Gus Hansen - The Great Dane Poker Player

Gus Hansen hasn’t yet won a World Series gold bracelet, but has been inducted into the World Poker Tour Poker Walk of Fame for winning 3 WPT events.

It started off simply enough. Gus just loved math, and had a passion for numbers. So he began – purely for fun – playing backgammon. But it quickly became more than jut a game. He got really into it and began practicing for hours. This passion led him to games in New York where he played at clubs. At these clubs he found poker and Stud games to which he also took an immediate liking.

How Gus Hansen Got Into Big Time Poker Playing

Hansen Begins A Bit Arrogantly

So he thought he had a real talent for poker. Which he did. But not that much of a talent. When he was just 22 he played his first World Series of Poker. It was probably an unwise move since he wasn’t even all that family with No-Limit Hold’em. He was beaten on the first day. This gave him a bit of a kick that he needed though, and from then on, you could find Hansen practicing for hours, testing new strategies and styles to see what worked best for him. He feels such “experimentation and mixing-up [his] style,” is what he accounts for his success today.

Work, Work, Work, Makes Hansen a Success

So he kept at it. He wasn’t deterred by his loss. By 2002 he was ready for the World Poker Tour and had developed a good style which rendered him recognition and megabucks. What more could a poker player ask for? He even won the $10,000 No-Limit Hold’em tournament at the Give Diamond World Poker Classic as well as the championship at the WPT’s LA Poker classic, some months later. By 2004, Hansen had won his fourth WPT title.

Things Just Keep Getting Better

2005-7 were pretty good years for Hansen too. In 2005 he made it to the final table at FullTiltPoker.Net Poker Invitational from Monaco and also won the Grand Final of the Poker Superstars Invitational. The following year he took down the show’s biggest pot ever ($575,700), defeating poker giant Daniel Negreanu. This made television history. He also came first at the FullTiltPoker.com London All Star Challenge, netting $100,000. In 2007 Hansen won the biggest tournament outside of North America (Aussie Millions Main Event), netting a staggering $1.2 million.

Hansen’s Personal Life

Born Gustav Hansen in 1974 in Denmark, Gus loved to play tennis. Today, he still enjoys the “Big Game” at the Bellagio, playing against as many as 13 different poker giants, all in his league. He likes to play online too, in Omaha games and sometimes enjoys low stakes Limit Hold’em too. Still an avid tennis fan, Hansen now also enjoys golf, squash and soccer as he finds a good work out gives him the stamina needed at the poker table.