A top-ranked female poker player has revealed the glitz and glamor of the underground poker scene.
Reyna, who goes by Rocket Reyna online, first started learning the game at the age of 20, before being allowed to play in US casinos at 21.
She became one of the best female poker players in the world after years of playing on and off in tournaments around the world.
By then, poker had already taken Reyna far beyond the regular casino floors.
She has played in Monaco, Australia, Hong Kong and Las Vegas and has collected as many country flags as possible on her tournament record.
As she grew in confidence, Reyna also found herself in private poker rooms that seemed a world away from the low-stakes casino where she first doubled her money.
A top-ranked female poker player has revealed the glitz and glamor of the underground poker scene. In the photo: Rocket Reyna
One game, held at a well-known luxury hotel in Los Angeles, had a $15,000 buy-in and a room full of wealthy, influential men.
‘I’ve met a few [A-listers] when I played an underground game in Los Angeles. These were film producers and tech startups,” she explained.
“There was a match where it was a private match at the Ritz-Carlton in Los Angeles. It was a $15,000 buy-in.
“I walked into this game and there were girls giving massages, there was a private chef and there were Hollywood celebrities and venture capitalists.
“But when you get into the general field, it’s all people: blue-collar, white-collar, it doesn’t matter. People who shouldn’t be playing.
‘I think it’s a very wild place where everyone can be.’
Reyna managed to get into the poker game in LA when she became “very friendly” with “an older gentleman” who wasn’t shy about flaunting his wealth.
“There was an instance where I became really friendly with an older gentleman who was big in the poker scene,” she recalls.
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Reyna, who goes by Rocket Reyna online, tells Daily Mail she first started learning the game at the age of 20, before being allowed to play in US casinos at 21.
“He was the one who invited me to that game in LA, but I knew him years before that.
“He’s the reason I went to Manila [Philippines] too, but when we were there he wanted to go shopping on the island.
“So we took a helicopter with a broker, and he just complained that the sand on some of the islands was too soft.
‘He didn’t buy it that day. I don’t think he bought one after that either, so I don’t know what his intentions were.
“He grew up in Singapore and I think he had his little claws in a number of different tech startups and grew from there.”
Reyna says the underground poker world doesn’t have as many glamorous WAGs as you might find in F1 or football, but poker rooms can still get lush.
‘It can be glitzy and glamorous. Designer clothes are everywhere in the poker rooms,” she says.
Reyna spent several years in the scene and was previously one of the best female poker players in the world
“WAGs I can name off the top of my head include Lala Kent from Vanderpump Rules,” she adds.
“She saw Randall Emmett, who is infamous around the world for crazy stunts like hiring a marching band during the main event. That was very memorable.
‘That doesn’t really happen. Some people do something fun, like a costume or something, because it’s like a big reunion and it’s supposed to be fun.”
Lala and Randall Emmett, a film producer, had a high-profile relationship that ended in an explosive breakup in 2021.
The couple started dating around 2015 and got engaged in September 2018, before welcoming their daughter Ocean in March 2021.
They ended their engagement just months later in October.
Reyna continues: “It’s not as amazing and glamorous as the F1 WAGs or the professional athletes. In general, many poker players have difficulty finding girlfriends.
‘Just because, when they play professionally, they sit at the table fourteen hours a day and their girlfriends just can’t sit behind them and play with them.
“WAGs I can name off the top of my head include Lala Kent (right) from Vanderpump Rules,” she adds. She saw Randall Emmett (left), who is infamous around the world for crazy stunts like hiring a marching band during the main event. That was very memorable’
“So if they’re trying to find someone, they need to find someone who also plays poker in general or understands that they’re not going to get to spend a lot of time with them.”
Reyna says things can also get a bit strange among poker players who largely play in the underground scene, claiming there is little regulation.
“The poker world is… a lot of it is underground,” she says.
“There are some public poker tours, but because it’s underground, no one can really go to the police for anything.
“And so there have been stories where some people I know have hired negotiators just to collect the dues, and so that’s something that’s so interesting.”
Reyna says she also knows of an example where a top-ranked poker player would subject his “horses” to bizarre rituals to help them win.
A horse is someone who has a portion of the total buy-in paid by someone else, who receives a portion of the horse’s profits.
Some lenders have ‘horse stables’, meaning they pay for the buy-in of many different players in the expectation of receiving a share of their profits.
As she grew in confidence, Reyna also found herself in private poker rooms that felt worlds away from the low-stakes casino where she doubled her money for the first time.
‘[This poker player] trained a group of guys to become the best poker players ever,” Reyna claims.
“They got together to practice and who knows what they did to get money.
“But I think… they went on a retreat or something to see a witch, and the witch made them do a bunch of different things.
‘I don’t think they called her a witch. She cast some spells…a shaman.”
Reyna says the strange rituals the group underwent were intended to “make the most of their brains.”
She further adds that there is a dark side to the world of underground poker, saying that ‘gambling problems are very rampant’.
‘EI had problems with that too when I first started,” she recalls.
“I remember playing a poker tournament in Manila in the Philippines, and I remember stacking someone for a small amount of money, like maybe $100.
“And that man, a resident of Manila, looked like he had just lost his life savings. That gave me a terrible feeling. I didn’t want to play anymore.
‘Lots of poker players It doesn’t matter. They’ll say, “Okay, so they knew what they were coming here for, and they knew they could have lost money, and if they couldn’t handle it, then that’s their fault. It’s not my fault that I played better than them.”
“I think that’s a very selfish way to think about it.”
Reyna, who has won hundreds of thousands of dollars playing poker in recent years, says she doesn’t play the game as often as she used to.
‘I haven’t played much in the past two years. “I tried to collect an Australian poker flag, and I did that at my first tournament, so I just gave up,” she says.
“But I’ll probably get in a tournament game, once or twice a year these days. But that used to be every weekend.’
She says the most she has ever won in one tournament was $100,000 [AU$142,298].
“Every poker player’s dream is to win something called the WSOP bracelet,” she adds.
“It’s the World Series of Poker and every year, around May and June, the events take place. I think there is nearby [100] of them.
‘The main event that is the mecca of all poker tournaments is called the Main Event.
“It’s a $10,000 buy-in, and people from all over the world pay, even if they know they’re not great, just for a chance to win the top prize, which is about $10 million.
“No woman has ever won it, but there have been women who have come close.”
