Sunday may have been
Father’s Day, but it was a woman, Allyn Jaffrey Shulman,
who was making headlines at the final table of the $1,000 Seniors No-Limit
Hold’em Championship. Wife of 2009 WSOP Europe Main Event winner Barry Shulman and
step-mother of 2009 WSOP Main Event final tablist Jeff Shulman, Allyn
became the third member of her family to make a final table this week—a historic
feat in a historic event. The family
made history, but Allyn made some history in her own right, becoming the first
woman to win a bracelet in a tournament besides the Ladies Event since 2008.
The victory is a landmark for the Shulmans and for women, not to mention the
second largest payday of this WSOP at $603,713.
The Shulmans have gotten
progressively closer to the gold this past week. First, Barry took eighth in last
weekend’s $1,500 No Limit Hold’em event. He busted, then headed just one room
over to watch Jeff play his way to a third place finish in the $5,000 Limit
Hold’em Championship for $92,562. That
day was impressive, but not the first time a father and a son found success at
the WSOP. In fact, it wasn’t even the first time the Shulman’s saw their
poker successes overlap. Back in ’09, it was during Jeff’s November Nine final
table hiatus that his father won his WSOPE title.
Then Allyn bested them
both, defeating 2008 November Niner Dennis Phillips heads-up. Her performance
at the final table was a sight to see. Allyn and Phillips began the final table
as eighth and ninth in the counts, but the pair rallied, picked their spots,
and positioned themselves as the last two standing in the record-setting event. Allyn prevailed in the end, making history and breaking the four-year and 200+ event drought of female bracelet winners.
This wasn’t just any
final table either. Allyn became the eighth woman to make a final table
at this year’s WSOP and she did so in the largest poker tournament of the year
thus far. Shulman was one of 4,128 players in this year’s Seniors Event, a
number that shattered the record for largest single starting day field in poker
tournament history. Her solo performance in noteworthy in its own right,
as she joins Patricia Baker and Amanda Musumeci as the third woman to get down
to heads-up action this summer. She also
joins Musumeci and Vanessa Selbst as the third woman to earn a six-figure score
at this year’s WSOP.
To look at Allyn’s
performance in a vacuum doesn’t do her story justice though. Just by virtue of making the final table,
Allyn helped the Shulman’s do something no family in poker has ever done—make three
WSOP final tables in the same year. Her victory
brings the family 2012 WSOP bounty to $753,987 and puts the Shulman name
alongside the likes of Brunson, Le, and Mizrachi in the pantheon of great poker
families.
Allyn’s best game is
Omaha Hi-Low according to her husband, but a couple of years ago, she decided
to take up Hold’em. She got some tips from her husband and stepson, but Barry
claims most of her No-Limit success is her own doing. “She is a pretty
studious type of person. She likes to study things and get good at them,” Barry
explains.
Even though the Shulmans
have one of the more impressive ROIs of the summer so far, the brood actually
has a broad range of interests outside of poker, which is by and large an activity
confined to the Rio each summer.
“Believe it or not, we
don’t really play that much poker,” Barry explained on the WSOP
livestream. “Allyn and I go around the world almost every year for the
first three or four months. We just love travelling.”
Even though they are
wanderers, the Shulman family reconvenes in Vegas every summer for the WSOP.
Like many poker enthusiasts who aren’t full-time players, the Shulmans always
find time for poker’s biggest stage and the trio is arguably one of the most compelling
plotlines of this year’s Series so far. Their story has a little
something to satisfy everyone. You have a heroine continuing the strong
performance of women in large field events and breaking the dry spell of female
bracelet winners. You have known names making final tables, with November
Niners from both 2008 and 2009 playing key roles in this saga. You have
massive paydays in record-setting tournaments. And you have a tight-knit poker
family showing us how much more fun it is to win together than alone just one
day after a holiday where family matters most.
Photo by Jay WhoJedi
Newnum