Lord of the Swings: Return of Isildur1 2015

Almost five years after taking the poker world by storm and revealing his true identity,Viktor ‘Isildur1’ Blom has fired up PokerStars’ highest stakes once more. He was exiled by Full Tilt - PS half-brother - this summer (FT closed the nosebleeds limits in an attempt to re-brand) and now he’s riding one of the biggest waves of his life. But knowing Viktor Blom and his uber-aggressive play, we must wonder for how long? When will he come down to Earth? And can he rewrite poker history? To answer all these questions, let’s review the last ten months or so and get on track with the Isildur1 2015 edition.

Goodbye Full Tilt

Unlike his former Full Tilt teammate Tom ‘durrrr’ Dwan, Blom had no issue whatsoever with the platform and continued playing there long after FT terminated his sponsored contract. Unfortunately for him, the poker gods weren’t kind in early 2015. The Swede continued his downswing that started in 2014 - he finished last year with -$1,698,911 and according to HighStakesDB, he was down another $800,000 in January before trying to climb back up to the break even point. He never reached that point as Blom slowly but surely started a steep downfall of $1 million in the month of May. In fact, ‘Isildur1’ lost around $420,000 in just 50 minutes at just two Pot-Limit Omaha tables where he played heads-up against Ben ‘Sauce1234’ Sulsky. He went further down to about $1.1 million at the 8-Game tables with the likes of Phil ‘Polarizing’ Ivey, Patrik ‘FinddaGrind’ Antonius, and Alexander ‘PostFlopAction’ Kostritsyn.

The trend continued into the summer when Blom only salvaged around $300,000. His attempt to gain momentum was stopped however by the Full Tilt re-branding.

‘Isildur1' finished his 2015 FT adventure with a loss of $1,367,244 over 69,133 hands. Probably not what Blom had in mind...

Full-Time PokerStars and $4M Upswing

For a guy like ‘Isildur1’ though, the end of one adventure usually means the beginning of a new, more exciting one. So being left without his tables on FT, Blom moved to PokerStars where he finally found his way back to the winning team.

It’s not like the Swede didn’t play on PS, he actually did but fairly infrequently in the last years. In August 2015, he committed himself and started playing full-time on PS, at of course, the highest limits. In his first week as a full-time PS grinder, Blom crushed everybody winning $2,700,000 at basically all poker cash tables from the platform except No-Limit Texas Hold’Em. And to show you a glimpse of the Swedish late-summer heater, let’s rewind the largest pot of the year so far played between Blom and Sean ‘WithColor’ Rafael. Who won? The answer is obvious.

But this doesn’t mean ‘Isildur1’ was favoured by all poker gods in the last two months. Along with his major upswings, he did experience some pretty brutal downswings including a September $1.5 million dip. Yet, like always, he rebounded, got his game moving and rode the next wave up to this day when he sits at a comfortable +$4,428,797. Yes, that’s OVER FOUR MILLION DOLLARS in 222,840 hands. If he keeps it up, he could rewrite online poker history. For example, no single user has won over $5 million online since Daniel ‘jungleman’ Cates did in 2010 ($5,503,296). One year before, Patrik Antonius set up the all-time record with $8,973,946 in a single year at the FT tables.

Can Blom reach those heights?

Some Poker Precedents

If we look at the Swede’s online history, it's not that likely he will surpass these records. Why? In 2013, for instance, Blom was riding the same waves. He was up over $5 million in October but then the downswing struck him and left him with only a tenth of his profit ($542,796). During that year, he reached the $5M mark twice besides October - in January and July as well.

And that’s not the only case. When he first was introduced to the online poker world, he shocked everybody with his insane aggro play and his inhumane swings. In 2009, after some epic heads-up battles with ‘durrrr’, ‘Isildur1’ was up $5.46 million. In only one and a half months, he managed to blow through it all and then some, finishing that year in the red: -$2,216,177. The usual suspect who crushed him? The all-time record man himself, Patrik Antonius.

So has Blom learned from all his previous mistakes? Can he ride the upswing smoothly till the end of the year? Let's hold on and find out...