Andrey Pateychuk is quickly taking the poker world by storm. At only 22 years of age, this Russian card slinger made a name for himself, along with more than $2 million dollars, all in the course of a single year. In this short time, he has accumulated one EPT title, one WPT title and more than $2m in live tournament winnings. He is indubitably skilled at the game of real money poker, and if he continues on his current course, Pateychuk could easily grasp the summit of the poker totem pole long before his 30th birthday.
Andrey Wins the WPT Prague – Interview
Pateychuk saw his first live tournament victory in the second annual Merit Poker Open held in Kyrenia, Cyprus. He placed 4th out of 174 competitors in the $2,500 NLH Main Event to wrangle in $29,537. He took in another $3k at the Bellagio Cup VI with a 10th place finish in a $1,000 NLH event, and finished out 2010 with another 4ht place finish in an NLH event on the Russian Poker Tour in Odessa for $10k.
For his first year in live tournaments, Andrey was making impressive headway with $43k in his pocket. He was also dabbling in a lofty career as an online poker player, but the Moscow native hadn’t managed to turn any prominent heads up to that point.
Andrey Pateychuk saw a slow start to 2011 as his first live tournament cash of $400, awarded for a 19th place finish in a Russian Poker Series NLH Bounty event, barely covered the $300 buy-in. Two months later, he managed to skate to a 12th place finish in the RPS Main Event in Riga for a little more than $6k. On the whole, things were looking bleak, but Pateychuk’s tide finally came in when he entered the World Series of Poker 2011 Main Event.
The young Russian whittled his way through an enormous field of 6,865, grinding the tables, day after day, until he finally met his match in Pius Heinz. Pius crippled Pateychuk’s stack on an enormous hand that dropped him to the shortest stack, and just a few hands later, Heinz called Pateychuk’s open all-in. Andrey rode the river all the way back to Moscow when his AcQs couldn’t hold up to Heinz’s JhJs, but the end result was one filled with pride for the Russian. Still in his infant poker career, he wrapped up a 15th place victory and a life-altering check worth nearly half a million dollars; $478,174 to be exact.
From that point on, 2011 just kept getting better for Andrey Pateychuk. On October 21, his most notable accomplishment yet would take place in Italy at EPT San Remos. The young Russian’s intense concentration and ferocious bursts of aggression paid off immensely with a 1st place finish, the EPT Title and his largest cash to date, $975,470.
Andrey wasn’t ready to stop. He didn’t even take a break. Just 9 days later he drew another $27k (4th) victory at the RPT in Kiev, then made his way to the plush felts of WPT Prague where he collected his first WPT Title as well, winning the championship to the tune of $630,623. One week later, he played in an EPT Prague NLH event and placed 6th for another $38k.
After raking in more than $2 million in 2011 alone, it comes as little surprise that the 11th Annual European Poker Awards have bestowed Andrey with the prestigious title, Rookie of the Year. He has also seen significant bounds of success in the online poker field, racking up more than $300k in tournaments, and enumerable cash game winnings at PokerStars under his conspicuous alias, “ThePateychuk”.