Peter Eastgate

Peter Nicolas Eastgate (born 13 December 1985) is a poker player from Denmark, best known as the winner of the Main Event at the 2008 World Series of Poker. At the time, he became the youngest player ever to win the event, at 22 years, 10 months, and 28 days, just days short of a full two years younger than the mark set by Phil Hellmuth, Jr. at the 1989 event. Eastgate reached the final table with 18,375,000 in starting chips, the fourth largest stack behind Scott Montgomery (19,690,000), Ivan Demidov (24,400,000) and Dennis Phillips (26,295,000). Eastgate and Demidov reached the 2008 World Series of Poker (WSOP) heads-up stage. At the final hand, Eastgate had 120.4 million in chips, and Demidov went all in with 16.5 million chips. Eastgate beat Demidov at 2:33 AM local time, after a two-day final table consisting of 274 hands that took 15 hours and 28 minutes to play.

By winning the Main Event at age 22, he became the then youngest WSOP Main Event champion, surpassing Phil Hellmuth, who was 24 when he won in 1989. He was surpassed as the youngest winner of the WSOP by Joseph Cada the following year at age 21

+ World Series of Poker braceletsYearTournamentPrize (US$)2008$10,000 World Championship No Limit Hold'em Main Event$9,119,517

Other events Prior to the WSOP, Eastgate's live tournament results included a final table finish at the 2007 Irish Poker Open and a money finish in the 2008 European Poker Tour event in Copenhagen. Eastgate's previous biggest win was $46,714 at the 2007 Paddy Power Irish Open. After his WSOP Main Event victory, Eastgate took to the tournament trail and quickly found success. He cashed in the European Poker Tour (EPT) PokerStars Caribbean Adventure (PCA) Main Event and then won the $5,000 side event for $343,000. Eastgate came second in the 2009 London EPT, winning £530,000. In 2010, Eastgate finished 5th in the NBC National Heads-Up Championship in Las Vegas for $75,000.

As of 2026, his total live tournament winnings exceed $11,130,000.

Hiatus In July 2010, Eastgate announced that he was taking a break from poker in a statement through his sponsor PokerStars.com, saying, "When I started playing poker for a living, it was never my goal to spend the rest of my life as a professional poker player. My goal was to become financially independent. I achieved that by winning the WSOP main event in 2008. The period following has taken me on a worldwide tour, where I have seen some amazing places and met many new people; it has been a great experience." In November 2010, Eastgate put his main event bracelet up for auction on eBay with a starting bid of $16,000. It eventually sold for $147,500 and this money was donated to UNICEF.

In February 2011, Eastgate announced that he would be ending his eight-month break to return to poker. However, he has chosen not to play in any of the major tournaments since 2013.