Martin Staszko (born 22 June 1976 in

Třinec Třinec (; pl, Trzyniec ; german: Trzynietz) is a city in Frýdek-Místek District in the Moravian-Silesian Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 34,000 inhabitants and is the least populated statutory city in the country. The city is a ...

) is a

Czech Czech may refer to: * Anything from or related to the Czech Republic, a country in Europe ** Czech language ** Czechs, the people of the area ** Czech culture ** Czech cuisine * One of three mythical brothers, Lech, Czech, and Rus' Places * Czech, ...

poker player, best known as the runner-up of the

Main Event In sports, a card lists the matches taking place in a title match combat-sport event. Cards include a main event match and the undercard listing the rest of the matches. The undercard may be divided into a midcard and a lower card, according to ...

at the

2011 World Series of Poker The 2011 World Series of Poker was the 42nd annual World Series of Poker (WSOP). The WSOP is the most prestigious poker tournament in the world with the winner of the Main Event considered to be the World Champion. It was held at the Rio All Suit ...

, where he finished second to

Pius Heinz Pius Heinz (born 4 May 1989) is a German professional poker player from Bonn, best known as the winner of the Main Event at the 2011 World Series of Poker. He is the first German player to capture the Main Event bracelet. He defeated Czech ...

Life and career

Staszko lives in the city of

. His parents are Rudolf, who works in

Třinec Iron and Steel Works Třinec Iron and Steel Works (TŽ) ( cs, Třinecké železárny, pl, Huta trzyniecka) is a producer of long rolled steel products in Třinec, Moravian-Silesian Region, Czech Republic. TŽ produces over a third of all steel produced in the Cze ...

, and Žofie, who works as a pharmacist. As a child, Staszko was an athlete, becoming long jump champion of his Třinec Polish primary school. He started playing

mariáš Mariáš or Mariasch a three-player, solo trick-taking game of the King–Queen family of Ace-Ten games, but with a simplified scoring system. It is one of the most popular card games in the Czech Republic and Slovakia, but is also played in Bav ...

and betting on sport games during high school. Later, while studying at

Technical University of Ostrava Technical may refer to: * Technical (vehicle), an improvised fighting vehicle * Technical analysis, a discipline for forecasting the future direction of prices through the study of past market data * Technical drawing, showing how something is co ...

, he not only supported himself from the games, but he also saved roughly

CZK The koruna, or crown, ( sign: Kč; code: CZK, cs, koruna česká) has been the currency of the Czech Republic since 1993. The koruna is one of the European Union's 9 currencies, and the Czech Republic is legally bound to adopt the euro curre ...

400,000 (

€ The euro sign () is the currency sign used for the euro, the official currency of the eurozone and unilaterally adopted by Kosovo and Montenegro. The design was presented to the public by the European Commission on 12 December 1996. It consists ...

14,000) annually. During his studies, Staszko became champion of the Czech university

darts Darts or dart-throwing is a competitive sport in which two or more players bare-handedly throw small sharp-pointed missiles known as darts at a round target known as a dartboard. Points can be scored by hitting specific marked areas of the bo ...

league and was also a successful chess player. After finishing studies, Staszko started working at

. He began playing poker in 2007, initially playing online in games which did not require entrance fee, but provided some very limited returns. At that time, Staszko worked as foreman at Hyundai Nošovice automobile manufacturing plant's paint shop. He was in charge of around 200 workers, earning a little over CZK 30,000 (€1,200) a month. He used to get up at five in the morning in order to attend twelve hours shifts followed by playing poker, leaving only some four to five hours for sleep. He was able to win an equivalent of six-months salary during a night online session. In 2010, following a win of €35,000 in France, Staszko decided to leave his job in order to fully concentrate on gaming. His runner-up finish in the 2011 Main Event garnered him $5.43 million (€3.98 million).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Staszko, Martin 1976 births Sportspeople from Třinec Czech chess players Czech poker players Living people