Olivier Busquet is probably one of the most well-known and respected poker player that is out there. Olivier was born on August 22, 1981 in New York City where he started his competitive playing at a young age. He learned his skill and discipline from playing chess at the age of six. In fact, he played many chess tournaments because of his skill. He was also active in sports while in school. Olivier ended up attending Cornell University after attending the elite Trinity High School where he planned to major in Mathematics, but ended up graduating with a degree in Philosophy. Where he took his degree to Wall Street and worked for a few years.

During this time Olivier was introduced to the game of poker while playing with friends. And from that moment on he was hooked, as he went to playing online. He started out playing cash games at Party Poker, then moved to Full Tilt Poker and was before long playing the most high staked cash games that can be found online.

He started his poker life playing online, but soon showed the world what he had. He was included in the WSOP for two years in a row. In 2009, he won his first main event, and shattered headlines putting his name in the heads of those that follow the game forever. He won’t the Borgata WPT Poke open, with a win that was nearly one million dollars. The reason that the headlines surrounded Olivier was due to the fact that many did not believe that he could take his online play into real life. He started out bad with a 20-1 chip disadvantage, however, overcame this to take the win.

Nine months later, he placed third place in a 25 thousand No Limits Heads-up WCOOP event. He also placed second in the Monte Carlo High Roller event, where he brought in around eight hundred thousand dollars. He also got close in this year’s NBC’s Heads Up playing an epic match against fellow online genius Vanessa Selbst.

Many people close to the player claim that his natural attitude towards life is one way in which he has flourished at poker. He is naturally competitive, which is needed in order to survive. Take into addition his flourishing math skills, he should have been a shoe in to win almost anything that he played. However, he did have problems at first. He found that it was hard to pick the games that he should really be playing, as well as having trouble manging his funds during a game. In fact, there were many games at the beginning in which he lost it all. He also found that keeping his emotions out of the game was a step that he would have to work on. Though practice made perfect, as Olivier is now one of the people that those in the poker world are hesitant to come up against. He is a formidable opponent even for those players that have been playing for years longer than him, and most likely this can all be traced back to his childhood in which he was encouraged to be competitive and think with his mind. He is sure to be around for many years to come.