Donnacha O'Dea

Donnacha O’Dea was born into an Irish theatrical dynasty. Both his parents were mainstays of the Abbey Theatre in Dublin and had film careers acting in movies directed by major directors in Britain and America such as Alfred Hitchcock, John Ford and David Lean. However, Donnacha did not follow his parents as an actor but instead found fame as a competitive swimmer. Whilst studying at Trinity College, Dublin he became the first Irishman to swim 100 metres in less than a minute but failed to progress past the heats in any of his three events at the 1968 Games.

In the eighties he emerged as a professional gambler and reached the final table of the 1983 World Series of Poker Main Event in Nevada. He repeated this feat in 1991. In Europe he was the winner of the 2003 Poker Million tournament and was the first member voted into the European Poker Players Hall of Fame. His career tournament winnings reached $1,000,000 in 2009.