With a frightfully loose and aggressive playing style that comes off as impetuously erratic and haphazard, Gus Hansen insists there is method to his madness. $7,205,743 in live tournament earnings between June 2002 and January 2010 - in 25 cashes with 8 first place finishes – suggest that there may be some validity to Hansen's “play the players, not the cards,” approach to poker.

Nicknamed “The Great Dane,” Gustav Hansen was born near Copenhagen, Denmark on February 13, 1974. A sports and gaming enthusiast, Gus excelled at backgammon, and sought to make a career in New York as a backgammon and gin rummy competitor. However, Gus also dabbled in poker, learning a variety of games, and ultimately scoring his first live tournament cash – along with his first WPT Title – in 2002. Gus Hansen has earned three World Poker Tour titles - the most WPT titles of any poker player – as well as a fourth WPT first place in a Bad Boys of Poker invitational event.

A member of the elite, Team Full Tilt, Gus Hansen has experienced huge variances in his online poker cash games. The huge spikes and dips in Hansen's online earnings are not unusual at the highest stakes, especially given the loose nature of his playing style. But in 2009, after a $4.8 million peak at the end of March, Hansen continued to drop huge sums of money, ending the year with a loss of $5.5 million. By March 15, 2010, Gus Hansen had lost more than $6 million playing online at Full Tilt Poker since 2007.

Gus Hansen resides in the popular poker pro haven of Monte Carlo, Monaco. Notorious for participating in propositional bets, in 2009 Gus Hansen fought – and lost – a boxing match with fellow Dane and poker pro Theo Jorgensen. In addition to playing poker and backgammon, Gus enjoys playing many sports, including golf, tennis, squash and soccer.