There’s good news and bad news for Kevin Martin on his 24/7 live-streaming bankroll challenge. The good news is he’s reached 100,000 YouTube subscribers. But the bad news is he’s only about 20% of the way to his $5,000 online poker goal after 13 days.
Martin, a reality TV star who appeared on Poker After Dark: Game of Gold and twice on Big Brother Canada, is attempting to go from $0 to $5,000 playing poker online, and he’s live-streaming every last minute of his daily routine, making this one of the more unique bankroll challenges ever.
Grinding Through the Tough Poker Sessions
The GGPoker ambassador, who is playing on the poker site in Canada he represents, abandoned his entire bankroll, pawned off a few items to get a bit of a bankroll started, and has since been grinding micro and low stakes cash games and tournaments. And it’s going about as one would expect — plenty of ups and downs, good days, bad days, and a difficult but doable road ahead.
Through now just over 13 days and more than 330 hours since he first turned on the Twitch camera, Martin has built a bankroll up to just a few bucks under $1,000. He has yet to finish a day above the four-figure mark, and it’s been a battle to inch closer to his goal. But he’s only a few deep tournament runs away from completing the challenge, which of course can happen at any time.
Martin, an experienced streamer, has seen a massive uptick in YouTube subscribers since he began the bankroll challenge nearly two weeks ago, going from around 87,000 to 101,000 subscribers. Each day since the beginning of the challenge, his team, which includes PokerNews veteran live reporter Adam Lamers, has uploaded a recap video.
On Twitch, Martin’s viewership has also been strong, with over 1,200 fans watching throughout most of the day, and he cracked 2,700 concurrent viewers during a recent stream. The “KevinMartin” Twitch channel has nearly 140,000 followers.
Martin’s hourly rate thus far in the bankroll challenge is under $4, about one-third of what he’d make flipping burgers at Mickey D’s. But the online poker grind seems more appealing, and at least he doesn’t have to deal with angry customers complaining about cold fries or the ice cream machine being broken (is it ever not?).
Plus, he could spike up that hourly wage quickly with just one heater. Will it happen this week? Tune in to Martin’s Twitch channel to find out.