The Italian Job: European Poker Tour San Remo

The PokerStars.com European Poker Tour San Remo was an astounding success with 1,178 participants including some of the world’s best players. A tasty prize pool of €5,713,300 was on offer, and with Dragan Galic dominating the chip leader board for most of the event, it was assumed he would take down one of the larger slices. However, once the final table began, everything changed. The player who rocked the boat the most ended up tipping his opponents overboard and taking home the top prize for himself — that player was 20-year-old Constant Rijkenberg from Amsterdam. His battles with another player, William Reynolds were captivating, but in the end, everything seemed to go Rijkenberg’s way. Card Player spoke to the young gun moments after he won €1,508,000 for taking down first place.

Twenty-year-old American, Reynolds is yet another great find at this season’s EPT. Impressing fellow players and spectators alike, the curly-haired aggressor showed sparks of pure brilliance, and is definitely one to watch in the near future. Card Player also spoke with him as he took his defeat on the chin, and expressed appreciation for his fourth place achievement (€377,000).

Constant Rijkenberg

Rebecca McAdam: How you feeling now?

Constant Rijkenberg: To be honest? I feel nothing, totally nothing. I’ve got one rule for myself, I made it up when I started building a lot, and it is — don’t show any emotions, don’t have any emotions when you’re playing a tournament. I mean in cash games it doesn’t really matter because you can walk out and get away but here you have to sit down and play your A-game every hand. And I might have made some mistakes—like the fours I shoved, that wasn’t great, but I was kind of tilting there. For the rest, I feel great. I’m happy I won the tournament. I feel like I deserved it but a lot of people say I didn’t because I got lucky a few times, but for me it was like fate or something, I don’t know.

RM: You said that from a long time ago you knew that you were going to win this. Why San Remo?

CR: I had a good feeling about it for some reason, I have no clue why.

RM: Have you got a lot of live tournament experience?

CR: Yeah, I’ve been playing poker professionally for one and a half years. I went broke two times in those one and a half years, so how professional that is I don’t know but I’ve played over 200 tournaments.

RM: What did you think of your opponents at the final table?

CR: I think William [Reynolds] was a great player, Alex was unlucky to be short. The guy on my right, [Gustav Sundell] I think he was a pretty decent player but he played too tight, he folded way too many of my three-bets, and I kept three-betting with air at random moments, and he kept folding. I think he couldn’t handle the aggression well, and William did it much better, but then again I got lucky against Will, and doubled up, and kept winning hands.

RM: What are you going to do with the money now?

CR: No clue. I have some backers I have to pay them first, and then I will just see what the hell I’m going to do.

RM: What events are you going to play next?

CR: Monte Carlo, and after that I’ve no clue. I can’t go to Vegas, which is terrible, I’m 20. I might have a nice holiday somewhere, just go lay on the beach for a month and get my tan on, because I’m like a zombie now. It’s crazy.

RM: Were you relieved to see Dragan Galic bust out early at the final table?

CR: No, I would have liked to have him a little bit more at the table because when I showed the bluff he went on a raging tilt. I would have liked to see him get some chips from other guys and then give them to me. To be honest, I think I had action on him even though he was sitting on my left because he has some sick tells he gives away, I pick up on them pretty quickly.

RM: You’re obviously prepared to gamble, do you think that’s what you need to go the whole way at a tournament like the EPT?

CR: If you’re scared, you will never win. Like the guy I played heads up [Kalle Niemi], he was totally scared. The hand A-8-4 he raised the button, he knows I’m sick aggressive so I either have fours there, or I have nothing. So he actually should three-bet with his whole range there because I am not representing anything. I’m three-betting any ace pre [flop], just to keep the pressure on. I had like Q-9 or something. I just decided I would play him any post-flop I could. I did as many as I could and this last time, with aces against A-10 on a ten-high board, so that was like a set up.

RM: What a perfect final hand!

CR: That was a perfect hand, the first time I had aces in the whole tournament. I had kings and aces twice in this tournament, once aces and once kings, and they were both today.

William Reynolds

Rebecca McAdam: A lot of people were saying that you were the best player at the final table, so what went wrong for you?

William Reynolds: I had to get it all-in in a few spots, and they just woke up with bigger hands, and I lost some flips. I lost a huge pot to Constant [Rijkenberg] when he four-bet shipped with Q-J and I had A-K and the flop came down 10-9-8 for 3.8 million. The blinds were rather small there, like that was a massive pot with six people left. Basically, that’s what went wrong. I can’t really say I made any huge mistakes that cost me the tournament. Everything kind of set everything else up, and the cards just came down the way the cards came down.

RM: What did you think of the other players at the table?

WR: To be honest, Constant was tricky but he just loves to bluff, he loves to really just go with it, and once he does, he’s going to donate a massive stack, but he’s tricky when he gets chips. The guy on my left, the Swedish guy who got third [Gustav Sundell], he was solid, he was probably the second best player at the table, I’d say. Everyone else, I didn’t have much respect for poker-wise and I liked them being at the table. For that much money, it had to be one of the softest EPT final tables ever.

RM: It must be really good experience for you now because obviously you’re not of the age yet to play in the States.

WR: Yeah, I still can’t play in the States, and it was my first EPT cash, so at least my first EPT cash was a final table. That works out, and it’s hard to complain with the money still, so I’m still trying to keep a smile on my face.

RM: So, are you sticking to Europe for the moment with tournaments?

WR: I’ll play in the season finale in Monaco and then probably play a lot of the Euro tournaments. They’re just generally softer than the American tournaments, and they get more entrants. The World Poker Tour is not doing as well right now, and I’m not 21 so I’ll go to these EPTs — the cities are usually a little better, I like these Euro cities, it’s a good experience every time.

RM: Do you play a lot online?

WR: Yeah, I play a lot online — cash games and some big tournaments.

RM: Are you looking for sponsorship now?

WR: I mean if PokerStars gave me sponsorship, yeah that would be awesome! I’ve played on Stars like every single day for the last three years, so I’m a huge Stars regular.

RM: What’s your main ambition now, where do you go from this — 20-years of age, final table.

WR: Just, 20-years of age, another final table, twenty-one years of age, three final tables. Just more poker, and see how it goes!