Olympic champion boxer Audley Harrison is hunting a different sort of gold these days. And 24 years after he became the first Brit to claim victory in the Super Heavyweight division, at the 2000 Olympics, Harrison has made a bold prediction: “I am winning a WSOP bracelet in 2024”.
He’s already cashed twice in big-field events this summer, finishing 1127/20,647 in the Gladiators of Poker event and 126/7,954 in the Seniors. And he’s targeting the game with the same laser focus that saw him taking the boxing world by storm.
Harrison has always had to fight for what he wants
“I came from a broken home,” Harrison says to me in the Horseshoe Casino shortly after busting from the Seniors.
“I was expelled from two schools, went to a young offender institution. The year before I won the Olympics I’d gone back to school as a mature student, and graduated with a degree in Sports Science and Leisure Management. I’m big on education. I see how much it’s helped me in turning my life around.”
The Olympics led to a pro boxing career that saw Harrison sign a ground-breaking deal with the BBC, and while he didn’t win the belts he wanted, he’s proud of his legacy.
He set up the amateur boxer’s union and marched 100 students to the Houses of Parliament, securing funding on a promise to deliver gold at the next Olympics, which he personally delivered.
“Me winning the Olympics changed boxing,” Harrison states with conviction. “As simple as that. They got £4 million there. They got the Sheffield Institute of Sport. Had I not won a medal? That’s it, it’s over. When you talk about the Amir Khan story, the Anthony Joshua story, the Nicola Adams story, James DeGale, Frankie Gavin. None of that would have happened without me winning the gold. All the athletes are now paid, all the coaches are trained. We’re a powerhouse Olympic boxing nation. It all came from the gold. So that's my legacy.”
“Okay, I didn’t do it as a pro,” Harrison admits, “but the BBC deal was unprecedented. And 30 years on people still tell me they remember my first fight. There were six million people watching. It was so impactful. I was bigger than a rockstar and I still get the love today. I had the press write shit about me, and that was part of the reason I left the UK. But I’m glad I did because I met my wife, and we’ve got amazing kids.”
The road to poker
Relocating to the States also led Harrison to poker. He found the game by luck, graduating from slots at Mandalay Bay (played while he was waiting to pick his now-wife up from her gig as a celebrity stylist – “I realized I was just giving money to the house, I thought ‘I’m not doing this any more”) – to cash games. That didn’t go much better at the start. “I didn’t know what the hell I was doing,” Harrison says with a smile, “and I was losing more than I was winning, but I was really enjoying it.
“And then I played my first tournament in 2006 and I finished 11th. I was hooked from then, loved it, this thrill of going deep in tournaments.”
He was sponsored by Full Tilt before Black Friday shut down the online world in the US. And then he moved from Vegas to California, and stopped playing in 2012. When he came back to the tables in 2017, he quickly realized the game had left him behind.
“I was horrible. I said to myself, ‘you’re gonna have to train up, or you’re gonna have to retire because you can't compete’.” Harrison decided he wasn’t ready to turn his back on the game and went back to school, signing up with sites like Jaka Coaching and Jonathan Little’s PokerCoaching.com to learn enough about the new GTO style to play his own exploitative game.
“I’ve done the time and put the volume in,” Harrison says. “I started playing on ClubWPT, grinding, and it improved my game 100%. I got to play all the different situations, trying things out. I read the game well but being studied now gives me a bigger arsenal. I have an edge on a lot of players I’m playing against.”
And Harrison already knows things that elude even some top poker players. “Self reflection is massively important,” he says. “A lot of people don't think about it, but being able to look back at yourself honestly, you know, have an honest assessment of your game, your strengths and weaknesses. You need to keep improving your skills and improving your edge.”
'The boxer in me has to just chill out a bit'
Harrison is also aware of his image, and he says that’s another facet of the game that he has to control.
“I’m a black guy with dreadlocks,” he says. “I look like someone who’s going to be bluffing. That’s why I wear a shirt and look nice because everyone calls me down. I can’t bluff as much as I want.
“How people view you is really important. People look at me and think, ‘He’s got a hoodie on, he looks like he plays aggressively’, and I do play aggressively, so I have to mix it up.”
But it’s the same mindset and determination that saw him compete at the very top level in boxing, that he’s now using to great effect on the poker table.
Has he got any weaknesses? “Sometimes I just need to ease off the gas a bit. The boxer in me has to just chill out a bit.”
And he’s also had to come to terms with the one big difference between boxing and poker.
“When I walked to the ring, I’d done the work, mentally, spiritually, I’d feel like Superman. That competitiveness and the mental fortitude you need to take into the ring. You have control… I’m in control of my destiny. I’m going to beat you by being faster than you and stronger than you.
“Poker’s different. In poker you can do everything right and still get kicked in the nuts. You just have to keep moving forward. It’s a brutal game.”
Does he find that frustrating? “Yes, for sure. The mental game is something that I think a lot of players need help with.”
But there’s one thing that Harrison has always had: confidence. And as we round off the interview he insists he’s got one last point to make.
“I am winning a WSOP bracelet in 2024. And I want to win poker’s triple crown – WSOP, EPT and WPT titles.”
And when he says it, you can believe it.
