Chau Giang

Chau Giang is showing the youngsters how to do it. Picture courtesy of Poker Listings.

Given that online poker is supposed to be a young mans game, Chau Giang is a refreshing change to your average internet professional.

One of the great cash players of all-time, Vietnamese born Giang has been a regular in the biggest Vegas games going since before most of the top Full Tilt nose-bleeders were even born. But as the Bellagio ‘Big Game’ and most live high stakes action drying up, Giang has turned online – and with phenomenal results.

Playing under the moniker ‘La Key U’ on Full Tilt (apparently chosen as the ill-fated poker film ‘Lucky You’ was on TV at the time), Chau was one of the top 10 biggest winners on the site in 2008 with over $2million posted in profit (despite logging considerably fewer hands than the vast majority of the other high stakes regulars such as Phil Ivey, durrrr & OMGClayAiken). More than $1.6million of this came from PLO & almost $600,000 was made from the NLH games – an incredible feat considering both the standard of opposition & that he played less than 3,000 hands of Hold ‘Em all year! Full Tilt have since taken notice and in January 2009 was officially signed as one of their prestigious pros – with many suggesting this move should have been taken a long time ago by Howard Lederer and co.

It is hard to disagree considering he is playing – and winning – in the $500/$1,000 NLH & PLO games as well as being part of the furniture in the Bellagio big games for decades (with $2,000/$4,000 Limit being his bread & butter). Barry Greenstein said of Giang: “Chau has been a consistent winner in the biggest games for many years. If he was more articulate, he would be recognized as one of the top five players in the world.” On this evidence it is hard to disagree.

Given that 2 of his 3 WSOP bracelets came in Omaha is not surprising that his biggest profits have come in this form of the game and Giang is still an excellent World Series tournament player 17 years after his first cash. In fact, he made the money no fewer than 8 times in the 2008 Series and over $3million in live tournament winnings (when he shunned tournament poker for long periods in his early days) demonstrates the all-round ability of the man. He was also part of the legendary ‘Corporation’ to take on Andy Beal at the highest stakes ever seen from 2001 to 2004.

We think it is fantastic to see a ‘live’ cash game pro come online and still be hugely successful – very rarely does it happen at the nose-bleed games and the recognition from Full Tilt is almost certainly long overdue. Now he will be playing under his own name as ‘Chau Giang’ and it will be interesting to see if he can continue beating the best cash players in the world live & online in the future.