At the conclusion of the event, I noticed a young, rather shy Thorsten Hohmann from Germany sitting alone in the distance. I remember admiring his blond hair. I got the nerve to walk over and sit next to him because I wanted to ask him a question about whether there was much money in pool back in Europe. He shook his head no. I thought that would be the end of the conversation, thinking maybe he didn't speak English well. But then he spoke. He told me he preferred competing in the United States because there were simply more opportunities here for a professional player like himself.
Thanks for sharing that. He was very shy when he moved to the United States nearly twenty years ago. I recall a time when Jennifer Barretta and I were practicing together one night in 2006 at Amsterdam Billiards, intending to go out to dinner when we had finished. I noticed Thorsten practicing in another corner of the room and suggested to Jennifer that we invite him to dinner. He seemed to know almost nobody in the New York city pool scene at that point, and he accepted the invitation to join us for dinner. Just a few weeks later, he won $350,000 at IPT Las Vegas.
The three of us are still close friends all these years later, but like you, I well remember just how shy he was in those early years. As we both found out, however, he is very approachable and he's a really good guy once you get to know him, not to mention a consummate professional.
