Charlie Carrel Attempting to Show the Poker Dream is Still Alive
Online poker is full of stories of players turning professional after winning a freeroll tournament or making a small deposit. The likes of Annette “Annette_15” Obrestad and Tom Dwan are two of the most famous cases, as is Chris “Jesus” Ferguson who completed a $0 to $10,000 challenge back in 2006.
Another player who famously ran up a massive bankroll from a small deposit is Charlie “Epiphany77” Carrel. The popular British star deposited $15 and ran that up to $500,000. Carrel put $15 into his PokerStars account and won a $1 buy-in 180-man sit & go for $49 at the first attempt. From there, Carrel began playing nine-handed SNGs with a $1.50 buy-in before progressing to $3.50 and $7 games.
Carrel made the switch to Zoom cash games before moving his bankroll over to partypoker after deciding to move to Jersey with his Grandma, so he could focus on improving his poker game without the distraction of his friends.
A $1,800 bankroll soon swelled to $60,000 and beyond. Carrel then returned to PokerStars where he chopped the Sunday Million for $200,000. Now making a name for himself in online poker circles, Carrel switched to $2/$5 six-max Zoom where he crushed opponents daily. His bankroll peaked at $520,000 from his $15 investment.
It was not only the online arena where Carrel continued to excel; he began dominating on the live circuit too. A couple of six-figure scores were followed up with a €1,114,000 win in the €25,500 8-Handed High Roller event at the EPT Grand Final in 2015. Since then, Carrel has won more than $6.2 million from live poker tournaments.
Retirement and Resurrection
Carrel recently announced he was stepping away from poker to concentrate on other projects. Much like the also retired Fedor Holz, another young phenom, Carrel has returned to the game that propelled him into the limelight, although he is doing so to prove that the poker dream of turning a small deposit into a large sum is still alive.
Naysayers claim that online poker is dying or is dead and that it is practically impossible for a player to turn a small investment into a much larger bankroll, but Carrel has set out to prove the doubters wrong.
He deposited $50 into his PokerStars account a week ago and is attempting to grind his way to $10,000 all while streaming his play on Twitch. Carrel is using a 20 buy-in rule meaning he can move up stakes once he has 20 buy-ins for the next stakes; he will drop down stakes when he has 17 buy-ins for the current level.
After starting at $0.01/$0.02 Zoom, Carrel is now playing three tables of $0.02/$0.05 with a $166 bankroll. There’s a long way to go before Carrel hits his ambitious target, but if anyone can do it, it is the man they call “Epiphany77.”
Check out Carrel’s Twitch channel to monitor Carrel's progress as he attempts to prove the poker dream is still alive.
