Calgary - While he deliberates his next move, Matt Jarvis is as still as a lizard on rock.

The 25-year-old from Surrey, B.C., is working on restraining his movement in preparation for the World Series of Poker championship final in Las Vegas in November.

Almost US$9 million in prize money rides on not letting even the smallest gesture give away what's in his head or in his hand.

Sunglasses on, U2 playing in one ear from his iPod, his right hand splayed on the table and his left cupped over his pocket cards, even the air around him is calm.

"It's very tough for other players to read me," Jarvis said in Calgary during the Canadian Open Poker Championship. "I don't ever say I have it nailed. I'm slowly moving towards it."

He's one of two Canadians in the "November Nine", meaning he's among the last nine players standing from the 7,319 who started out playing 57 events over 50 days from May 28 to July 17 in Las Vegas.

Jarvis and Jonathan Duhamel of Montreal will compete against the seven others for the most coveted title in poker starting Nov. 6 at the Rio Hotel and Casino. The final two will square off Nov. 8 with $8,944,138 going to the winner.

Living the dream

Jarvis was slinging wood in a lumber mill just a couple of years ago. Before that, he was a knife salesman while he attended business school.

He's now living the dream of being on national television in Las Vegas with a big stack of chips in front of him.

"You go from being almost nobody to almost everyone in the poker room knowing who you are after that," Jarvis said. "Not that I'm a guy who craves attention, but at the same time, it's kind of nice. I don't mind it either.

"It's every poker player's dream to get to this tournament."

All nine WSOP finalists walked away from the table July 18 with $811,823 in their pockets and the knowledge they'd be back to play for much more. Even fifth place in the final is worth over $2 million.

Duhamel heads into the final with the most chips carrying over from the last round. His chip count is 65.9 million while Jarvis is fifth at 16.7 million.

Jarvis has hired lawyers, accountants and a manager since July. He's already claimed about $70,000 and the Canadian title in Calgary with more hands to be played before the Open ends Sunday.

"I'm such a competitive guy, I love the feel of victory and competing in things like this," he said. "There's pride in it too, but at the end of the day, it comes down to the dollars and cents. I think it's always about the money."

Jarvis's job at the lumber mill was taking wood off a belt and tossing it into a bin for 12 hours a day. The pay was good, but the work mind-numbing, so he spent his days off playing online poker. He discovered he was making as much money at cards as he was at the mill.

Almost didn't go to Vegas

When he quit the mill to concentrate on poker, his play initially took a dive because the pressure of having to feed, clothe and house himself solely on his winnings made him play differently. But in December 2008, when Jarvis strung together three wins in major online tournaments, he realized he could compete with the best in the world.

Jarvis almost didn't go to Vegas this year because his father Norm, a former pro golfer, was diagnosed with cancer in his tonsils and lymph nodes. Norm underwent his final chemotherapy and radiation treatments this week.

"It was my dad who pushed me to go. He said 'this is what you are meant to do,"' Jarvis said. "He was in rough shape for a while there, but it seems like he's definitely progressing. I think he feels like he's getting a lot better. You can hear excitement in his voice that maybe about a month ago wasn't as much there."

Norm played on the Canadian Tour and also spent a season on the Champions Tour. Jarvis carried his father's bag for him on the latter and met stars such as Jack Nicklaus, Ben Crenshaw and Arnold Palmer.

The pro golf tour is also a place where nerves of steel are rewarded with celebrity and money. Jarvis discovered he liked that world.

"They just treat you like royalty out there," he said. "I think that was great for me because I felt 'they treat you so well on this tour, I really want something like that for myself.'

"I was good in a lot of sports, but not great and this was an opportunity for me to find that kind of life in something else."

Concentrating for hours on end at the poker table takes a physical and mental toll.

Jarvis runs almost every day to prepare for a long day at the tables and sometimes he runs during the short breaks during a tournament. He watches what he eats. Jarvis cut alcohol out of his life nine months ago because he wants nothing dulling his edge at the poker table.

Mother was ashamed of his career

He'll prepare for the final on two fronts. To keep his own game sharp, he plans to go to London in September for the World Series of Poker Europe and a European Poker Tour stop, with perhaps a tournament in Austria after that.

Jarvis will watch video of his opponents and their media interviews in order to put together personality profiles.

"A lot of people play to their personality," he explains. "If they talk any strategy or anything like that, you want to pick up on it. It's very rare anyone is going to give away any of their strategy tips, but you get inside their head and what they are feeling. It helps you decide what kind of buttons you can press once you get there."

He's also going to recruit his poker-playing friends to set up a mock finals table.

"I'm going to give my friends a week to study an opponent and replicate how they would act, or how they would respond," he explained. "I have a group of friends who are solid poker players, so I'm going to bounce a lot of things off them and talk about different strategies."

The life of a poker player isn't mainstream. Jarvis admits his mother Diane, a schoolteacher, initially struggled with his decision to play cards for a living.

"She had a lot of family members who asked 'what is your son doing?' It wasn't lying but she wasn't shouting from the rooftops that I was playing poker and didn't have a job," he said.

"Now she is."