Dan Bilzerian who earned $1million from a poker game has just returned from a celebratory trip to the Mexican resort of Puerta Vallarta: ‘We loaded a bunch of girls on a plane and went down there.
‘We went zip-lining, rented a yacht, got some baby Bengal tigers and some monkeys at the house. It cost like $10,000.’
With a roar of laughter he adds: ‘One of the tigers bit one of the girls – bit her tit! Thankfully, I didn’t have to buy new implants.’
Welcome to what passes for ordinary in Bilzerian’s most extraordinary life. #See more flamboyant lifestyle photos after the cut...
They are packed with mounds of cash, guns, guns and more guns (he has a grenade launcher in his Vegas pad), supercars with license plates reading ‘SUCK IT’ and ‘MR GOAT’ and girls, nubile, cosmetically enhanced and overdressed if wearing both halves of a bikini.
He turned 33 last week and he doesn’t know what he wants to be when he grows up. He says: ‘I’m like a big kid. But it’s not like a called myself the Instagram King. I put up what people want to see and that just happened.’
Bilzerian sits expansively on an over-sized couch in his vast sunken living room. He is flanked by a marble-topped bar, stocked with every liquor imaginable and featuring a tap shaped like an upturned revolver.
He reflects: ‘Basically I didn’t get a ton of attention as a kid, I guess that’s why I’m such a flashy lunatic.’ Pop psychology perhaps but, he admits: ‘There’s some truth to it.’
Because if Bilzerian’s life today is unpredictable and wild, it is positively stable compared to his childhood and youth.
Born in St Petersburg, Florida, Bilzerian is the eldest of two sons. His brother, Adam, two years his junior is also a professional gambler.
His father Paul, married his Stanford sweetheart Terri Steffen, moved with her to Florida in 1978 and embarked on a career as a corporate raider. He made millions and he made headlines. He took over Singer and the Hammermill Paper Company, cannibalized companies and was worth more than $40million by the age of 36.
And in 1988 he was indicted by a grand jury on charges including tax and security frauds.
Bilzerian was eight years old. He remembers: ‘Tampa was a small town and he was front page news every single day.
‘All the kids in school taunted me, “Your dad’s going to jail,” and I believed my parents when they said no it wouldn’t happen. Then one day I was driving into school with him, which was weird because my mom always took us. And he was like, “yeah, I’m going to jail.” That was kind of a s***y time.’
The childhood that Bilzerian describes is one of extremes. His father lavished his family with material wealth – he built a 44,000 sq ft house in Tampa complete with indoor basketball court, three pool tables, a pool with a slide and mountain made of volcanic rock and a batting cage in the backyard with a major league pitching machine.
‘It was like a kid's paradise,’ Bilzerian recalls. ‘Except he was never flashy with clothes, cars or watches or all the stuff I kind of am now.’
He says he wants a child in five years and if marriage is part of the deal he’ll take it.
Bilzerian sits expansively on an over-sized couch in his vast sunken living room. He is flanked by a marble-topped bar, stocked with every liquor imaginable and featuring a tap shaped like an upturned revolver.
He reflects: ‘Basically I didn’t get a ton of attention as a kid, I guess that’s why I’m such a flashy lunatic.’ Pop psychology perhaps but, he admits: ‘There’s some truth to it.’
Because if Bilzerian’s life today is unpredictable and wild, it is positively stable compared to his childhood and youth.
Born in St Petersburg, Florida, Bilzerian is the eldest of two sons. His brother, Adam, two years his junior is also a professional gambler.
His father Paul, married his Stanford sweetheart Terri Steffen, moved with her to Florida in 1978 and embarked on a career as a corporate raider. He made millions and he made headlines. He took over Singer and the Hammermill Paper Company, cannibalized companies and was worth more than $40million by the age of 36.
And in 1988 he was indicted by a grand jury on charges including tax and security frauds.
Bilzerian was eight years old. He remembers: ‘Tampa was a small town and he was front page news every single day.
‘All the kids in school taunted me, “Your dad’s going to jail,” and I believed my parents when they said no it wouldn’t happen. Then one day I was driving into school with him, which was weird because my mom always took us. And he was like, “yeah, I’m going to jail.” That was kind of a s***y time.’
The childhood that Bilzerian describes is one of extremes. His father lavished his family with material wealth – he built a 44,000 sq ft house in Tampa complete with indoor basketball court, three pool tables, a pool with a slide and mountain made of volcanic rock and a batting cage in the backyard with a major league pitching machine.
‘It was like a kid's paradise,’ Bilzerian recalls. ‘Except he was never flashy with clothes, cars or watches or all the stuff I kind of am now.’
He says he wants a child in five years and if marriage is part of the deal he’ll take it.
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