DAVIDI KITAI

Last Updated on July 6, 2026 by Bala Kumar

Davidi Kitai is a Belgian professional poker player and one of only a handful of players in history to complete poker’s “Triple Crown” , winning a WSOP bracelet, a WPT title, and an EPT title. Best known as the first Belgian to ever win a WSOP gold bracelet, Kitai has built a tournament resume spanning nearly two decades, with career earnings that place him comfortably among the world’s top 150 all-time money winners.

$11.9M+ Total Live Earnings 3 WSOP Bracelets 1 WPT Title 1 EPT Title 1 of ~10 Players to Win the Triple Crown #1 Belgium All-Time Money List 145th All-Time Money List (Global, 2026)

Davidi Kitai Quick Facts

Category	Info
Full Name	Davidi Jacob Kitai
Alias	“legrouzin” (PokerStars); Kitbul (X)
Born	Sept 28, 1979 · Antwerp, Belgium
Nationality	Belgian
Residence	St. Julian’s, Malta
WSOP Bracelets	3 (all hold’em)
WPT / EPT Titles	1 each — Triple Crown winner
Live Earnings	$11.9M+ (Hendon Mob, 2026)
Biggest Cash	$930,816 — EPT Berlin (2012)
All-Time Rank	#1 Belgium · 145th global

Biography

Davidi Kitai was born on September 28, 1979, in Antwerp, Belgium, and later relocated to Brussels, where he built the foundation of his adult life before poker ever entered the picture. As a kid, his ambition wasn’t cards at all—it was football. He played on an amateur level for lower-tier Belgian clubs until he was 20, chasing a dream that eventually gave way to more practical pursuits.

That practical path led him to university, where he earned a degree in economics. After graduating at 22, Kitai did what many young Europeans do to sharpen their English: he moved to Los Angeles with friends. During that trip, he discovered Texas Hold’em and returned to Brussels with a new passion. For a while, he tried to build a business around it by running both a physical and online retail store, but the venture didn’t work out. Poker, however, did.

Kitai started grinding online cash games, first at limit hold’em before shifting into multi-table tournaments around 2006, marking the beginning of his professional poker career. His first recorded live cash came that September at EPT Barcelona, where he earned €1,420 in a €550 event. By December, he had captured the Euro Finals of Poker title in Paris for €30,610, providing early proof that he could compete on the live circuit.

The real breakthrough came in 2008. After cashing the WSOP Main Event and making several deep runs, including a sixth-place finish worth $120,693 in a $5,000 No-Limit Hold’em event, Kitai captured the $2,000 Pot-Limit Hold’em bracelet for $244,583. The victory made him the first Belgian to win a WSOP gold bracelet, establishing him as the country’s leading poker figure, a position he has maintained throughout his career.

Career Timeline

Year	Key Career Milestone
2003	Discovered Texas Hold’em while in Los Angeles improving his English.
2006	Turned professional after breakthrough online MTT results; first live cash at EPT Barcelona.
2007	First trip to the WSOP; crashes the Main Event.
2008	Wins the $2,000 Pot-Limit Hold’em event at the WSOP for $244,583, first-ever Belgian WSOP bracelet. Also finished 3rd at EPT Barcelona Main Event for €455,000.
2009	4th place, WSOP $10,000 Pot-Limit Hold’em World Championship, $183,638.
2011	Wins WPT Celebrity Invitational for $100,000 (later ratified as an official WPT title).
2012	Wins EPT Berlin Main Event for €712,000 (~$930,816) — his career-best live cash and first EPT title. Completes poker’s Triple Crown.
2013	Wins 2nd WSOP bracelet: $5,000 Pot-Limit Hold’em, defeating Cary Katz heads-up for $224,560.
2014	Wins 3rd WSOP bracelet: $3,000 NLH Six-Handed event, defeating Gordon Vayo heads-up for $508,640. Also 3rd place, EPT Monte Carlo High Roller, $728,692.
2015	Runner-up, WSOP Europe €25,600 NLH High Roller, Berlin, €342,620.
2016	Runner-up, WSOP $10,000 NLH Six-Handed Championship, losing heads-up to Martin Kozlov for $411,441.
2018	Wins partypoker MILLIONS Barcelona Grand Final for $857,980. Also wins the €25K Super High Roller at partypoker Millions Barcelona (€700,000).
2020	Wins the $10,300 Super MILLION$ Main Event on GGPoker/Natural8 for $726,839, defeating a final table that included Niklas Åstedt.
2023	Career live earnings surpass $10 million (per PokerNews, June 2023).
2025–2026	Continued active play across the EPT, WSOP, and regional festivals; multiple cashes recorded through May 2026, pushing total live earnings past $11.9 million.

Poker’s Triple Crown

Completing poker’s “Triple Crown”, winning at least one WSOP bracelet, one WPT title, and one EPT title, is one of the rarest feats in the game. Depending on which titles are officially recognized, only around nine or ten players have ever done it, a group that has included names like Gavin Griffin, Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier, Jake Cody, and Roland de Wolfe. Kitai’s place on that list came with a bit of controversy attached: his WPT credential came from the Celebrity Invitational event, a made-for-TV charity tournament rather than a traditional open-field Main Event, and critics argued the field was weaker than a standard WPT stop. The WPT itself settled the debate by officially recognizing the Invitational as a sanctioned Main Event, and the Triple Crown claim has stood ever since. It’s worth knowing this backstory if you ever see the achievement disputed in poker forums,  the short version is that the record books and the tour itself both side with Kitai.

WSOP Bracelet Wins

1st | 2008 , $2,000 Pot-Limit Hold’em | $2,000 | $244,583 (first-ever Belgian WSOP bracelet winner) 2nd | 2013, $5,000 Pot-Limit Hold’em | $5,000 | $224,560 (defeated Cary Katz heads-up) 3rd | 2014,  $3,000 NLH Six-Handed | $3,000 | $508,640 (defeated Gordon Vayo heads-up)

All three of Kitai’s bracelets came in hold’em variants,  two in pot-limit and one in no-limit six-handed play, and all three were won heads-up against recognizable opposition, which says something about his composure once a tournament gets short-handed. He also came agonizingly close to a fourth bracelet in 2016, finishing runner-up in the $10,000 Six-Handed Championship for $411,441.

Top 5 Career Cashes

Date	Event	Place	Prize (USD)
April 2012	EPT Berlin Main Event	1st	$930,816
April 2018	partypoker MILLIONS Barcelona Grand Final	1st	$857,980
April 2014	EPT Monte Carlo High Roller	3rd	$728,692
November 2020	GGPoker Super MILLION$ ($10,300)	1st	$726,839
September 2008	EPT Barcelona Main Event	3rd	$649,036

Recent Tournament Results (2026)

Event	Place	Prize
2026 World Series of Poker,  Event #83: $1,500 Double Board Bomb Pot Pot-Limit Omaha	70th	$4,881
2026 World Series of Poker,  Event #79: $3,000 Freezeout No-Limit Hold’em	178th	$6,310
2026 Estoril Poker Fest, €500 Main Event	315th	€1,000
2026 PokerStars EPT Monte-Carlo, €25,000 EPT High Roller	30th	€41,300
2026 PokerStars EPT Monte-Carlo,  €2,700 PokerStars Open High Roller	4th	€121,200

Even outside the marquee wins, Kitai’s 2026 schedule shows exactly what a veteran grinder’s year looks like: a deep run and a big score at EPT Monte Carlo’s high roller side event, a near-miss at the flagship high roller, and a handful of smaller cashes that don’t move the needle on earnings but keep him active across the circuit. That mix of “one big score, several minor ones” is fairly typical of a career built on live-tournament grinding rather than a single dominant format.

Tour-by-Tour Breakdown

Tour	Cashes	Winnings	Titles	Final Tables
World Series of Poker (WSOP)	76	$3,201,083	3	10
European Poker Tour (EPT)	22	$2,034,025	1	2
World Poker Tour (WPT)	5	$195,297	1	1
All Tours & Events Combined	221–244 (source-dependent)	$11,672,276–$11,946,167	14 total tournament wins	—

Note on figures: Kitai’s exact cash count and total earnings vary slightly (by roughly $200,000–$300,000 and 5–10 cashes) depending on whether the source is Hendon Mob or CardPlayer, and whether recurring/non-headline events are included. As of the most recent update in May 2026, Hendon Mob lists $11,917,952 in verified live earnings across 244 cashes, while CardPlayer’s database, which also credits some online events under real-name results,  lists $11,946,167 across 221 cashes. Either figure places him solidly inside the global top 150 all-time.

All-Time Money List Context (2026)

Kitai has held the #1 position on Belgium’s all-time money list for well over a decade, with a lead over the next-closest Belgian player (Pierre Neuville) of several million dollars. Globally, he sits around 145th on Hendon Mob’s all-time list as of 2026, a solid standing for a player from a country with a comparatively small live tournament pool, and a ranking built almost entirely on deep, repeated cashes rather than one outsized score. Unlike high-roller specialists whose rankings hinge on a handful of seven-figure wins, Kitai’s total is the product of nearly 20 years of consistent grinding across WSOP, EPT, WPT, and independent festival stops.

Playing Style & Strengths

Kitai doesn’t have the same public “solver-nerd” reputation that defines some of the younger high-roller regulars, but his longevity tells its own story. A few things stand out about how he plays:

Heads-up composure. All three of his WSOP bracelets, plus his EPT Berlin title, were sealed in heads-up play against legitimate, live-circuit-tested opponents. That’s not a coincidence, it points to a player who is comfortable narrowing his focus to one opponent and making bold, well-timed calls, like the famous king-five hero call that broke the EPT Berlin final table open in his favor.

Format versatility. Kitai’s biggest cashes span pot-limit hold’em, no-limit hold’em, six-max, full-ring, and even online formats on GGPoker. Rather than specializing narrowly, he’s built a career on being competent enough across formats to keep cashing wherever the schedule takes him.

Longevity over peak. He’s never had a single season that rivals poker’s most explosive individual years, but few players from his generation have sustained relevance in both live and select online formats for close to two decades. That’s arguably harder to do than winning one enormous score and disappearing from leaderboards afterward.

Cash game roots. Before tournaments became his primary income, Kitai cut his teeth in online cash games, particularly pot-limit Omaha and limit hold’em. That cash-game background likely explains his comfort navigating deep-stacked pot-limit tournament formats, where PLO-style pot-sizing instincts translate well.

Personal Life & Public Presence

Kitai now resides in St. Julian’s, Malta, a well-known relocation destination for European professional poker players due to its favorable tax treatment and its role as a hub for online poker operators. He remains a long-standing member of Team Winamax, the sponsored roster tied to the French-founded poker operator, and has represented the brand at events across Europe and the Caribbean for over a decade, including regular appearances at Winamax-sponsored festivals like the PSC Bahamas series.

Away from the table, Kitai’s background as a trained economic analyst is a detail that resurfaces often in profiles of him — it’s part of why some poker commentators describe his game as methodical rather than instinctive, shaped by someone who spent years thinking about risk professionally before ever sitting down at a card table for a living.

Platform	Handle / Profile	Content Focus
Twitter / X	@Kitbul	Tournament updates, Team Winamax content, French and English language
Team	Team Winamax	Long-tenured sponsored professional
Poker Databases	Hendon Mob, CardPlayer, GPI	Full tournament history and rankings

Current Status in 2026

As of mid-2026, Davidi Kitai remains an active player on the international circuit, with cashes recorded as recently as May 2026. His 2026 schedule has included EPT Monte Carlo (where he made a run to 4th place in the PokerStars Open High Roller for €121,200), several WSOP events in Las Vegas, and smaller festival stops like the Estoril Poker Fest in Portugal. Now in his mid-40s  of life, Kitai shows no signs of a Bonomo-style semi-retirement — he continues to play a full, multi-continent tournament schedule.

Why Davidi Kitai’s Career Matters

• First player in history to win a WSOP gold bracelet for Belgium (2008)
• One of only around nine or ten players ever to complete poker’s Triple Crown (WSOP + WPT + EPT titles)
• Three WSOP bracelets across three hold’em disciplines, all sealed heads-up
• Belgium’s all-time money list leader by a wide margin, for well over a decade running
• Nearly two decades of continuous tournament relevance, from his first cash in 2006 to active 2026 results
• A rare crossover success story,  strong in both live tournaments and select high-stakes online formats (GGPoker Super MILLION$ win in 2020)

Social Media Links

Platform	Link
Twitter / X	https://twitter.com/kitbul
Instagram	https://www.instagram.com/davidikitai_officiel/
Official Winamax Bio	https://www.winamax.es/en/team-winamax_davidi-kitai

Final Summary

Davidi Kitai’s story doesn’t have the single explosive peak that defines some of poker’s most famous careers,  there’s no one calendar year that dwarfs everything else he’s done. What he has instead is rare consistency: an amateur football career that never developed into a professional one , an economics degree that mostly stayed on the shelf, and a poker career that has quietly compounded into one of the most complete resumes to come out of continental Europe. Three WSOP bracelets, an EPT title, a WPT title, and a Triple Crown that took the tour’s official recognition to fully settle, all built by a player who has kept showing up, year after year, long after many of his 2008-era peers stepped away. In 2026, still active and still cashing, Kitai remained both Belgium’s greatest tournament export and a reminder that longevity in poker is its own kind of achievement.

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