We’re a couple of weeks into 2014 and already a handful of players have claimed PocketFives Triple Crowns. To do so, a person must win three $10,000 prize pool tournaments with at least 100 players each across three sites tracked for the PocketFives Poker Rankingsin a one-week period. The very first Triple Crown, won on New Year’s Day, went to aces_up4108. At the end of January, he scored his eighth Triple Crown! Article-worthy? Definitely.

“It’s nice to win the first Triple Crown of 2014,” aces_up4108 told PocketFives in an exclusive interview. “Hopefully, it’s a good sign for the year. Every time I win one, I just want more.” It was the seventh Triple Crown of his career and came by virtue of winning the Titan Poker $10,000 Guaranteed, PokerStars$51 No Limit Hold’em Hyper-Turbo, and Full Tilt Benjamin for nearly $10,000 total. As we mentioned, he scored his eighth career Triple Crown just before February began.

“I don’t really chase after them,” aces_up4108 said of his success winning Triple Crown after Triple Crown, “but if I know I need another win to get a Triple Crown, I’ll be more likely to play a few extra tournaments on the sites where I need the win.”

He said the Benjamin on Full Tilt was the most challenging tournament of the three: “Oftentimes, people have a curse on a particular site. For me, it’s Full Tilt, but winning the T-Rex recently and now the Benjamin hopefully breaks the curse.” Ten of his 12 largest cashes have come on PokerStars, including his largest tracked score to date, $40,000 for a WCOOP bracelet in a $215 No Limit Omaha High-Low event.

What’s the issue with Full Tilt? Why has he had issues navigating to victory on the site? “I’d like to say just because I run bad there,” he explained, “but the truth is it’s also because previously I would organize my tables in a way where PokerStars was more prominent. It seemed to make sense since the pools are bigger there, but it was often at the expense of other sites where I might miss spots. It’s something I’ve been trying to fix.”

It was at this point in the interview that aces_up4108 wanted to talk about his two kids. When his first child was born, aces_up4108 told us that he was facing a downswing. He narrated, “I was peaking online in July 2012, but something happened that significantly impacted my play: my first daughter was born. While it was the greatest moment in my life, it started impeding my tournament results. I started doing sessions when I was in no state to play and oftentimes I’d be distracted during a session. Sometimes I was changing nappies while playing.” That’s gross. By the way, the baby pictured is not his!

He shared a story of a memorable “daddy moment” during one poker session: “I recall one night I had multiple deep runs going and heard a sudden thud. I ran into the bedroom and the baby had fallen out of the bed and started screaming. My wife started crying too. It was not ideal mid-session! The biggest challenge I’ve faced in my poker career is balancing poker with being a father of two kids.”

He has made a few changes over the years in order to accommodate being a dad and playing poker simultaneously, telling us, “I learned a lot through that period about poker and myself and I feel it makes me a better player today. I play in an office now. When I get to work, I put on my game face and it’s down to business. I can really zone in. But, when I leave the office, it’s back to focusing on being a dad.”

aces_up4108 is the second ranked player in the Japan pokercommunity and tops in the hamlet of Shibetsu, where he is the lone PocketFiver with a PLB score. He has generated $2.5 million across 4,000 tracked scores, coming in at an average of $621 apiece. aces_up4108 has been a member of PocketFives for the last six years.

Visit our Triple Crown Wall of Champions to learn more.

Want the latest poker headlines and interviews? Follow PocketFives on Twitterand Like PocketFives on Facebook. You can also subscribe to our RSS feed.