About Phil Galfond

Name	Phil Galfond
Current Residence	Gaithersburg Md.

Don't let the name fool you; OMGClayAiken is not a crazed, 13-year-old American Idol fan caught up in the euphoria of having just seen her TV crush take home the gold. Well, not entirely anyways.

OMGClayAiken is the online moniker of feared poker pro Phil Galfond, a not-so-crazed American Idol fan caught up in the euphoria of having just taken down his first WSOP gold bracelet.

For those poker enthusiasts who've been eagerly following the career of Galfond, his take down of Event 28 at the 2008 WSOP came as no surprise.

An accomplished high-stakes online pro who regularly beats the $200/$400 Pot-Limit Omaha game at Full Tilt Poker, Phil has come a long way since his days at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he studied philosophy and dabbled in poker.

Now a full-fledged poker pro, Phil circles the globe with his buddies - known as the "Ship It Holla Ballas" - in search of pretty girls and plentiful poker games. He regularly wins and loses hundreds of thousands of dollars online and has defeated some of poker's biggest talents, including at the WSOP green felt.

After outlasting a record-breaking field in the 2008 WSOP $5,000 Pot-Limit Omaha re-buy event, Phil faced a final table that included John Juanda, Phil Hellmuth, Daniel Negreanu, Johnny Chan, David Benyamine and Kirill Gerasimov. Between them, the pros had 28 WSOP bracelets and more WSOP cashes than you can stomach.

But Phil persevered. He maintained his position as chip leader for most of the event and in the end found himself heads-up against the only pro at the table who hadn't been on TV: Adam Hourani.

After a heads-up match that lasted 100 hands, Phil took down the event with two pair to claim his $817,781 poker prize and his first gold bracelet.

When asked by PokerListings.com what winning his first bracelet meant to him, Phil admitted it was a long time coming.

"I felt that I had already proven myself winning in the toughest games online, for a long time now, but I hadn't really proven myself yet," he said.

"For me it means that I've proven myself to everybody else."

Away from the felt, Phil enjoys sleeping, watching movies, and performing and teaching improv comedy. He regularly writes for Bluff Magazine, and has appeared in Season 4 of High Stakes Poker.

Trivia

• Has been a monthly contributor to <em>Bluff Magazine</em> since March 2007
• Regularly plays in the biggest online games
• Won his first gold bracelet in the 2008 WSOP $5,000 Pot-Limit Omaha re-buy event
• Re-bought 4 times in the event before taking down the $800k-plus top prize