Brian Rast

American Professional poker player Brian Rast was born on November 8th, 1981, in Denver, Colorado. He remained there until moving to Poway, California, in 1990.  Rast is a 41-year-old professional poker player who now resides in Las Vegas, Nevada. He has six WSOP bracelets and a total live earnings total of over $25 million.

Brian Rast is currently ranked 1 in California. One of his most recent victories, was worth $1,324,747 during WSOP’s 54th edition.

Brian Rast: Early Life

He graduated from Poway High School as the valedictorian of the Class of 2000, which helped him gain admission to Stanford University. In the spring of 2003, he began participating on a weekly basis at the Stanford Poker Club. Brian returned home to Poway that summer with the intention of learning poker and making some money.  He began collecting as many poker books as he could and began reading them.  He got a temp job and used the money to support his online and live poker habit at Barona Casino.  Then, he left the temporary position after five weeks in order to dedicate himself entirely to poker for the rest of the summer.

Brian Rast: Poker Career

Brian kept on playing live and online poker while still residing in the Palo Alto region.  He mainly played cash no-limit hold ’em online and at Lucky Chances most of the time live. Rast can be found playing poker online at Full Tilt Poker and PokerStars under the username tsarrast. 

He left the Bay Area in the summer of 2005 and entered the WSOP for the first time.  Then, he quickly returned to Poway, where he continued to play online and travel frequently to Commerce Casino in Las Vegas to play live. He ultimately decided on Las Vegas over Los Angeles due to the poker opportunities and the party atmosphere.  

At the Bellagio Weekly Tournaments in Las Vegas in July 2006, he won his first tournament. winning $56,345 in prize money.  Rast finished fourth with a prize of $14,770 at the Festa Al Lago V Poker Tournament in Las Vegas the same year.

He won his first bracelet at the 42nd World Series of Poker in Las Vegas in June 2011. He received $1,720,328. At the $1,500 Pot Limit Hold’em, 42nd World Series of Poker – WSOP 2011, Las Vegas, he earned another WSOP bracelet in the same year and same month. He received $227,232 in earnings.

Rast also won $1,621,333 in July 2012 after finishing sixth at the 43rd World Series of Poker in Las Vegas.

In Las Vegas, he triumphed in the Five Diamond World Poker Classic of the World Poker Tour in December 2013. He earned $1,083,500 in profit. He won another tournament in 2014, the Bellagio High Roller IV in Las Vegas, for a total of $289,119.

His largest win, $7,525,000, came in July 2015 when he finished first at the Super High Roller Bowl in Las Vegas. 

For well over a decade, Rast has excelled as a professional poker player at the highest level. He has triumphed in both major cash games and tournaments around the globe. He has won three Poker Players Championships in addition to three WSOP bracelets. 

Brian Rast will be inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame in 2023, according to a World Series of Poker announcement made last July. His total live earnings of $25,258,945 place him at number 29 on the all-time money list for poker, making him the only player to ever cash more than $1 million in tournaments seven years in a row. 

Rast has already achieved two feats of history during his 2023 WSOP run: he is the second player in history to have won the $50,000 Poker Players Championship event three times, and he is the 19th person in WSOP history to have won a sixth bracelet. 

Conclusion

One of the best poker players right now is Brian Rast. He is well-known for his abilities and commitment at the poker table. Many are in awe of his skill and him as a person and many believe that he will continue to do more great things in the future.

Recently, Brian and his wife Juliana moved the family from Panorama to a home in Summerlin. Brian continues to enjoy playing poker, which is still his main focus.  He has many different kinds of interests, including basketball, reading, movies, music, TV shows, and fitness and nutrition.  Brian continues to be curious and loves to learn new things, keeping up with science, cosmology, politics, and other topics.