Phil Galfond create a lot of buzz for himself when he launched his Run It Once (RIO) poker website in 2019. The Maryland poker pro told the poker world before the launch of RIO that he was going to take it slow at the poker tables and focus on his business interests.
What no one knew at the time was that Galfond was going through a tough phase in his life as he was finding it difficult to cope with the mental challenges that were confronting him. Some of these fears included childhood fears but also fears of not being good enough to win at the poker tables.
Galfond Shares Mental Struggles
The top poker pros rarely open up about their mental struggles and hence a lot of times the rest of the poker playing community think that the top players have a very strong mental game and its one of the reasons why they are successful. When a player like Galfond takes to social media to admit that he struggled mentally and provide details on some of those struggles, it inspires the poker community as mental volatility is something that we all have to deal with.
Galfond has just under $3 million in career prize money and has 3 WSOP gold bracelets to his name. He is not only an accomplished poker player but one of those players that carried a lot of potential to dominate the poker circuit. So when he decided to semi-retire in his early 30s, it surprised a lot of those who were close to Galfond.
Phil Galfond took to Twitter recently to share why he stepped away from the game of poker. He said that the fame of winning WSOP bracelets and playing on popular poker shows like High Stakes Poker only imposed more pressure on him as he subconsciously developed the fear of losing.
He said that he did not think he could do well in the post solver era of poker and he felt that he would not do well in transferring his strengths to the poker solver era. He said that this was based on some of his childhood memories of not doing well in school and not being able to do his homework.
Galfond felt that he would not be able to give enough time and attention to study the strategies of the poker solver era and would not be good enough to compete against the modern generation of poker players and hence he subconsciously decided to semi retire and launch RIO.
Performance Coach Helps Galfond
Galfond said that he started to face his fears and see things turn around in his life when he started working with Elliot Roe – a performance coach. After a number of one on one sessions and lengthy exercises, Galfond was forced to admit that he engaged in what Roe called ‘too smart to try’ thinking.
Roe worked with Galfond and helped him realize that he had to face his fears instead of run from them. This was one of the reasons why Galfond came out with the Galfond Challenge in 2019 as he wanted to go public and show the poker community that he was willing to play some of the toughest poker players on the circuit and had no problem with winning or losing.
Galfond said that he had subconsciously used distractions in his life to prevent him from facing his real fears. He admitted that things had been tough mentally through the COVID-19 situation, especially in 2021 when his dad passed away. He thanked Roe for helping him and said that he was in a good space mentally.
Galfond is not the only top poker pro to work with a performance coach. German poker pro Fedor Holz has worked with a mental coach in the past and said it was one of the reasons why he played so well at the poker tables.