2008 WSOP Main Event winner Peter Eastgate has been quite a hot topic last year. The Dane officially retired from poker in 2010 summer, when he cancelled his participation at the 2010 WSOP, and instead went to the South African Soccer World Cup. Not sure if was worth it financially, but it might have been much more fun for him. Now he decided it’s time to return to poker, and make some more money.
"When I started playing poker for a living, it was never my goal to spend the rest of my life as a professional poker player. My goal was to become financially independent. I achieved that by winning the WSOP Main Event in 2008. The period following has taken me on a worldwide tour, where I have seen some amazing places and met many new people; it has been a great experience. In the 20 months following my WSOP win, I feel that I have lost my motivation for playing high level poker along the way and I have decided that now is the time to find out what I want to do with the rest of my life. What this will be, I do not yet know. I have decided to take a break from live tournament poker, and try to focus on Peter Eastgate, the person." – stated Eastgate last summer.
In his recent blog post on PokerStars Blog he told the world that he wants to get back to poker, as he feels it’s time, and he managed to get himself together. He plans to participate in the 2011 EPT Copenhagen, but he will also play at the NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship on February 21:
"I do not consider this a comeback, as I always knew there was a good chance I would play poker again. During my hiatus from poker, PokerStars have been very supportive. Therefore, I am pleased that I will start out with playing two events where I will be sponsored by PokerStars. First, I will be playing the PokerStars.com EPT Copenhagen which of course means a lot to me, since it is on my home ground. Then I will play the NBC Heads Up Championship. I am fortunate that PokerStars have the best online tournaments, so I have an opportunity to get back in tournament shape." – writes Eastgate about his return. He also reflected upon the many accusations he got of devaluating a WSOP bracelet’s value when he auctioned his 2008 WSOP Main Event bracelet to Scottish millionaire William Haughey.
Peter Eastgate’s Bracelet
"There have been some questions about the sale of my WSOP bracelet. I was not trying to devaluate the WSOP name. It was not sold to make any kind of statement. It was sold to raise money for UNICEF and I am very proud and thankful that the sale raised £100,000 to UNICEF"
Peter Eastgate is now 11th on the all-time money list with $10,904,211 of live tournament winnings. We’ll see how he performs after the 8 month hiatus. What do you think? Will he be any good?
