Stand down! If you don’t, WrathOfRamis coming for you. It’s one of our favorite PocketFives user names and belongs to Ram Siva (pictured), who took down the 888 Poker Sunday Challenge on the last day of March for $22,000. The 841-player tournament on 888 Poker had a buy-in of $90.

“During the final two tables, I was at the bottom,” Siva told PocketFives in an exclusive interview. “But, when it went to 10-handed right before the final table bubble, I started making some hands. I doubled up and then doubled up again and entered the final table as the chip leader.”

The top three finishers in the April 1 Sunday Challenge on 888 were all members of the PocketFives community, including Billyth3kidand WaGe N WaRz, who landed in second and third, respectively. Siva remarked, “With WaGe N WaRz as a short stack, I thought I had the tournament in the bag. The final table was pretty short, so the decisions were pretty easy.” The top two players took away five-figure paydays and 140 entrants finished in the money.

Siva is one course away from finishing college at the University of Waterloo in Canada. He is studying Economics and Finance and admitted that he has $18,000 in debt still to pay. Accordingly, much of his 888 Sunday Challenge haul will go toward that. In case you’re wondering, he has no plans to leave school early: “School was exhausting and expensive. I started playing poker full-time six months ago with two courses left in school. I plan to finish first.”

After school, it’s game on for poker. “I want to keep playing poker full-time after school,” he said. “I have a few guys I group chat with about strategy and whatnot and we just crack jokes and grind every day, so it’s fun.” He is ranked #16 in his hometown of Toronto, #37 in Ontario, and #76 in Canada. Siva is parked at #491 worldwide in the PocketFives Poker Rankings, his highest mark ever.

He hasn’t been a one-trick pony on the poker felts, either. In January, Siva won the PokerStars Wednesday Hundred Grandand scooped a payday of $25,000. As such, he has had a decent start to the year. “I have learned really quickly and have a really sick team with me,” Siva said. “I credit shakentoucan, betrthanphil(pictured), and julesdAA. We talk strategy every day and betrthanphil is hard on all of us.”

And as far as the Wednesday Hundred Grand went, Siva recollected, “I went in as the chip leader and just crushed. I ran well too, but I felt like I played that tournament very well.”

Siva didn’t have any notion of what poker was until he was 19 years old. In his second year of college, a friend introduced him to the game. He assessed, “We play a video game for money. How can I not like it?“

Finally, we asked Siva for a few pieces of advice for those looking to strike it rich in tournaments like the 888 Sunday Challenge. His response: “If you’re unsure about a hand, just raise. Also, get yourself a team that includes people who are better than you and worse than you so you can learn and teach at the same time.” If you want more, you can follow Siva on Twitter: @wrathofram.

If you don’t already have an 888 Poker account, sign up through PocketFives’ linksand make a deposit to get one free month of PocketFives Training with the sign-up fee waived, a $65 value. You’ll also get a special 100% up to $600 sign-up bonus (normally 100% up to $400) and $8 free. Get started here.

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