Behind the Swings: The Legend of Isildur1

I'm hosting a live coaching event this May in Las Vegas, join me + top high performance experts to improve your game on and off the felt: https://philgalfond.com/summit The legend of Viktor Blom / Isildur1 is highlighted by fellow high stakes poker player Phil Galfond, who competed with the Force of Nature, in this mini-documentary and personal high stakes highlight.

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In 2009, Viktor Blom aggressively launched himself from relative obscurity to high stakes poker stardom when he challenged the world’s best online heads-up poker players at the highest stakes online.

The most surprising fact, nobody knew who he was.

Isildur1 had allegedly been crushing the untracked Euro sites after a meteoric rise, destroying the best heads up poker players that Europe had to offer before suddenly appearing at the ultra high stakes online HU $200/$400 tables.

At first he was playing anybody who would sit him, and then he was playing 6 tables heads up against Poker Superstars Phil Ivey, Patrik Antonius, and Tom Dwan.

At the same time, at the highest stakes online.

And WINNING.


Tom Dwan, Patrik Antonius, and Phil Ivey are anything but easy customers (even today!) So who was Isildur1 and how was he able to compete with these legendary high stakes poker players (and other high stakes online pros?)

He appeared with a new aggressive strategy that all the ultra high stakes pros could agree was high variance and created huge poker pots, but nobody could agree on if it was good or bad.


At first.


Eventually Isildur1 was revealed as being Viktor Blom, and with that reveal came the opportunity for Phil Galfond to personally meet one of his greatest online poker rivals.


Phil and Isildur1 have battled at the online high stakes HU poker tables for years, with Phil legendarily losing $1,100,000 in one session against him in Vancouver of 2014.


Phil eventually returned the favor and had his most memorable poker session, his biggest winning session ever against Viktor Blom, winning over $1,600,000 in one poker session.


The legendary stories of these high stakes poker sessions, the story of getting Isildur1 to record videos for Runitonce training, and a look into Isildur1’s legendary upswing and downswing can be found in today’s high stakes poker story.



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Producer: Matti Harju
Writer/co-producer: Miikka Anttonen
Brand Design: Dan Deming-Henes
Creative Specialists: Quentin Cardinal-Juneau, Miikka Anttonen

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TIMESTAMPS

00:00 Intro
01:18 Getting Destroyed by Isildur1
02:17 From Euro Sites to Nosebleeds
04:13 Isildur1 vs. Everyone: How Did He Do It?
05:54 My First Time Playing Isildur1
08:17 My Most Memorable Session
09:44 Getting to Know Viktor Blom
10:58 Isildur Story #1: Triple Draw
12:35 Isildur Story #2: Training Videos
14:17 Isildur Story #3: Romcoms
15:09 Isildur Story #4: Love for the Game
16:50 What Happened to Isildur1?