Glen Adams suffered a heart attack at the final table of a poker tournament in December 2023 in Lethbridge.
After this life-changing event, Adams created LearnPoker4STARS, which is a poker education video that supports STARS Air Ambulance.
Adams, who has lived in Lethbridge since 2007, says one of his friends, who knows CPR, saw him in distress and put him down on the floor and “brought me back.”
“STARS came down, flew me up to Calgary, and I had a stent put in.”
Adams even had some chips left at the table where he was seated. “When I came back, I had an envelope waiting for me at the casino with some money in it. So that was cool too.”
After the incident, Adams sat down and thought about how poker has been good to him over the years. “I’ve had some pretty good results in tournaments across the country. I thought, I need to give back to STARS some way.”
Eventually, Adams came up with the idea of helping new and immediate poker players with an online course. “It took me about two or three months.”
Some of the funds from each video sale will go towards STARS.
“We’re now hosting the first STARS Charity Poker Tournament at PURE Casino Lethbridge Dec. 14 with a 3 p.m. start,” Adams notes.
Adams adds the idea is to organize charity poker tournaments throughout the areas where STARS has a footprint to raise awareness and funds. “There’ll be a STARS representative here playing in it.”
Adams believes STARS provides a great service for multiple health-related problems, accidents and emergencies. “I’m just very fortunate to have them be a part of helping me. I’d love to give back to them in some way.”
More information is available online at learnpoker4stars.ca.
“They’ll see the tournament information on there and a little bit of history about the event and the website. And if they’ve got friends that like poker or want to give a gift to somebody, I’ve got the video for sale online they can give for a Christmas present,” Adams notes.
