Robert Campbell Becomes First Double Bracelet Winner of 2019 WSOP

Over the weekend, I was combing through results from the 2019 World Series of Poker, seeing many familiar names and many unfamiliar ones and wondered to myself if there had been any double bracelet winners this year. Obviously, I could have carefully studied the list of winners, but that’s a long list and I’m a busy man. At the time, the answer to my question was no, but that changed this week when Robert Campbell became this summer’s first double bracelet winner at the WSOP when he captured the $10,000 Stud Hi-Lo Eight or Better title and $385,763.

Campbell has now made four final tables at the 2019 World Series of Poker and the two bracelets he has won are the first two of his career. His other win was in $1,500 2-7 Triple Draw. Campbell came extremely close to his first bracelet four years ago when he finished as the runner-up in $1,500 H.O.R.S.E.

Some people prepare for the Series by playing a ton. Phil Hui, for instance, grinded lots of low buy-in games to practice before his $50,000 Poker Players Championship win. Others, like Campbell, decide to take it easy and rest up.

“This summer, I had probably played less poker than I have ever played and I felt really, really excited to play,” he told WSOP.com afterward. “I was more excited, like really excited to come to Vegas. Much more than I have in the past.”

The final table was quite competitive; with seven players remaining, the top six players all had between 1.7 million and 1.0 million chips. But Campbell soon took off, scooping a huge pot from Qinghai Pan to rocket up to 2.93 million. He cruised to heads-up from there, entering the one-on-one match against Yueqi Zhu 5.350 million to 3.710 million.

And in heads-up, Campbell won nearly every hand, admitting he ran as hot as the sun.

“More than pure. Like whatever that next phase is after pure. It was like really sick, I was like holy fucking shit man. He just got barbecued that poor man. It’s just outrageous. Even when I thought I lost I won. That’s how sick I ran,” he recounted, almost apologizing for his success.

“It’s like you bet on roulette and you bet on number 16 and it comes up number 17 and you’re walking away from the table and an earthquake comes and pushes it to 16 and you’ve won a thousand dollars.”

With his second bracelet win and fourth final table (seventh cash overall), Campbell has climbed to the top spot in the 2019 WSOP Player of the Year race. He has now won $665,508 at the 2019 WSOP, about half of his lifetime live tournament total.