Thursday, 28th March 2024 22:04
Home / Poker / Who wants to be on the EPT Paris feature table? Not Timo Kamphues

Successful poker pro Timo Kamphues likes to keep a low profile, but that’s hard to do when you keep banking huge scores


It’s the dinner break on Day 3 of the European Poker Tour (EPT) stop in Paris and the players on the feature table wait to collect their phones from the TV staff.

Tournament titan Niklas “lena900” Astedt grabs his, followed by another crusher: Alexandros “mexican222” Kolonias. Then it’s Timo Kamphues’ turn, and he looks particularly relieved.

“This table has been really bad,” the 28-year-old tells us.

It’s not so much that Kamphues dislikes playing against such tough competition (although he definitely wishes he had an easier table). It’s more that Kamphues prefers to keep a low profile; hard to do when you’re on an EPT feature table.

“I don’t like it too much,” he says. “I’ll be happy to move after the dinner break!”

A NOT-SO-LOW PROFILE

While Timo Kamphues chooses to keep his live and online results private, we can assure you that he has enjoyed a highly successful career since turning pro five years ago. 

Online, he has more than $1.5 million in earnings, with multiple podium finishes in COOP events on PokerStars.

Live, his breakout result came at a World Poker Tour (WPT) Shooting Stars for Charity event in 2020, which he won for $90K after defeating a final table that included Matas Cimbolas and Sam Trickett.

He followed that up in 2021 with a third-place finish in the $888 Crazy Eights at the 2021 World Series of Poker, good for $200K.

“IT’S BEEN ALL POKER”

It all began in his German hometown when a friend introduced him to the game. “We used to play computer games together like Counter-Strike,” he says. “He played a little bit of poker and asked if we wanted to play. So I’d lose $25 every Sunday against them, then started to take it a little more seriously.”

After graduating high school, Kamphues worked for two years as a social worker in a care home for children with mental disabilities. “That’s what I wanted to do, and I studied it for half a year,” he says.

But his poker results kept getting better. Then his friends and brother (fellow pro player Lars Kamphues) invited him to move to Wörgl, Austria to pursue poker success. “Ever since then, it’s been all poker,” he says.

Timo Kamphues at EPT Paris

THE QUALIFYING KAMPHUES BROTHERS

Both the Kamphues brothers–Timo and Lars–qualified for EPT Paris on PokerStars.

“I would have played regardless, had I not qualified,” says the Timo Kamphues. “You’re sitting there on a Sunday and you see a qualifier and you think, why not? You get the hotel and stuff. It’s nice.”

But only Timo remains as we approach the end of Day 3. “It’s been pretty decent,” he says before heading off for dinner. “My stack has moved up smoothly.”

See? That tough feature table didn’t bother him one bit.

More about EPT Paris:

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