- Tom Vu
Infobox poker player
imagesize = 150px
firstname=Tommy
lastname=Vu
nickname=Tommy
|caption=
hometown=Orlando, Florida
wsop bracelet count= "None"
wsop money finishes=6
wsop main event best finish rank=22nd
wsop main event best finish year=2005
wpt titles= "None"
wpt final tables=1
wpt money finishes=1Tuan "Tommy" Vu is a
Vietnamese-American poker player,real estate investor and speaker best remembered as aninfomercial personality in the late 1980s and early 1990s.Infomercial career
His late night infomercials featured Vu surrounded by luxury items: mansions, yachts, expensive cars and most visibly, collections of young bikini clad women. He promoted his free 90-minute seminar to learn the same secrets he used to make millions. As a Vietnamese immigrant, he presented himself as the classical 'rags to riches' story.
Vu's investment theory involved finding "distressed" properties: foreclosures, bankruptcies, divorces, tax liens, and selling them at a profit.
Vu's somewhat loose grasp of the English language and his use of beautiful models as backdrops made him one of the more humorous and memorable personalities of the infomercial genre.
Formerly of
Longwood, Florida and later,California resident, Vu has retired from real estate and lives inLas Vegas, Nevada .Professional poker career
He does continue his parallel career as a tournament poker player. As of 2008, he has won more than $1,300,000 in casino poker tournaments, including a second place finish in a no limit
Texas hold 'em event at the2007 World Series of Poker and a 22nd place finish at the2005 World Series of Poker championship event. [ [http://pokerdb.thehendonmob.com/player.php?a=r&n=30206 Hendon Mob Poker Database: Tuan "Tommy" Vu] ]In April 2006, he finished ninth in the Season Five
World Poker Tour championship event, earning $216,585.Quotes
*"Are you man enough to get off your lazy American ass and go to Vu’s seminars?" [http://observer.bard.edu/articles/opinions/141]
*"A lot of your friends will tell you, 'Don't come to the seminar. It's a get-rich-quick plan.' Well, tell them, it is a get-rich-quick plan because life is too short to get rich slow."
*"Tom Vu says his system is different than other experts'."
*"Okay. You've seen me make a lot of money. You've seen my students who are average people make a lot of money. Isn't is about time for you to go out and make a lot of money?"
*"There's two kinds of work in America: hard work and smart work. Which one are you doing now?"
*"This is not a country club! This is my house!"
*"Today I'm gonna show you how to drive a sports car. First, you need a lot of money!"
*"Don't listen to your friends. They're losers!"
*"Do you think these girls like me? NO, they like my money!"
*"At first I got lots of discouragement from friends and stranger who are loser! You know what these people kept telling me? They kept saying, 'Well Tom Vu, you a crazy nut, here you are, a poor immigrant, poor minority, speak no English, no contact, on and on, and you trying to be rich in America! You crazy, man! Look at people out there! They smarter than you are, they not even rich! Who are you to try?' And you know what? I have to keep telling these people every time, I kept saying, 'You are loser! Get out of my way! I make it somehow!'" [http://youtube.com/watch?v=rPyrx7d1h7A]Notes
External links
* [http://infomercial.tvheaven.com/tomvu.htm Tom Vu] at tvheaven
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYqDS9i8zJw Video clip] of classic Tom Vu infomercial atYouTube
* [http://www.infomercial-hell.com/blog/2006/06/22/hard-time-in-prison-for-tom-vu/ Hard Time in Prison for Tom Vu?]
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