What hasn’t been said about Viktor “Isildur1” Blom that still needs to be said? The guy is a sicko. On Monday night, the nosebleed stakes cash game king showed that he’s not a one trick pony, winning the PokerStars Spring Championship of Online Poker (SCOOP) $10,000 Main Event, adding over $1 million to his already multi-million dollar bankroll.
In a funny little twist, most or all of his winning may soon leave PokerStars. As he is one of “The Professionals,” along with Tom “durrrr” Dwan and Gus Hansen, on Full Tilt Poker, odds are he will want the loot on his account over there. After all, he is paid to play on Full Tilt. Since Full Tilt Poker is owned by PokerStars, though, we don’t think Stars will care all that much about losing so much liquidity.
This is not Blom’s first tourney rodeo, either. Last year, he wowed the poker world by winning back-to-back SCOOP events. First was Event #2-M, a $215 No-Limit Hold’em freezout in which he beat 8,239 opponents to win $247,200. The very next day, he took down Event #3-H, $530 No-Limit Hold’em Six-Max Re-buy, good for $160,000.
But Blom is best known for his cash game prowess, which makes his wins in big online tournaments even more impressive, especially since he does not play in them all that often. He is the ultimate draw for railbirds at Full Tilt Poker, as he flings chips around with reckless abandon. Willing to take on anyone and everyone and virtually any game, he often sees seven-figure daily swings in his bankroll. Year to date, he is up $2.9 million, according to HighStakesDB.com.
Blom made his charge to the top of the chip counts near the end of Day 1, finishing the day in second place with 412,539 chips, one of just three players above the 300,000 chip mark. When the original field of 580 was eventually trimmed to the final nine, Isildur1 was in the middle of the pack with 825,522, well behind chip leader Noah “Exclusive” Boeken, who had 2,397,709.
It was those two who ended up squaring off in the end and though Blom had chipped up to over 2 million, Boeken had three times as many chips. Both stacks were very deep, though, as the blinds were just 17,500/35,000. Contrary to how he normally plays cash games, the PokerStars blog wrote that Blom “proceeded with caution,” methodically picking up chips without risking his entire stack. By the next scheduled break, Blom was winning, 6,721,891 to 1,978,109.
Shortly after the break, the tournament came to an end in spectacular fashion. Boeken min-raised pre-flop to 100,000 and Blom called, bringing a flop of J♠-K♣-9♠. Blom then check-raised Boeken’s 130,000 chip bet to 342,500, only to watch Boeken move all-in. Blom snap called, revealing Q♣-T♣ for the incredible flopped nut-straight. Boeken held K♠-5♣, giving him top pair and a long way to go to keep the tourney going. The 9♣ did give him a chance at a boat, but the A♦ sealed the deal for Blom.
Afterwards, Viktor Blom sent out a celebratory tweet: “I win the scoop main! Feeling just like a million bucks..cash game seat open?”
Figures.
2013 PokerStars Spring Championship of Online Poker – Final Table Results
1. Viktor “Isildur1” Blom – $1,096,200
2. Noah “Exclusive” Boeken – $803,300
3. cmontopdeck – $591,600
4. Mike “munchenHB” Telker – $446,600
5. Sergio “zcedrick” Aido – $313,200
6. Ravi “govshark2” Raghavan – $246,500
7. w4ldo – $188,500
8. leshkaGmBlZ – $130,500
9. Amadi_017 – $88,740