Lara Eisenberg is an accomplished poker player hailing from Silver Spring, MD. In 2019, she earned a WSOP Circuit Ring and in 2021 won the Ladies Championship event at the World Series of Poker, obtaining her first ever bracelet and taking home a six-figure sum. Her most lucrative win comes from the WPT Prime Championship (2022) where she placed second and was awarded $481,500. To date, Eisenberg has amassed over $870,000 in tournament winnings.
She is an avid poker player who loves the competitive nature of the game, but she has a day job running her own radiology practice. Despite this limitation to her playing schedule, Eisenberg has achieved remarkable success in poker tournaments.
A blind date that turned into a lifetime passion
In addition to poker, she has another great passion – skydiving. In 2006, Lara was part of a group of 400 skydivers who set a world record for forming the largest single formation in the sky. By 2019, she had made over 4,500 jumps! Ultimately, however, she decided to step away from her parachuting career and devote more time to her family and playing poker.
A was a resident in surgery and somebody said: hey I know this guy he’s an anaesthesiologist, he wants to go on a blind date. He wants to go skydiving. I was like: yeah i’ll do that!
Bernard Lee Poker
The Moneymaker effect
She discovered poker in her thirties. This was shortly after Chris Moneymaker’s historic win in the World Series of Poker Main Event (2003). She quickly became aware of online poker and was immediately drawn to learning more about the game.
I’d never played poker at all until I saw it on TV. I happened to catch a commercial for probably poker stars or Full Tilt Poker and I was like: Whoa, people are playing games for money on the internet? Let me learn how to do that.
CardPlayer.com
Lara Eisenberg is not a full time pro. She is a radiologist who works every other week. During her time off, she sets aside one or two days to play poker and uses the other days to focus on developing her skills and conducting research on the impact skill games have on the human brain. She believes that it is not necessary to be a full-time professional player in order to succeed in poker and that it is more important to manage one’s time wisely.
If you are somebody that isn’t a full time professional and you have a regular job that doesn’t mean that you are counted out. It means that you have to be smart and strategize about what you can do with your time.
PokerDeals
Her impressive results have yielded her more than $870,000 in profit, as well as the most prestigious accolade in poker: a WSOP golden bracelet for taking out the $1,000 No Limit Hold’em – Ladies Championship event in 2021. An incredible feat! Undoubtedly, she is an inspiration not only for female poker players, but also for any poker enthusiast.
Being a poker ambassador
In an interview, she revealed that after paying her taxes and repaying her investors, only a small portion of the winnings from the WSOP went toward her own pleasures. The rest was added to her poker bankroll. Although this gave her a financial boost, becoming recognizable opened up even more opportunities for her.
It’s great to have the recognition to have won an event
Pokernews.com
The media started to take notice of Lara Eisenberg, and she began appearing on podcasts and giving interviews. Her insightful views on the game of poker captured the attention of listeners, and she soon found herself becoming a great ambassador for the sport.
Eisenberg praises the Poker League of Nations, the world’s largest women’s poker group, for the efforts put in to provide female players with more opportunities to participate in poker. She believes it will have a positive impact on the growth of women in this sport.
A small number of women grow up in households where poker is a regular pastime. And, in general, young women don’t tend to play poker when they get together as often as young men do. So, the exposure element is a factor.
Pokernews.com
She was invited by Lena Evans (PLN founder) to write one of the chapters in her upcoming book titled “Poker for Life”. In this chapter, Lara will focus on the brain’s impact on poker. Her contribution to the book promises to be a fascinating read.