Before the 2011 WSOP, Brian Rast was a little known poker player outside of the Las Vegas scene. Sure he had some decent live tournament stats and was a well known online player, but the average person was much more likely to take note of his Smurfish features rather than recognize his poker accomplishments. However, all of this has changed in a big way since Rast is the only multi-bracelet winner in the 2011 WSOP.

One of the people Rast can thank for his multiple bracelet wins is Antonio Esfandiari since the “Magician” talked the 29-year-old into playing the $1,500 Pot-Limit Omaha tourney he won. Rast had just gotten home from a month-long vacation in Brazil, and he had no intention of playing in this tournament until Esfandiari not only talked him into playing, but also paid his buy-in. Just a few days later, Rast earned his first gold bracelet and $227,232 after defeating Allen Kessler heads-up to win the tourney.

Moving to his second bracelet win in the $50k Players Championship, Rast needed quite a bit of luck to deny Phil Hellmuth his 12th bracelet win after the Poker Brat made Rast go all-in three different times. But the Poway, California native survived all three coin flips, and went on to defeat Hellmuth en route to a $1.72 million first place prize.

With his two bracelet wins, Rast now has $2,710,069 in career winnings, and he is likely headed for a top 5 finish in the 2011 WSOP Player of the Year standings; Hellmuth looks to have the title locked up at this point.

Antonin Teisseire has capped a French invasion at the 2011 WSOP, which has included 4 bracelet wins for France. This is more than double the three gold bracelets that the nation had won in the previous 40+ years of the WSOP.

So what’s the catalyst behind this French poker revolution? Teisseire believes it’s merely France’s time as he said, “It’s because of variance. We did not do so well in previous years. But we are supposed to win a lot this year.”

In addition to explaining why France has become a poker power all of the sudden, Teisseire also revealed himself to be a wine-guzzling, vineyard-lurking French stereotype by saying, “I have a lot of friends. I like to eat. I like good food. I like to party. And, I don’t like to work.” He continued by offering, “If eating, drinking and partying were my sport, I’d be the Phil Ivey of the game.”

Teisseire now has an extra $825,604 to put towards his sports of partying and drinking. In addition to this, he has earned over $1,469,390 in total winnings.

Platinum blonde-haired freak Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier earned his first WSOP bracelet after claiming victory in the Event #21 Seven Card Stud Championship. Grospellier cashed for $331,639 after outlasting 126 players -many of whom were the top Stud players in the world. What’s really interesting about this point is that the Frenchman had never even played the game of Stud before his title run.

Amid being compared to Lady Gaga by the WSOP reporters, Grospellier discussed his big win with them by saying, “As my friend pushed me to play, he said I had a really good memory for the cards so I can analyze the cards and the combination.”

He completed the thought by saying, “I think I caught up quickly and all the poker games are all similar. It’s about reading your opponents and adapting to the situation. Of course I have a lack of experience but sometimes I think it (helped) me because I was playing really aggressive, and getting my opponents to fold in some spots where they’re not supposed to fold.”

Another really important thing worth mentioning is that Grospellier added a WSOP bracelet along with his EPT and WPT titles. Going further, this means ElkY joins a limited list of triple crown winners who have accomplished the same feat. The other players who’ve won all three titles include Jake Cody (also won a 2011 WSOP bracelet), Roland De Wolfe and Gavin Griffin.