"Chips and Chicks" - All-Level Poker Series
Some of my earliest memories are of playing backgammon with my Dad. The distinct smell of the leather board, familiar faded dice cups, smooth checkers, and doubling die.
Backgammon led to poker, and soon enough, at the age of 12, I was multi-tabling under an anonymous account.
If we’re being honest, that might have been my peak. School and sports got competitive in high school and college, and I stopped playing — only to pick it back up years later when I moved to SF and was lucky enough to stumble upon a home game filled with brilliant, inclusive, degenerate engineers.
Looking back, the SF game was the starting point for countless wild stories, but also friendships — personal and professional. It goes without saying that a unique kind of bond is formed when you play with someone for hours: engaging in competition, learning how their mind works, and having casual conversations.
Now, there are a ton of home games in venture and the startup world. If you go to any of the investor or founder games, you’ll realize quickly that it’s networking without the painful awkwardness of networking.
But as I’m sure you can imagine, the male-to-female ratios are tough. All men, maybe 1 or 2 women.
Of course, I don’t believe it’s a lack of interest or capacity. It’s just that poker can be intimidating, and most women have never had exposure to it.
I want to change that. I want more women to play poker: to make money, create connections, and enjoy the action — and so, I’m launching a female-only all-levels poker series focused on getting more founders, investors, engineers, and startup operators into the game.
Details for the event are below. If you know any women based in London who might be interested, please forward them the invite!
🔥 “Chips and Chips” Poker Series 🔥
➡️ “Chips and Chicks” is a female-only poker series for all levels — absolute beginner to shark.
The games will be based in London. The only requirement is that you are a female founder, investor, engineer, or operator who works within venture or tech.
The main aim is to provide a relaxed and supportive environment for learning the game. I want us to have a great time while gaining poker skills and meeting new people.
For inclusivity (and fun), I am building an in-game mechanism to promote collaborative learning. What does that mean? All players will receive four “analyze hand” chips that they can throw into the middle after any hand. If you choose to do so, the dealer will anonymously record the action and hand.
Post-event, we’ll send out an analysis of every hand where an “analyze hand’ chip was used. That way, we can all get better at thinking through strategy using real-life examples that played out at the table.
It will be a low-stakes (~20 GBP) buy-in.
You game?
Sign up here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfxn6K_Cs9oVRBbE3jFT1NKFfMQnQApQrziwW4HOQl8IlFvXw/viewform