Juha Helppi

Scandinavian players are some of the most feared in the global poker world, and Juha Helppi is part of the group of aggressive players who add to that reputation. He is a fearless competitor who has won millions of dollars in his quest to become a top player.

Juha Helppi was born on March 4, 1977, in the town of Turku, Finland. He was a typical competitive child, playing soccer well into his teenage years while he completed his schooling. He also found an intellectual challenge in Magic: The Gathering, a card game that yields competition from all around the world.

As an adult, he took a job as a casino dealer while deciding on a career, and he not only watched poker but spoke with players and fellow dealers, learning about the game and its different variations as he went. He soon spent some of his leisure time playing online poker at Paradise Poker, and he read books like “Hold’em Poker for Advanced Players” by Sklansky and Malmuth in order to better his game. Each year, he accumulated more income from online poker until he was able to quit his job and survive on poker alone.

In 2001, Helppi began to play live poker. It didn’t take long to see results. His first cash came that year in a hold’em event at the Helsinki Freezout, but in 2002, he traveled to Aruba for the World Poker Tour’s UltimateBet Poker Classic. His practice paid off, and he was able to win the $300 NLHE Main Event for $50,000.

He continued to final table tournaments in Helsinki, Vienna, and Tallinn, and he then visited the United States for the 2003 World Series of Poker. He cashed in a $2,000 LHE event and then final tabled a $2,000 NLHE tournament, taking fourth for $45,420.

Back in Tallinn, Helppi took another win in a PLO event at the Estonia Poker Championships, and he finished 2003 with a fourth place finish at the WPT Battle of Champions, an invitation-only event. His final tables in 2004 were more diverse, with one in Tunica and another in Monte Carlo, the latter being a second place finish at the Monte Carlo Millions for $200,000.

In 2005, Helppi made another WPT final table, that one at the Rendez Vous a Paris in Paris and finished second for 254,830. The following year, he final tabled a WSOP $1,000 NLHE event and took second for $331,144. And in 2007, he won a $5,000 NLHE event at the Bellagio Cup in Las Vegas for $85,120.

More recently, he won the 2009 EPT Deauville High Roller event for €192,000, and he won an EPT San Remo side event in 2010 for €84,000 and an EPT Berlin Heads-Up event in 2011 for €21,600. Among other 2011 accomplishments, Helppi also final tabled the EPT copenhagen Main Event, finishing in eight place, and final tabled two events, one being the High Roller, at the EPT Grand Final in Madrid.

To date, Helppi has accumulated more than $3.8 million in live tournament earnings. Along the way, he also played a good deal of online poker but neglects to reveal his online screen name.

When not playing poker, competition is still in play as he competes on a high level in paintball, even captaining the Finnish team in their champion years of 1997, 2003, 2007, and 2008.