1999 WSOP Champion Noel Furlong Leaves Behind $59.5 Million Estate
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Former Main Event champion Noel Furlong might have pocketed $1,000,000 for his victory in 1999, but by the time he passed away in June 2021, he had amassed a whole lot more.
A recent article has laid bare the estate of the former World Champion, with over €56 million ($59.5 million) left behind to his family.
The figure is so vast that were it all to have come from poker, he would sit second in the all-time money list, trailing only Justin Bonomo. But as you'll find out, Furlong enjoyed much success away from the poker tables.
Furlong's Poker Career
Furlong's death at the age of 83 was met by an outpouring of grief from those within the poker community who knew him. 16-time WSOP bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth, who won the WSOP Main Event ten years before Furlong, called him one of the most successful businessmen in Ireland who handled himself "with class and always a smile."
Meanwhile, the WSOP itself said in a statement that he was a "worthy champion" who helped put the 'World' in World Series of Poker.
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Furlong was introduced to poker by chance while walking his dogs. In a story told by Irish poker legend Padraig Parkinson, Furlong bumped into a fellow poker player while out one night who encouraged him to come and battle against some "top Americans" who were in town to play poker.
Those "top Americans" were Doyle Brunson, Chip Reese, Puggy Pearson and Stu Ungar — not bad company!
"So he brought his dogs home, came back," said Parkinson. "And a couple of hours later he was playing heads up with Puggy Pearson and he’s winning $6,000. It was the funniest thing. So that was Noel hooked."
By the time Furlong made it to the 1999 WSOP Main Event final table, he was joined by Parkinson and another Irishman in the shape of George McKeever. That year's final table is often remembered as one of the toughest in WSOP Main Event history. From a field of 393, the final table featured eventual runner-up Alan Goehring, Poker Hall of Famer Erik Seidel and Huck Seed, who had won the tournament three years earlier.
Furlong had already made a name for himself in the poker world by winning the Irish Poker Open in 1987 and 1989, but this result was the largest of his poker career, coming out on top for the $1,000,000 payday.
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Carpets and Racing
So where did the rest of the Irishman's fortune come from? Almost two decades before his Main Event win, Furlong founded 'Furlong Flooring' a leading manufacturer of carpets and other flooring products. The company flourished, mainly due to Furlong's concentrated efforts in the late 1980s.
During this time, Furlong was also heavily involved in the horse racing industry as a racehorse trainer and gambler. His most famous bets came in 1991, when he won £2,500,000 in the space of a couple of months.
His first was a 33/1 (+3300) longshot in Ireland, before following that up with a £300,000 bet on his horse Destriero at odds of 6/1 (+600) to win the Supreme Novices' Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival.
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