Lifestyles of the Sick and Famous
By: Chris Vaughn

WARNING: If you’re like me – someone who gets up and goes to work in the morning in order to pay the bills, and who struggles with the everyday expenses of life – then reading this could very well cause feelings of rage, jealousy, and resentment. The following is not recommended for those with heart problems or high blood pressure.

I would like to introduce to you two superstars of poker, David Benefield and Tom Dwan. Unless you are among the minority that closely follows the “big names” of internet poker, I highly doubt that either of those names rings the least bit familiar.

But David and Tom, respectively known across poker sites as “Raptor” and “durrrr,” have experienced the kind of success that most young internet poker players could only dream about.

David, 20 years old, and Tom, 19, recently invited me to stay with them in their Texas home for a few days to experience and witness the “normal” lives of internet poker superstars. I really had no idea what to expect other than the obvious juxtaposition of my own life to theirs and the anxiety that would cause.

I flew into Dallas around 1pm, and had to take a cab, as 1pm is still the middle of the night to an internet poker player. As the cab pulled into their driveway, the house looked modest but inviting; although it was impossible not to notice that I was in one of the nicer neighborhoods of the city. I imagine that if I had walked down the road and told the neighbors that the owners of this house weren’t even 21 years old (yet owned the house), they’d have looked at me as if I had a few screws loose.

David and Tom had both gone to grab lunch, and the only people in the house were some electricians installing a new plasma TV for the computer room. My hosts finally arrived with Chinese and we sat at the bar in the main living room to eat.

After lunch, I felt completely prepared for the long day ahead, which began with a tedious session of “Fight Night Round 3” on one of their many XBOX 360 systems situated around the house. The only word that really comes to mind when describing the game room: sick.

Two 73” widescreen TVs are placed side by side against the back wall (why have one when you can have two?), which means you can play video games with near life-size characters on one screen, while watching a movie or playing poker on the other. A long U-shaped leather couch could easily fit 15 people, and there are speakers resonating digital surround sound at every corner. And did I mention multiple XBOX 360s? (Why have one when you can have six?)

After I had thoroughly beaten them at games of their choice (ha!), Tom decided to play a game with the electricians in the house. After handing them all a $100 bill just for being nice guys, Tom produced three ballpoint pens in a closed fist, and instructed each of them to draw a pen from his hand. Whoever chose the pen with the cap on it, he explained, would win the prize. The first two, who drew and missed, were surprisingly disappointed, even after the $100 giveaway. As the last electrician pulled out the pen with the cap, Tom scurried off to retrieve the prize. He returned with a bottle of Johnny Walker Blue Label, another accessory Tom and David keep in plentiful stock. The prizewinner sputtered his thanks, but it wasn’t difficult to notice the “What the ^$#%?” expression on his face. It wouldn’t be the last time those we came in contact with would be bewildered by the money and generosity spread around by these kids.

After the technicians left, Tom asked me to watch him play a quick “sesh.” Naturally, a quick sesh for Tom involved opening six tables at which the smallest limit being played was 100/200 NL Hold’em. Over the next 45 minutes, I watched him win nearly $200,000. I have never seen, and don’t expect to ever see again, anyone win that kind of money in such a short amount of time. Tom would be the first person to tell me that it’s not a regular occurrence, and that he could lose just as much in a short period, but something about his demeanor after he won told me that the wins far outweigh the losses.

We decided, since it had already been such a long, hard day filled with video games, Johnny Walker, and poker, that we would postpone the actual interviews and photo shoot until tomorrow. So we went bowling instead. We hooked up with Mario, a friend and fellow high-stakes internet player who plays as “Pwnasaurus.” Mario was a really nice guy, and has as much sit-n-go knowledge as anyone I have talked to on the subject. We jumped in his car to go for a few sets at the lanes. When we arrived, David told the attendant that we would need two lanes for as many games as we liked, pulling out a roll of hundreds to pay the astonished man behind the shelf.

I went to the bar to grab us a pitcher, and it was probably the only time during the whole trip I was allowed to pay for anything; the exception due to the fact that I was the only one of age to buy the beer. All three of them were much better than I was at bowling, but after six games I felt I was getting the knack. More fun, however, was watching and listening to the side bets Tom and David had going on. There was a certain amount (we’re talking thousands) that one would have to pay the other if he bowled 200 or better, and a much higher amount that would be paid in the case of someone bowling a 300. This wasn’t just for one night, but an ongoing bet every time they played.

When we got back to the house, Tom and David went right to the computer room to get some hands in. I had traveled most of the day and was tired, so I went to bed as they played through the night.

I woke up much earlier than either of them, so I did some work on David’s laptop and waited for them to appear, hoping we could get some things done for the article. Hours passed, and when they finally appeared, David responded with something resembling “meh” when I mentioned what I had planned for the day. I realized that getting them motivated to do some work was going to be difficult.

Most of the afternoon and evening was spent watching them play poker, which gave me more of an opportunity to watch David play (he plays as “Bebop86 on most sites). He plays at lower stakes than Tom, and his style seems significantly different. I watched as David agonized over whether he should play at all, muttering that he didn’t feel like it and wasn’t in the mood, and then about how he would just play “a couple of tables.” Then a couple of tables turned into ten spread across two screens, a mix of $1,000 sit-n-gos and 10/20 NL Hold’em.

David is very focused when he plays. His mouse flies across the screen, clicking rapidly whether he is making a play or not. He doesn’t hear anything I say while he plays, so eventually I just stop talking, occasionally glancing over to see how he is doing. From time to time, he screams out an expletive or kicks back in his chair, and then there is dead silence and more tables opening up. After a couple hours of this, he shrugs and tells me he’s made about $40,000, which seems incredible considering his nonchalant demeanor and the stakes he has been playing. David is one of the most well-rounded poker players I have ever watched or spoken to. He is well known and respected as a cash game player, a multi-table tournament player, and a sit-n-go player, and is a huge winner in all three arenas, something very few players are capable of.

David is usually joking and sardonic, often fielding questions with looks that say “Are you that stupid?” or short one-word replies to display his general disinterest with trivial conversation. So going into the interview, I was worried about getting him to talk to me about the decisions he made in his life that put him where he is today. But the moment we sat down, I could tell immediately that he was willing to talk openly about anything I asked him.

David grew up like a lot of kids: He played baseball and video games, and spent a lot of time with his friends or chasing girls. He didn’t really start to play poker at all until he was 16 years old, when he began playing some low stakes with friends. They would play $20 buy-in No Limit games, and later they would play $1-$2 No Limit at a private club in Texas. “It really wasn’t very serious at first, but I knew I was good at it. I was able to start winning immediately and picked up on things at a quicker rate than most people seemed to.”

It wasn’t until David enrolled in college at TCU that he realized his earning potential and that he could make poker a full time job. He lasted one semester in school, as he was spending most of his time online or at the private club playing cards. He had started to build his bankroll playing sit-n-gos, and was rapidly moving up levels and gaining a reputation as a top player. He got an apartment with some friends who had also started to take poker very seriously, and they would spend day and night grinding out hands and learning the game.

His living situation, as he described it, was “a filthy apartment with three guys who never cleaned and did nothing but play poker.” (It’s hard to believe when you see his spotless house now, but that is largely due to the fact that Tom and David have a personal assistant who does most everything that 19- and 20-year-old kids don’t want to do: pay bills, grocery shop, clean, laundry, and any other chores that need doing. Her job is tough but, as you can imagine, she is well compensated.)

David became irritated with his living situation and decided to enroll again in school and join a fraternity to experience more of the “normal college life.” For a couple months he watched his bankroll shrink and realized he was going to need to start playing poker again to keep up with his lifestyle. He had $450 and decided to join four $100 sit-n-gos. He won three of them and got second in the fourth. Over the next two days he increased that $450 to over $20,000. He dropped out of school for good and hasn’t looked back since.

When I ask David about how his parents reacted to his decision to drop out of school and play poker full time, he replies honestly. “They were obviously very skeptical at first. They are both successful and work hard, so they wanted me to go to school and follow a similar path. So I decided to show them a spreadsheet of my wins and losses. (David keeps very good records of all his winnings.) They realized then that this was something I was very good at, that I planned to take it seriously as a career choice, and that I wasn’t going to be persuaded not to do it. They have been very supportive ever since.”

This past spring, David decided to go stay at a house in Vegas, knowing that they would be there through the summer and the World Series, even though he would not be old enough to play in any of the tournaments there. He and some friends would end up spending a lot of time at the “Ship It Holla Balla Mansion,” where a lot of young poker players lived and partied and played cards for the entire summer. The house became notorious for throwing some of the biggest parties that summer, and many high stakes players would come by to enjoy the various festivities. That’s when David and Tom started talking about getting a house in Texas. Tom was becoming a very well-known NL cash game player and was rapidly moving up limits. Tom was a student in Boston, but had also decided to drop out to pursue poker full time. At the end of the summer, they bought the house and moved in. (Tom still keeps a place in Boston where he lives half the time.)

Tom might be the perfect example of the hyper-aggressive, young online player. He has always played cash games, and moved up from low stakes No Limit Hold’em at breakneck speed. His reputation online is fearsome. Most high-stakes online players and even a lot of well known professionals will list Tom as one of the best NL cash game players in the world today. He will play in the highest games available and will sit with just about anyone at any time. You can see him playing as “durrrr” on Full Tilt or Prima Poker with hundreds of thousands of dollars in front of him. And on the rare occasion he does play a tournament, he’s always one of the favorites to win, as is indicated by his second place finish to Chad Brown in the $5,000 HORSE event at the PokerStars World Championship of Online Poker, where he held a dominating chip lead for a great portion of the latter half of the tournament. He is notorious for playing very big pots, and his reputation as someone who is not afraid to get all of his chips in the middle if he feels he has even a very slight edge has made him one of the most feared cash game players online.

When I sat to talk with Tom, I asked him what qualities he thought he possessed that separated him from the other high-stakes players and made him so successful. Most of those who sit in his games are all accomplished players or have been very successful at lower stakes. One thing I noticed about him was an uncanny ability to read a player as weak and know when his opponent can be taken off a pot. This is difficult to do online, especially against tough competition. He told me about “click tells” and how he can accurately gauge strength and weakness in his opponents by the amount of time it takes them to bet.

Like most people who are very successful in any field, Tom is extremely aware of what happens around him. On several occasions when talking about his winnings or his poker qualities or other players, he would stop himself when he noticed me making a mental note and tell me that he didn’t want it repeated. It is something that I can’t understand because I do not play at the level he does, but I imagine that his general paranoia about public access to his thoughts and feelings on his own game - or on the games of others - has only contributed to his success.

On my last night in town, we all decided to go to a party hosted by some of David’s old fraternity brothers. We had a good time drinking and engaging in the general excitement a good college party brings, but it was particularly interesting to talk to David and Tom’s friends. Surprisingly, very few of them were aware of the kind of success Tom and David have had playing poker. Everyone seemed to know they played a lot of poker and had a cool house, but when I told some of them about the sort of notoriety and success they were beginning to encounter, I was met with looks of surprise or doubt. It was a great relief to me to know that two kids with hundreds of thousands of dollars in property and six- and seven-figure bankrolls still enjoyed going out and spending time with other kids their own age who were living on Ramen noodles and cheap beer.

I woke up the next day with a bit of a hangover and, as their assistant drove me to the airport in Tom’s BMW M3 convertible, I thought about my experience: the absurd amounts of money won, the crazy hands I’d witnessed, the sick house I’d stayed in, and the good times we’d had. Most importantly, however, I was inspired by the way they got there. Tom and David are not where they are because of luck. The reason they’ve been so much more successful than others their age could imagine is because of the sacrifices they have made and the risks they have taken in order to follow their dreams. With that in mind, I know for sure that the success they have found is nothing in comparison to what lies ahead.