In last week’s release of the PocketFives.com Online Poker Rankings, Mick M1cKmAcKCarlson (pictured) cracked the top 100. One week ago, he stood at #101 worldwide, his highest ranking to date, and finally got over the hump. Carlson is a two-time Triple Crownwinner on PocketFives.com whose largest online cash tracked by our site came in November, when he final tabled the Full Tilt Poker $100 Rebuy for nearly $40,000. We caught up with Carlson to discuss his debut.

Carlson was elated to be joining the elite group of players in the top 100 of the Rankings. “It feels pretty great,” Carlson told us. “This was one of the goals I set for myself at the beginning of the year and to reach it so quickly was pretty satisfying. The past two years, I have made a list at the beginning of the year. This year, being ranked first in the state of Indiana and being ranked top 100 worldwide were just naturally the next achievements I wanted to make.” He currently stands at #2 in the Hoosier State.

In mid-January, Carlson won the Full Tilt $100 Rebuy for $28,000 and has had a considerable amount of success in the format. He explained, “I’ve had some luck in the $100 Rebuys across all three major sites. I really haven’t been playing the $100 Rebuys for too long, so the recent success has been pretty motivating to say the least.”

Carlson ran deep in a $1,000 No Limit Hold’em tournament during the 2010 World Series of Poker (WSOP). In fact, he was the runner-up to fellow PocketFives.com member and former November Niner Scott r_a_y Montgomery (pictured) and banked $297,000. Carlson fondly recalled, “It was incredible. It was the last event I was scheduled to play. Before that, I went 0-fer and didn’t even make any Day 2s. I was pretty bummed and almost decided to come home, but had some friends flying in the day of the tournament and so decided to play. The final table was so surreal. I had such an awesome support group there. It was really something special.”

For Montgomery, the $1,000 No Limit Hold’em event served as retribution of sorts. The Canadian collected $481,000 after finishing fifth in the 2008 WSOP Main Event for $3.1 million. On Montgomery’s game, Carlson commented, “When it came down to it, Scott won and I think overall he played all right. He has a different approach than I do, so naturally I’m probably going to disagree with some stuff he does, but he has good results and I wish him the best.”

Carlson has largely maintained a low profile on our site despite a tremendous amount of success. He’s been a member of the online poker community since 2007 and noted, “I’m not shy or anything, but I’m not one to shove my accomplishments in your face. If you notice, that’s great. If not, that’s great too because flying under the radar is much more +EV than recognition.” He has over $1 million in Rankings-eligible earnings.

After seeing the 2003 WSOP on ESPN, Carlson received a chipset as a birthday present and started hosting home games a few times each week. What would he be doing if he weren’t playing poker full-time? “I went to college to get my undergraduate degree in History, but left to take a job opportunity with my Dad,” Carlson told us. “I would imagine if poker were out of the picture, I would go back to get my degree. History has always intrigued me.”

He wanted to extend shout outs to Denmark’s Mickey mementmoriPetersen (pictured) and Germany’s HotKarlMC. He also recognized Indiana’s jdvanvac: “You probably don’t know him yet, but he’s a close friend of mine and an absolute machine. Look for him in the next year.” jdvanvac won the PokerStars $100,000 Guarantee in September for $20,000.

Check out the rest of the PocketFives.com Rankings.