Fri, 12/24/2010 – 14:43 – PokerPages Staff

#5 Jude Ainsworth
Our number five position this week goes to a PhD in biochemistry who lives in Galway, Ireland.  Jude Ainsworth shot to prominence in the 2008 Irish Poker Championships when he won €145,000.  As a Team PokerStars Sponsored Pro, he plays under the name “J. Thaddeus” and, in the space of two years, has accrued a tidy sum of $383,683 in poker winnings.

#4 John-Paul “JP” Kelly
Marching into fourth place with a handsome $1,199,654 in total winnings is London-based John-Paul “JP” Kelly.  This young man won his first WSOP bracelet last year at the tender age of 22.  But he has been playing poker since way back, winning seven tournaments in the UK and Europe in just 15 months when he was only 18 years old!  JP plays as a Team PokerStars Sponsored Pro under the screen name “JohnDuthie.”

#3 Liv Boeree
Beating JP into third place by almost a million dollars is a graduate in astrophysics from East Molesy, England.  Liv Boeree became the third woman ever to win a European Poker Tour Championship when she took home a breathtaking €1,125,000 in April this year.  She now has total poker winnings of $2,105,307.

#2 Julian Thew
This week’s runner up is a former draughtsman for an engineering company in Nottingham, England.  That was before he began crushing the tournament circuit to become one of the UK’s highest earning poker pros; Julian Thew today has total winnings of $2,391,808.  He uses the screen name “JulianThew” when playing as a Team PokerStars Sponsored Pro.

#1 John Duthie
But the king of the UK Team PokerStars Sponsored Pro castle is an accomplished TV director who also happens to be an outstanding poker player.  John Duthie, who lives in London, is the man who founded the dazzlingly successful European Poker Tour.  He has total poker winnings of $2,967,481 to his credit – and he’s still directing.

Wed, 12/22/2010 – 23:10 – PokerPages Staff

Ilari ‘Ziigmund’ Sahamies returned to form on Monday evening after dominating several $300/$600 Pot Limit Omaha sessions on the virtual felt. ‘Ziigmund’ finished the evening $119,000 in the black to arrest his recent run of downswings.

The online sensation downed a pot worth $136,674 after completing a full house on the river against nosebleed regulars Di ‘Urindanger’ Dang and ‘Rumprammer.’

‘Ziigmund’ raised to $3,600 from the big blind and his opponents called. A flop of Ah-Qs-8s prompted Dang to check and Sahamies led out for $13,780. ‘Rumprammer’ then jammed for $26,195 and Dang check raised to $107,085. ‘Ziigmund’ completed.

The trio had each hit a set on the flop but ‘Ziigmund’ had his opponents covered with Aces. The turn and river drew air for ‘Rumprammer’ and Dang and ‘Ziigmund’ snared the pot with his boat.

Patrik Antonius took the crown as the biggest winner of the weekend after seven lucrative sessions. Antonius tabled trip deuces against Dan ‘jungleman12′ Cates to take down a hand worth $226,000 before spiking a rivered set of Aces against long running challenger ‘IHateJuice’ for a $96,000 pot.

Antonius’ profits of $332,663 placed him ahead of ‘luckexpress10′ (+$143,992) and Ziigmund (+$119,0000). The renowned Phil Ivey (+$83,981) rounded out the top four.

Dan Cates (-$249,376) was the biggest loser. The Durrrr Challenger has seen his 2010 profits drop from over $5 million to $4.76 million in recent weeks. However, those figures are still good enough to make him the highest earner for the calendar year.

For more information about the biggest names in online poker visit the PokerPages Popular Players section.