Things you might not know:
- Ulliot was unmotivated in school and left when he was 15, taking his first job making trophies.
- Ulliot got into picking horses and was eventually fired from his job for taking an afternoon off to go to the races.
- Ulliot, around 19, became involved in a safe-cracking team that targeted tobacconists and garages.
- Ulliot was eventually caught and sent to prison for nine months. Soon after his release he was caught again for armed robbery.Upon his release, after a failed job at a timber yard, he fell in again with safe-cracking, while working as a bouncer and gambler.
- Ulliot was arrested again at 28 for a nightclub fight, served 18 months and befriended a criminal who wanted him for a bank robbery upon his release. The day for the robbery came, but he was arrested again and informed by the criminal's wife to go straight. He met his second wife soon after and seemed to leave his life of crime behind permanently.
- Ulliot, around 1990, became involved in high stakes home games against top players like Dave Colclough, John Shipley and Lucy Rokach.
- Ulliot carried a gun with him to private games, once firing it in the air to scare off some opponents who were planning to rob him of the money he had won from them.
- Ulliot's close buddy Whitaker labeled him the Devilfish in response to fans calling out support for his opponent Men " The Master" Nguyen in the 1997 Four Queens Poker Classic tournament he won.
- Ulliot had an eventful 1997 World Series of Poker, losing the $200k he brought, losing another $70k he borrowed before winning his bracelet and the $168k first prize. Using that momentum he would go on to kill the PLO cash games and end up with $742k in cash to take home where he was met by a standing ovation at his regular Leeds casino by his usual opponents.
- Ulliot has come close to winning a second WSOP bracelet finishing second in events in 1998, 2000, and 2001, each time being eliminated while holding Aces.
- Ulliot has become a jeweler over the years, often designing many of his own pieces.
- Ulliot has always preferred four card poker, seeing No Limit Hold'em as a game of much more luck.
- Ulliot is also an accomplished musician, playing both the guitar and piano, and a singer.
- Ulliot is the co-author with Des Wilson of his biography Swimming with the Devilfish.
Dave "Devilfish" Ulliot is one of the true characters of the game. He came from a rough and tumble background that has made his later poker success in life all the more legendary. He is a firm believer of the maxim that one must play hard both on and off the table to fully enjoy life.
Ulliot video interviews discussing his career, an EPT event, and a WSOP event:
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