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Doug Polk – The World’s Greatest And Most Successful Poker Player

From humble beginnings, Doug Polk quickly took the world of professional poker playing by storm. After playing small-stakes games whilst at college, he decided to try his hand in with the big boys. To his great surprise, he won. And then just kept on winning. Over the course of a relatively short career, it's thought that he amassed winnings of over $10 million. And though e retired from the game at a very early age, he went on to set up a poker school online. This is to help would-be players.

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The Story of Poker Player Doug Polk

Whether you’re a poker player or are simply a fan of a game, then you’ll know that the name Doug Polk. After all, he’s one of the most revered names in the game. What’s interesting is that his playing style and personality are very calm. And he appears to be a very quiet person. Yet those who played him claim that he is a nightmare. And also one of the most talented players they have ever come across. He didn’t make his fortune using his real name. But has an alias “WGCRider.” It was with this name that he made huge sums of cash. He enjoyed a massive and successful poker career being able to win the jackpot online, over and over. But let’s look back and see how the Doug Pok story began.

How It All Started

Doug Polk was born in Pasadena on the the16th of December 1988. There’s nothing really special about him and he was just an average boy next door. Maybe one factor that was to play an important part later in life was the fact that he learned to play chess from his father when he was just 5 years old. In fact, his father said that his son had an attraction to the strategic nature of the game. After high school, Doug Polk finally enrolled in college where he became a big fan of Warcraft 3. Once again, this was another game that appealed to his strategic mind. It was here that he started using the alias of WGCRider, as he would play in the tournaments of the World Cyber Games.

The University of North Carolina was Doug Polk’s choice of college, and whilst there he created his first online poker account. He said that he used to play very low stake games as he had very little money in his bankroll. In the beginning, he would deposit just $20. And then he would play at 1 cent or 2 cent tables. But as time passed, and his love of the game increased, he discovered that there was a talent lying within him. At this point, he resolved to take more risks and play more serious jackpot poker. You don’t have to take huge risks to play at 32Red Casino. They have a huge selection of poker variants, and you can play with free-play so that you can get the hang of the game-play before you play with real money.

Doug Polk: The Rise to Fame

One memorable day, Doug Polk gathered together his courage. He sat down to play at a high stakes table. Later, he was to claim that it was his first test. He wanted to see if he really possessed the skills to proceed and make a career of playing poker. He said it was a big surprise when, at the end of the game, he was able to cash out a clean profit of $10,000. From this point, he was on his way and never looked back. To show what a gifted player he really was, after he dropped out of college, he managed to set the poker world on fire in less than a year.

Doug Polk – Image source: Txlolo3 / CC BY via Wikimedia Commons

Early on, he decided that the best way was to make a name for himself. This was to chase the dream prizes of hundreds of thousands of dollars being offered in high stakes poker games, using his self-taught jackpot winning strategies. Of course, after he won these, everybody sat up and took notice of him. He became a high roller and dominated the niche of online heads up. Unfortunately, as his fame increased, his name became more familiar. Soon he found it more and more difficult to find players who would actually go up against him.

Notable Career Moments

Finally, in 2013, Doug Polk found a really worthy opponent. Going by the nickname of “Sauce 123,” the poker player Ben Sulsky played an exhausting game of 15,000 hands with Doug Polk. At the end of the day, Doug Polk walked away with a massive $740,000 plus an additional $100,000. The lengthy nature of the game and the massive prizes immediately saw Doug Polk status jump upwards to become one of the great online poker players of all time. But he was much more than just an online poker player. He actually managed to win huge sums of money by playing live poker games at real casinos. In fact, the thinking is that his total prize money was closer to $10 million.

Although Doug Polk was well known for winning money, he was also very well respected within the poker community. He enjoyed playing the game no limit hold’em. And he won a huge number of tournaments with this game. He actually won an amazing total of 3 WSOP bracelets. These are considered to be some of the most sacred prizes that professional poker players can obtain. Though you probably will not win these iconic prizes playing online at 32Red Casino, they do offer all new players a fantastic welcome bonus of 200% Up to €1000!

Although Doug Polk announced his retirement from professional poker via a YouTube video in 2018, he is still considered a sensational player today. He claimed that the reason he was retiring was that he had grown bored of the limited poker circles. Also that many of his old friends had already retired from the professional poker scene.

Where is Doug Polk Now?

But don’t assume that just because Doug Polk retired from professional poker, doesn’t mean that he retired from playing poker altogether. One of his poker friends, Ryan Fee and Doug Polk decided to start an online poker training school which is called Upswing Poker. With this website, you can learn all the jackpot winning tips and tricks of playing poker, as well as lots of different poker strategies. The courses offered have proved hugely popular, probably thanks to the name of Doug Polk being behind the online venture. In spite of, or maybe because of his popular internet personality, he has a huge number of YouTube followers. As one of the most revered players of all time, even though he’s retired, Doug Polk continues to give inspiration to young poker players and his fans. As such you will always find him encouraging new poker players to follow their dreams.

Conclusion: The Greatest Poker Player, Doug Polk

As you’re well aware, poker is a game of strategy and being able to keep your nerve. Just being able to master the basics of the game, especially when playing at a live casino gaming table, is quite a feat in itself. But for Doug Polk, even with no previous training and zero experience, he proved himself to be a natural poker player. Of course, now that he is in retirement, he still finds it difficult to leave the poker cards alone. Nevertheless, he has proved to be an inspiration to all young pro-players. As well as those who wish to start a professional poker playing journey. We must say that not only is Doug Polk one of the most respected players in the world. But he is also one of the best poker players of all time. As well as being a truly standup guy.