Post WSOP Interview with Team Bodog's Alper Sar

by Bodog Poker | Aug 4 2009

The 2009 edition of Team Bodog had a great year at the WSOP Main Event. And out of all the professionals and qualifiers, the player who went the deepest was a young Turkish player who had to travel halfway across the globe to get to Vegas. Alper "ThunderFX" Sar won his WSOP seat back in the spring, and a couple of months later he turned that seat into an 85th-place finish and walked away with a $58K check for his troubles. We caught up to Alper back in Istanbul to get his thoughts on his deep run in the Main Event that extended into Day 6.

As a member of Team Bodog, Alper could attend all the Bodog celebrations during the week of the Main Event, but he didn't partake in any social gatherings or promotions. He spent his entire time in Vegas playing poker or resting up to play the next day. He only had a week away from his job as a budding investment banker and he had to concentrate on the task at hand.

"I only had one week off of work and I spent the entire time playing poker. I would have liked to have played some cash games and gone to Bodog's party, but my schedule was too tight to enjoy any of those things this year."

Despite Alper's success online, and at this year's WSOP Main Event, he has no intentions of becoming a professional poker player. The 23-year-old is just learning his career and has a greater passion for his work than he does for poker.

"I really like my work and it pays me very well. If I only played poker it would be all that I would do. Playing part-time allows me to have an exciting career and I get to play poker too. I may be a poker player but I think that I'm a risk adverse person."

When asked about his play in the Main Event Sar still mentions his disappointment. It was his first live event with a good size buy-in, but he feels that he could have done better if things didn't turn sour on him the way they did on Day 6.

"I think I could have gone further but bad luck knocked me out. I hope to play for Bodog again next year, but if I don't win a Main Event seat I'll play in a couple of smaller events. I do best in limit action games like Razz or stud. Next year I'll try to get enough time off to play two or three of them."

Alper had nothing but good things to say about how he was treated in Vegas. "I'd like to say that Bodog made me feel comfortable and treated me very well. I'd also like to thank Serge who handled everything that I needed, and I look forward to playing for Bodog again some day."

Sar intends to play as much big tournament action as he can online over the next few months. He would like to play in some EPT events but doesn't see any time away from work in his near future.