He’s the Netherlands #1-ranked player, but now, five years into his online career ‘etxnl01’ is looking for more.

With over $1.6 million in lifetime earnings, the 24-year old player who also goes by ‘etx’ has been a regular fixture in the PocketFives top-100 for months. A daily grinder of the mid-stakes, ‘etx’ finds himself regularly firing in the largest tournaments online, which is a long way from where he was just a few years ago.

“I started playing poker in middle school, but it was just like with friends. The good old cash game for a couple of bucks,” said ‘etx’. “We just used to play like two days a week, just after school. We’d go to someone’s house an play poker for a few hours. That’s basically how I learned. It wasn’t really strategies back then. It was just like playing for fun and trying to, you know, win some money off your friends. It wasn’t really an attempt to get good that the game yet at this point.”

His regular home game turned into splashing around online, at the time it was purely for fun.

“I mean I started it out just for fun, at the low stakes. I just played MTTs for a dollar or something, then over the years I got more and more interested and managed to climb stakes and grow my bankroll.”

As his bankroll grew so did his desire to get better and learn more, a consistant theme in ‘etx’s career. He would watch Jason Somerville streams, catch The Big Game and High Stakes Poker on TV, go over the replays of the PokerStars Sunday Million. His found himself absorbing as much as he could.

“I just looked for as much poker content as I could. Basically, if I saw something interesting, I would try to figure it out on my own why someone would do that or what the reasoning would be. That’s basically how I got my wits, I guess.”

His story is a familiar one to a generation of young online players. Slightly obsessed, he played in high school, then took his love of the game to university. He completed his first few years and then “decided to try poker full-time at some point.”

“It was an interesting choice to make, obviously. Dropping out of college was a thing in its own, but I just decided I wanted to try it. If I didn’t try it, I would always regret it,” he said.

So he decided to make a run at being a pro. The decision, of course, was an unconventional one, especially in the Netherlands. According to ‘etx’, in his home country poker still doesn’t have the best reputation.

“[Poker’s reputation] is not that great, honestly. Well, it’s not unpopular or anything but the general view, especially the older generations is that poker is gambling. People are always scared. Everyone knows a gambling addict…There’s not a lot of positivity around it.

“So, it’s a bit weird when you talk to random people and they ask ‘What do you do?’ It’s not always the best answer to say ‘I play poker.’ You get the same conversation about people who know people who are gambling addicts.  The younger generation is a lot more open about it I think, but definitely, when you talk to older people, it’s very negatively viewed.”

‘etx’ has been an online professional for the better part of five years now. Like some of those players he looks up to, including Raise Your Edge mastermind ‘bencb789’, the player who goes by the nickname ‘etx’ doesn’t see many purposes in exposing his real name. It’s his play that he’d like to draw attention to.

“I really still like the game itself. I usually play things like Super Tuesday to the Thursday Thrill, that kind of stuff. I also still really playing the mid-stakes, just because I enjoy the game. I think there’s a lot of value playing the medium stakes. I don’t think stakes is the thing I look for when I look at the tournament schedule. I just look for formats that I like. Obviously, the high stakes are exciting but I don’t think it’s just about playing the high stakes personally, for me.”

It may not be all about the high stakes for ‘etx’ however his largest online cash did come from a big-time tournament. In 2016, he earned a PokerStars SCOOP title in Event #2 ($2,100 NLHE PKO) for a huge score of over $155,000 + another six figures in bounties.

“That was a big help for my bankroll, obviously, a nice boost. I’m very proud of that achievement, but I think I’m personally even happier that I managed to [perform in] more big tournaments later on in my career for over $100K. This made it not like a one-time thing for me but showed me that I could do it more consistently.”

Consistency is something he keeps working on. He studies on a daily basis whether it’s watching a stream, reviewing hands, or discussing spots with other players.

“I’m happy with my current game, but I think there’s still a lot of room for my improvement. I’m theoretically planning on keeping to improve and getting better and climbing the ranks, as you will.”

Climbing the ranks is not lost on him. He’s the #1 player in the Netherlands, currently sitting above well-known tournament grinder Bryan ‘bparis’ Paris. He has flown as high at #48 in the world and is currently situated at #77.

“I’ve been looking at rankings and such a little bit. I think in poker, it’s really hard to truly measure someone’s skill set, even with rankings and point leaderboards,” he said. “But  I really do enjoy them. I’m a very competitive person. I really like to win, so I put in a lot of time and effort in whatever I do, just to make sure I of as good as I can. So, yeah, I’m definitely happy with being ranked number one in The Netherlands right now on PocketFives. But I also still look at the other rankings, like the general rankings, hoping to climb them and become a better player as well. Not just get a high score or something because you are lucky. I want to consistently have good scores. That, for me, is more important than just winning one tournament.”

Nowadays, ‘etx’ finds himself playing in some of the largest online tournaments in the world, battling the very players he looks up to – not just in the rankings but as players. Even though he’s been registering for the upper echelon tournaments for some time, he still considers himself the new guy in the higher stakes.

“In the beginning, you really get starstruck, but at this point, I’ve played with enough of them [‘lena900’, ‘C Darwin2’] to know what I can expect. Obviously, they are still amazing players and probably have a notch over me. But, you know, the goal for me is to get closer and closer to the top guys and learn from them if they play a hand a certain way. I’m definitely going to look into the line they took and why they would take it and then, hopefully, I can respond to them better next time.”

Another reoccurring theme with ‘etx’ is his passion for poker. A PocketFiver for over two years, an online reg for longer, his grind is one that rarely takes breaks. He continues to work online and off to get better.

“Obviously, there’s tough periods. Downswinging is never fun. It’s never fun when you run bad for periods. But in the end, I really, really still love being able to play as much poker as I do. For me, poker is always changing. If I compare how I play now to like a few years ago, I have definitely made leaps and bounds…It’s a fun battle for me, trying to stay ahead of the curve, or at least on top of the curve. I don’t think that I will not love poker anytime soon. Obviously, everyone can get burnt out and after SCOOP I really love taking a few week off and doing other stuff. But I always get the itch to play within a few weeks. I don’t think that’s going away anytime soon.”

His #1-ranking in his home country, the rewards of playing in the high stakes and consistently getting better at the game are all rewards that ‘etx’ has been enjoying. However, if he has it his way, there’s more on the horizon for this still up-and-comer.

“I think, for me, a great goal would be to work my way up and if there’s new players that start playing poker, to be one of the names they aspire to play with as some point. If you call all the best players…’lena900’, ‘C Darwin2’, ‘girafganger7’ and so on. Being able to, at some point, get into that list would be awesome for me. That would be a nice personal goal.”