Howard Lederer was born into in a family of five where he loved betting on various card games at a young age. He discovered himself becoming very aggressive in these card games as he was competing against his father. After finishing secondary school, Howard decided to put higher education on hold for a little bit and headed to New York to compete in some serious chess. While playing chess, he was introduced to a poker game going on in the back of the room. Howard’s 1st two years were difficult as he played extensive hours and lost a majority of the time. He made some additional cash by becoming an runner for the poker players. He theorized he possibly could better his game by adjusting his life outside of poker. He made an attempt to get more sleep and focus attention more on poker.
The real improvement in his abilities happened when he started gambling at the Mayfair Club in New York. The Mayfair was a bridge and backgammon club where the best players would often wager against each other. He was able to access some of the best minds in chess. With their assistance, Howard would hone his logical thinking techniques. He applied these strategy concepts to the game of NL hold’em.
Howard also assisted his sister Annie Duke master poker. Annie was a superb student of the game as she would always be asking questions about how to make the proper decision. He told Annie Duke to move out to Las Vegas and play in the World Series of Poker tournaments. She is one of the best female players the poker arena has ever seen. He moved to Sin City in 1993 and played money games for the subsequent 10 years. When the WPT gained popularity, he made the decision to compete in more tournaments.