of such a prize,” Tavares said of his largest online tournament score to date. “It was the culmination of my game and evolution since I started playing professionally. Now, I’m safer to play higher stakes and withstand the variance without being affected psychologically.”

If his screen name doesn’t sound familiar, you might recognize Tavares as Lagrecassoon PokerStars and Astrokreepon 888 Poker. He started playing poker in home games and, soon after that, hit up freerolls on PokerStars. He narrated, “While I was playing frerolls, I’d watch some small- and mid-stakes cash game tables and realized I could play better than them.” He was gifted a $50 bankroll and started in late 2010.

By the time 2013 rolled around, he left university halfway through. There, he was studying law, but decided to pursue poker full-time. He explained that if he weren’t playing poker for a living, he’d likely still be depending on himself, and himself only, to make a living: “I’d be studying the stock exchange, forex, sports betting, or trading – anything where I could work for myself and depend only on myself to grow.”

According to Tavares, being self-critical has helped him leapfrog his competition over the years and accelerate his growth. He admitted, “If I were playing only for the money, I’d have stopped evolving a long time ago. If I make a relevant mistake, I get really disappointed and think about it for a long time, so I write down every single spot.”

Tavares is one of 2,555 registered PocketFives members from the Brazil poker community and is currently the 52nd ranked player in the South American nation. He has nearly $350,000 in online tournament scores to his credit and has been a member of PocketFives since late last year.

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