This past weekend David R. Lloyd took down the 2008 Caribbean Poker Classic, which played out on the world's largest luxury cruise ship. Netting himself over $90,000 and the title of CPC champion, Lloyd won't be telling anyone about the one that got away when he returns to his home in Brighton in the U.K.
While $90k isn't exactly life-changing money, it's certainly more than Lloyd expected when he was invited to the CPC by a close friend just weeks ago. Once aboard Lloyd decided to play one of the supersatellites, and ended up winning his ticket to the main event.
After battling through the 114-person field and posing for a few winner photographs, Lloyd sat down and gave PokerListings the exclusive winner interview.
Congratulations David. We barely know a thing about you so please, give us a bit of background.
OK. I've been playing for a few years. I first became interested in poker after watching Late Night Poker, on Channel 4, and I was just fascinated by the way the Devilfish played in particular. I tried my hand online playing with free money and began reading a few books.
One weekend I won like half a million in play money. I realized at the time that the free money was a completely different game than playing for real but it got me comfortable enough to buy in and start playing very low stakes and I just built my bankroll up from there.
Shortly after that a friend told me I should go down to the casino and play live, and I ended up coming in third in my second tournament and I haven't looked back since.
How long ago were you playing for free money?
It was about four years ago.
Tell us a bit about your style. Are you all tournaments or do you play cash as well?
I do prefer tournaments but to be honest I'm probably a better cash-game player than I am a tournament player. I like to see flops and I think I can play beyond the flop better than a lot of players, or at least the players I find myself playing against.
We heard you qualified for this event so tell us about that and how you found yourself here at the CPC.
Sure. A friend of mine won a package to play here and the tickets were for two. His wife wasn't able to come so he offered it to a few of his friends and I jumped at the chance. I changed out some of my online bankroll and played in a supersatellite and won the ticket.
Take us through this main event and how it went for you. We didn't really notice you until you went on a big heater when we made the money.
Yeah. Throughout this whole event I was pretty short although I did double up in the third level. I lost a big pot not long after that so I was never a really big stack. Once we made the money yesterday I was getting really short-stacked and I needed to get some chips.
It was folded to me and I picked up 8♠ 6♠ and moved in. The player on the button actually didn't realize I had done it and announced a standard raise. So he had to raise on top of my all-in. I knew he had a really weak hand but unfortunately it had to be ahead of mine. [laughs]
So he turned over T-9 and he flopped a ten on a rainbow board, so I thought it was all over. But I went runner-runner for the flush, which was fantastic.
We heard you say this was your biggest poker win so far. How does this change the role poker plays in your life?
To be honest this really doesn't change a thing. I love playing poker and I make a bit of money from it, rather than playing something like golf. I'm going to withdraw some of the money and do some stuff with it for sure.
I have a great job that I love so it's not like I'm going to quit and become a professional or anything.
Will the money let you play a bit more poker?
I already play far too much! [laughs]
Congratulations again David and we hope to see you again.
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This event may have been small in terms of the field but it was big on action, and who can argue with a week cruising the Caribbean? While David Lloyd walked away profiting the most financially, everyone who made it to this event got more than their money's worth.
PokerListings.com was honored to provide the exclusive tournament coverage for the 2008 Caribbean Poker Classic. Our congratulations go out to David Lloyd and to everyone else who cashed in this year's main event.
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