The winners of the 3rd annual European Poker Awards

Casino Staff Person of the Year: Teresa Nousiainen (Finland, Casino RAY)

  • She is a poker supervisor in Casino RAY.
  • She has trained dealers in the new poker areas of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania and has dealt in other countries such as France and England where she was dealer on the televised Poker Million tournament.
  • One of the people who nominated her said: „She dealt to me in Paris and was very professional and adept, even at games she had not dealt before. And she never lost her composure even when some players were openly abusive.“
  • She always handles difficult situations with fairness and good judgement.

Rookie of the Year: Juha Helppi (Finland)

  • He is the winner of the non professionals half of the World Poker Tour Aruba Freezeout. Just losing out for the title at the heads up stage.
  • He also made 4th in USD 2,000 no limit hold’em WSOP for USD 45,000 from 407 players also 13th in USD 2,000 limit WSOP (422 players).

Outstanding Tournament Performance of the Year: Gus Hanssen (Denmark)

  • This 29 year old player from Denmark competes mainly in the USA His unique achievement this year was to win two WPT events. He is the only person so far to have done this.
  • Little know in Europe he won the first event in the World Poker Tour at the Bellagio, collecting USD 556,000 and had a repeat win at the LA Classic at the Commerce for the same amount. The Americans could not believe it……and nor could the famous Dave Devil Fish Ulliott who said of him: „I don’t like the way he plays.“

Player of the Year: Dave Colclough (England)

  • This nominee, also known as „El Blondie“… has set a new record for the number of final tables reached in European competition.
  • This year he made the money in a total of 26 competitions on this side of the Atlantic and also racked up several money finishes at the World Series of Poker.
  • In Europe his final table finishes have included four wins and six seconds.
  • For much of the year he has led the European rankings and is currently in second position overall in the all games list and leads of the Omaha rankings.
  • He also writes funny articles to Poker Europa Magazine

Lifetime Achievement Award: Lucy Rokach

  • This player started out as a history teacher and moved on to greener pastures by graduating into car sales. Maybe that is where her final table negotiating skills come from.
  • She started playing 17 years ago locally in England and moved gradually into bigger venues.
  • She has won in Europe 365,000 EUR since 1999 and more than 500,000 EUR world wide.
  • Her strongest characteristics throughout her career have been her courage and resilience allied with respect for other players
  • She also never afraid to stand up and voice her opinion when she sees something wrong
  • She has paved the way for other ladies on the European scene.