Annette Obrestad, or ‘Annette 15’ comes from a small coastal town in Norway. The number 15 is due to the fact she began playing poker at the age 15.
She was formerly a competitive bowler, until she saw an advertisement for an online poker site while watching the sport on television and was interested.
Starting out with play-chip tables and freerolls, Obrestad eventually won a $9 tournament entry chip on UltimateBet. She decided to cash in and use the money to play $1 sit-n-goes. Obrestad increased that $9 up into the several thousands, exclusively playing low-limit SNGs and the occasional $5 tournament.
She gradually made here way up the ladder to the highest buy-in tournaments. All this without even making a cash deposit!
When she got to the higher buy-ins, she realized that the playing style was a lot different and her normal strategies wouldn’t be so successful. So she re-examined her game and adapted a more aggressive style of play. However she played it, it worked, taking down multiple first-place wins in the $100 rebuy events on PokerStars. Her biggest win online, though was in the Full Tilt $500,000 guaranteed this past August, which she won for over $117,000.
Still being under-age for playing in the US, Obrestad travelled to London in September to play the World Series of Poker Europe. She entered the £10,000 WSOPE Main Event where she played an instinctively read-based poker over the course tournament. In the early morning hours of September 17, 2007, only two days shy of her 19th birthday, Obrestad beat John Tabatabai heads-up to win the WSOPE Main Event and £1,000,000. She became the youngest WSOP bracelet winner in history, the youngest WSOP Main Event champion in history, the first-ever female champion of a WSOP Main Event, and the top female money earner at the WSOP all in the same night. To get where she did Annette defeated some of poker's most successful women, Annie Duke, Jennifer Harman, and Beth Shak.
Obrestad played the EPT Dublin only six weeks after the WSOPE and made yet another final table. She made it to second place, taking home nearly €300,000 for her runner-up finish. Her performance in Dublin sent her 2007 live tournament earnings alone up to $2,469,453.
Annette Obrestad lives in Stavanger, Norway. So what does someone at the age of 15 buy with all her winnings, a house for her and her mother. Annette is now sponsored by Betfair.com and thought to be the one to watch of years to come. We all know we haven’t seen the last of her.
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