Adeniya on Busting the Main, Drinking with Viktor Blom & More
Last month Martins Adeniya was announced as one of four Full Tilt Poker ambassadors brought in to represent the online room at all stops of the United Kingdom and Ireland Poker Tour (UKIPT). His first assignment was the FTP UKIPT Galway Festival, which has been playing out over the last week on the west coast of Ireland.
Adeniya discovered poker while studying business at the University of Bath and quickly worked his way up from low-stakes home games to multi-tabling $10/$20 NL Hold’em online. After earning over $180,000 for a third place finish in the FTOPS Main Event, Martins decided to focus 100% on poker.
Since then Adeinya has become a rising star in the poker world with $487,965 in career earnings dating back to 2009. Among his notable accomplishments are a seventh-place finish in the 2011 EPT/UKIPT London Main Event for $134,964; 13th in the 2010 World Series of Poker $25,000 No Limit Hold’em – Six Handed for $58,699; 9th in the 2010 WSOP $2,500 No Limit Hold’em – Six Handed for $40,547; second in a 2010 Venetian Deep Stack $500 No Limit Hold’em for $28,265; and 474th in the 2009 WSOP Main Event for $25,027. The only win on Adeniya’s résumé came in 2012 in the £500 London Super Stack Series – High Roller for $16,899.
Even though he busted on Day 1a, PokerNews caught up with the Londoner on the first break of Day 1b to see what he's been up to in the last 24 hours.
PokerNews: You busted late on Day 1a of the Main Event. What did you do after your elimination?
Adeniya: I went back to the room for about 20 minutes and then I got the call that bars and clubs were being hit tonight and that I needed to be there. So I came down to the Full Tilt Poker Village, was having a few drinks with Jake Cody and Liv Boeree. We were drinking here until pretty late and then we went to a club but the club was shut, so we went back to the Harbor Hotel where we met up with Viktor Blom as well. Everyone was out and we were all just ordering shots and drinks. A lot of vodka was consumed.
Most people only know Blom from his online play. Is he fun to drink and socialize with?
He's a funny guy. I can't release too many stories from what happened last night, but it was a good laugh.
Is it safe to assume that since he hasn't made it to Day 1b yet that he is sleeping in and maybe tending to a bit of a hangover?
Yeah, I'm pretty sure he's still in recovery right now [laughs].
Since you're out of the Main Event, what are your plans here in Galway? Will you be playing the FTOPS?
Today I plan on just getting some food and then I might play online a bit. I'm actually thinking of going to Pure Skill, which is a place we went to earlier in the week. It's like a sports center where you can play football, basketball, baseball and all sorts of other sports like that. It's a lot of fun actually. We have team scoring and we plan on going down there and having some side bets on the action.