‘Ultimate Sweat’
100 POUNDS LATER, FORMER LETHBRIDGE POKER PLAYER IS ON THE VERGE OF A MAJOR PAYDAY
I expect the next 18, 19 days to be the most difficult days of my life. Jaime Staples
Jaime Staples knows when to hold ’em, knows when to fold ’em, knows when to walk away ... and walk, and walk, and walk. The Lethbridge native, now an online poker sensation living in Malta, has hit the homestretch of a mind-numbing weight-loss prop bet that could see him and his younger brother, Matt, share in a $150,000 payday.
The goal is simple. The brothers need to weigh within a pound of each other on March 25 — bridging a 170pound gap from one year ago.
The challenge was laid by Bill Perkins, an avid American poker player and who gambling enthusiast
has amassed a fortune as a hedge fund manager. Perkins was hosting the brothers on his yacht in the Virgin Islands for a week of online poker broadcasts when the idea surfaced — could Jaime and Matt ever weigh the same.
Jaime weighed 305 pounds, Matt 134. Perkins, who has made six-figure prop bets in the past, immediately offered 50to-1 odds.
“I kind of just looked at Matt,” Jaime told Lane Anderson of Poker News last summer. “I knew immediately I was taking the bet, but I had to convince Matt pretty quickly to, like, ‘let’s shake the hand and let’s do this, right?’”
The brothers put up $3,000, and the race was on. For Jaime, months of diet control and extensive cardio work will culminate March 25, in perhaps the most celebrated weigh-in since the orchestrated Floyd Mayweather-Colin McGregor theatrics last summer in Las Vegas.
Along with regular poker-playing broadcasts to thousands of viewers on his Twitch online streaming channel, Jaime has live-streamed many of his exercise sessions online — they can also be found on YouTube — and last week he cracked the 200-pound barrier. Matt checked in at 185 pounds, leaving a 14pound separation with three weeks remaining.
“I feel (Matt) has made a big sacrifice,” says Jaime on his most recent video-log post, in the midst of a 21kilometre, zero-calorie day spent hiking the streets and beaches of Malta.
“He’s bulked up, but he wouldn’t have wanted to do it in the way he’s doing it ... he hates eating right now. So I really need to win this bet. For myself, I’m really motivated to win this bet, but also for him. I need that.”
The initial challenge was obvious. Jaime makes his living playing online poker tournaments and streams live video of his games five days a week, eight hours a day. While he has recently lived in Lethbridge, Calgary, Montreal, Europe, Costa Rica, and now Malta, playing regular sessions of online poker remains a very sedentary lifestyle.
Despite being a Team PokerStars ambassador, and earning the American Poker Award for Streamer of the Year last month, he admits the stress of fulltime poker led to food becoming a crutch.
“Stress sucks,” Jaime says in the video post. “But there is a way to be skinny, and stress free, too. You don’t have to lose weight as fast as I am.
“I felt totally helpless before I started this journey, but I’ve learned so much. I learned the skill-set to be able to execute a healthy lifestyle.”
Staples also credits YouTube fitness guru Mike Vacanti and his nutrition app for explaining the pros and cons of proteins, fats and carbs, and guiding him through necessary calorie counts during the weight-loss grind.
“At the end of this bet, the most effective way for me to lose weight fast is going to be cardio, long sustained walks, two- or three- or four-hour walks,” says Jaime.
“There’s so many opinions on how to do weight loss, so many different approaches. Intermittent fasting, vegan, vegetarian, a conventional sort of food pyramid which is like heavy carb-based, or a more modern food pyramid which is more fat and protein-based.
“The thing is, there are a lot of ways to get it done. At the end of the day, it’s how much energy you’re burning, and how much energy you’re taking in.”
Staples has also been taking in a lot of support. He has dubbed the prop bet as the “Ultimate Sweat” on Twitter, and draws regular encouragement from his 26,000-plus followers. He is able to share the highs and lows of the challenge alongside Matt, and another brother, Chris, who is on hand in Malta to help manage their activities and social media presence.
If the brothers win the bet, the financial payoff is obvious. But Jaime has already realized other changes in his life.
“There are so many things that change,” Jaime told Barry Carter of PokerStrategy.com in January. “Little things people don’t understand was a struggle.
“Walking through groups of people, I still hold my arms out wide because I’m used to it. I usually give people way too much room because I’m usually wider. Things like how the rest of the world interacts with me is totally different, I very much look normal now. Walking down the street you get more eye contact, previously people would be polite and look away so as not to insinuate something. You feel more like you are part of society.”
When cards fall your way at the poker table, it’s said the player “runs good.” For Staples, he walks even better. He recently enjoyed a European vacation that included stops in Rome, Vienna, Amsterdam and Iceland. He posted several video logs of his travels, often carrying a selfie-stick as he walked the endless narrow city streets and climbed the infamous Spanish steps in Rome — all while interacting live with thousands of social media followers.
“Walking around Rome, trying to avoid pasta ... in Italy,” he jokes at one point.
He shares his agony as he walks past restaurants that smell of fresh-baked garlic bread, and shares his wonder at how easily he can now slip into a beach chair.
He shares the highs of weight-barriers crossed, and the lows of mental beatdowns when the scale refuses to cooperate.
“This morning’s weigh-in wasn’t great,” he sighed last week. “Over 200, which is a stressful number to be at with 25 days left. Really frustrated because I had been working hard on my trip, going to the gym and stuff, but we haven’t made a lot of progress.
“I expect the next 18, 19 days to be the most difficult days of my life. I’m just going to be physically exhausted, and mentally really struggling, but you know what, it’s worth it, to win the bet, get $75K cash, and win the challenge.”
Win or lose, there is no question Staples is walking away a winner.