Katie Stone

Katie Stone's interest in strategic games began when she started playing chess at a young age. Eventually, Katie began organizing chess camps for kids, stating, "Chess had been a positive part of my life and I understood the skills I'd learned had helped me in other areas of life, so I decided to try and create a chess camp that was fun - one that kids would love going to just as much as the basketball camps I had attended only a few years earlier."

It was during a chess camp in 2004 that Katie learned poker from some of the instructors at the camp. She took a liking to the game and began participating in local and home games in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, actively improving as she played more and more. With the thought that her chess background would serve as a solid foundation, Katie turned her attention to poker tournaments.

A bumpy start turned into Katie taking a break from poker, but things picked back up quite a bit in 2008 and 2009 when she was traveling a lot and playing. By the time 2010 rolled around, Katie was playing online poker tournaments full time and having success doing so. Poker's "Black Friday" struck in April 2011 and put a halt to Katie's online poker playing, causing her to relocate first to Las Vegas to play live poker and then to Rosarito, Mexico, in 2012 where she began playing online poker again. Once online poker became legal and regulated in her home state of New Jersey, Katie moved back to the Garden State in 2014 and made a living playing online there. During this time Katie served as a team pro ambassador for partypokerUS and a sponsored pro for Borgata Poker.

Katie's journey in poker didn't come without its obstacles. Throughout all of the curveballs thrown her way, she has successfully maneuvered the path of her career and has been doing so for nearly two decades.