The Scoop -- Ted Forrest

Ted Forrest has more than $5.6 million in tournament cashes, he played in the biggest cash game of all time against Andy Beal, and he is known to have made some very interesting proposition bets during his long career as a poker pro. He recently stopped by The Scoop studio to discuss a recent prop bet that has the poker world talking.

Diego Cordovez: We want to talk about poker, but first of all, you just concluded an amazing feat, which was betting $2 million on your ability to lose 50 pounds, which sounds extremely dangerous and terrifying.

Ted Forrest: It was like 45 pounds.

Adam Schoenfeld: A mere trifle.

DC: Oh, OK; let’s move on to something else, then; 45 pounds in four or five months …

TF: It doesn’t sound like that much when you put it like that.

DC: It sounds like a lot, because in our world of poker, there are a few gentlemen who are large, and for them to lose 45 pounds would be reasonable, but you are a normal-sized adult, not obese; I mean, you weighed what, 180 or 190 when you started this?

TF: Yeah, about 185.

DC: So, what were the circumstances?

TF: Well, Matusow came into the Commerce drinking, and was talking about the weight bet where he lost 60 pounds. I think he was 245 pounds, and I bet him that he couldn’t get down to 181 pounds. Somehow, that morphed into me getting down to 140 pounds. So, I took 20-to-1 on it, a million against $50,000, that I could do it by July 15 of this year, and another million against $100,000 that I could do it by Sept. 24, but I just had to weigh in once to win both bets.

DC: Did you get medical counseling and a nutritionist, or did you just stop eating?

TF: I actually learned a lot about it. I spoke to nutritionists, but I didn’t really trust the doctors in Las Vegas too much.

DC: Did the nutritionists warn you that this could be detrimental to your health?

TF: Actually, I lost the weight pretty evenly and slowly. It came off at about 2 pounds every three days.

DC: That’s a lot.

TF: Well, that was after I started pushing it. I attacked it in two stages. First, I went from 185 to 163 just by eating less and exercising more. I was 163 for a number of years in my life, so that was like a plateau point where I seemed to stick for a week or so. The second half was harder, where I really kicked it into high gear. I started having three-a-day workout sessions, two hours a day, and walked 15 miles at night. That’s when the pounds really started coming off at about 2 pounds every three days.

AS: Can you discuss, in general, your philosophy on proposition betting? Because, as I’ve said to Diego and other people many times, you’re not a locksmith; you will lose a prop bet, also.

TF: I’ve actually lost my last three or four weight bets, not betting on myself but betting against other people.

AS: You give a lot of action.

TF: That is the nature of a bet; it should be close. There should be opinions on both sides.

DC: There are people who are known for prop betting, but they really are in essence hustlers, because they always have the best of it and have always figured it out. But you have been around for like 20 years now …

TF: I’ll tell you what, I am so overrated, it’s not even funny. A couple of years ago, Nick Schulman and I were having a couple of drinks, and all of a sudden, I came up with, you know, Nick’s not the fastest guy in the world; I’ll race him in a 50-yard dash with a 100-pound person on my back. Now, about three seconds after saying this, I realized that I was drawing dead. So, I said to him, “And I’m going to retract that offer after 60 seconds.” And all the while I’m praying, “Please say no, please say no!” And he said, “Nah, I’m pretty slow. I better not.”