Leaderboard: Female All-Time Tournament Earnings

Despite a near complete shutdown of the live tournament poker world last year, Kristen Bicknell became just the third female poker player in history to surpass $5 million in lifetime tournament earnings. The 34-year-old Canadian cashed for $709,001 during 2020, by far the most of any female player on the circuit. As a result, she now sits with $5,434,472 in total cashes, putting her squarely in third place on the female all-time money list. Bicknell earned her third career World Series of Poker gold bracelet during the 2020 WSOP Online series, beating out a field of 892 entries in the $2,500 no-limit hold’em six-max event to win $356,412. In doing so, she became just the fourth female player to win three bracelets, joining the elite list alongside Barbara Enright, Nani Dollison, and all-time female earnings leader Vanessa Selbst.

Speaking of Selbst, the Yale Law School graduate still has more than a $5 million lead on Bicknell on this leaderboard, but has retired as a full-time poker player. She has only recorded four cashes in the last four years. Before leaving the poker world to work at an investment management firm, Selbst was active on the high roller scene, having won the $25,000 buy-in PokerStars Caribbean Adventure High Roller for $1.4 million. She also won the 2010 Partouche Poker Tour main event for $1.8 million, finished third in the PCA $100,000 High Roller for another $760,000, and won back-to-back NAPT main events at Mohegan Sun in 2010 and 2011.

Longtime professional grinder Kathy Leibert currently sits in second place with more than $6.3 million in total earnings. At 53-years-old, Liebert remains active on the tournament scene, having recorded another fifteen cashes in 2020 to bring her total to more than 350. She was the first woman to ever win a seven-figure prize, banking $1 million for winning the 2002 Party Poker Million. Liebert also has a bracelet of her own, taking down the $1,500 limit hold’em shootout at the 2004 WSOP, to go along with six World Poker Tour final table appearances.

Maria Ho and Maria Lampropulos joined Bicknell as the only female players inside the top ten to cash for six figures or more in 2020. Ho added $139,471 to her totals last year, including a deep run in the WSOP $10,000 buy-in main event that saw her finish 22nd in the ‘Domestic Tournament’ for $35,194. Lampropulos made two live final tables in January of 2020, including an eighth-place showing in the $10,300 buy-in MILLIONS United Kingdom main event for $100,000. The Argentinian player had previously won the main event of the MILLIONS UK in 2017 for $1,280,000, the largest score of her career.