Fedor Holz Beats Wiktor “limitless” Malinowski in Face-Off Challenge for $90,374.98

08:23
18 Mar

Fedor Holz has claimed victory in the Face-Off Challenge against Wiktor “limitless” Malinowski. The German Wunderkind was a heavy underdog coming into the match but came out in front after storming ahead by winning the first three sessions.

---

Success or Not?

This match was looked forward to by the poker community probably more than any other in recent months. That says a lot; but did it live up to expectations?

In all fairness to the participants, it was far too short to really build up any excitement. Only four sessions of around 400 hands each were over far too quickly, even if it was $100/$200 NL with two of the best players on the planet.

Session	Result ($)
1	Fedor +37,420.54
2	Fedor +14,651.97
3	Fedor +108,195.91
4	“limitless” +69,893.44

Final result was Fedor Holz claiming victory by $90,374.98.

Although the coverage was top level, there didn’t look to be much excitement going on. The media were left with little more to write about than the end of session result. Was there an expectation that it was all going to be over too quickly anyway killing off any real interest?

Doug Polk even made a comment in commentary that he suspected it was staged. Now, Polk being Polk might well have just used this language to emphasise his point, but who knows.

“I don’t think this can be for real money, Mike. These decisions are just horrific. This feels completely staged to me.”

He continued by suggesting that GGPoker may have promised to cover the loser’s losses, while “limitless” was deliberately playing so badly to encourage more action at higher stakes. Harsh words.

---

Bad Timing?

Maybe the match timing wasn’t great. After all, we have just been through a few months of the High Stakes Feud and three Galfond Challenge matches. It may be true that we all need a break from following these heads-up matches while the live poker scene begins to pull itself out of the doldrums over the next few months.

“limitless” is also $557k down in his match against Stefan Burakov, but he is also currently trying to raise the stakes and to extend the contract to 50,000 hands. Now that could raise a lot of excitement, with the possibility of it going quite wrong for the Polish star.

• Want poker news as it breaks? Join the Poker News and Gossip Telegram channel!