Jennifer Harman-Traniello, aka Jen, is a feminist icon in the poker world, since she is arguably the most famous female player. However, for her this does not mean much, since she is competing with men and says sex is irrelevant in poker. With that being said, Harman has more than enough poker experience to make her stand out from many of her male opponents.
Jennifer was born and raised in Reno, Nevada. She started playing poker when she was only eight years old, when her mother introduced her to it. As Jennifer reveals, “My mum had basically taught me how to play poker”. Jennifer had played many different types of games when she was younger, and she, her sister and her cousins were always very competitive. During her teens her mother suffered from kidney failure, and she and her sister ended up taking care of her. Her father was not around that much. Unfortunately, due largely to negligence from the hospital which was responsible for her mother’s kidney transplant, her mother passed away a year later. Nevertheless, Jennifer was still able to count on her her aunts, uncles and grandparents to offer her support.
When Jennifer was 16, she started sneaking into casinos to play poker, using a fake ID card. At the time, according to her, the tables were 13-handed and tough. As is with many successful poker players today, Jennifer started out losing money, but gradually improved her game over time. Unlike a large majority of poker pro’s who either don’t go to university or drop out, Jennifer obtained a degree studying biology. During that time she had started making money in poker, and was regularly playing when she wasn’t studying.
When Jennifer finished her degree, she ended up having little use for biology in her career, since knowledge of this topic is generally not considered a prerequisite for a becoming a successful and professional poker player.
Harman won her first WSOP bracelet in 2000 at the No Limit Deuce to Seven Lowball Event. Interestingly enough, she had never even played that game prior to this event, but did receive a five-minute lesson from fellow poker player, Howard Lederer. She admits that her poker reading skills were probably what helped her most. She didn’t stop there though, and went on to win her second WSOP bracelet in 2002 at the $5k Limit Hold ‘em Event. She even authored the Limit Hold‘em chapter in the Super System II, aka the bible of poker.
Harman can regularly be seen on TV, having appeared on the GSN series, “High Stakes Poker” and on the NBC series, “Poker After Dark”. She was also an active participant in “The Corporation”, a group of high stakes poker players who played real estate billionaire, Andy Beal, for limits of up to $100,000/$200,000.
Other notable wins included a 4th place finish at the Five-Diamond World Poker Classic Tour, 5th place in the inaugural Professional Poker Tour event, and 2nd in the WSOP Circuit Championship Event at the Rio. As of December 2012, her total live tournament winnings exceed $2,433,000. Although Harman has had success in tournament poker, most of her wealth and prestige has come from playing in high stakes cash games.
Harman is also an active fundraiser for the Nevada Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (NSPCA) and frequently hosts charity poker tournaments. In addition, due largely to kidney health problems which she inherited from her Mother, she founded the Creating Organ Donation Awareness (CODA).
Jennifer is married to stylist Marco Traniello, who since became a professional poker player as well. She and Marco have two twin boys. Harman has endured what some might call a tough childhood, but she has kept her head up high, and has since achieved great things in her life. Her tremendous success in poker, her large contributions to charity and the fact that she is raising a family to top it off, are all things which make it unsurprising that she is such an inspiration to so many people.
