Isildur Playing High Stakes Heads Up SNG Poker

February 14, 2011 - High stakes cash professional Viktor "Isildur" Blom has been trying his hand in heads up sng poker as of late.  Playing the highest heads up sng buyin levels on PokerStars, Viktor plays under the alias "Isildur1."  After being stuck $50,000 around game 500, Isildur has heated up, with a total profit of about $55,000 during his roughly 875 lifetime heads up sng matches. 

HUSNG recently talked to some of the players he's been playing the most, which also happen to be some of the best high stakes heads up sng professionals in the world.

Pistons87 has played over 130 matches against Isildur1 and is currently down about $66,000 in those matches.  "I think Isildur is good at the deeper stacks, but in the shallow stack areas he's more exploitable," said Pistons.  He added, "So far I've run well below expectation against him.  He's just run too hot to take advantage at this point.  I think in the long run luck will catch up with him."  When asked if he'll continue to play Isildur, Pistons responded, "I will keep playing him, probably selling action to people like I have been doing to reduce variance.  I like my chances long term."

Berndsen12 is the high stakes heads up sng player that is down the most to Isildur thus far, about $80,000 over 186 matches.  He echoed Pistons when asked about Isildur's play.  "He is without a doubt the best husng player in the deep levels," he said.  "At first, he was really bad in the late levels, making ridiculous stack offs that were probably a result of him not caring much.  But he's improved a lot since then and at the moment he is one of the three toughest opponents to play for me."  When asked what he thinks about Isildur's future in heads up sngs, he said "It will probably depend how serious he takes the game and whether or not he ends up going on massive tilt at some point."  He added, "I will probably play him in the future because of the challenge, that's just the way I am.  I think I've had a breakeven to slight edge expectation against him so far, mainly because he's called some of my deep 4-bet shoves very light, with hands like 85s and Q8s.  But if we continue to play, I can't tell you who is a favorite."

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Swinging For the Fences - Isildur1's Heads Up SNG Graph Photo From Sharkscope

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Olivier "Livb112" Busquet is one of the few players up five figures on Isildur.  He's currently made about $14,000 over 30 matches against him, playing under the name Adonis112 on PokerStars.  Olivier said, "He's certainly tough to play.  Like anyone though, he has tendencies, weaknesses and the key is to try to understand how he thinks about the game.  He's usually playing 4-6 heads up sngs with some PLO on the side.  I'm not sure anybody can be a consistent winner at the highest levels of heads up sngs if they are 8-tabling."  He added that he will likely continue to play him at times and that he feels he has an edge in the matches that they play.

One player who isn't likely to be playing Isildur anytime soon is Danny "heybude" Steinberg.  At his blog, Suited-Aces, he recently discussed his recent experience playing Isildur.  "He did one thing very badly the entire time I played him, I suppose speaks of a degenerate gambler within him.  He rarely 3-bets and folds.  I was 4-betting him with a tight range the entire time we played and he would repeatedly get it in with Q8s or K6s."  Danny continued, "There were other things he did that were kind of bad.  But are his big mistakes and small mistakes enough to justify an edge against him, even when he does so many other things well?  Possibly, but not enough to make me want to continue to play him, nor enough to justify anyone buying my action."  Danny finished 55-62 and played as many as 6 tables at once when facing Isildur.