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Notable Information:Andrew Robl is a 23 year-old professional poker player from Okemos, Michigan, who’s career began after witnessing Moneymaker parlay a $39 satellite to the World Series of Poker Main event into a $2.5 million win. Like many impressionable teenagers, Robl thought, “I can do this.” He and his junior high school buddies began hosting 25/ 50-cent home games, but Robl discovered he could lose money as quickly as he earned it. He became a student of the game, spending countless hours at Barnes & Noble pouring over poker books because he couldn’t afford to buy them. After weeks of study, he dominated the home games, sometimes taking his friends’ last dollars, and then stashing his winnings - as much as $1,000 in worn and wrinkled small bills - in a sock drawer at his parent’s house.
After mastering home games and frequenting a local Indian casino, Robl discovered online poker. He honed his skills, playing up to 800 poker tournaments a month, and eventually became a single-table tournament master. By the time he entered college, he was making a decent living, and eventually found it difficult to focus on school. By 2009, Robl had traveled to Europe and the Caribbean, bounced back and forth from Las Vegas, and eventually dropped out of college. Today, Robl lives in Las Vegas, has earned millions of dollars playing online and live poker tournaments, is a Team Victory Pro, and enjoys spending time with his fellow professional poker player friends.
“I am amazed at how far I have come since those home games after school,” said Robl. “It was not an easy path. There were a lot of bumps and bruises along the way. I am often asked how I got to where I am, and it is not an easy answer. But, I can say, it took a lot of hard work and a lot of luck at the right times.”
At 23 years old, Robl was selected to appear on NBC’s Poker After Dark. “As I sat at the table with Johnny Chan and Doyle Brunson, I could not help but laugh inside, wondering if it was all a dream,” he added. “Sitting with two of the greatest poker players of all time was a real honor and I will always look back at that day as a very special one.
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Notable Information:Born December 8th, 1978 in Tehran, Iran, Antonio Esfandiari grew up in San Jose, California and currently lives in Las Vegas. Esfandiari has packed a lot of triumph into his young life. Before his lightning rise to the top of the poker world, Antonio was a professional magician, and turned 12-hour days of practice into a thriving professional career. However when his roommate introduced him to poker at 19, he recognized quickly that poker would be his life. He attacked the game like he had any other of his interests and it wasn’t long before he found success in poker.
Antonio won the 2004 World Poker Tour L.A. Poker Classic main event, receiving nearly $1.4 million. At the age of 25, he became the youngest person ever to win a televised WPT event, as well as the youngest poker player to win a million-dollar prize. He also won a World Series of Poker bracelet in the 2004 $2,000 pot-limit hold'em event. He finished third in the 2005 NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship, winning $125,000. In 2008 he made the final table of the European Poker Tour Grand Final in Monte Carlo. He continues to have success in tournament play having cashed in two events of the WSOP (one being 24th of the Main Event) and a WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic. He is also a skilled cash game player and one of the most televised players in poker. He has appeared on both Poker After Dark and High Stakes Poker shows.
Notable Information:Brian was born in Denver, Colorado and raised in Poway, California. He and his high-school buddies began playing poker buddies after being inspired by the movie “Rounders”. It’s no wonder Brian would be fascinated by the storyline and main character - a rebel with a brilliant mind who applied his talents to the game of poker.
The high school valedictorian went on to study at Stanford University. It was during a summer break in 2003 that he realized his job as a lab technician was taking time away from his passion – playing poker. He began playing seriously for money while home from college. The next year he quit Stanford to play poker professionally.
Rast’s record may not reflect the statistics of his peers. Probably because he hasn’t competed in many tournaments. But the results he does have are impressive, with more than a million dollars in tournament winnings in less than a year. He took seventh place at the final table of the 2009 World Poker Tour $25,000 Championship and entered the 2009 World Series of Poker Event #2 $40,000 no-limit hold’em event to place fourteenth. But Rast is best known for working his way up the cash games high-stakes ladder, compounding his winnings to become a deep stack no-limit hold’em and pot-limit Omaha specialist.
One of his most memorable poker moments was traveling to China and winning 1.2 Million dollars in a cash game. Players who scooped a pot were required to show their hole cards. He was making big plays and even bigger bluffs, taking a number of competitors to the felt. “It was an incredible feeling,” said Rast, “to dominate nearly every other hand in a big game for hours.”
Rast also recalls one of his most painful losses in a 300/600 pot-limit Omaha game against a poker legend. “I turned the nut flush on a board Qd 9d 8d against Sammy Farha. Farha made a straight flush on the river and I lost a 700K pot.”
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Notable Information:Never let the quiet demeanor of this young man fool you. He is one of the best cash game specialists in poker today. Keith Gipson discovered gambling early in life and has never looked back.
Born in 1983 in Huntsville, Alabama, Gipson has one brother four years older. He has never really entertained the idea of a “real job,” since he started playing in a band when he was 15 years old. He played the drums for a band that would tour the country during summers and breaks from school. After a couple of years, he realized that being in a band didn’t pay what he’d had hoped, so at 17 he began “bonus hustling” at online poker, building his first bankroll.
While making money as a seventeen year-old bonus hustler, Gipson would incessantly read blackjack books and forums. He learned a lot of the tricks of the trade by reading others’ posts. At eighteen, he moved to Santa Barbara, California with his band.
While in California, he was old enough to enter and win a fair amount of money from the Indian casinos. Although Gipson did well at blackjack, his main reason for moving to California was his music. When it became clear that music wasn’t the path he wanted to take, he moved back to Alabama to finish school, occasionally playing in places like Puerto Rico and other eighteen-plus friendly casinos. Once he reached the age of twenty-one, he realized how much money he could make playing full time. He left school. About then another pro "advantage player" suggested he should learn how to play poker. Gipson took him up on his advice, and now plays Las Vegas’ biggest no-limit hold’em and pot-limit Omaha games in existence, including those at Bellagio, Wynn, Venetian, and the new Aria. When in Los Angeles, he frequents the games at Commerce Casino.
“I’m most proud of becoming both a highly successful ‘advantage player’ and successful poker player,” said Gipson. “Few people succeed in both fields.”
Outside of poker, he claims to be a “badass” at rock-paper-scissors - with no-limit hold’em coming in a close second.
Gipson has many poker stories, but one memorable incident comes to mind. “I once was playing with a guy so coked up that he refused to put his money on the table. He had all of his chips in a laundry bag and when asked about how much he had, he guesstimated to the nearest 100,000.”