Poker news tagged with 'full tilt poker'

About a week ago we wrote about the poker player "Din_Fru" and his huge success at Full Tilt Poker. We also mentioned that Erik Sagtröm from Sweden is the man hiding behind the alias "Din_Fru". However, according to one of Erik Sagtröm's friends, it's not Erik who's playing with the alias Din_Fru at Full Tilt Poker...

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Jungleman12 and URnotINdanger2 are the nicknames of two of the most successful and active poker players at Full Tilt Poker at the moment. Even though they have been in the spotlight for almost a year now, they have decided not to reveal their real names. There have been many people who have tried to figure it out though, but nothing has ever been confirmed - until now! 

Thanks to some investigations done by people working for one of the poker world's leading magazines, we can now tell you who they are...

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After summarizing last week's high stakes games, it stands clear that a Swede with the alias DIN_FRU grabbed the first place with almost $400,000 won. DIN_FRU is a very familiar face at Full Tilt Poker where he usually plays PLO and Omaha Hi/Lo against some of the world's best poker players.

But even though he's a well-known figure at Full Tilt many don't know that it's actually high stakes legend Erik Sagström who's hiding behind the alias. Erik Sagström has been quite anonymous lately when it comes to big cashes. Hopefully the top 1 spot on the previous week's biggest winner list will make him play even better and score higher.    

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After a very action filled and interesting weekend at the high stakes tables many players took a well needed break on Monday. But we only had to wait until Tuesday before the games were on again. Most interesting player to follow that day was Tom "durrrr" Dwan who played lots of hands and was involved in many big pots. After about 6,200 played hands, he had won nothing less that $720,000 from Patrik Antonius, UrnotINdanger2 and other notables. Durrrr has been playing extremely well in the past few days, but he also been very lucky in many big pots.

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Do you remember Martonas? For those who don't remember him, I can inform you that he's from Sweden and used to play high stakes at Full Tilt Poker over a year ago. When Martonas started showing up at Full Tilt, he won about $2.5 million in less than 2 weeks time (most of it from durrrr) and create headlines all over the poker world. But it didn't take long before he lost it all again (most of it to durrrr) and disappeared from the scene shortly after.

Many thought that we would have to wait for a very long time before another unknown player like Martonas would show up and play against the world's best. However, most people forgot about him almost straight away when another unknown swede entered the scene and broke all the records. You know who I'm talking about, right? :)

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The unknown Russian "NEKOTYAN" is not a newbie when it comes to playing high stakes. Even though he's not in the same "weight-class" as Ivey, durrr and other notables, "NEKOTYAN" still takes some shots at the nosebleed stakes once in a while, and last week he had a really good run at Full Tilt as he won $338k and ended up being the biggest winner.

Not far behind him in the top of last week's biggest winners is another unknown player called "LokolsBack" from Finland. However, it's still too early to say whether or not these 2 will continue to play this high and become regulars in the top winners/losers lists. The future will tell I guess.

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Gus Hansen had a terrible year at Full Tilt's nosebleed tables in 2009. At the end of the year he had lost $5 million dollars and was far the biggest loser. It can be very hard to get back in business and believe in your own game after such a nightmare year, but somehow Gus managed to keep a cool head and started off 2010 in the best possible way by winning about $2 millions.

However, the winning streak didn't last for long and in the last couple of months he has lost most of what he won. Last weekend was especially tough on Gus Hansen as he ended up losing almost $400k within a timeframe of 24 hours. Since 2007 Gus Hansen has now lost about $7 million dollars.

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Even though the durrr challenge between Tom Dwan (picture) and Patrik Antonius is still going on and never seems to end, Tom "durrrr" Dwan still wants to get another one going. Rumors saying that Tom "durrrr" Dwan is trying to get another challenge going has been circulating on the web for some time now. Many of these rumors claims that Tom Dwan has challenged jungleman12 (successful high stakes player - true identity currently not known) numerous times but never got any positive feedback.

However, now it seems seems like jungleman12 will accepted the challenge. During a small $100/$200 NLH game, durrrr proposed the challenge to jungleman12 in the chat and it seems like jungleman12 is considering to accept. 

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Ziigmund didn't show up in Las Vegas for the 2010 WSOP and he hasn't been playing almost anything at the nosebleed stakes lately. We are talking about very, very few hours of poker here, and usually he ended up losing big the few times he has played. This is usually a clear indication that something is very wrong. Well, thank god it was just due to holidays and nothing else.

Instead of playing poker online or traveling to Vegas, Ilari "Ziigmund" Sahamies has been busy with enjoying the summer in Finland and traveling to for example South Africa to watch football.

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It is now official that Full Tilt Poker will continue to sponsor the Million Dollar Cash Game as they have renewed the contract for another 3 years. This year's Million Dollar Cash Game will be filmed in HD and will take place at an exclusive venue in London between 8th and 9th September. However, we will have to wait until January 2011 before it's broadcasted on Sky Sports.

According to the tournament director James Hopkins, we can expect to the see the strongest field ever in this year's Million Dollar Cash Game. Phil Ivey, Tom Dwan and Phil Hellmuth are just 3 of the huge names that will take part and make sure that we get to see poker at its best. And Who knows? Maybe we will get to see an even bigger pot than the $1.1 dollar pot between Tom Dwan and Phil Ivey in season 4. In fact that pot is the largest ever televised cash game pot. 

 

Many of the poker world's best have retuned to the online high stakes tables in the past week. Even though the action isn't like what we were used to see a few months back, it still looks like we will have a quite interesting ending of the summer ahead of us.

Two players that haven't played much online lately are the poker giants Tom "durrrr" Dwan and Gus Hansen. Unfortunately none of them had a great comeback on Sunday and they both decided to call it a day as "losers". We are not talking about huge amounts though, at least not for Tom Dwan who has been running extremely well this year.

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Isildur1 has been playing frequently at Full Tilt poker in the last few weeks. However, it's not the sick swings that we used to see back in 2009, even though he still plays for high stakes. Anyhow, yesterday Isildur1 played Omaha and No Limit Hold'em heads up's against URnotINdanger2, mickeyG16, Hal0zination and Theo "THEDONKEYNO1" Jorgensen.

Isildur1 was losing around $50k to URnotINdanger2 but managed to win back the money he lost from some of the other players mentioned above. He was winning the most money from Theo Jorgensen - around $27,000. After that Isildur1 decided to call it a day, he had won only $4,000. Not a lot of money for someone who used to gamble for millions every day, but still better than nothing.

 

Last week came to be a week that poker players from the nordic countries should be proud of. Not less than 3 players from Sweden and Finland made it to the top 5 last week, and I got a feeling that there are more great results to come from 2 of them, Isildur1 and Patrik Antonius. Both Isildur1 and Patrik Antonius had a fantastic flow in their game last week, and both of them also ended up being the top 2 winners of the week. Isildur1 played around 18,000 hands and won $175k and Patrik won almost double that amount, $345k.

Is this week going to be as thrilling as the previous week? Is the WSOP and the nice weather going to affect the action online? We will have to wait and see I guess. :)

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Patrik Antonius, the Finnish Full Tilt Pro, doesn't think think much of World Series of Poker. He thinks that the WSOP bracelets are bullshit because there are 100 WSOP events every year and because everyone has one. The bracelets are shit quality, false and probably not worth more than $50, according to Patrik.

"The WSOP crew wants to rob the players. They don't really care about them and it's ridiculous. They have moved the tournament to the summer time in Las Vegas when no one wants to be there. They are just doing it so hotels and restaurants will be filled up. I personally think I will stop playing the WSOP in the future."

He continues...

"No one wants to be in Vegas during the summer, anywhere else than there. Its a period when people want to have vacation and be with their families, but instead one has to be in Vegas for a shitty bracelet", says Patrik Antonius in a video interview.

 

After a couple weeks of absence, Isildur1 was finally back at the high stakes tables this morning. He played a few thousand hands at the stakes $50/$100 and $100/$200 against the player Jungleman12. It wasn't a very action filled session between them. 

However, Isildur1 managed to win about $25,000 before they decided to stop for the day. Lets hope that we will get to see more action from our favorite mystery swede in the coming weeks, because the high stakes scene is not the same without him!

 

Anette Obrestad, the Norwegian poker pro, has just signed a sponsorship contract with Full Tilt Poker and is now part of its team. Anette started playing poker already at the age of 15, but back then she played for fun and usually only for play money - just in order to learn the game. She probably didn't have a clue what a successful poker player she would become a few years later.

Today, she's a millionaire and one of the world's best poker players thanks to many great results online and live. Not long ago Anette turned 21-years-old, so this year she can finally take part in the WSOP. It will be very interesting to see how she does there! I have a feeling that she will do very well! 

Tom "durrrr" Dwan has been running extremely good this year and he has won many million dollars. Well, last week the winning streak came to an end and he ended up losing over $2 million dollars. Most of the money durrrr lost was during the weekend. Even though durrrr had a tough week at the tables, he's still up a few millions this year and also has a big lead in the durrrr challenge with about 11,000 hands to go. If he wins the durrrr challenge, he will get $500,000 from Patrik Antonius. Speaking of Patrik Antonius. He finally got his long-awaited win last week and also became the biggest winner with a profit of $707,043.

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Another week at the high stakes tables in now in the books. It was maybe not the most interesting week this year, even though so many big names played. Three players that were running extremely well last week were Phil Ivey ($1,289,691), Tom "durrrr" Dwan ($961,325) and Patrik Antonius ($666,711). It was a while ago since we saw such big names in top 3 of the weekly winners list.

Number 1 in the list of losing players is Ziigmund. What happened to Illari "Ziigmund" Sahamies? He was running so good in the beginning of the year, and now he's losing millions in no-time! I hope that Ziigmund can stop this loosing streak and get back in business. Well, its not the first time this happens to him, so I'm sure he knows how to deal with it.

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Rush Poker has been a huge success since it was introduced at Full Tilt Poker a couple of months ago. Now, Full Tilt Poker has taken Rush Poker a step further as it is now available in tournament mode as well. The Rush Poker tournaments can at the moment be played in the games Holdem and Omaha and up to 136 players can take part in single tournament. However, the buy-in is quite low for the tournaments that are available at the moment. 

The Rush Poker tournaments are similar to a Rush Poker ring games. You can fold/quick fold and you will be moved to a new table in the blink of an eye. When less than 30 players are left in a Rush Poker tournament, the remaining tables will become short-handed. And when the tournament is down to the final table, it will be played like any other final table. In other words, more time to act and get to know your opponents. 

 

After weeks of speculations, Full Tilt has finally announced that Van 'Sirens' Marcus, 26, and Jonathan 'xMONSTERxDONGx' Karamalikis, 21, are the 2 new players who will be awarded with the Red Pro status. Both Van Marcus and Jonathan Karamalikis have been very successful poker players in the past few years, both online and live, and are among the best poker players in Australia. The 2 new red pros will for sure help Full Tilt strengthen its status in Australia and hopefully also get them a lot of new players.

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For second week in a row the american poker pro Tom Dwan ended up being the biggest winner again. Last week, Tom Dwan won $1.6 million dollars and has now won as much as $5.6 million this year. No one is even close of winning the amounts Tom Dwan wins at the moment. Some people think that Dwan might have a hard time finding opponents to play again soon.

Well, Dwan is a quite loose and aggressive player who it really can pay off to play against (not from own experience) when he's having a bad run. In other words, I don't think it will be an issue for him to find people to play against as many knows is just a matter of time before the winning streak comes to an end.

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The poker giant Full Tilt Poker is being investigated by a federal jury in Manhattan at the moment. The main owners of Full Tilt Poker, Howard Lederer and Chris Ferguson are 2 named persons in the investigation. They are accused of money-laundering and breaking the american gambling laws.

According to Nelson Rose, an author of books on gambling law, the government is trying to make example on Howard (right) and Ferguson (left) because they are both 2 well-known faces in the poker world.

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There is a swedish poker player with the nickname "ingsoni" who's running really good at Party Poker lately. "ingsoni" has won more than $500,000 at the stakes $25/$50 (highest stakes at Party Poker) in less than 80k hands. Rumors are circulating in different forums on the web that the new player is the mysterious swede Isildur1. However, many who have followed "ingsoni" and "Isildur1" for some time say that their styles of playing poker are totally different and that its not very likely to be the same person.

We will have to wait and see if the new super swede's winning streak continues and if he will try his luck at Full Tilt poker soon as well.

 

Isildur1 and Brian Hastings played heads-up on several PLO tables with the stakes $500/$1000 the other day. It started well for Brian Hastings who almost straight away won $300k from the mysterious Swede. Isildur1 fought back and managed to win back what he had lost plus another $400k after some time. However, it didn't take long before Hastings started taking down pot after pot. And after that Hastings had won over a million dollars, Isildur1 closed down all tables except 1.

This is of course nothing we are used to see when watching Isiludr1 playing. It could only mean one thing -- he was running out of money. However, the game continued and after that about 2800 hands had been played, they stopped. Hastings won $1,5 million from Isildur1. 

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Yesterday, the mysterious Swede Isildur1 and Cole South started playing $100/$200 PLO (Pot Limit Omaha) on several tables. Then they moved on to playing $200/$400 and at last $300/$600. This was probably Isildur1's best session so far against Cole South as he ended up winning about $800,000. It wasn't all about who took down the biggest pots in this session, it was more about Isildur1 playing his very best game.

Its great to see that Isildur1 has been doing so well since the comeback. It seems like he have learned something from the mistakes he did back in 2009, when he played too long sessions and easily went on tilt. Maybe he's playing so good and focused this year because he's staked by someone who gives him expertise coaching (Tony G??!!)?

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Tom Dwan had some great poker sessions last week. And in the end of last week, he had won almost 1,4 million dollars. Another 2 players that did very well last week were Ziigmund and the mysterious Swede Isiildur1. However, both of their winnings almost matched the amount which Tom Dwan won. 

Dwan has also been doing very well in the durrrr challenge against Patrik Antonius in the last few sessions. He's now has a lead with $1,755,708 after 33,242, of 50,000 hands have been played. 

They didn't do so well last week..
As usual, when some players win big - some have to lose as well! Here are last weeks biggest "losers" - Cole South (-$1,031,983), Patrik Antonius (-$766,477), PixKim (-$756,459), Brian Townsend (-$691,240) and Brian Hastings (-$489,084).

 

The Full Tilt pro Cole South just keep on winning, and at the moment - it seems like nothing and no one can stop him! Last month, he was the biggest winner online with almost $2 million in winnings. This year, Cole South has won almost $3,5 million and because of that he's the one who has won the most money this year.

Other players that have been doing well so far this year and in the previous month are PostFlopAction (February:+1,559,469 Total winnings: +$2,570,307), Tom "durrr" Dwan (February:+1,003,270).

Players that didn't do so well last month - Brian Townsend (-1,293,778), Zigmund (-$872,856), Brian Hastings (-$794,875), Urindanger (-646,305).

Lets hope that March will be even more action-filled and thrilling than February was!

 

Isildur1 is once again back playing for high stakes at Full Tilt poker! To be honest, I (and probably many other people who have followed him from Day 1) couldn't see a comeback coming this soon. I mean, where did he get all that money from? Is Tony G staking him? There are many questions we will have to wait for answers to. However, Isildur1 had the best possible start on his comeback as he ended up winning $732,000 in just over 5800 hands.

Most of the money Isildur1 won came from the high stakes player ZeeJustin. Isildur1 crushed ZeeJustin in this session. Let's just hope that Isildur1 has learned from his mistakes back in 2009 and that he's here to stay this time.

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Did you know that Tom "durrrr" Dwan has his own blog? If the answer is no - then you're not alone! Dwan's blog is almost never updated and therefore many have gotten used to follow their favorite American high stakes pro through media. Anyhow, just a few days ago, durrrr updated his blog with some really interesting things.

For example Tom Dwan writes a few words about why he created the "durrrr challenge", about the money he lost in 2009, and most interesting of all - some thoughts about the mysterious Swede Isildur1, who he lost millions of dollars to last year. Tom Dwan ends his blog by promising his fans that he'll donate $10,000 to Haiti every month he doesn't update the blog at least 3 times. 

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On February 8, it was once again time for another session of the durrrr challenge between Tom Dwan and Patrik Antonius. This time they played a 883-hand session. Tom Dwan crushed Antonius this time, taking a total of $315,000 from him.

One of the biggest pots of the night was played out this way.

Antonius opened on the button to $1200. Dwan three-bet to $3600 and Patrik called.

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After a few weeks break, it was finally time for Tom Dwan and Patrik Antonius to continue the battle last night. During 4 hours, they managed to play 1230 hands. Even though it was a quite long session, it wasn't as much action as many hoped for. The biggest pot this night landed on around $120,000 and was won by Tom Dwan. However, it came to be Patrik Antonius who ended up plus $5,983 in the end of the day.

This result doesn't change a lot in the durrrr challenge. Dwan still has a big lead ($878,000) and there is still 19,000 hands to be played. Ladies and gentlemen, it seems like we will have to wait a few more months (at least) before this challenge comes to an end and we have a winner.

 

Isildur1 probably doesn't need a closer presentation since he was the most talked-about person in the end of 2009 thanks to the millions of dollars he won and lost in no-time. Anyhow, we all know that Isildur1 ended up losing everything he had won, and also that he lost about 2 million dollars from his own bankroll. After this, Isildur1 disappeared from the high stakes scene for a while, and then he returned a few weeks later playing $5/$10 NL. This time, the unknown Swede lost about $400 and didn't seem to care about the money at all (who can blame him?).

Now, after a few weeks of complete silence, he's once again back at the poker tables. But, unfortunately, it's on even lower stakes than last time - $0,25/$0.50 NL Holdem. Isildur1 sat down at the table with $10, which he lost later on after that his pair of kings was beaten by three of a kind 5's.

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Warning: Rush Poker is extremely fast paced – prepare yourself for the most intense poker action in the world!

Available exclusively at Full Tilt Poker, Rush Poker is the ultimate high-speed poker experience.

This new poker format is designed to minimize your wait time between hands and keep you in the action. You’ll join a large player pool and face a different table of opponents every hand you play. When you fold your hand, you’ll be rushed to another table for a new hand right away.

Watch this video as BankrollMob demonstrates how it is to play Rush Poker at two tables - try it out yourself and click here to get a 27% rakeback deal with Full Tilt Poker!

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A few days ago a hacker managed to overtake Jon "Pearljammer" Turner girlfriend's Full Tilt account. His girlfriend, Tracey "XTraCey" Nguyen had about $30,000 and a lot of player points in the account. The hacker lost all of the cash by going all in every single hand on a $25/$50 NL Holdem table. Turner could just stand beside and watch when all the money was lost, and at the same time the hacker made fun of him in the chat. Turner tried to stop the madness by contacting Full Tilt's support by mail and in the poker chat, but no luck before it was too late. 

Here is the chat conversation between Turner and his girlfriend (A.k.A. The Hacker)...

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The hottest poker news of 2009 were mostly about one player, Isildur1 from Sweden. Isildur1 came from nowhere and won almost $6 millions in a couple of weeks and then lost it all + another $1.5 million in just a few days. After that, Isildur1 had another upswing and was plus for a day or two before he started losing again. Even though Isildur1 lost so much money, many of the world's best poker players praised the young Swede by saying that he is an outstanding poker player who just needs to avoid playing such long sessions and that he should stop playing PL Omaha and stick to NL Holdem instead.

The big scandal
Isildur1 made many poker players even richer when his game wasn't at its best. For example, he lost about $4 million dollars in one single session to Brian Hastings, and also a few more millions to Brian Townsend, Cole South, Illari Sahamies, Phil Ivey etc. Shortly after this, Isildur1 disappeared from the high stakes scene and it seemed like it could take long before we heard about the unknown swede again. However, it didn't take long before Isildur1 once again was in the headlines as a big scandal was about to be revealed. It all started after that Brian Townsend got his red pro status removed by Full Tilt for a month because he had used a non-allowed poker program to collect data from the games against Isiludr1. And according to different rumors, Townsend had shared this information with Cole South and Hastings. However, neither of them got punished in any kind of way by Full Tilt. After that Isildur1 got to know about this, he said that he will ask Full Tilt to give back some of the money he had lost, and that he probably wouldn't play at Full Tilt anymore.

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Its not only Tiger Woods who have problems with his relationship at the moment, but also Phil "Tiger Woods of Poker" Ivey who's leaving his wife, Lucietta. According to an american news site, Phil Ivey handed in the divorce papers on 22nd December and then he got his divorce request approved already on the 29th December. At the moment details on this divorce are very few and it might remain so as Phil Ivey and his ex-wife probably didn't have the same kind of problem as Tiger and Elin Woods.

Do you hope that american media will write much more about this divorce, or do you think that they should leave Phil Ivey alone and write about his poker instead? 

Not long ago, Brian Townsend got his red pro status at Full Tilt removed after that the poker site found out that he had been using a non-allowed poker program to collect hand history against Isildur1. Townsend had also shared the information he had collected using this program with Brian Hastings and Cole South. However, neither of them got any kind of penalty from Full Tilt poker. This made Isildur1 really upset, and now he wants his money back, or at least some of it according to what he said in a recent interview.

"I do feel like I deserve to get something back. I feel that Hastings had a big edge over me due to the hand history database. They were able to dissect the exact way I was playing because they analyzed the hands so precisely, and it was impossible for me to adjust, as I had no idea they were doing it.
Even though this information is not out there, since they admitted to sharing hand histories, how can I be sure that all three of them did not have input on the hands while we were playing?"

Isildur1 about the future and if he will continue playing at Full Tilt poker after the scandal.

"Well, honestly I am going to stay quiet for a while now. I am planning on putting in the request to Full Tilt to look into this further, and until I hear back, I don't plan on playing much poker on the site."

 

Last week rumors that Brian Townsend, Brian Hastings & Cole South had been cheating against Isildur1 started circulate on the web. It all started after that someone got to know that Brian Townsend, Brian Hastings & Cole South had been going through thousands of hands Isildur1 had played and also discussed different strategies on how to beat the Swede. They could do this thanks to that Townsend had been using a program that is not allowed at Full Tilt poker. Full Tilt took action sraight away after getting to know this and they punished Townsend by giving him warning and removing his red pro status for a 1 month. However, Brian Hastings and Cole South didn't get punished as Full Tilt couldn't see that they had broken any of their rules.

This is not the first time Brian Townsend has been breaking the rules at Full Tilt poker. Back in August 2008, Townsend got his red pro status removed for 6 months after that Full Tilt found out that he had been using multiple accounts playing cash games. After this, he apologized in his blog. It will be interesting to see what he writes this time. It will also be interesting to hear what Isildur1 has to say about all this.

 

Even though the mysterious Swede "Isildur1" moved down in stakes after the $4 million losing session against Brian Hastings, he still keeps on losing a lot of money. Between 11th and 15th December, Isildur1 has played almost 5,000 hands and lost more than half a million dollars. In total Isildur1 has lost almost $2.2 million dollars since he started showing up at Full Tilt's poker tables. 

Lets hope, if Isildur1 is playing at more poker sites than Full Tilt at the moment, that he's not losing there as well, because the high stakes scene wont be the same without the mysterious Swede.

 

Play with the PROs at Full Tilt poker and get a $100 No Deposit Bonus from us.

Brian Hastings became one of the most talked about poker players after that he won over $4 million dollars in one single session against the unknown Swede "Isildur1." The win is the biggest someone has ever had in a single session, so of course, it wasn't so strange that he ended up in almost all poker headlines around the globe.

After the huge win, one could read in his blog about how happy and chocked he was after winning so much money. Now, a few days later, he has made his first big interview. In this interview one can read that he could never see this happening when he started playing against "Isildur1" that day and that he feels very fortunate to be were he is right now, and even though he played very well, luck was a major factor, according to himself. Brian Hastings says that he have received a lot of great feedback from players and friends after the big win, which he is really thankful for.

Its also mentioned in the interview that according to some rumors, a few players had a piece of his big win. However that was nothing he wanted to leave out any details about. And when he was asked about a possible comeback from "Isiludur1", he answered that he's a great player and that he for sure will be back at the high stakes in a near future.

 

The 2 poker giants PokerStars and Full Tilt poker just keep on growing and growing. This year both of them have increased their customer base with 68%, and last week both of them reached a new milestone as they stood for 60% of all the poker traffic online. Its seems like it has paid off very well for these 2 sites to spend lots and lots of money on marketing and by offering the biggest monthly/weekly guarantee tournaments online.

However, its not just PokerStars and Full Tilt that have increased their traffic, since the traffic at all other poker sites has increased with 12%. In other words, its seems like the financial crises that has been going on for quite some time now hasn't stopped people from gambling. Now the question is: Has the traffic online increased because of the financial crises, or is it just a normal growth we are seeing?

 

After that Isildur1 lost big to Brian Townsend last Sunday and also stopped bringing in money to the tables he went broke on - many said that he probably was running out of money and that he would soon be gone from the high stakes scene. However, already on Monday he was back on the high stakes, but this time "only" playing $100/$200 PLO against Cole South. The losing streak continued for the Swede in the session against Cole South and at around 6:00AM on Tuesday morning they called it a day.

"He must be missing a chromosome"
That is what Ilari "Ziigmund" Sahamies said about Isildur1 in recent interview he made in Finnish radio. However, Ziigmund said that he thinks that Isildur1 is one of the best NL heads-up players in the world and that he should stick to playing that instead of Pot Limit Omaha. Ilari "Ziigmund" Sahamies also said that he dont have the bankroll to play as high as he and Isildur1 did for a while. However, it seemed to have paid off as he's up about a million dollars against the Swede.

 

The losing streak continues for the unknown Swede after that he lost another 400k+ last night to Brian Townsend at Full Tilt. Isildur1 played many tables as usual in last nights session, however, he didn't bring in any more chips to the tables he lost on, and when he went broke on a table, he just closed it down. This is nothing Isildur1 ever has done before, and because of it, many people believe that Isildur1 is running out of money and that its just a matter of time before he disappears from the high stakes scene.

The man behind the nickname "Isildur1"
Many people who have followed the unknown Swede for some time now strongly believes that Viktor Blom is the man behind the nickname "Isildur1". And many pros that have played against Isildur1 thinks the same, even though Viktor Blom already has denied that he's Isildur1. Whoever Isildur might be, he will surely be missed by thousands of people if he stops playing for high stakes.

Patrik Antonius, the Finnish poker pro, has played and followed Isildur1 since he started showing up at Full Tilt poker. In a recent interview with a poker magazine, Patrik Antonius gave his opinion about Isildur1 and his way of playing poker.

"At first, I wasn't very impressed about the way he played poker. But at that time we played fewer tables than he wanted to. However, I noticed that Isildur1 is a great player when it comes to playing many tables at the same time as he then plays a very aggressive style of poker which gives him a great advantage against many of the world's best players."

Patrik continues...

"Every time I thought I figured out how he's playing, he changed tactics. It seems like he always have a plan and a thought behind every single move he makes. And when he's bluffing, it's not a thoughtless move."

Patrik about Isildur1's money management
"When it comes to such a talented and young poker player as Isildur1, he probably doesn't have a lot of expenses, and even if he goes broke and only have for example $2000 left, I still think that he easily could build up a $1 million dollar bankroll in a year. All of the best players, including me, have been taking many risks on the way to the top. The ones that fail on the way just have to move down in stakes and start building up their bankroll again."

 

Brian Hastings is not a newcomer when it comes to playing poker or blogging. Already back in 2005, when he had his first big win, he started writing about his life as poker pro in his blog. However, it's thanks to the big win against Isildur1 that Brian Hastings has been in the headlines on the most poker sites and poker magazines in the past few days.

In the latest blog post, Hastings writes that he still can't believe that he has the biggest winning day in online poker history thanks to the $4,2 million session against Isildur1. However, he doesn't write anything about any of the hands from the session. In other words, it seems like he doesn't want to reveal any info on how to play and win big against the Swede.

 

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It didn't take long before Isildur1 lost really big again. Yesterday night, the Unknown Swede was playing against Brian Hastings (member of Full Tilt Team CardRunners) in Pot Limit Omaha at the $500/$1000 stakes at Full Tilt poker. Isildur1 didn't have a chance against Brian Hasting this time and at around 6:00 O'clock in the morning, Brian Hasting called it a day, $4,200,000 richer.

Isildur1 is now once again about $1,5 million minus at Full Tilt poker and once again people are speculating in that his about to go broke. Many people that have been following Isildur1 thinks that he needs to stop playing PLO and instead should stick to NLHE if he want's to play as high as $500/$1000 against the worlds best players. Whatever game Isildur1 chooses to play - let's just hope that we haven't seen him for the last time!

 

Last month, Full Tilt Online Poker Series XIV was played and Full Tilt guaranteed 16 million dollars in 25 events. FTOPS XIV became a huge success as many players took part in the 25 events and more money was up for grabs than Full Tilt guaranteed.

Now, it's time for the MiniFTOPS XIV. MiniFTOPS features the same events as FTOPS, but all at 1/10 of the buy-in. The first event will be played today at 21:00 ET and not less than $250,000 is guaranteed by Full Tilt. However, there is another $3,750,000 up for grabs in the other 24 events as Full Tilt guarantees $4 million dollars in total.

 

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Yesterday, after another long break, durrrr and Dwan played 588 hands in 2 hours time - a quite short session in other words. The winner this time came to be Patrik Antonius who won $68,000 even though durrrr took home many of the bigger pots. However, Patrik was the one who took home the biggest pot this time, $143,193. This session was probably the most boring of all durrrr challenge sessions so far. Let's hope for longer sessions, more action and bigger pots the next time durrrr and Antonius play against each other.

Tom Dwan still has a big lead
Tom "durrrr" Dwan is in the lead with $711,556 after that 27,773 hands out of 50,000 hands have been played. It seems like we will have to wait a few more months (at least) for the durrrr challenge to come to an end if they don't start playing more often.

 

After that Isildur1 went from 6 million dollars plus to 1,5 million minus, no one thought that he would be able to play at the higher stakes again. Many were even speculating in that he was broke. However, it didn't take long before Isildur1 returned...

In the past few days, he has been playing a lot of PLO at the $300/$600 & $500/$1000 stakes at Full Tilt poker. Isildur1's game hasn't changed a bit since the tilt sessions. In other words - it's still the same kind of roller coaster poker as he played before. Well, something has changed, and that is that everyone wants to play against him.

A very successful comeback
Isildur1 is doing very, very well and he has went from 1,5 million minus to about $2 million plus. A lot of this money comes from Ziigmund, Brian Townsend and durrrr. The luck has really been on Isildur1's side in the past few days. For example, he flopped top set versus bottom set against Townsend and won $720,000. In another pot, Ziigmund made a move at the wrong time and was 4-1 underdog when Isildur1 called his all in. Already on the turn, Ziigmund's chances of winning the pot were gone and Isildur1 just had to wait for the river card before the pot of $788,000 was his.

 

The action at the high stakes just keeps on getting more and more crazy ever year. In 2006, games were a lot smaller than today as the highest games back then were played with $200/$400 blinds, and only a few poker sites dared to offer these high stakes. The most talked about hand, and also the biggest pot back in 2006, was when Johnny "bad_ip" Lodden lost a $465,451 pot to Kowssarie. Many people were amazed over how one could lose/win so much in just a single hand.

These days we can see pots of this size every week and we are getting used to seeing Patrik Antonius, Isildur1, Tom Dwan, Phil Ivey and other pros winning and losing millions of dollars in just days, or even hours. Losing and winning these kind amounts is just something as normal as eating and sleeping for many of these guys. The question is: How big can the pots become? We'll, let's take Isildur1 as an example. This guy came from nowhere and won $6 millions in a few weeks, and then he lost it all plus another million+ in no-time. Isildur1 has thanks to his crazy style of playing poker already set a few records as he has been involved in the 8 biggest pots ever. However, the biggest pot Isildur1 has played was when he lost $1,356,947 to Patrik Antonius at the stakes $500/$1000 in Pot Limit Omaha. 

A short conclusion
The future looks very bright for people who loves watching the action at the highest stakes and the adrenaline it brings with it. The average pot will keep on growing and we will see more players like Isildur1 and Martonas who wins big, then lose it all and disappears from the high stakes scene.