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Poker Wunderkind Jeff Madsen

Jeff Madsen had been old enough to play poker in a regular casino for just five weeks when he entered the World Series of Poker and made waves in the poker scenes. The kid made it to four final tables, got two bracelets and a cool $1.5 million.

"I started playing poker the summer before I went to college. My friend taught me how to play and we played just for fun. Like most young guys, we would drink a beer and play some cards," Madsen said.

When I got into college, I started playing at a small Indian casino and I also developed my game a little bit online. I started playing Limit Hold'em and quickly moved up into a $2/$5 No Limit Hold'em game. That soon became my main game, although I did start to mix in a lot of tournaments as well."

There had been rumors that Madsen threw an entire bankroll into the Omaha 8/b tournament, where he eventually finished third. Madsen clears this up:

"Well, to start, I didn't really have a bankroll. I had borrowed money from my parents to enable myself to play in six WSOP events. My initial goal was to make the money back and cash in two events. Five of the events I had picked were Hold'em tournaments and the sixth was the $1,500 Omaha 8/b. I had played a fair amount of Omaha and thought that I was a pretty skilled player and that I would have a decent shot at cashing in this event if things fell into place right."

"It's just crazy. It's a crazy feeling making a final table. Once we started playing, that feeling of "I'm just happy to be here!" wore off and I wasn't nervous at all. I just played my game. I thought I played really well, too. I came in as the chip leader and thought I had a great shot of winning it," Madsen said on making his first World Series table and coming in at third place.

"Actually, I still think that I could have won it. Daniel Negreanu was at the table, so that was very cool, and I was lucky enough to scoop a few big pots from him. There was one hand in particular, when I hit the third nut flush and the nut low. Daniel had the straight and the second nut low. That hand crippled him, and after that pot, I didn't play many more hands with him. It was really cool, though; that he was at that final table."