The Tribune

A BUDDHIST poker player who won more than half a million dollars at a tournament at the Atlantis resort last week plans to give it all away.

Scott Wellenbach, a 67-year-old Canadian, won $671,240 at the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure tournament last week and said he will donate the winnings, as he always does.

According to Canadian news outlet CBC, Mr Wellenbach, who works as a translator of Buddhist documents, has a deal with the “poker gods” who allow him to win games as long as he donates the winnings.

He finished third in the tournament on January 16 and meditates before playing.

“I’ve been able to do so much better than really my ability or my experience would warrant. I’ve been so fortunate,” he told Maritime Noon last week.

“The deal that I have with them ... has been an excellent one and I will do nothing to change it. I might start losing.”

CBC also reported his donations over the years are into the hundreds of thousands of dollars; he has donated to Doctors Without Borders as well as Canadian groups, among others.

The outlet said Mr Wellenbach won six figures in a tournament in Barcelona two years ago and pledged much of it to a Buddhist nunnery in Nepal.

“I would say the world could use a lot more of that at the moment everywhere. And if women receive an education such that they can assume positions of significance in the world I think we all might be better off,” he told CBC.