Vanessa Selbst

She may well be the greatest female poker player of all time. In a career spanning twelve years, Vanessa Selbst racked up a string of high-flying performances to forge a thundering record of achievements and earn the respect of the entire global poker community. Now retired, the American has amassed nearly $12 million in tournament winnings.

From Yale University to Las Vegas

Vanessa Selbst excels at what she's passionate about. During her youth, the American was a remarkable student, studying law at the prestigious Yale University. At the time, she was considering a career as a lawyer, but her passion for gambling would quickly turn her career on its head.

As a child, Vanessa spent a lot of time playing Pacman and card games. She took a particular interest in poker and developed a great understanding of the game before she was even 21. Once she had reached the age of majority, the New Yorker embarked on her first WSOP and had already made her first final table, in a $2,000 No Limit Texas Hold'em tournament, for $101,285. The following year, she did it again in the $5,000 heads-up tournament for another six-figure win, in only her second World Championship appearance.

2008, the revelation

These two attempts would be transformed the following year. In 2018, Vanessa Selbst had a fantastic year that would reveal her to the world and change her career as a player forever. It all began with a victory in the Laides tournament at the 2008 WPT. An appetizer before a magnificent spring in Vegas where Vanessa picked up her first WSOP bracelet.

Highly comfortable in Pot Lait Omaha, Vanessa defeated a field of 759 players to take home the title and $227,933. In the same week, she took 3rd place in the $10,000 Heads-Up Tournament to add $108,288 to her haul for the week. This double success shone a spotlight on the young American. She won the respect of the community, the media asked her for interviews and sponsors from all over the world took an interest in the new poker prodigy. Pokerstars then approached the player, who signed a sponsorship contract in 2010 to join Team Pro.

Serial player

Vanessa began travelling and robbing casinos around the world. In Cannes in 2010, she won the prestigious Partouche Poker Tour for €1,300,000. She also became the first person to win the North American Poker Tour Main Event in Uncasville twice in a row, for $750,000 and $450,000 in winnings.

In 2012, she added a second WSOP bracelet to her collection. Already a finalist in the festival-opening $1,500 No Limit Hold'em, Vanessa showed her talent in variants by winning the $2,500 10-game for $244,259 in winnings. Six months later, Team Pro Pokerstars scored one of the biggest wins of its career at the 2013 PCA in the Bahamas. Vanessa Selbst finished 1st in the $25,000 High Roller in front of a stellar field to take home $1,424,420, the 2nd biggest prize of her career. She thus became the biggest winner in the history tournament poker and would gradually widen the gap with her pursuers, until she reached almost $12 million in gross winnings.

The American would win her 3rd bracelet at the 2014 WSOP, in a new variant tournament, the 25,000 Mixed Max, for $871,148. From then on, Vanessa's big wins became rarer and the player gradually left the high plateaus of poker, until bowing out in 2017. After twelve years in the game, she's retiring to the recreational side to focus on a career in finance.