James Akenhead Poker
James Akenhead is one of the most easily recognizable poker players in the UK, but it was not always this way. His amazing poker successes have come mainly in the last two years, but he is one of the most successful poker players during that time. James was a train driver and semi-professional pool player in the UK and discovered cards in the evening when playing Pool with friends after work.
After showing a bit of talent at the game he entered a tournament in Newcastle where he came third winning just over $40,000. With that bankroll boost he boarded a plane and headed to Las Vegas for the 2008 World Series of Poker.* Entering the second event of the series which had a $1,500 buy-in he played his way to face Grant Hinkle heads up for the bracelet. Fate would intervene and he finished runner-up earning $520,000.
The 2009 World Series of Poker* main event was to be life changing for James. He went on a great run all the way to the final table and secured a place among the November nine which included Phil Ivey. During the intervening months between play, James managed to make the final table of the WSOPE main event and qualified for the final table of the Poker Million. He would finish 9th in both WSOP* main events, earning a combined total of around $1.5 million.
James Akenhead Poker Card
James Akenhead's Results, Stats, Bio, Gallery & Pictures. Date Country Watch Place Prize GPI Points POY Points; 18-Feb-2020: Czech Republic € 3,000 + 300 No Limit Hold'em - WPT Main Event (Event #10) World Poker Tour - WPT Germany in partnership with partypoker LIVE, Rozvadov. James Akenhead played in more than 74 live tournaments in total. That makes him the number 21 poker player in England and # 413 in the alltime cash list. His biggest success was winning more than USD 1,263,602.00 in a single live tournament.
The final of the Poker Million in 2009 was shown live on Sky Sports in the UK and James beat players like Taylor Caby, Dag Martin Mikkelsen and Luke Schwartz to the title where he defeated Juha Helppi heads-up. It was his first major win and the relief in his interview immediately after winning was obvious. He won $500,000 for the win. It capped an amazing run for the British poker expert who, it seems, has the world at his feet going into 2010 and beyond.
* The World Series of Poker and WSOP are trademarks of Harrah's License Company, LLC ('Harrah's'). Harrah's does not sponsor or endorse, and is not associated or affiliated with Titan Poker or its products, services, promotions or tournaments.
James Akenhead Poker Rules
- James Akenhead: The UK hero on why he left poker and what he’s doing in 2014 13 Jan 2014 Dave WoodsPlayer Interviews, Poker Players, Slider In 2009 James Akenheadwas on top of the world. The south Londoner made the November Nine alongside Phil Iveyand Darvin Moon in one of the most memorable WSOP Main Event finales in recent history.
- The poker player James Akenhead was first discovered by HighstakesDB on the high stakes tables of Full Tilt Poker on. Since then, a total of 6041 poker hands have been tracked with James Akenhead.
- James Akenhead poker results, stats, photos, videos, news, magazine columns, blogs, Twitter, and more.
James Akenhead’s poker career has been characterised by volatility – something that many players experience but not so many speak openly about. After a brief stint as a train driver from 18 to 21, the Londoner found poker and quickly became hooked on it. He came up in the game in the online world, but it was his successes on the live tournament circuit that made him one of the more recognisable players to emerge from the UK.
In 2009, he managed an extremely unique feat by making both the final tables of the WSOP and WSOPE Main Events. Becoming a part of the November Nine is always going to be a prestigious achievement, but that the line-up included poker great Phil Ivey made it all the more special. Though Akenhead was the first to go, he picked up a huge seven-figure payday and managed to outrun the likes of Ben Lamb, Antonio Esfandiari and Bretrand ‘ElkY’ Grospellier.
Unfortunately for James, he suffered the same fate at the WSOPE Main Event final table. With an equally decorated line-up featuring Daniel Negreanu and Jason Mercier, the Englishman exited in ninth once again – this time for a six-figure score.
Before 2009 played out, Akenhead did finally get to claim a tournament win – at the $20,000 Full Tilt Poker Million VIII where he bagged a huge $500,000 for his first-place finish. This made 2009 his most successful year in poker to date as his list of scores came close to exceeding $2,000,000.
Following this string of successes, James enjoyed a period of being sponsored by Full Tilt and made appearances on televised events such as Poker After Dark. In 2010, he won the Series 6, Week 9 winner-takes-all sit and go after triumphing over David Williams, Mike Matusow, Bradley Booth, Antonio Esfandiari and Erick Lindgren.
Akenhead took a hiatus from poker in 2013 after a rocky year that cost him more than £400,000 from buy-ins and expenses. As he explained in a 2016 WPT interview:
‘The reason I left poker in the first place was because I wasn’t doing so well . . . I didn’t have a wife, kids or a mortgage and I owned my own house at the time, but I knew I did want to have those responsibilities at some point in my life. I just thought, ‘I don’t want to have this year with three kids, be married and have a mortgage on a nice house – that’s when I decided to get out of the game’.
In search of a more stable life, James invested money into a building and renovated it into a pub/restaurant. Although he hoped this would give him the steady income and security he wanted, it just reminded him of how good he had it as a poker pro. As he recently admitted:
James Akenhead Poker Play
‘I worked a hundred hours a week. I lived there . . . suddenly you realise that you have no life and no energy . . . eventually someone wanted to buy it [the business] so I sold it and lost a shit load of money’.
Now having returned to poker as a husband and father, James is reinvigorated and motivated to play his best once again:
James Akenhead Wsop
‘I am looking forward to every tournament I play . . . I am in a pretty good place right now with my life. I don’t have heaps of money, but I am full of confidence’.