Mike Leah Making This Series Special

For some folks, third time is the charm. For Mike Leah, the third time is just, well, par for the course.

Last night, Leah bested a field of 1,524 entries in the Fallsview Poker Classic CAD $1,000 No-Limit Hold’em preliminary event to pocket CAD $244,244. This is impressive in and of itself. What makes the feat downright astonishing is this is the third time in four years Leah has won the tournament.

Last year he earned over CAD $210,000 when he won the second time, but his victory in 2014 for over CAD $110,000 was not exactly chump change.

Leah has a huge list of tournament results, but after some marquee wins and frequent cashes, Leah started shying away from grinding a bunch of side events. He made an exception for Fallsview though.

“It is special,” the Ontario native explains. “It is close to home, which always makes it a little more special.”

As for whether or not the fact he seems more likely to win it than not does play a role in how special it is to Leah.

“Whenever you win something, you’re going to be more inclined to play it again,” he says with a smile.

The hefty paydays also add some shine to the trophy, as the field size continues to grow in these prelims year after year. The side events for Fallsview generated numerous six-figure paydays, which ballooned even higher this weekend since it was a Canadian holiday weekend for Family Day.

The more than half a million he has banked is a great accomplishment, but the trip to Niagara is nowhere close to over for Leah. He has a long list of milestone victories, but winning his way onto the Champions Cup remains a top goal and something he is aiming to do in this event.

He has a rough start at a table with poker pro Justin Liberto and Champions Club member Dietrich Fast, but if anyone has home field advantage in this line-up, it is going to be Mike “Trifecta” Leah.