As you can imagine, I was riding high. I said to myself, “Alright, tournaments are fun! I can make more money!” I began a tournament tour— Las Vegas, California. Before I knew it, I had made over a million dollars. I couldn’t believe it. I was now a millionaire. I was living the American dream.
I decided that it was time for me to test the limits of my game, and I began playing in the biggest games I could find, with the best players in the world. With a million-dollar bankroll, I believed I could take on the likes of Chip Reese, Doyle Brunson, Bobby Baldwin, and Lyle Berman. These were games that started with $4,000-$8,000 limits. Later, we’d kick it up to $8,000-$16,000 limits.
I turned that $1 million into $20 million in what seemed like a snap of the fingers. It had actually taken about two years, but it went by so fast it didn’t seem that long. It was an incredible run. Brunson’s son, Todd, even bought into 25% of my action at one time, and he earned a tidy $2.5 million from my efforts.
Victim of vegas
The stakes I was now playing for kept me away from tournaments for a while. I felt I could make more money in these high-stakes games. The money came so quickly. Even today, I don’t play a lot of tournaments. Chan GiangOf course, I will still play the Main Event and some of the bigger tournaments in Nevada and California, but I want to stay near my family, who live with me here in Las Vegas.
To an outsider looking in, you’d think things were going really well for me. I was a refugee from Vietnam living the American dream, making huge amounts of money—over $20 million. What could be better than that?
Unfortunately, winning $20 million in Las Vegas and keeping $20 million in Las Vegas are two different things. I was good at the large cash card games, no doubt. But those games didn’t happen every day, or even every week. Lower-stakes games now bored me. They didn’t hold my attention, or generate the thrill of the high-stakes game. So I sought new avenues for excitement, and unfortunately those avenues were in the casino games, where the house is heavily favored to win.
I began to play craps and baccarat. The experience was a disaster. I lost everything. Everything! I lost all $20 million. What could I do at that point? I had to go back to playing small limits again, but this time I stuck exclusively with poker. No more casino games. I started winning again, slowly at first, with small limits. Before I knew it, I was back up to $200-400 limit games, and then higher limits once I rebuilt my bankroll. It took a while, but I did it.
this thread shall be a dedication to that totally underrated poker player who's been crushing game for like 1000 time
