Heart-to-heart: Kind Maniac David «Viffer» Peat
Poker is a world full of personalities. Some of them are altruistic, some are clever and educated, and many can’t live without the game. However, most of the players are famous for playing poker in the first place. Our today’s hero is not only one of the noble cash players, but is well known for his temper.
“My father left my mom when I was 3 years old. She has married another man two years later. My stepfather got sick when I was 8 and died when I was 10. I don’t communicate with my father for over 20 years and I don’t see my mother as well.
I’ve been living alone since I am 15…”
This is a very brief description about his childhood from Viffer himself. His nickname sounds better than his real name, isn’t it? All his friends call him that.
David Peat is a milestone for Vegas, and it’s seen everywhere. There was a time he showed up in a lot of poker shows, including Poker After Dark, High Stakes Poker, The Big Game, PartyPoker Big Game. Phil Helmuth used to be his victim back then. Like in this case:
Meanwhile, there are plenty of videos with such hands at Peat’s old site. During his TV career he crossed many people’s ways. With love, of course.
Viffer is high stakes regular in Las Vegas. His usual stakes are $300/600 NL Holdem.
Phil Laak describes Viffer in such way:
“When Viffer comes along, stakes triple up. Everybody thinks he joins the game to chit-chat and show off, but it’s not the deal… David is not keeping his words to himself, and audience and producers (of poker shows) love it…”
Peat is famous mostly due to unordinary style of play. Raise – mini donk – bet – call – mini raise – all-in is typical hand for Viffer. He can bet one tenth of the pot on the flop and push for two pots on the turn. His VPIP and PFR are quite huge all the time.
Viffer also has a wonderful dog:
https://twitter.com/4viffer/status/337755456040738820
Pool and parties
It all started from online poker:
“I started to play on PokerStars at stakes $1/2, have been playing at work. I remember depositing $400 and playing $0.1/0.25; Maximum stakes were $2/4…
Have I ever used bankroll management? I had plenty of friends with lots of money. That was all my bankroll management. I’ve never chosen my opponents. Have been playing with everyone I met”
With time Peat started to play at really big stakes online. It has been rumored that he lost couple of millions of dollars and switched to live poker where he succeeded.
Before poker Viffer played pool professionally:
“There is no money left in pool. I was playing $5k per game maximum”
Being passionate lover of women and nightclubs, Viffer set his own records. Answering the question how much did he spent for one hell of a night in strip club and how much total time he spent on it, David wrote:
“I think, it was 12 hours. But drinks cost me more than girls – somewhere about $10k. I could spent $50k per night”.
Big Heart
David Peat can irritate, seem too talkative and even a little bit crazy, but he’s for sure nor envious man nor splitter:
“Anyone of my real friends can confirm that I have a big heart. I really like helping people. When I was trying to build a normal career I couldn’t realize how it’s possible to go over other people’s head, tripping ‘em up”.
Viffer was even participating in charity program dedicated to buying Cristmas presents for not very wealthy families and so on.
Quitting poker
In the middle of 2013 Peat announced his retirement from poker:
“My poker career is over; I don’t find it interesting any more. It’s time to look for something new”
It has been rumored, that Viffer lost to Bill Perkins (one hell of a guy) $3.2 mln in one hand…
There is no clarity whether this was true, but it seems that Peat is rarely seen.
In the end of 2014 he was noticed in a company of some hottie. He was smiling and seemed happy.
Previous episodes:
Heart-to-heart: the man of the world Igor Kurganov
Heart-to-heart: cutie Xuan Liu
Heart-to-heart: high-principled prodigy Daniel Colman
Heart-to-heart: Vladimir Troyanovskiy or The Perfect Russian Gambler