He's one of the most recognizable faces in the UK poker circuit and may also be reasonably well known in Vegas, considering he's visited there several times a year for most of the last two decades. In fact not long ago, Neil Channing estimated that he'd spent a total of two years of his life in Sin City.
When he's not in America he can usually be found in the £500 no-limit hold'em cash game at The Vic casino in London. In fact, he spends so much time there that he recently moved flats so he could be within walking distance of the casino he refers to as his "office." However, during the recent Easter weekend, Neil left the office and made the short trip to Dublin for the Irish Open, arguably the most established and prestigious of European tournaments.
He was in good company as this year the likes of Doyle Brunson and Sorrel Mizzi were among the 667 players who took part in the €4,500 event, which had a guaranteed prize pool of €3m thanks to event sponsor Paddy Power bookmakers. But by the end of the of the five-day tournament it was Neil who took down the €800,000 ($1.25 million) first prize, having left beasts numbering 666 to burn in poker hell while he progressed victoriously to poker heaven. Neil has been a gambler all his life, regularly winning the dinner money from his classmates throughout his school days before naturally progressing to become a bookmaker. Having worked as a sports trader for various London based spread betting companies, and as a trackside bookmaker at racecourses around the UK, he then left the world of work to become a professional poker player and concentrate on being a general all-round gambler. He is mainly a cash game player but likes to play in the occasional tournament, even though he often rues the action he is missing by doing so. In fact, just a couple of weeks before the Irish Open, Neil contemplated playing even fewer tournaments in order to concentrate on the juicy cash games in London these days.
His tournament record is reasonably extensive, with several final table appearances under his belt. He has cashed in three of the last four WSOP main events, and up until now his biggest tournament win was in December last year when he won £35,000 ($70,000) for taking down a £1,000 event at the Grosvenor UK Poker Tour (GUKPT).
2008 had already started well for him, with a cash finish in the Walsall GUKPT and second place in a £500 event last month in London. Neil often likes to back other players with his money too, and in that same London event he had significant percentages of both the winner and the seventh place finisher. If he does give up playing tournaments in favor of cash, I suspect it won't be for long.
Neil is also a writer, penning a regular monthly column for Bluff Europe and frequently contributes to the thehendonmob.com, one of the UK's busiest poker info sites. He also provides odds-making services for poker events to most of the UK's bookmakers. Indeed, as a gambler with an eye for a bit of value, he sometimes has a bet on poker tournaments and on this occasion he put his money where his mouth is by placing a £500 bet on himself after Day One at odds of 100-to-1. Paddy Power, who took the bet, had already contributed a €200,000 overlay to the tournament but Channing's win ensured that they had to pay out quite a bit more to him as well. When I phoned Neil to congratulate him and ask him how he felt about his victory he replied simply, with his favorite catchphrase, by saying it was "... marvelous."
