Unofficial site about Erick Lindgren

• Erick Lindgren was born in Burney, California in August 11th 1976.
• Lindgren dropped out of college to pursue a career in poker.
• He is single and has no children.

Erick Lindgren’s life is the classic American story of a small town boy made good. He was born in a town of only three thousand residents, Burney California. He is one of a family of five, three boys who competed heavily in all forms of sport available to them. His mother was a stay-at-home wife and his father owned a tyre shop. Although he didn’t play poker, he was a gambler from an early age and often made bets with his friends on everyday events, like making a half court basketball shot.

Lindgren originally dreamed of playing professional football or basketball but eventually realised, like so many other hopefuls do that he simply would not be able to realise that dream even though he won an MVP award for high school basketball and all-league honours for football. Lacking the speed and the height that successful professional athletes possess, he took up a place in a local college instead.

Near Butte Junior College where Lindgren was enrolled, was the Colusa Indian Casino and Lindgren began to spend more and more time there. It was at this casino that he got his first and only job as a blackjack dealer. He learned to play Texas Hold ‘Em and found his true calling.

Chat with Erick online at Full Tilt Poker. Get a $600 bonus on sign up with the Full Tilt Poker referral code.

Poker proved more compelling for Lindgren that college and he dropped out, hiding the fact from his parents for as long as he could. At 21, he began working as a prop player and delved into the world of online poker, playing on three computers from home. Working in poker and playing in poker quickly honed Lindgren’s skills (he would often play for 24 or more hours straight online). After five years he moved to Las Vegas to make the leap into the big time and in 2002, the same year he settled in Las Vegas, he walked away from the main event of the Bellagio Five Diamond Classic with a little under $230,000. He is quoted as saying that the best thing about that win wasn’t the money, but that he no longer had to be afraid of his parents when he told people what he did for a living. In 2003 Erick won his first major World Tour of Poker event, taking half a million dollars. Only 6 months after that he pocketed a one million dollar top prize in the World Poker Tour Poker Million III, defeating poker legend Daniel Negreneau. Erick Lindgren was now a confirmed contender.

Lindgren cites Negreneau, Phil Ivey and Gus Hansen as the three players he finds hardest to beat and the players he watches most closely.

2005 kicked off an amazing run of success for Erick Lindgren, with the first three months of that year bringing him a second place in the World Series of Poker Circuit event, a fifth in the World Poker Tour Los Angeles Poker Classic and another second in the Professional Poker Tour tournament.

2006 was no different. He took third in the World Poker Tour Borgata Winter Poker Open and won the Full Tilt Poker Pro Showdown event in June, beating out Mike Matusow (a fellow Full Tilt team member) to win a solid $600,000 prize. He placed in cash-gaining spots in four more events at the 2006 World Series of Poker.

He made a prop bet in 2007 with some of his friends, including Gavin Smith and Phil Ivey that he could play four back to back rounds of golf, shooting under a hundred each round. It was a spontaneous bet that came after he disappointed himself by being beaten in the $50,000 H.O.R.S.E. event. Gavin Smith laughed that he would be in for a hundred thousand on the golf bet and after a few more bets, the pot stood at almost two hundred thousand dollars. He played golf the next morning from 5.30 am until 8pm and lost 12 pounds of body weight in a single day. Lindgren shot 83, 85, 94 and 94 and walked away with the money.

Like many of his poker playing counterparts, Erick Lindgren has written a book. World Poker Tour: Making the Final Table is not a book for amateurs – even though it is a great read – but for more advanced players who are looking to refine their skills and break into the world of high-stakes poker.

Full Tilt Poker commercial featuring Erick Lindgren

Erick Lindgren enjoys the party element of the poker circuit and indulges his bachelor tastes for plasma TV’s five-figure bar tabs and a 65 inch screen with dual monitors purely devoted to eatching sports.

Although it would be easy to dismiss Erick Lindgren as a playboy kid, his friend Negreneau praises him as “an extremely good-natured and generous person who's always up for anything," in the foreword of Lindgren’s book.

His jubilant and youthful lifestyle also makes it easy to forget that Lindgren is a ten year veteran of the circuit. His massive tournament and cash game wins made him a perfect choice for the Full Tilt poker team, not to mention his insatiable appetite for online poker. Although he may not spend 24 straight hours playing online these days, he is still a regular on the site, playing online exclusively with the Full Tilt team.

• Apart from being a blackjack dealer when he was 19, the only jobs Erick Lindgren has ever had have been shovelling snow off roofs in high school and dealing baseball cards when he was 14.
• Both his surname and first names is Swedish, reflecting his ancestry and are often misspelled.
• He hosted the 2008 Full Tilt Tournament of Poker series, a large buy-in tournament with a field of 5,600 competitors. He became the first host to ever win the event, taking home $291,000.