The Festival Series Meets – Christian ‘Sycksbe’ Arstad
The poker world is expanding in extremely fast and one of the main reasons to keep poker so interesting is the development of online poker to where it is today. Alongside online poker and dozens of communities on various platforms, you have the online streaming community which played a vital role in bringing online poker to everyone's living room. It all kicked of with known names such as Jason Somerville and Lex Veldhuis. In Norway, the online community is immense popular and Christian 'Sycksbe' Arstad is one of the main characters of the scene out there!
Christian Arstad is residing in Spydeberg (Norway), and has been playing poker for almost two decades now. Building up experience in the online- as well as the live poker environment, in hold'em and mixed games. Of which the last poker variants are by far his favourite. And let it just be that The Festival Series is a great place to be when having ingredients such as mixed games, deep structured events, and 50+ tournaments in a fully packed tournament schedule. It's Rozvadov up next, kicking off at King's Casino on May 31st until June 9th.
| Name | Total Live Winnings |
|---|---|
 Christian 'Sycksbe' Arstad | $280, 329 |
The Festival Series: Hi Christian! Best wishes for 2024 at first!
Christian: ''Thank you! It's great to talk to you and all the best for the New Year!''
The Festival Series: We have seen you around in various live events, as well as our own online satellites! Every poker player has a great story when they first came in touch with the poker game, what's yours?
Christian: ''I've started playing when I was in the army. Played along with friends and from there it really started for me. I was 18/19 years old, and the nights working there were quite long! It is also the period where I picked up online poker. And from there onwards, I never looked back. Until now I have been taking it piece by piece to another level.''
The Festival Series: We know you as a online poker streamer for Coolbet. The Festival Series also has its own Twitch Channel. How did you end up streaming and what are your goals in poker overall?
Christian: ''It started off for fun, really. I was coaching some friends in poker and they wanted to see me play. I started doing it without the intention of broadcasting, but then it just spread around as more people wanted to see me play. When I had done several sessions, it was Coolbet who wanted to collaborate with me, so I started to become part of a team full online poker streamers.''
''My goal in poker is to win some titles in tournament poker. I always have seen it from a competitive side, I don't play poker to grind cash games for money, titles are the main goal. By working on my end game of tournament poker, as I have been close a lot of times.''
Fun fact: Christian is sharing all his highlights through his social media channels. Definitely worthwhile to have an exclusive look into the world of poker for one of Norwegian's finest poker streamers!
Twitch > LINK
Instagram > LINK
Facebook > LINK
The Festival Series: In the Coolbet team you have also Ylva 'jevakim' Thorsrud, and Oskar and Jonathan Wedde, better known as 'The Wedde Brothers'. You guys get along well? You are familiar to each other?
Christian: ''Ylva and I, are part of the poker community in Oslo for over ten years now, the Weddes joined later on. We are quite close, and do a lot of social stuff outside poker as well together. With poker we also help each other out when its needed, for example to discuss certain hands.''
The Festival Series: You had won a package for the next Festival Series event in Rozvadov already, Congratulations! It will be the first time we are heading to King's Casino. Have you been there before?
Christian: ''Haha, thank you! I actually am looking forward to it a lot! I have been once in Rozvadov a couple years ago for the WSOP Circuit. The good thing about the King's Casino in Rozvadov is that it's made for our purpose, to play poker. It's all you get, if poker is what you want to do.
The Festival Series will be my first time, and I cannot wait for the schedule to be published. I'm going to play as much as I can, with a lot of mixed games! It's the good part of The Festival, so many tournaments..!''
The Festival Series: What are your upcoming plans for online- and live poker? Will you compete in more satellite tournaments?
Christian: ''I always stream every Thursday and Sunday of the week. Whenever there is a satellite available, I'm in there. The next live stop for me will be the Norwegian Championships in March, and after that The Festival Series. Will see you there!''
Photo Credits: Coolbet + Elisabeth Nordskog + Norwegian Championships
