Online Poker

In November and December of 2009, the mysterious Swedish player Isildur1 tore up the felt on the high limit tables at Full Tilt Poker. During this period, Isildur1 took part in the 12 richest online hands in poker history up to that point, including being part of the first online hand to surpass the $1 million mark. The following is a rough timeline of Isildur1's highs and lows from November 2009 through to the beginning of 2010.

Early November - Isildur1 was gaining a reputation at this point for his utter decimation of Tom "Durrrr" Dwan, with a $3 million profit from Dwan making headlines on the poker news sites. Luckily for Dwan, he got picked up as part of Team Full Tilt soon after. Isildur1 had also been destroying a few other pros in No Limit Hold 'Em, and they had responded by running away to the Pot Limit Omaha tables, where Isildur1 did not seem to have an advantage.

Isildur1 wanted more victims, however. He took $162,000 from Phil "OMGClayAiken" Galfond, and set his sights on Patrik Antonius in the same night, taking $686,000 from Antonius in a PLO game and even managing to squeeze $22,000 out of Phil Ivey.

Late November - The latter part of November started out with Isildur1 having taken about $1.5 million from Patrik Antonius, and $1 million from David Benyamine, in addition to the massive wins he had against Dwan. People began to suspect that Isildur1 was Victor Blom, though this is discounted by many sources, including Blom himself.

Isildur1 made headlines with Patrik Antonius on November 16th when they broke the record for the biggest-ever online poker hand at $878,958.50. This was part of a session where Isildur1 lost around $2.9 million to Antonius. Brian Townsend sweetened this bitter pill by losing $440,000 or so to Isildur1 on the same night, though.

A few days later, on the evening of November 21st, the two broke the biggest hand record again and managed to be the first players to be part of an online poker hand worth more than $1 million. Unfortunately for Isildur1, it is yet again in Patrik Antonius' favor, with the $1,356,946 hand going to the former model. Total losses to Antonius that night ran up to $2.1 million for Isildur1, with a further $1.2 million going to Phil Ivey.

Isildur1 recovered somewhat at this point with more big wins against Tom Dwan and Phil Sahamies. He also managed to take a $1.1 million pot against Phil Ivey, a story that would surely get Isildur1 free drinks for the rest of his life if he ever decides to reveal himself. Unfortunately, even taking that massive hand did not put Isildur1 ahead for the session, as Ivey left $300,000 richer.

Closing out the month of November, Isildur1 managed to reclaim some of his lost cash from Antonius again, and a player known as DjAdi. DjAdi added $160,000 to Isildur1's bank, and Antonius lost enough for Isildur1 to take away $667,000 in profit for a night's work. It's too bad that, soon after, a $1.5 million loss to Ilari "Ziigmund" Sahamies and a loss of $566,000 to Brian Townsend bit further into Isildur1's profits.

Early December - The troubles from the end of November continued for Isildur1 in December. He was well and truly on his way to downfall in his first run at the high stakes Full Tilt Poker tables, especially when Brian Hastings took more than $3.2 million from him in a single five hour long session. It may be the worst single session anyone has had in online poker, and completely undid all the work of Isildur1 in the days prior - a three day stretch of fortune that gave him $4.35 million for a tragically short time.

Around this period, Patrik Antonius made some very complimentary comments about Isildur1 and his playing style, but a few nice words did nothing to help the mystery Swede to start turning a profit again. Brian Hastings gave his own analysis of Isildur1, coming to the conclusion that Isildur1 plays for too long and is too obsessed with trying to turn a losing match around. Chat logs between Isildur1 and other players during this time certainly suggest that he wasn't immune to tilting.

Late December - As the year began to close, Isildur1 dropped down to lower stakes. He still had no luck in recovering his money, however, as Cole South got $238,000 from yet another incredibly long playing session for Isildur1. It's possible that Isildur1 may have been chasing his rival Tom Dwan, who had already gone down to lower stakes, but Cole South acted as something of a buffer, winning against Isildur1, but losing some massive pots to Dwan.

In an interview with ESPN, Brian Hastings revealed he and Brian Townsend had discussed Isildur1's playing style, including the use of a 50,000 hand history compiled by Townsend. This led Isildur1 to seek compensation from Full Tilt Poker, after Brian Townsend's Red Pro status was suspended from Full Tilt for 30 days. Cole South was also implicated in gaining insight on Isildur1's play from Townsend, and he was the last beneficiary of Isildur1's dying gasps against the pros at Full Tilt.

It appeared that Isildur1 had gone bust, as he was nowhere to be found through the end of the year. As 2010 began, Tony G stated he would be willing to stake Isildur1 in some major events, and an interview with the Isildur1 revealed that he intended to return and still had a bankroll to play with. His initial glory run at Full Tilt Poker had ended, however, with losses in excess of $1 million. We can only hope he will come back having learned a few lessons. The most important one of all would be to stop taking on fresh high stakes players in 5 hour long sessions after having already played for 9 hours straight.

Are you looking forward to the second run of Isildur1? Fans of the mystery player should sound off in the comments.

- Shad