Dr. Steven Weiner, of The Aesthetic Clinique in Blue Mountain Beach, hedged his bets just right to score the big win at the most-recent World Poker Tour Deep Stacks tournament in Biloxi, Miss.

Weiner is a trained plastic surgeon who left behind a successful plastic surgery business in Georgia 10 years ago to move to 30A and place another kind of bet: on opening a cutting-edge, non-surgical, minimally invasive cosmetic procedure clinic. At the time, it was a bold move, but Weiner felt it was the direction his customers would want him to go. Today, he’s a leader in this ever-growing field and students even travel to the Aesthetic Clinique in Blue Mountain Beach for instruction. The clinic’s business is growing more than 20 percent each year.

Weiner loves the work, but he also gets a thrill from his weekly poker nights with the guys. And it’s that hobby that led him to the World Poker Tour late last month, where he slowly knocked out the pros to take home nearly $24,000 in winnings.

“I’ve always been great at math and statistics. I love trying to figure out the odds. But then, people think it’s about 80 percent skill and 20 percent luck, so even if you play great, there’s always that element of excitement that things could go the other way,” he said with a grin. “I think I’m just a gambler at heart.”

Hear about Weiner’s experience in this 30A interview:

During the tournament, Weiner was down nine-to-one to the chip leader, but with a little encouragement from his friend Dave Rauschkolb, who owns Bud and Alley’s, he was able to fight back and win.

“It was a whirlwind from there,” Weiner said. “My phone just lit up with phone calls and texts, I couldn’t answer because of all the handshaking and the photos being taken.”

He did it all while donning his lucky 30A Gear hat, which he also wore when he won his second-largest pot at a tournament in Ebro.

“No one at the tournaments knew what 30A represents so I had to tell them what it means and where I live and that they should come visit,” Weiner said. “From now on, that hat’s on whenever I play poker.”

Weiner will now go on to play the World Poker Tour Deep Stacks championship in Calgary, Canada.

Check out this fantastic interview, shot right after Weiner’s big win: