Prop Bets Lead to Incredible Physical Transformation for John Juanda
The European Poker Tour Barcelona, which kicked off the tour's 12th season, was chock full of big stories, but perhaps none more so than John Juanda taking down the largest Main Event in EPT history. The EPT Barcelona Main Event attracted 1,694 players, and Juanda took home €1,022,593 after a deal, which also saw Steve Warburton earn €941,613 for his runner-up finish.
Prior to that win, PokerNews' Sarah Grant caught up with Juanda in a video interview where he explained his nearly year-long absence from the poker world.
"The reason I haven't been playing many tournaments is because, I think in December of last year during a Christmas party, me and my buddy, maybe we had a little too much to drink, ended up making a bunch of crazy side bets on a bunch of things like running, doing pull-ups," Juanda explained. "He bet me I couldn't do 20 pull-ups in six months … maybe it was a bad bet on my part, I could do six at the time."
Juanda continued: "After two months there was no progress, I didn't do anything. I decided, you know what, I'm either going to give up or go all out, so I said, 'You want to press the bet?' Then we ended up betting bigger, and now I really have to train for it."
Juanda, who has lived in Tokyo for four years now, went on to train for six months. Check out the following video to see whether or not Juanda was able to win the pull-up bet.
"I was king of out of shape when we made the bet, so it helped me get in shape. We also made some running bets … there was an interesting bet where I run 100 yards and my friend hop on one leg for 50 yards … He said I'll offer this bet to you, but it's a sucker bet, I'm trying to hustle you. But when I thought about it, there's no way he can hop faster than me running."
Of course PokerNews obtained footage of that bet as well:
As you can see from the lead photo, the bets certainly did wonders for Juanda's physique.
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