Gus Hansen

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**Gus Hansen**
Gus Hansen on GSN's High Stakes Poker
Nickname(s)	The Great Dane
Hometown	Copenhagen, Denmark
World Series of Poker
Bracelet(s)	None
Money finishes	1
Highest ITM main event finish	150th, 2004
World Poker Tour
Titles	3(+1)
Final tables	5(+3)
Money Finishes	8

Gus "The Great Dane" Hansen (born Gustav Hansen on February 13, 1974 outside Copenhagen, Denmark) is a professional poker player who lives in Monaco.^[1]

1 Biography
2 Poker career
3 Trivia
4 References
5 External links

[edit] Biography

Before turning to playing poker professionally in 1997, Hansen was a world class backgammon player and a youth tennis champion. He was known for being a sports enthusiast throughout his teens, competing in several indoor and outdoor sports as a successful junior athlete. In 2000, he moved to New York City, and tried to make a living playing professional backgammon, but found the field too small for his taste.

He calls himself a professional gambler and has been known to take private bets on various personal athletic challenges (such as running), other than poker and professional sports.

[edit] Poker career

Hansen started playing poker in Santa Cruz, California while he was an exchange student at The University of California at Santa Cruz in 1993. He is notorious for his extremely loose, aggressive play. He has a reputation for raising or bluffing with almost any two cards, which leads to opponents calling (or raising) his bets when he has a legitimate hand.

As of 2007, his total live tournament winnings exceed $4,770,000.^[2]

[edit] World Series of Poker

Gus has not done well at the WSOP tournaments. His best career finish came in the 2004 Main Event, where he finished in 150th place and in the money. In the 2006 Tournament of Champions, Gus finally made a World Series of Poker final table, but lost on the very first hand with Ace King against a pair of 9s.

[edit] World Poker Tour

Hansen is the only player to win three World Poker Tour (WPT) open tournaments. He also won the first WPT Bad Boys of Poker invitational event. In 2004, he was inducted into the World Poker Tour Walk of Fame, along with Doyle Brunson and James Garner.

[edit] European Poker Masters

Gus Hansen & EPM tournament director Mel Judah

In September 2006 Hansen won the inaugural EPM event, The London All Star Challenge, eventually beating Marc Goodwin heads-up to take home the title and cheque for £53,600 ($US102,000).

[edit] Poker Superstars

Hansen won the inaugural $400,000 Poker Superstars Invitational Tournament, winning the $1,000,000 first prize in a one-table event featuring some of the most well-known players today. He did not appear in the second series, but returned for Poker Superstars III where he reached the semifinals.

[edit] Other events

Hansen finished in the money of the 2004 World Series of Poker main event, and also made the final table of a European Poker Tour (EPT) event in Barcelona.

In 2006, Hansen was a member of the winning Danish team in the PartyPoker.com Football & Poker Legends Cup tournament, alongside Theo Jørgensen and Kim Christofte.

He is currently featured in the Professional Poker Tour and the second season of High Stakes Poker, where he won the biggest pot in the show's history ($575,700) when his 5♦ 5♣ defeated Daniel Negreanu's 6♠ 6♥ on a board of 9♣ 6♦ 5♥ 5♠ 8♠.

He was in Singapore in November 12-17, 2006 to participate in the Betfair Asian Poker Tour.

Gus was the first winner on NBC's Poker After Dark earning him $120,000, as he outlasted a field of six pro's including Phil Hellmuth and Huck Seed.

In January 2007, Gus won the $10,500 main event at the Aussie Millions in Melbourne, Australia, beating a field of 747 players to take home the AUD $1,500,000 first prize.

[edit] Other ventures

Gus Hansen was a founding partner and house pro of the online poker site pokerchamps.com, launched in 2003. In 2005 the company and game software technology were sold to the British company Betfair, for over 100 million Danish kroner (approximately £8.8 million / 13 million euro / $15,000,000 USD). Despite the sale, Hansen was involved in a PokerChamps Danish championship in October 2005. In 2006, he signed a contract to play exclusively on Full Tilt Poker.

In 2005, Hansen appeared in Texas Hold'Em Poker Advanced Strategies With Gus Hansen, which is part of the Going All In instructional series of DVDs.

He is presently a spokesmodel for Frank Q, a Danish men's fashion line, which he is contracted to wear exclusively for public appearances.^[3]

[edit] Losses

Despite his ongoing success, Hansen has struggled with money problems, reportedly because of losses during live cash games. ^[4] Hansen is a regular in the The Big Game normally held in "Bobby’s Room" at the Bellagio Casino in Las Vegas. He has said that his losses aren't a secret and has admitted to losing a million or so at a couple of games. He also admits to being a perennial loser in sports betting, so much so that he wishes he could stop.^[5]

[edit] Trivia

Claims to have learned to speak English by listening to, and reading the liner notes of, Pink Floyd albums in his youth.
People Magazine's editors voted him as the "Sexiest Poker Player" in their December 2004 50 Sexiest Men Alive issue.
Flexes his right arm after a win -- a move he says he copied from Mats Wilander.
Plays high-stakes Yahtzee and backgammon -- sometimes for at least $1000 a point.
Was the subject of a Danish TV documentary called Royal Straight Flush in 2003.
His manager is his brother-in-law Erik
Has been known to use the screen names broksi, bsg1, havoc14, VJabotinsky, and waddello to play online poker.
Writes a weekly blog for the Danish newspaper Ekstra Bladet in Danish, which is reprinted on his official site with accompanying English translations.