If you’re looking for the best female poker player in the world you might glance over names like Annie Duke, Kathy Liebert and Kristy Gazes, but your search stops at Jennifer Harman. Harman is considered by most people in the poker world to be the best female poker player on the planet. In fact, many experts peg her as one of the best poker players around, period.
Harman has won two World Series of Poker bracelets, with her first coming in the No Limit Deuce to Seven Lowball event in 2000. That win was extra special not only because it was her first WSOP bracelet, but it was also the first time she had played the game Deuce to Seven Lowball. Apparently Harman was shown the game and given a few tips by friend and fellow poker pro Howard Lederer before the event, and she proved to be a natural who picked it up in mere minutes.
Her second WSOP bracelet win came in the $5,000 No Limit Hold’em event back in 2002. That win made her the only woman to hold two bracelets in WSOP events.
When she’s not touring the tournament circuit Harman can be found grinding out a living at the highest limit cash games available at the Bellagio in Las Vegas. Harman was considered to be a good enough player to be part of “The Corporation”, a group of poker pros that faced infamous billionaire Andy Beal for limits as high as $100,000-$200,000.
Harman is also active away from the poker tables as an author, spokeswoman and advocate for organ donation. Harman has first-hand experience with the necessity of organ donation after taking a year off from poker in 2004 while having her second kidney transplant. After her second transplant, Harman founded CODA – Creating Organ Donation Awareness – a non-profit organization to raise money and awareness for the cause.
As an author, Harman the author first took a crack at poker literature by writing the Limit Hold’em section in Doyle Brunson’s Super System II. Harman is a member of Team Full Tilt, and appears in ads and plays online at Full Tilt Poker.
As for the feminine mystique, Harman sums it up this way: “I think women have the more intuitive edge than men; they have better gut feelings than men do.
“This is still a man’s world, and I think men use that to get under a woman’s skin to make more money off of the women. If a woman can conquer that, and let that roll off their shoulders and not be intimidated, I think they can become very good.”
