It’s been a stellar year for Dash Dudley on the poker circuit, and just when he thought it couldn’t get any better he went out and won another WSOP Bracelet. The American pro took his seat at the Pot-Limit Omaha table in the $550 World Series of Poker Europe event, taking on a 476-strong field for a share of the $100,000 prize fund.
It was the first time that the 34-year-old had played outside of the US, but as the man himself said after adding a second career Bracelet less than four months after his first, ‘the heater is real’. Dudley took down the field to earn a new piece of gold as well as a cool top prize of $57,000, taking his year-to-date earnings to in excess of $1.1 million. He is on the brink of entering the top 1000 of the all-time money list, despite only going pro in 2010.
His latest success in the city of Rozvadov comes just weeks after the biggest payday of his career, when the Michigan man took down a $10,000 8-Handed Championship game at the 50th WSOP championship in Las Vegas.
Congrats to @DashDudley, winner of the €550 Pot-Limit Omaha 6-Handed Event @PokerroomKings!
This is Dudley’s 2nd PLO bracelet of 2019.https://t.co/7y0ED546YK pic.twitter.com/qacGulQ4gE
— WSOP (@WSOP) October 17, 2019
But Dudley had to do things the hard way in the Czech Republic, as he headed into the final day trailing chip leader Denis Drobina by a considerable margin.
The American soon edged out another WSOP bracelet winner, Ivo Donev, who went all-in with a pair of jacks against Dudley’s A-A-Q-7 hand. Donev actually picked up a flush on the river, but a full house of aces and tens kept Dudley in the game. Others fell by the wayside to leave Dudley heads-up against Christopher Back, a recent winner at the Wynn Fall Classic. He landed a straight on the final deal, with Back all-in and waiting for an eight to hit a straight of his own. But the river served up a king, and that was enough for Dudley to take the spoils for yet another lucrative payday.
Dashing to the Top
It has been an astonishing rise up the poker rankings from Dudley, who only played in his first WSOP event in the summer of 2010. A couple of decent early cashes took him to Las Vegas, where an eighth-place finish in a $1,000 No Limit Hold’em game saw him earn $67,221.
Further successes followed for the Lansing native, but it was actually a switch to Pot-Limit Omaha that has brought Dudley his finest hours in the game. A handsome cash at the 47th WSOP in 2016 provided a platform that would ultimately lead to Event #52 at WSOP 2019, where he outlasted a final table that included James Park and Joel Feldman at the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino to land more than $1 million in prize money and that first Bracelet.
Dudley’s career earnings are now a shade shy of the $2 million mark and he sits at 546th on the United States all-time money list. He still has some way to go before he can lay claim to being Michigan’s most famous poker son, however. Both Ryan Riess and Joe Cada have earned in excess of $14 million and counting!
