A native of Queens, New York now living in a town just northeast of San Diego, California called Poway, Bob Buckenmayer (SoCalBuck on PocketFives) is a cash game player who found himself in the thick of the chase for the most coveted prize in all of poker. An avid golfer and traveler, he had never cashed at the World Series of Poker until the 2012 Main Event, where he finished in 17th place for $369,000.

In fact, Buckenmayer has about as sparse of a live tournament resume as you’ll see for someone who has been able to make such a deep run in the WSOP Main Event. He had just seven cashes to his name, none in tournaments with more than a $500 buy-in. He had never won a live event and had just $7,379 in earnings to his name until the biggest event in all of poker rolled around.

“SoCalBuck” placed 567th in the 2012 WSOP Senior’s Championship, missing out on his chance at his first WSOP cash when his pocket queens fell to his opponent’s A-K when the turn produced a king.

He fared much better in the Main Event, though, scooping one of the largest pots of Day 6 to vault himself to the top of the leaderboard with about 70 players remaining. About four hours into the day, Russell Thomasraised pre-flop to 100,000 chips, Buckenmayer 3bet to 235,000, and David Kluchman took it up to 400,000.

Thomas folded, but Buckenmayer stayed in the hand, calling the 4bet for 165,000 more. On the flop of 8-6-4, Kluchman bet 500,000 and Buckenmayer called. They both checked the 6 of spades on the turn, but Kluchman shoved all-in when the 3 of clubs fell on the river. Buckenmayer almost beat him to the pot, showing two black eights for a flopped set and turned full house.

Kluchman had Buckenmayer covered, so he wasn’t out, but he was definitely down, while Buckenmayer saw his stack soar to 5.985 million in chips.