The challenge was supposed to span two Sundays and 5,000 hands. Viktor Blom had other ideas. In the fifth running of the Isildur Challenge on PokerStars Blom absolutely demolished fellow PokerStars Pro Daniel “KidPoker” Negreanu to the tune of $150,000 at $50/$100 No-Limit Hold’em. The match started out on four different tables with Blom quickly taking a $40,000 lead. After the first few hours and 1,000 hands Blom was up six figures on the poker legend and never looked back. It took approximately 1,000 more hands to finish off his foe and cruise to victor.
Blom was able to mix in a lot of overbets on the river which seemed to work perfectly against Negreanu’s passive-calling style. Negreanu, who twittered throughout the match about how poorly he was running, ended up $44,000 below equity in all-in EV spots. Still, there was more than $100,000 won in non showdown efforts by Blom who continually won medium sized pots on the flop and turn. Negreanu simply had no answer for one of the best heads-up Hold’em players in the world. Daniel seemed to understand what he was getting into as the past few weeks he put in a lot of hands against some solid heads-up players including FTR Member Ben “Sauce123” Sulsky who also took a six figure sum off of the live professional. Despite his week long crash course in four-tabling online heads-up poker Daniel could never seem to gain any momentum against Blom. In fact, as the match went on he continued to play worse as the match shrunk to 3, 2, and eventually one table as Daniel’s $150,000 buy-in dwindled. The last hour of the match was spent on one table as the players passed small to medium pots back and forth before the final hand.
After three-betting before the flop Daniel was faced with a 4-bet shove from Blom. After tanking, Negreanu let out a “alright let’s gamble” in chat as he called with KJ offsuit. Blom was happy to table AKo but was probably a little annoyed when the flop came down Jd Ts 7d. However his frustration was quickly alleviated at the Queen of clubs fell on the turn giving him the nut straight. With only a chop possible the river blanked out and Negreanu was sent home $150,000 poorer. The match doesn’t do much to add to Isildur’s credibility as one of the world’s best poker players but it does do wonders for his brand. He received a lot of publicity outside of the online poker world for playing this match and winning in such a dominating fashion will make people stand up and take notice of the European great. He has joined players like Rich “Nutsinho” Lyndaker, Tom “Durrr” Dwan, and Phil Galfond as online poker’s best NL Hold’em players.
It is still unknown if the players will come back next Sunday for another $150,000 challenge. One can only imagine Blom is chomping at the bit to get another shot at Negreanu heads-up but Daniel might be done trying to take on the world’s best online. While the $150,000 is a small sum to such an established player like Negreanu, getting crushed is certainly a hit to both his ego and credibility in the online poker world.
FlopTurnRiver has full video of all the hands from the Isildur Challenge. Be sure to check back later this week for key hands and analysis of this epic beatdown.