Before Barcelona, you’d only ever cashed once at the EPT. What did you do differently this time?
I played in five or six of the EPT events last season and made it to the second day in Deauville and Copenhagen. But I didn’t play well in either of those. So I analysed my game on both days and tried to find some improvements.

Going into the final table, what were your tactics?
Phil Ivey was chip leader, he had slightly more than me. Luckily he was positioned to my right side. I only had Jeff Lisandro, who was two seats to my left to worry about. The rest of the table was low-stackish. So my strategy at the beginning was to avoid big pots against the medium-stacks and focus on the small stacks. I had a pretty good start and I picked up three or four big pots.

You faced Phil Ivey in the final heads-up. Did he intimidate you?
Obviously he was the favourite coming into the tournament and the fact he came second is amazing. He probably gets more information than the rest of us, but he didn’t terrify me. He had a ten-minute think in a crucial hand when we were down three-handed. I was on the big blind with a pair of 9s, he was on the small blind. The button limped, I re-raised to 120,000. The button folded and Ivey called. The flop was K-3-2 rainbow. He checked, I bet 150,000. He raised me to 350,000 – half his remaining chips.

What did you do?
Before he check-raised me, I had already decided if he went over the top, I would push him all-in. Then he took another ten minutes and I was staring at the table. But then he folded. It was not the most comfortable time I’ve ever had, although I was pretty certain that I had the best hand.

Beating Ivey must make victory so much sweeter.
It doesn’t make the performance any worse, certainly not!