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Swede Wins $500,000 in Spectacular Online Poker Duel

In a dramatic high-stakes poker game spanning three days, 21-year-old Viktor Blom from Dals-Ed won half a million dollars from seasoned American pro player Isaac Haxton.

Published: 4 April 2012 10:53 CEST

Swede Wins $500,000 in Spectacular Online Poker Duel

Known in the online poker world as “Isildur1,” Blom is Sweden’s most famous high-stakes poker player.

He’s been known to win or lose millions of dollars in a single day and he’s been part of several of the biggest pots ever played online, including the biggest of all-time in November 2009 when he lost a $1.35 million pot to Patrik Antonius from Finland.

Since December 2010 Blom has had a sponsorship deal with the world’s largest poker site PokerStars. As part of the agreement the young Swede will take on any opponent who wants to challenge him in a special heads-up poker format called the SuperStar Showdown.

In the latest edition of the SuperStar Showdown, Blom and Haxton decided to put up $500,000 each and play No-Limit Holdem for four hours per day until one of them was broke. The game was the biggest so far within this format and was dubbed “The $1 Million SuperStar Showdown.”

The four-hour first session was played on Saturday and Blom got off to a great start winning close to $200 000. The Swede won another $80 000 on Sunday and then finished the match off on Monday by winning the rest of Haxton’s money.

The final hand was played just five minutes before the Monday session ended and Blom secured his victory with trip aces.

In total, the match lasted over eleven hours and 5,030 hands were played. The biggest pot of the match came in at $169,000 and was won by Blom.

Dates for the next SuperStar Showdown are still to be determined at this point and no opponent has been named yet.

Check the latest Swedish poker news here.

Article sponsored by Poker Listings.

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Suck-outs and failed bluffs

High Stakes Players are the most fascinating to watch for the average amateur player. While you might be sitting at home grinding away at 1c/2c tables, these guys play for money you would never dare to risk (partly because you don’t have it). The highest games running online these days have Blinds of $200/$400.

A single pot can easily amount to the value of a middle class car, and within a week, some players win or lose as much as a house.

The two Germans who fared badly last week are called Tsubasa Manabe and Benny Spindler. Manabe, who plays under the nick Tsubi87, has been a regular online player since 2007. He is sponsored by German poker school PokerStrategy, where he became a Black Member in early 2011.

His family originates from Japan, but he grew up in Bensheim, Hessen, and speaks fluent German. Over his whole career, he has made around $500,000 profit with online poker, but last week that dwindled to a mere $180,000 within only a couple of days. Manabe lost $313,000 and was thus the biggest loser in online poker last week.

A lot better known, mainly because of his formidable success in live poker tournaments, is “Psycho”Benny Spindler. Spindler emerged on the live poker stage with a 3rd place in the $9700 PCA main event 2009, where he reached third place and won over a million dollars.

His nickname is no accident, as he is infamous for his hyper-aggressive, forward playing style.

He went on to make several final tables in large international events, and went on to win the English leg of this year’s EPT season for another $1,2 million. On the whole, he has over three million dollars in live poker winnings.

Online though, where he is better known under his nick toweliestar, nothing seems to go his way this year. Last week alone, he lost $220k playing his favourite game No Limit Hold’em. Over the course of 2012, his losses now amount to more than $700k.

It’s the worst run the German MTT specialist has ever had in his career. Although the presence seems to look bleak for Spindler, if he can’t turn things around online, there is some light at the end of the tunnel.

It’s only two weeks until the World Series of Poker begins, and that means a series of almost 60 live MTTs. More than enough chances for “Psycho”-Benny to make up for his online downswing of the last couple of months.

The World Series of Poker takes place every year in Las Vegas. The main attraction always is the $10.000 main event, but this year it will also feature the Poker Players Championship with $50.000 Byu-in as well as the biggest buy-in tournament ever: “The Big One”, as it’s called, will cost you a cool million to play in. That’s real dollars, not Facebook chips.

Article sponsored by Poker Listings

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