'Chip' Reese: World Series of Poker champion

Back in 1974, David Reese was planning to attend the prestigious Stanford University Business School. But he went to Las Vegas with a friend for a weekend of poker. The $400 he had with him had turned into more than $60,000 by the time he had finished a session of seven-card stud at the Flamingo and a weekend turned into a lifetime.

By the time of his death, "Chip" Reese was widely regarded as the greatest all-round poker player of his era no small accolade in a country comprising an estimated 30 million poker players of varying accomplishment. "If I had to stake my life on a single player," his close friend and fellow professional gambler Doyle Brunson once said, "it'd be Chip."

Reese, who in 1991 became the youngest ever inductee into the Poker Hall of Fame, won the World Series of Poker three times the last of them in 2006, played under the "H.O.R.S.E." format that combines the five most popular forms of poker Texas hold 'em, Omaha eight or better, Razz, seven-card stud and seven-card eight or better. The game had a record buy-in of $50,000, and after an epic final battle with Andy Bloch that lasted 286 hands, Reese walked away with the first prize of $1.7m.

In fact, however, tournaments were something of a sideline for him. What Reese preferred were straight cash games with buy-ins of anything up to $1m. His preference earned him a cherished anonymity and an estimated $50m, a sum which dwarfed his official tournament winnings of some $3m.

His control and self-discipline were legendary. Even when taking a bad loss, Reese never appeared upset. He also had a wonderful way of talking people into games, known in the trade as "Chip-Talk", along the lines of, "Buddy, we've got the perfect game for you. We're playing all your best games. I can't believe you're not gonna take a shot." Many did, to their regret.

He started early. By six, Reese was playing poker at home, using baseball cards as chips. He was a demon at the game at high school, and at Dartmouth College (from where he graduated in economics in 1973 and would have gone on to Stanford), his poker prowess was such that his friends named the card room in his honour. He was also adept at blackgammon and gin, and a competent high-school football player.

But poker was his trade, and one he had to fall back on after other things failed. He and Brunson lost money on a host of business ventures racehorses, oil-drilling, mining, searching for the Titanic, to name a few. "Unfortunately, we always had to come back to poker to rescue ourselves," Brunson recounted.

Rupert Cornwell