One of the year's hottest tournament poker players you probably never heard of is a grandmother from Las Vegas who craves competition and respect at the felt more than the money.

"I'm just getting started," said Becky Makar, 65. "It has taken me all this time to get past the things you have to do in life. Now I want to have fun."

Her idea of fun has caused plenty of consternation for opponents on the tournament circuit so far in 2008, especially for macho young guns out there who, as she put it, "don't like getting beaten by a senior-aged woman."

Her latest triumph is a case in point.

Down to the final five in the recent 145-player Horseshoe Poker Classic main event in Council Bluffs, Iowa, she had just 172,000 chips left. Her four young male opponents, each holding about a million chips, nixed the idea of a prize-money "chop" that would have secured a nice profit for everyone.

"They were absolutely intimidating," Becky said. "They had fans chanting for them, while all I had cheering for me was a homeless-looking guy." But she wasn't about to give up.

Also in her corner was her tournament-traveling partner and poker mentor, retired Texas oilman Woody Moore. He calmly told her during the final break: "This is where you shine. Go after it."

When the tournament director brought out the trophy and the bracelet to entice the players, Becky really got her game on. "Gee, this looks like a girl's bracelet," she told her opponents. "You guys can't wear this bracelet. You don't want to look like girly boys."

So, the senior citizen turned up the heat on the pushy young guns. "I pulled myself together and decided I wasn't going down without a fight. I really got aggressive toward the end," she said.

What happened next was "magical," said Woody. Becky ousted her four opponents, won the bracelet and pocketed the $45,581 first-place prize. It was her fourth final-table cash at the Classic.

Those Council Bluffs results pushed her past $110,000 in winnings for the year. Two months earlier, she had four final-table cashes at the Eureka Mesquite Open in Nevada. She also finished fifth in the 280-player main event at the Spring Poker Roundup in Oregon ($20,647) and 27th out of 261 players ($18,733) at the World Poker Challenge, a World Poker Tour event in Reno, Nev.

"I really want to be the first woman to win a WPT event. Reno was just a taste," said Becky, who thinks women of all ages shouldn't fear playing poker against men. "Just sit down, and be yourself. Forget the dark glasses and fancy jewelry." She laughed and added, "You can bring out the bling when you make the final table."

Her pre-poker experiences included washing dishes in a Chinese restaurant to provide money for high school, earning a broker's license and owning a real-estate business, producing a magic show in Vegas, and buying a computer-services business in 1989 that catered to doctors and lawyers.

But her life hit a low point when her best friend Jeanenne became gravely ill and died. Jeanenne left her handicapped daughter Cindy, a victim of birth complications, in Becky's care. "She's such a beautiful child and has grown into a wonderful person," Becky said.

The death cast a somber mood over Becky even though she had moved from California into the nonstop excitement of Las Vegas. "My son decided I needed to get out of the house and go to this party with his friends. He kept pushing, so I went," she said.

"I was sitting there, and next thing I know, some guy stood over me, poured me a glass of wine and said, 'Hello, my name is Woody Moore.' The rest is history," she said.

"I knew her son," explained Woody, a retired Dallas-area oil and gas executive. "She was sitting off to the side alone, so I went over to introduce myself. We hit it off just great, and now we've got a dream life traveling the country, playing in tournaments and actually making money doing it."

However far her poker pursuits take her, Becky said it's because family and friends such as Woody, Lou Mango and Steve Makar gave her "major encouragement and support, which freed up my life to play poker."

Woody said he has "tweaked" Becky's poker game in their five years together, but called her a "very aggressive, intuitive tournament player who is able to fold a big hand when necessary."

An accomplished player himself with more than a decade of tournament cashes, Woody hit it big in February at the L.A. Poker Classic main event with a third-place finish for $625,630 at a tough final table featuring Phil Ivey, Phil Hellmuth and other top pros.

The competitive couple cheers each other's successes, but they can't wait for the day when they battle heads-up for a tournament title. "I want to beat him so bad," Becky said, "but I know he'll show me no mercy. That's OK, I won't show him any, either!"

E-mail your poker questions and comments to [email protected] for use in future columns. To find out more about Russ Scott and read previous LuckyDog Poker columns, visit www.creators.com or www.luckydogpoker.com.