Poker professional, Peter Eastgate has just announced that he is retiring. The young poker star’s decision to retire is a surprising one, considering the amount of success he has had over the years. Just 2 years ago, he was the talk of the poker world, winning $9.15 million as the 2008 WSOP Main Event Champion. Unfortunately, for his fans, it looks like that victory has also led to his recent decision to retire. Eastgate has stated that he never intended to be a life-long poker pro, but instead, he wanted to be financially secure. The 2008 World Series of Poker Championship made that happen for him.

This isn?t the first time that a young player has decided to call it quits early in their career. Shaun Deeb did the same thing in 2009. However, his ‘retirement’ was short lived, seeing that he participated in this year’s World Series of Poker event. Jonas Danielsson, a successful online poker player and Michael McDonald a past EPT champion, each announced their retirement this year.

Attempting to explain his decision to take time away from the felts both real and virtual, he wrote on his PokerStars sponsored blog, ‘The period following (winning the WSOP Main Event) 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,’  Eastgate writes in the statement on the PokerStars blog. ‘In the 20 months following my WSOP win, I feel that I have lost my motivation for playing high level poker along the way and I have decided that now is the time to find out what I want to do with the rest of my life.’

Eastgate has given no definitive response to what he plans to do after retiring. He also hasn?t ruled out returning but he has mentioned focusing more on the man who is Peter Eastgate. Who knows, perhaps in a few years Peter will return, refreshed, focus and ready to again take the poker world by storm.