Chau Tu Giang (born July 2, 1955 in

Vietnam Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making ...

) is a Vietnamese-American professional

poker Poker is a family of comparing card games in which players wager over which hand is best according to that specific game's rules. It is played worldwide, however in some places the rules may vary. While the earliest known form of the game wa ...

player of Chinese descent, who is a three-time

World Series of Poker bracelet The World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet is considered the most coveted non-monetary prize a poker player can win. Since 1976, a bracelet has been awarded to the winner of every event at the annual WSOP. Even if the victory occurred before 19 ...

winner and a three-time final tablist of the

World Poker Tour The World Poker Tour (WPT) is an internationally televised gaming and entertainment brand. Since 2002, the World Poker Tour has operated a series of international poker tournaments and associated television series broadcasting playdown and the f ...

with over $3 million in live tournament winnings alone.

Biography

Giang fled Vietnam in a small boat in the late 1970s and arrived in Denver, Colorado, working

minimum wage A minimum wage is the lowest remuneration that employers can legally pay their employees—the price floor below which employees may not sell their labor. Most countries had introduced minimum wage legislation by the end of the 20th century. B ...

jobs. It was then that he began to learn poker. He moved to Florida soon after, taking a job as a

chef A chef is a trained professional cook and tradesman who is proficient in all aspects of food preparation, often focusing on a particular cuisine. The word "chef" is derived from the term ''chef de cuisine'' (), the director or head of a ki ...

at $160 per week. His poker success led him to move to

Las Vegas Las Vegas (; Spanish for "The Meadows"), often known simply as Vegas, is the 25th-most populous city in the United States, the most populous city in the state of Nevada, and the county seat of Clark County. The city anchors the Las Veg ...

, where he made more than $100,000 in his first year as a professional player.

Poker

He first had success at the

World Series of Poker The World Series of Poker (WSOP) is a series of poker tournaments held annually in Paradise, Nevada and, since 2004, sponsored by Caesars Entertainment. It dates its origins to 1970, when Benny Binion invited seven of the best-known poker pl ...

(WSOP) in 1993, where he finished 2nd in the $1,500 Pot Limit

Hold'em Texas hold 'em (also known as Texas holdem, hold 'em, and holdem) is one of the most popular variants of the card game of poker. Two cards, known as hole cards, are dealt face down to each player, and then five community cards are dealt fac ...

event to

John Bonetti John Joseph Bonetti (June 1928June 27, 2008) was an American professional poker player from Houston, Texas. Born in Brooklyn, New York City, Bonetti began playing poker at the age of 54, and won three bracelets at the World Series of Poker (WS ...

, and winning his first bracelet in the $1,500 Ace to Five Draw event the same year. He first cashed in the WSOP Main Event in

1996 File:1996 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: A bomb explodes at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, set off by a radical anti-abortionist; The center fuel tank explodes on TWA Flight 800, causing the plane to crash and killing everyone o ...

, finishing in 13th place. He won a second bracelet in the $2,000 Omaha 8 or Better event in

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for frozen water, in soil in permanently s ...

, and a third bracelet in the $2,000 Pot Limit Omaha event in 2004, finishing ahead of

Robert Williamson III Robert Williamson III (born November 7, 1970) is an American poker player from Dallas, Texas. Williamson grew up with three sisters and his best friend, Chris Caywood in Granbury, Texas and received Bachelor of Business Administration, B.B.A. d ...

Dave Colclough David E. Colclough (4 March 1964 – 18 October 2016) was a Welsh poker player. Early life Colclough was born in Carmarthen. Prior to becoming a poker professional, he worked in IT. He left IT after the 2000 World Series of Poker. Poker c ...

and

Chris Ferguson Christopher Philip Ferguson (born April 11, 1963) is an American professional poker player. He has won six World Series of Poker events, including the 2000 WSOP Main Event, and the 2008 NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship. Ferguson is a ...

. Giang used to play online at

Full Tilt Poker Full Tilt Poker is an Irish online poker card room and online casino that opened in June 2004. Formerly privately owned by Tiltware, LLC and later by the Rational Entertainment Group, the site was acquired by The Stars Group (then known as Am ...

under the user name "La Key U" and was signed as a Pro in January 2009. He earned 2.1 million playing online in 2008. As of 2009, his total live tournament winnings exceed $3,500,000. His 51 cashes as the WSOP account for $1,767,062 of those winnings. He is in 8th for most all time cashes at the WSOP.

World Series of Poker bracelets

The big game

Giang avoided playing tournaments other than the WSOP for many years, as he preferred to concentrate on his cash game play, where he plays $4,000/$8,000 limit regularly. Giang is a regular in " The Big Game" in Las Vegas, alongside his next-door neighbor

Doyle Brunson Doyle F. Brunson (born August 10, 1933) is a retired American poker player who played professionally for over 50 years. He is a two-time World Series of Poker (WSOP) Main Event champion, a Poker Hall of Fame inductee, and the author of several ...

. He returned to tournaments when his children asked him why he was not on television. His first

(WPT) cash was 9th place in the first WPT Championship. He would also cash in the second WPT Championship. However, his largest tournament prize to date was 2nd place in the 2005 $10,000 World Poker Open, which earned him $773,448.

Poker philosophy

Giang has regularly stated that poker is not a game of chance. In a 1994 interview, he said, "At the table I hear people say, ‘Poker is luck.’ That is 100 percent wrong. If they are losing, it is because they're doing something wrong. Poker is skill, it isn't luck. In the long run, day after day after day, you cannot get lucky all the time." In the book ''Deal Me In'', Giang said "Poker is a game of skill with an element of luck, not a game of luck with an element of skill." He discusses how he lost his twenty million dollar bankroll playing craps, a game of luck. He says nowadays he gets a physical revulsion when he goes near a game of craps, or any game of dice. He believes that if he sticks to poker, he will always make money in the long run.

Personal life

Giang is divorced and has three children.

Notes

External links

World Poker Tour profileChau MySpace page
{{DEFAULTSORT:Giang, Chau 1955 births Living people American people of Chinese descent American poker players Chinese poker players Hoa people People from Las Vegas Vietnamese emigrants to the United States World Series of Poker bracelet winners