Mild-mannered TU student by day, ruthless Internet poker shark by night, Remco Schrijvers is making big money beating American poker players at their own game.
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What Internet surfer hasn’t spent time deleting those flashy, irritating pop-up ads for online casinos % “Win! Poker! Casino! Free!” But if you did enter an Internet casino to gamble at a virtual poker table, there’s a good chance you’d eventually end up losing money to an Internet poker player named Demokritos, which is the online nom de poker of 22-year-old Remco Schrijvers, an Applied Physics student who also happens to be one of the best Internet poker players in the (cyber) world, and certainly one of the best-paid TU students, having earned tens of thousands of dollars at online poker tables%which isn’t bad for a part-time job he does from the comfort of his own bedroom.
Like many young guys, Schrijvers began playing poker with friends while in high school, for ”fun”. He liked the game for the thrill of the gamble but also for what he saw as poker’s depth and complexity. ”There’s lots of “long-term” skill involved in playing poker,” Schrijvers says. ”You must make lots of decisions, calculate quickly, bet when the expected value is highest, analyze your opponents, all while under pressure.”
Having discovered his talent for poker and seen and loved Rounders (1998), a romanticized Hollywood ‘poker movie’, Schrijvers was hooked: ”That movie inspired me to take the next step.”
That step was into an Internet casino. ”The first time I played online, I started with $50, a lot of money for me back then,” he recalls. ”And I lost it all quickly.” Disappointed but not deterred, Schrijvers determined to become a better player and win the next time. ”It was a competitive thing. I didn’t want to believe there were better players than me,” he says. ”Playing poker isn’t primarily about the money; it’s about beating opponents.”
To improve his poker game, student Schrijvers took a suitably academic approach, studying books on poker theory and learning from other players’ experiences via online poker forums. Schrijvers: ”When I was sufficiently prepared, I bought into a game for another $50.” That was three years ago, and Schrijvers hasn’t looked back since, parlaying that $50 into thousands of dollars in winnings. Last year, Schrijvers cashed out of one Internet casino with $30,000 in winnings. He subsequently took a year off university to travel across the USA, where, incidentally, he won another $2,000 playing poker in Las Vegas.
Today, Schrijvers, once again a full-time TU student, plays Internet poker four hours a night, five days a week, at multiple Internet casinos. He continues to win. ”Calculating my winnings in terms of an hourly rate, I’m earn around $65-an-hour playing poker,” he declares. Schrijvers’ claim that he’s ”probably among the top 5% of online poker players in the world” isn%t hubris: He recently participated in the World Championship of Online Poker, competing against the world%s best players for a $200,000 first prize. Of the 891 participants, Schrijvers finished in 38th place, ”in the money”, winning $2,673 in prize money.
The obvious questions for a student who spends 20 hours a week gambling are: does poker interfere with his studies and, more seriously, does he fear becoming a gambling addict? ”Of course my studies suffer somewhat,” he admits, ”but not worse than other students with part-time jobs.” As for being a gambling addict, Schrijvers is adamant that he’s not: ”I don’t engage in other forms of gambling. I just play poker.”
Any negatives resulting from his Internet poker playing are offset by the benefits, he believes. ”Through poker I’ve learned to deal better with pressure, to act rationally, analyze objectively and control my emotions, which is good for playing poker and for life generally,” he says.
Schrijvers academic background has also aided his game. Good in math and statistics, he can rapidly process the poker player’s standard formula before acting: pot (money waged) size + probability of winning % bet size x probability of losing. Moreover, Schrijvers keeps a database of the (good) players he regularly competes against online, tracking his opponents% playing styles and looking for patterns in their play: ”To win, it helps know your opponents.”
Today, Internet poker is a booming, billion-dollar business. New players come online every day to play, especially in the US % ”The majority of Internet poker players are Americans,” he says % and that suits Schrijvers and his bank balance just fine: ”Last month, the World Series of Poker tournament in Las Vegas was broadcast live on national TV in the States. Virtually overnight one online poker site I play at saw its number of registered players rise from 1,500 to 6,500 players. Which is great, because most new players are lousy players who lose their money to me and other established players.” Remco Schrijvers, a Dutch joker in the pack of American Internet poker players.
Mild-mannered TU student by day, ruthless Internet poker shark by night, Remco Schrijvers is making big money beating American poker players at their own game.
What Internet surfer hasn’t spent time deleting those flashy, irritating pop-up ads for online casinos % “Win! Poker! Casino! Free!” But if you did enter an Internet casino to gamble at a virtual poker table, there’s a good chance you’d eventually end up losing money to an Internet poker player named Demokritos, which is the online nom de poker of 22-year-old Remco Schrijvers, an Applied Physics student who also happens to be one of the best Internet poker players in the (cyber) world, and certainly one of the best-paid TU students, having earned tens of thousands of dollars at online poker tables%which isn’t bad for a part-time job he does from the comfort of his own bedroom.
Like many young guys, Schrijvers began playing poker with friends while in high school, for ”fun”. He liked the game for the thrill of the gamble but also for what he saw as poker’s depth and complexity. ”There’s lots of “long-term” skill involved in playing poker,” Schrijvers says. ”You must make lots of decisions, calculate quickly, bet when the expected value is highest, analyze your opponents, all while under pressure.”
Having discovered his talent for poker and seen and loved Rounders (1998), a romanticized Hollywood ‘poker movie’, Schrijvers was hooked: ”That movie inspired me to take the next step.”
That step was into an Internet casino. ”The first time I played online, I started with $50, a lot of money for me back then,” he recalls. ”And I lost it all quickly.” Disappointed but not deterred, Schrijvers determined to become a better player and win the next time. ”It was a competitive thing. I didn’t want to believe there were better players than me,” he says. ”Playing poker isn’t primarily about the money; it’s about beating opponents.”
To improve his poker game, student Schrijvers took a suitably academic approach, studying books on poker theory and learning from other players’ experiences via online poker forums. Schrijvers: ”When I was sufficiently prepared, I bought into a game for another $50.” That was three years ago, and Schrijvers hasn’t looked back since, parlaying that $50 into thousands of dollars in winnings. Last year, Schrijvers cashed out of one Internet casino with $30,000 in winnings. He subsequently took a year off university to travel across the USA, where, incidentally, he won another $2,000 playing poker in Las Vegas.
Today, Schrijvers, once again a full-time TU student, plays Internet poker four hours a night, five days a week, at multiple Internet casinos. He continues to win. ”Calculating my winnings in terms of an hourly rate, I’m earn around $65-an-hour playing poker,” he declares. Schrijvers’ claim that he’s ”probably among the top 5% of online poker players in the world” isn%t hubris: He recently participated in the World Championship of Online Poker, competing against the world%s best players for a $200,000 first prize. Of the 891 participants, Schrijvers finished in 38th place, ”in the money”, winning $2,673 in prize money.
The obvious questions for a student who spends 20 hours a week gambling are: does poker interfere with his studies and, more seriously, does he fear becoming a gambling addict? ”Of course my studies suffer somewhat,” he admits, ”but not worse than other students with part-time jobs.” As for being a gambling addict, Schrijvers is adamant that he’s not: ”I don’t engage in other forms of gambling. I just play poker.”
Any negatives resulting from his Internet poker playing are offset by the benefits, he believes. ”Through poker I’ve learned to deal better with pressure, to act rationally, analyze objectively and control my emotions, which is good for playing poker and for life generally,” he says.
Schrijvers academic background has also aided his game. Good in math and statistics, he can rapidly process the poker player’s standard formula before acting: pot (money waged) size + probability of winning % bet size x probability of losing. Moreover, Schrijvers keeps a database of the (good) players he regularly competes against online, tracking his opponents% playing styles and looking for patterns in their play: ”To win, it helps know your opponents.”
Today, Internet poker is a booming, billion-dollar business. New players come online every day to play, especially in the US % ”The majority of Internet poker players are Americans,” he says % and that suits Schrijvers and his bank balance just fine: ”Last month, the World Series of Poker tournament in Las Vegas was broadcast live on national TV in the States. Virtually overnight one online poker site I play at saw its number of registered players rise from 1,500 to 6,500 players. Which is great, because most new players are lousy players who lose their money to me and other established players.” Remco Schrijvers, a Dutch joker in the pack of American Internet poker players.

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