Last month, Running Goot, known as Robert Hordejuk (pictured) in the real world, was part of a three-way chop of the PokerStars Sunday Million, reeling in $161,000. The Waterloo, Ontario, Canada resident joined PocketFives in early 2011 and has now amassed $413,000 in tracked online poker earnings. We caught up with him to break down his epic cash.

PocketFives: Congrats on your chop in the Sunday Million. Tell us how you’re feeling.

Robert Hordejuk: It’s still a bit surreal. I’m not sure how long it will really take to set in, but it’s almost like a dream come true for any poker player.

PocketFives: Talk about the chopand how that played out.

Robert Hordejuk: I was pretty sure going into the final table that I would be willing to chop at some point, especially once life-changing money started coming into question. A lot of the other players were willing to chop early on, but understandably blumenkind53 was against it. Even three-handed when it came down to figuring something out, he wanted a fair bit more. I feel like, in that case, it made sense to give some money up to be guaranteed almost second place against a guy who definitely had me outclassed. If I went on to win, I would end up taking the most out of the three, so I figured it made sense.

PocketFives: Do you have any plans for the money?

Robert Hordejuk: I am not too sure yet. A big part of it will probably end up going toward paying for school because I’m planning on going to graduate school, which will be a pretty sizeable expense. I was backed for this win, so about 40% of it went to my backer. One of the first things I want to do is move to my own dime. I’m also planning to use some of the money for live MTTs and probably a summer trip to Las Vegas that some of my other poker friends have been getting excited about.

PocketFives: What are you studying? Will you play poker full-time?

Robert Hordejuk: I am studying Health Sciences, but am planning on future education in Chemistry, I think. I wasn’t going to play full-time before this score, but it has definitely changed a lot of things. Lately, I’ve been thinking that once I finish school, I’ll probably give playing poker full-time a shot, see where it takes me, and then fall back on my education if it doesn’t work.

PocketFives: What have your friends and family said about the score?

Robert Hordejuk: I have gotten a ton of love and support from pretty much everyone. All of my friends know how much poker means to me and they were going just as crazy as I was when they stayed up to watch the end of the tournament.

PocketFives: How did you get started in poker originally and why was it appealing?

Robert Hordejuk: I got into it like a lot of other people, by playing small home games with friends for a couple of bucks every now and then with the chip set my parents bought me.

When I first started playing poker online, I didn’t really have the intention of it ever becoming serious. It was more that I wanted to check it out after seeing all of the commercials on TV. I think what really got me very interested in the game was when I won my first $5.50 Turbo MTT. Back then it was huge money for me. The rush of getting to the final table and winning it was crazy.

For pretty much for all of 2012, I was kind of an unsuccessful grinder. I think a lot of it was due to my poker ego getting too big and thinking I was some kind of sick player when in reality there were so many things I was doing wrong and so many things I had left to learn.

Even earlier this year, I was still not taking it seriously enough and thinking I was better than I actually was. It was only once the summer started and my friend and I decided we were going to try to do big things in poker that I started taking the game seriously. He was the one who gave me a reality check and put me back into the mentality that in order for me to succeed at poker, I always had to be willing to learn. His name is walmartcnxn, so I would like to give a special shout out to him.

You can catch the Sunday Million weekly on PokerStars. If you don’t already have a PokerStars account, create one through PocketFives’ links to get a 100% deposit bonus up to $600 and one free month of PocketFives Training. Get started here.

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