Kristen Bicknell: First Woman to Win a WSOP Bracelet this Year

7 years ago
Kirsten Bicknell Woman Wins WSOP Bracelet
15:52
06 Jul

I want to offer our congratulations to Canadian poker player Kristen Bicknell for becoming the first woman to win a WSOP bracelet this year.

When I covered the story of Jessica Dawley tweeting about gender issues in poker, I reflected on whether reporting about a woman winning a WSOP bracelet could be seen to do women in poker a disservice. Why? Because it is not sensational for a woman to win a bracelet! There are loads of excellent woman poker players and when a woman does really well and wins a WSOP tournament that’s not weird, it’s inevitable!

However, because the male to female split in large poker tournaments remains hugely weighted in favour of men, the gender gap has some way to go before we reach parity. Reporting on a woman’s success at the tables highlights that it is possible for woman to do really well at poker and will hopefully draw more women into poker. Simply put, we need to see more women in poker and an article like this is a great means of visibility.


Let’s look at Kristen’s achievement in more detail. On July 1st, Kristen took down the $1,500 No Limit Hold’em Bounty Event, defeating a large field of 2,157 other entrants to win the first prize of $290,768. The top 324 players cashed in the event which had a total prize pool of just over $1.8 million. Kristen busted out 17 players at $500 per knockout and by retaining her own bounty chip she earned an extra $9000 as a bounty bonus. Kristen later commented that the added element of the bounties had dramatically altered the fields style of play.

I was surprised how many people busted out on Day One, which I think was because of the bounty. It made the tournament a lot of fun.”

The tough final table contained WSOP bracelet winners Norbert Szecsi and Steve Gee. Other notable players who had cashed in the event were stars like Michael Mizrachi, Barry Shulman, Todd Witteles, online poker legend Chris Moorman, and former WSOP Main Event winner Martin Jacobson. A special mention must also go to Norbert Szecsi who passed $1 million in career earnings with his $179,000 runners-up finish, but when the dust settled the day belonged to Kristen Bicknell.



It was fitting that Kristen won the tournament on July 1st, which is National Canada Day and by winning the tournament, she not only becomes one of only a handful of women to win an open event at the WSOP. She is also the first Canadian to win a bracelet event this year. Speaking immediately after winning the tournament and collecting her second WSOP bracelet, Kristen said:

It all feels so surreal. But it almost doesn’t feel true. It’s the dream you always had. When you bust from a tournament, you feel so bad. But when you win it’s such a weird feeling.”

Kristen won her first WSOP bracelet in 2013 when she won the 2013 Ladies Event which earned her $173,922. Her latest bracelet was earned in only her third ever cash at a WSOP event. Not many players can boast 2 wins out of 3 cashes at the WSOP. If Phil Hellmuth won two thirds of the WSOP tournaments where he cashed, he would currently hold over 100 bracelets!



Kristen plays online poker Pokerstars under the username ‘krissyb24’ and is well-known on the site as she achieved supernova elite status in 2013. Kristen began her online poker career in 2005 and ground low stakes MTTs, SNGs, and later Zoom poker to learn the games and gain a lot of experience in the tough online poker arena. Despite poker winnings of over $400,000 Kristen views her poker playing as a sideline to her true passion which sees her dedicate much of her time towards eating well and living a healthy lifestyle.

Congratulations to Kristen on her second bracelet. If you want to follow Kristen’s poker progress as she hopes to acquire a third bracelet, you can follow her on twitter where she posts under the name Krissyb24poker. She currently has around 1600 followers.

When asked whether her recent win validated her 2013 success in a woman only event, Kristen said,

I beat out a lot of good players, in both the tournaments I won. Yes, this is still a validation. But there are a lot of great female poker players, too. There’s lots of them.”


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Malcolm comes from Consett in the North East of England and is an avid poker player and writer.Read more

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