Poker News

PokerStars Announces 2010 Nordic Poker Awards

The Nordic Poker Awards, previously the Scandinavian Poker Awards, will celebrate the best players from Finland, Norway, Denmark and Sweden on Feb. 15 – the day before EPT Copenhagen begins.

This year there are 30 nominees from across the four Nordic countries.

Some of the notable players to be nominated include Peter Eastgate, Patrik Antonius, Ville Wahlbeck, Dag Martin Mikkelsen, Ilari Sahamies, Jens Kyllonen and Erik Sagstrom.

The categories for 2010 include Best Live Tournament Player, Best Performance, Best Online Player and Rookie of the Year.

Award winners will be chosen by a public vote.

All EPT players are invited to the awards ceremony, which will be held at Park Café in Copenhagen at 8 p.m.

Check the PokerStars website for the complete list of nominees.

Visit PokerListings.com

Ilari Sahamies and Alexander “PostflopAction” Kostritsyn chats up

Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies is currently in Australia, but he is still dominating the Full Tilt Poker high stakes games and making huge profit.

Ziigmund

The exact results will arrive a bit later, but it looks like Sahamies has won about 1,6 million dollars in January already.

The Finn dominated the Aussie Million 2008 winner Alexander “PostflopAction” Kostritsyn along with others.

Alexander “PostflopAction” Kostritsyn

They chatted a lot during their play:

Ziigmund: u r f amazing sick lucky
PostflopAction: fu
Ziigmund: f
Ziigmund: u
Ziigmund: its f omg
Ziigmund: never seen as lucky as u
PostflopAction: ur winning 120k
Ziigmund: i doesn maer
Ziigmund: i should be 400k
PostflopAction: its how big your bankroll should be
Ziigmund: lers go 1,5k 3k
PostflopAction: nah, need to win first
Ziigmund: sry was a phone
PostflopAction: fu
Ziigmund: room service
PostflopAction: die
Ziigmund: 1,5k 3k?
PostflopAction: yes in 10 min
Ziigmund: ok
Ziigmund: cool
PostflopAction: play now
PostflopAction: its sick how u play so bad and run so good
Ziigmund: stop whining
Ziigmund: and take more money

Also David Oppenheim seemed to be in a chatty mood:

David Oppenheim: are you gonna runaway when the limit games come
David Oppenheim: hey zigg
David Oppenheim: are you man enough to play all the games

Ziigmund: i have to play 2 tables postflop action
Ziigmund: lets play later
David Oppenheim: your a &%!!%
David Oppenheim: b itch
Ziigmund: ok lets play
David Oppenheim: now you r a man
Ziigmund:

Tommy_devito77 (Observer): i seen a video of david opp on cardplayer
Tommy_devito77 (Observer): he was checking out his daughters tits
Tommy_devito77 (Observer): weird 4 sure
David Oppenheim: saw a video of tommy s mom on porn tune
David Oppenheim: she was definately a freak
Tommy_devito77 (Observer): was she good
David Oppenheim: ask your brother

Source: 2+2, Highstakesdb

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Ilari Sahamies and Alexander “PostflopAction” Kostritsyn chats up

Ilari Sahamies and Cole South against Patrik Antonius

There was a very interesting 3-handed Omaha session on Full Tilt Poker yesterday. There was no fishes involved as the three fearless lads clashed against each other.

Foes on the poker table, friends outside the game. Antonius and Sahamies.

Ilari Sahamies started the session with a heads up against Patrik Antonius, but shortly after Cole South joined their tables. And as you can guess, the game got very aggressive when all three got deep stacks in front of them.

It was Patrik Antonius who ended up losing this time around. They played $300/$600 Pot-Limit Omaha and Sahamies won almost all the big hands.

Ziigmund and Antonius in the biggest pot of the session - $281k
Cole South cracks Ziigmund’s top set - $268k
Also Antonius manages to win a big pot - $258k

In the end Antonius left the tables when he was around $810k down leaving Sahamies and South counting their winnings from the last 24 hours. Sahamies was up $454k and South $386k. South was running hot on PokerStars as well as he won nicely from “nutsinho” playing heads up.

Ziigmund: how much u end up?
Cole South: no clue, was playing a bunch of games and not sure what i won where
Cole South: u
Cole South: i was stuck a lot at first here
Ziigmund: totally up
Ziigmund: like
Ziigmund: 600
Cole South: live results says around +400k but a bunch of that was mix and 50100 plo
Ziigmund: when started with patrik
Cole South: not a bad day to be ziigmund
Ziigmund: lost for durrrrr 200
Cole South: gg
Ziigmund: gg

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Ilari Sahamies and Cole South against Patrik Antonius

Bunch of big winners on Full Tilt Poker

Gus Hansen has been the most dominant player on Full Tilt Poker in January - he has won 1,24 million dollars already. But now there’s competition. Cole South, Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies and Di “Urindanger” Dang have all managed to win almost million dollars.

The Great Dane - Gus Hansen

All the aforementioned players have won around million dollars in January - South has made 965,000 dollars, Sahamies and Dang a bit over 950.000 dollars.

Cole South leads all the way against Ilari Sahamies and Sami “LarsLuzak” Kelopuro in a $601k pot:

And when there’s winners, there has to be losers

Richard Ashby has taken the lead on the loser side of the field, he has lost about 780k dollars.

There’s still one missing, Isildur1. Where is the Swede? Let’s hope he will make a fast comeback.

Source: Highstakesdb

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Bunch of big winners on Full Tilt Poker

Ilari Sahamies writes about 2009: “Little more sense and I could’ve won 7 million”

Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies writes about his New Year’s partying at Tahko, Finland. Even though the party was a success, he lost his third tattoo bet.

Patrik Antonius and Ilari Sahamies were big winners in 2009 on Full Tilt Poker

Sahamies continues to tell that all the games in 2009 went very well, except when he lost 2,2 million dollars to Isildur1 and a bit less to some other players in December.

“I dont wanna say my all statements from every sites and cashgames last year but from Fulltilt I won 3,3 million…I should be fine with that but im not.Little bit more sense and I was winning like 7″, Sahamies writes in his latest blog entry.

Sahamies sets some goals for 2010 as well: he promises not to play when he is tired or in tilt.

The next time Ziigmund will play live is in Finland, in Helsinki Freezeout which starts this Friday.

Source: Ilari’s blog

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Ilari Sahamies writes about 2009: “Little more sense and I could’ve won 7 million”

The Top Winners and Losers of 2009

Below are summaries of the top five money earners, and top five losers of the year, including a month-by-month graph of their results.

To see more stats and hand replays from throughout the year, head to MarketPulse.

Patrik Antonius

It only makes sense to have the year’s top earner at the top of the list, so without further ado, we bring you the 2009 story of Patrik Antonius.

Patrik Antonius just might have hit the life jackpot. He was at one-time a model and tennis pro, before becoming one of the most respected, and feared, poker players in the world. He made the list of the top 10 top profit earners in 2007 under the username FinddaGrind with over $1.3 million earned.

In 2008, he made another $1.3 million, this time as part of Team Full Tilt.

This January Antonius made over $2 million and never dropped below that point. His year was filled with million dollar swings, but in the end, the Finnish pro always found a way to come out good.

On top of being the most profitable player on the year, Antonius was also busy breaking the records for the largest pots ever played online. Despite all of his profits, Antonius has fallen behind in the durrrr Challenge and needs to make close to $1 million in the second half to have a chance.

However, he finished 2009 as the top earner with a massive profit of over $8.9 million.

Phil Ivey

This year Phil Ivey has done exactly what Phil Ivey does every year: Win. In 2008, Ivey was the top online earner with over $7.3 million in profit. In 2007 he was the third largest earner with $1.9 million and this year he ends in second place with $6.3 million.

His story is the same every year: Any players, any game, any stakes. He’ll sit, and most of the time he’ll win. But even Ivey isn’t immune to the swings, starting off the year in the red he had to spend a couple of months getting back to even.

After an $800k loss in May, it was pretty much profit from that point on. Add these winnings to his two WSOP bracelets, Main Event final table appearance and prop bets won, and you have one hell of a good looking year.

Brian Hastings

CardRunners pro Brian Hastings has had one of the most interesting years out of anyone online. He started the year with a backing deal for playing the nose-bleed stakes against Gus Hansen.

Even with Hansen bleeding chips for months, Hastings struggled to get even for the majority of the year, finally showing a profit come August.

Come the end of November, it started to look as though Hastings would be having a positive year, but nothing too spectacular, or worth talking about. That was until he sat down with Isildur1 for possibly the biggest session in online poker history.

By the end of the single session with the game’s most explosive player, Hastings had made $4.2 million in profit; effectively ending Isildur1’s run at Full Tilt’s high-stakes tables.

The win was steeped in controversy when information came to light that Hastings, along with two fellow CardRunners pros Brian Townsend and Cole South, merged their hand history databases together to allow for an in-depth study of Isildur1’s heads up game.

For the full scoop on this controversy, head to: Full Tilt Suspends Brian Townsend.

theASHMAN103

Ashton “theASHMAN103” Griffin is only 20 years old, and began playing poker seriously in high-school. His downfall has always been bankroll management and tilt issues.

After a series of massive swings he went broke right at the beginning of the year, but Griffin finally got his head in the right spot coming in to April of 2009 when he was forced to get a stake to get back in the game.

Thanks to winning a prop bet for making $500k playing nothing higher than $25/$50 No-Limit immediately before the event was set to start, Griffin was able to enter into the $25k heads-up shootout, which he went on to win for another $500k.

Griffin’s heater continued over the next two months going from broke to the fifth most profitable player on the year. To read a full interview with Griffin about his heater, and life in poker, head to: Ashman103: The Interview Transcript.

Ilari Sahamies

Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies is one of the most well-known and entertaining online players in the world. Above all else he seems to have a love for gambling with sick amounts of money.

For a few days, Sahamies had convinced a few of the nosebleed players to convert the $500/$1,000 Pot-Limit Omaha tables into $3,000/$9,000. Along with all the massive flips Sahamies played over the year, it’s safe to say he is the biggest gambler at the tables.

But despite his love for gambling, Ziigmund is still one of the most profitable players in the world. The occasional swing aside, Ziigmund’s graph is mostly un-eventful, hovering around the $2-$3 million mark for the majority of the year.

It wasn’t until Ziigmund set his sights on Isildur1 that his graph took a violent swing upwards. After taking a few million from the unknown player, Ziigmund finished his year up an impressive $3.2 million.

Isildur1

True identity still unknown, Isildur1 showed up on the poker scene Sept. 16. He splashed around in medium to high-stakes for about a month before starting to take shots in the nosebleed games.

The true story of Isildur1 started on Nov. 7 when he began his first serious upswing by crushing well known players like Haseeb Qureshi and UgotaBanana. After these wins, Isildur1 seemed fearless, willing to play anyone at any stakes.

Soon Isildur1 set his sights on Tom “durrrr” Dwan and over the next three days he absolutely destroyed him for over $4 million. At his highest point on Nov. 15^, Isildur1 sat with over $5 million in profit, only to lose it all, mostly to Ivey and Antonius, by the 21^st.

After making another quick run back up to almost $3 million in just one week, Isildur1 began his largest downswing.

It was during the downswing where Isildur1 shattered all the records for the largest pots of all time. He first broke the record with an $878k pot versus Patrik Antonius, only to break that record a few days later losing the first pot worth over a million at $1,356,947. 

Mostly a result of losing over $4.2 million in a single session to Brian Hastings, Isildur1 saw his roll get almost entirely crushed, sitting down over $2 million for the remainder of the month.

With his only hands being played at the medium stakes tables, it appears at this point as if Isildur1’s run at the highest stakes games online is through.

David Benyamine

In 2008, David Benyamine was the sixth most profitable online player in the world. He finished the year having made almost $3 million profit and had snagged himself one of the most beautiful girls in poker, Erica Schoenberg.

At the very end of 2008, Full Tilt Poker dropped Benyamine as a red-name pro. As a result, he began 2009 playing under the username “MR B 2 U SON”. He played under that username until July of 2009 when his Team Full Tilt status was re-instated.

At the time of the username switch, Benyamine was down $731,128 on the year. Things continued to get worse for the French pro as he struggled throughout 2009, finishing down $2.9 million. To top it all off, many sources have reported an end to his relationship with Schoenberg.

All in all, 2009 might just have been the worst year in Benyamine’s career.

LarsLuzak

Sami “LarsLuzak” Kelopuro is a 22-year-old Finnish poker pro who showed up on the high-stakes scene in 2007. He made over a million dollars in both 2007 and 2008, plus a rumored large profit from $250/$500 No-Limit sessions played on Betfair poker.

Despite hopes of cementing his name as one of the top players in the world, 2009 turned out to be a complete disaster for Kelopuro.

Starting the year with an $810k loss, Kelopuro was almost able to grind his way back to even in February before beginning a landslide of losses.

At no point in 2009 did Kelopuro show a profit, despite his continued efforts at the games highest stakes. After reaching nearly $4 million in losses on the year, Kelopuro disappeared from the high-stakes games, sparking rumors of a busted bankroll.

With a laundry list of impressive results from both cash games and tournaments, it’s safe to assume the poker world will hear more from Kelopuro in 2010.

Tom “durrrr” Dwan

Tom Dwan has to be considerd one of the most entertaining poker players in the world. As a result, there has been more time spent talking about Dwan in 2009 than any other online player.

His year began by losing over $4 million in the first two months, only to grind back up to over $1.4 million in profit just four months later. However, the massive swings were only one of Dwan’s many stories on the year.

The first came with the introduction of the durrrr Challenge. After almost two months of speculation and rumors, Patrik Antonius stepped up as the first competitor, and the challenge was underway.

After a short period of consistent play between the two competitors, the Challenge took a hiatus as both players chose to focus on busting a new fish splashing around at the highest stake tables available.

It didn’t take Dwan, and the rest of the online regulars, long to bust a new fish calling himself Martonas, and the challenge seemed as if it would resume.

But it wasn’t long before another new face showed up on the scene and began stirring the pot. Luke “fullflush1” Schwartz proved to be as strong at the table as he was mouthy, focusing the majority of his insults at Dwan, including the now infamous “cork it durrrrballs”.

Schwartz successfully made over $700k at the tables before cashing out, and buying a house with his profits.

The next big story for Dwan came with the third unknown player to splash around in the big game. Unfortunately for Dwan, this player, Isildur1, would end up taking him for over $5 million, before giving it all away to everyone else.

Shortly after losing the majority of his online roll, Dwan became the newest member of Team Full Tilt, and began grinding his way back towards even. By the end of 2009 Dwan had brought himself back to -$4.3 million from his November low point of -$6.8 million.

On the bright side, he is ahead in the durrrr Challenge by over $937k.

Gus Hansen

This year’s story for Gus Hansen is simple: He made $3 million in the first month, mostly off Tom Dwan, then proceeded to lose almost exclusively for the remainder of the year. Although there were months in which he showed a profit, Hansen’s graph on the year is anything but encouraging.

Due to his consistent negative results, Hansen has become one of the most popular online players amongst the other regular high-stakes grinders. As he explained in an interview with PokerListings, the high-stakes games on Full Tilt simply follow him from table to table.

As a result, Hansen chose to play almost exclusively 7-Game for the remainder of the year, at times killing absolutely all high-stakes action for all other variants.

For a look into high-stakes, and how some of the other players in the game view Hansen, head to: State of the High Stakes Poker Nation.

Visit PokerListings.com

Ilari Sahamies down over 3 million in December

The games haven’t been too kind for the Finnish Omaha King Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies. Yesterday Sahamies took a $452k beating on Full Tilt Poker high stakes games and his total losses in December are now almost 3,4 million dollars.

It’s strange to see that most of his losses have come from his main game, Pot Limit Omaha. Even though Ziigmund is in a downward bender right now, he has earned a bit over three million dollars in 2009.

Let’s see if he tries to get some of the losses back on New Years Eve like he did in last year, of course totally drunk, or shall we see him back on tables in 2010.

And in the end some random chatter from the session he had with Cole South yesterday:

Cole South: na sorry 100200 is as big as i can play vs u, ur too good
Ziigmund: huh
Ziigmund: f u
Ziigmund: h8 u
Cole South: respect ur game a lot i dont wanna play that big
Ziigmund: huh
Cole South: just saying i respect ur game a lot, i dont want to play u so high stakes
Cole South: i am happy to keep playing 100200
Ziigmund: u dont even know how f lucky u have been
Cole South: i have been extremely lucky against you
Cole South: completely agree
Ziigmund: hope someone shoot the rocket to your eyes in new year

Ziigmund can be so polite some times.

Source: Highstakesdb

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Ilari Sahamies down over 3 million in December

Sahamies believes that “Isildur1? will make a fast comeback

Ilari Sahamies writes about his games against “Isildur1″ in his latest blog entry.

Sahamies writes that he is up “million or two” against “Isildur1″ and feels bad about the last session with the Swede. Ilari tilted on that session and lost about 1,5 million dollars.

“I think he will be back soon there and I will play if he plays,” Sahamies writes.

Ilari has spent his time by decorating his new apartment and he is going join the new year’s eve party at Tahko. After Tahko he is going to fly to Bahamas.

You can read the whole entry here.

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Sahamies believes that “Isildur1″ will make a fast comeback

The Nightly Turbo: Ziigmund on Isildur1, World Series of Poker Circuit Record, and More

It's Friday and we're just as ready for the weekend as you are. We're sending you into the weekend with Ilari Sahamies' views on Isildur1, a record on the World Series of Poker Circuit, and more. What else are you going to talk about at the poker...

Ilari Sahamies speaks about “Isildur1?

Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies gave an interview to the Danish PokerRadio.dk. Sahamies, who is up about 6,6 million dollars for the year, spoke about the games he have had with “Isildur1″.

The interview starts hilariously when Ilari shouts “Hey, play that hand over and go sit out” in Finnish. After the awkward start the interview begins to roll.

Sahamies tells about his huge wins over “Isildur1″ and that he thinks “Isildur1″ is actually Viktor “Blom90″ Blom, but isn’t 100% sure. He also hopes that he’s going to bust the Swede.

If you can listen to some really broken english, you can check out the whole interview here.

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Ilari Sahamies speaks about “Isildur1″

Isildur1 in a heavy tailspin

“Isildur1″ has been mych talked last month. First he won $6,5 million and now within two weeks he has lost everything.

Last couple of days have been rough to the Swede as he has lost over 5 million dollars, so his games are around break-even now.

The Finnish power duo, Ilari Sahamies and Patrik Antonius, have won over 3 million dollars and now Cole South won around million dollars from “Isildur1″.

Cole South

South was running good as you can see from this hand. South’s higher flush takes the $271,980 pot. After that “Isildur1″ tried to change the game:

Isildur1: cany i give me a shot for my last money ay nl ?
Cole South: na sorry — i think i am still stuck to you lifetime anyways havent won against u in forever
Cole South: but i am only playing plo today, gl

It is interesting to see if “Isildur1’s” games are played or can he get some money somewhere.

You can follow the drama on Full Tilt Poker.

Source: Highstakesdb

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Isildur1 in a heavy tailspin

Ziigmund wins over $2 million from Isildur1

There’s not a boring moment when Ilari Sahamies and “Isildur1″ meet at the tables.

This time around it was “Ziigmund’s” turn to win the money. According to Highstakesnews, Sahamies won over 2 million dollars.

It wasn’t “Isildur1’s” day as he lost $600k to Brian Townsend as well, so his total loss went well over 2,6 million dollars.

Sahamies at Grand Casino Helsinki

Sahamies is up about 3,5 million dollars this month and “Isildur1″ is still up around 2,3 million.

Isildur1’s graph from the last 30 days:

Source: Highstakesdb

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Ziigmund wins over $2 million from Isildur1

Ilari Sahamies and Brian Townsend vs “Isildur1? pt. 2

“Isildur1″ lost million dollars to Brian Townsend and Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies yesterday. It didn’t take long until they continued the fight.

After the dust had settled down, the results looked like this:

Isildur1 – +$702,390
Brian Townsend – +$460,630
Ziigmund – $-1,166,630

Sahamies had came back online and lost his winnings and about $1,2 millions more!

The biggest hand of the evening - Sahamies wins a $709k pot with a straight.

We’re expecting them to continue today.

Source: Highstakesdb

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Ilari Sahamies and Brian Townsend vs “Isildur1″ pt. 2

Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies wins 2,4 million and talks about Isildur1

Ilari Sahamies had an unbeliavable day yesterday at Full Tilt Poker as he managed to win 2,4 million dollars!

First he faced the Swedish phenom Isildur1 and won 1,5 million. After that encounter he continued to beat his fellow Finn Patrik Antonius for 900.000$. “Semi-ok grind”, Ilari commented at his Facebook profile.

After the session he told that he played his best game ever, or at least he felt like it. Of course I also hit my cards well, Ilari noted.

He also gave few comments about Isildur1:

“He makes nice action at Full Tilt”

“The games he makes are too big, I shouldn’t play him - but still I play”

The games are really getting huge as it took only 1 hour for Ilari to beat Isildur1 for the 1,5 million. At this rate we could see 10 million swings easily.

Source: Pokerisivut.com (In Finnish)

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Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies wins 2,4 million and talks about Isildur1

Tom ‘durrrr’ Dwan beats Ilari ‘Ziigmund’ Sahamies in Full Tilt Million Dollar Challenge

Neither tiredness nor Ziigmund could keep Tom Dwan away from victory at Les Ambassadeurs in Mayfair yesterday but both ran him pretty hard. Resuming Day Two of the Full Tilt Million Dollar Challenge, after another epic all night encounter with the mysterious Isildur1, Dwan staged a classy comeback to take the honours against Ilari Sahamies.

Isildur1 beats the Finns - Ziigmund loses million dollars

Isildur1 fought against two Finns earlier today. Ilari Sahamies and Patrik Antonius took Isildur1’s challenge and they head to the PLO heads up tables.

They played $500/$1000 PLO and yet again Isildur1 was victorious. The Swede won exactly $1.363.230.

The Finns lost quite a lot, Ziigmund ended up -$1.034.230 and Antonius only -$329.592.

Couple of hands:

Ziigmund’s flush is not enough:

Ziigmund wins the $588k pot

Source: Highstakesdb

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Isildur1 beats the Finns - Ziigmund loses million dollars

Durrrr’s Million Dollar Challenge live version

Durrrr Million Dollar Challenge live version started yesterday. Tom Dwan will play heads up against Ilari Sahamies, Sammy “any two” George and Marcelo “luckexpress10″ Marigliano.

Tom Dwan

The format is simple: Dwan will play against each player for at least 500 hands and the games will be either No Limit Hold’em or Pot Limit Omaha.

Minimum buy-in is $500k and you can’t leave the table before you are bust or you have played 500 hands. Blinds will be $500/$1000.

Yesterday Dwan faced Marcelo Marigliano, who chose NLHE as the game they’ll play. Sammy George chose NLHE as his game as well.

People have speculated that only Ilari Sahamies will give Dwan a serious challenge. It was not a surprise that Sahamies chose PLO as the game for their heads up.

Ilari Sahamies

According to Poker News Daily, Sahamies told the orginisers that he is waiting eagerly to meet Dwan. There will be lots of sidebets, partying and drinking involved, so the players will have a good time.

Source: Poker News Daily

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Durrrr’s Million Dollar Challenge live version

Ilari Sahamies takes $1,2 million in two hours

It was yet another action filled night at Full Tilt Poker. It seemed that some of the top pros were hunting down Isildur1, but he didn’t show up.

We saw some old names on the big $300/$600 + ante tables. Brian “Sbrugby” Townsend and Niki “Kaibuxxe” Jedlicka joined the action after they’ve built up their bankroll in the lower stakes. Also Patrik Antonius, Hac “Trex313″ Hang and David Benyamine were checking out the action.

Sahamies was really unstoppable. He continued to play with his own style - which is really hyper- aggressive - so he got people to pay up when he held the nuts.

Ziigmund continued to play heads up against Tom Dwan in $500/$1000 PLO and he won $300k very fast. Dwan quit playing shortly after this.

Eventually Ziigmund took all the money from the Russian player “rospod” and shortly after the games dried up because Ilari had so deep stack.

Sahamies took about $1,2 million paycheck from the two hour long session. Quite nice.

Ziigmund gets great value from Trex313, $268k pot

Ilari takes down another pot, $264k

Sahamies vs Isildur1

A bit later on Sahamies played against David Benyamine and Isildur1. Isildur1 wouldn’t answer Ilari’s questions, so the games ended fast. Although, Isildur1 did say that he is not anyone that Ilari would know. We don’t have the results from these games yet.

Source: Highstakesdb

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Ilari Sahamies takes $1,2 million in two hours

High Stakes Poker 6 - Players unveiled

GSN Channel announced the players for the next season of High Stakes Poker. Also Kara Scott’s employment became official.

Yet again the player list is very impressive. Seventeen players, every one of them a real professional. The player list includes people like Doyle Brunson, Tom Dwan, Patrik Antonius, David Benyamine, Phil Ivey, Daniel Negreanu and Yevgeniy Timoshenko.

Doyle Brunson holding his signature hand

Minimum buy-in for this season is $200.000, so we are not talking about any small game here. We saw over $1 million pots in last season, and we expect the same kind of action this time around as well.

After announcing the player list, Kara Scott’s entry to the show was affirmed. Scott’s task is to make the player interviews which are going to be more in-depth on this season. Scott tries to dig a bit deeper into the game than previously seen. Season 6 will premiere on February 14th.

The player list might not be complete as e.g. Andrew Feldman is not mentioned. Feldman personally told that he is going to be in HSP.

We also have information that Ilari Sahamies might be part of the show. Sahamies told this to the Finnish poker site Pokerisivut.com

Incomplete list of HSP 6 players:

* Patrik Antonius
* David Benyamine
* Doyle Brunson
* Tom Dwan
* Eli Elezra
* Antonio Esfandiari
* Sammy George
* Barry Greenstein
* Phil Hellmuth
* Andreas Hoivold
* Phil Ivey
* Mike Matusow
* Allan Meltzer
* Daniel Negreanu
* Dennis Phillips
* Lex Veldhuis
* Yevgeniy Timoshenko

Source: 2+2, Pokerlistings, Pokerisivut.com

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High Stakes Poker 6 - Players unveiled

Ilari Sahamies loses a bet - has to take an icehockey team tattoo!

Poker players are known to make crazy bets. Ilari Sahamies is famous to be a huge HIFK (Helsingfors IF, a Finnish icehockey team) fan. Ilari and Heikki Paasonen, a famous Finnish TV host and poker player, were watching an icehockey game where they hooked a bet with a fan of the opposing team. Loser of the bet has to tattoo their team’s logo somewhere onto their body.

According to the official HIFK site the bet took place when JYP HT and HIFK were on 3-3 situation. Opposing team’s fan offered the tattoo bet to Heikki Paasonen and after a while he got Ilari Sahamies to take the bet as well.

Needless to say that JYP HT won the game 4-3.

So, on the next morning Sahamies and Paasonen proved to be men behind their words and went to Blue Dragon Tattoo Studio in Helsinki to take the tattoos. Sahamies took the HIFK logo onto his side while Paasonen took it on his caif.

Ilari Sahamies - Mr. “I bet on everything”

Source:HIFK.fi

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Ilari Sahamies loses a bet - has to take an icehockey team tattoo!

Sami Kelopuro and Ilari Sahamies among the highest earning Finns

During 2008, Sami “LarsLuzak” Kelopuro’s incomes were 1.693.432,85€. Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies informed the tax office about his 1.095.735,02€ income. They are both earning the same kind of salaries which the bankers and other top paid business people get.

Sami Kelopuro grinding the money

Sami Kelopuro, who was born in 1987, is the youngest person on the Finnish tax listing. Elopuro’s income, 1.693.432,85€, merits him the 20th place on the list, which is about the same what the top paid bankers get in Finland.

In 2007 Kelopuro’s income was 530.000€, so 2008 treated him well.

Kelopuro has moved to Monaco, so we won’t have an access to his this year’s earnings. On the other hand, he has managed to dig a deep hole on Full Tilt Poker high stakes games this year.

Ilari Sahamies feels lucky

Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies let the tax office know about his 1.095.735,02€ income. Sahamies, born in 1983, is still living in Finland. His earnings merited him the 60th place on the Finnish tax listing.

Ilari has made good profit this year, so we can expect to see him quite high on next year’s tax listing as well.

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Sami Kelopuro and Ilari Sahamies among the highest earning Finns

Patrik Antonius up $7 million this year

There’s a Finnish steam locomotive dominating the Full Tilt Poker high stakes tables, his name is Patrik Antonius. No one has been able to stop him. Last weekend he broke the $7 million limit.

Pokerlistings’ MarketPulse follows the high stakes games regularly and according to them, Antonius has been able to win $7 million during 148,000 hands.

148,000 hands for an average grinder is not much, but in high stakes games only Tom Dwan and Gus Hansen have played more hands than Antonius this year. Dwan has played 195,000 hands and Hansen 225,000.

Last night Antonius played against Ilari Sahamies and some other pros.

Antonius hits the river, $257k pot

Antonius flops top set, $248k pot

Source: Pokerlistings, HSDB

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Patrik Antonius up $7 million this year

Phil Ivey (+1,8 million), David Benyamine (-1,7 million) in October

October ended and it’s time to take a peak at last month’s high stakes games. There was decent amount of action so we got million dollar winners and losers.

October’s biggest winners - Patrik Antonius and Phil Ivey

October’s biggest winner was Phil Ivey who is currently preparing for the November 9. Ivey played about 8200 hands and managed to win $1,8 million. Patrik Antonius won $350k less and pushed himself into second place. Antonius played more than normally and highstakesdb recorded over 24.000 hands for him. Antonius won most of his money from 7-Game and H.O.R.S.E. Ivey got ovet $800k from Omaha. Patrik Antonius is up over $6.1 million on Full Tilt Poker high stakes games this year.

Other big winners were:

Abe “EazyPeazy” Mosseri $905k
Gus Hansen $735k
Tom “durrrr” Dwan $643k
Brian Hastings $594k
Ashton “theASHMAN103? Griffin $578k

The losers

David Benyamine managed to take a huge beat with over $1,7 million losses. Almost all of his losses came from 7-Game and H.O.R.S.E. Benyamine played second most hands of the month, only Richard Ashby played more. Even though Benyamine played a lot, he manged to lose time after time. Ilari Sahamies, Gus Hansen and Patrik Antonius took most of his money.

Other players who lost over $500k:

“Isildur1? $-989k
Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond $-963k
“Slick Puppy” $-897k
David Oppenheim $-777k
David “POKERBLUFFS” Eldar $-649k
Rafi “rafiboy” Amit $-618k
Chau Giang $-598k

Source: highstakesdb

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Phil Ivey (+1,8 million), David Benyamine (-1,7 million) in October

Phil Ivey isn’t allowed to flip on Full Tilt anymore?

Very strange. Phil Ivey says that he’s not allowed to flip on Full Tilt anymore.

Some info about Ivey’s flip ban can be read from the chat Bluff Europe captured from Full Tilt. Ilari Sahamies wants to flip to get back some of his previous flip losses, but Ivey refuses to flip.

Ziigmund: let sflip
Ziigmund: lets flip
Ziigmund: lets flip
Ziigmund: lets flip
Phil Ivey: full tilt won’t allow me to do that
System: The $3,000 Guarantee ($24+$2 Hold’em) will be starting in 5 minutes.
Ziigmund: ????
Phil Ivey: long stry
Ziigmund: huh¨¨
Ziigmund: whatever
Phil Ivey: im serious

We really don’t know the real reason for the flip ban, but Bluff Europe thinks it’s because of the WSOP Final Table and the US poker legislature. Seems really odd.

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Source: Bluff Europe

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Phil Ivey isn’t allowed to flip on Full Tilt anymore?

Sahamies + Soberness = 1.000.000$ Profit

Just a few days ago we wrote how Ilari Sahamies crushed David Benyamine on Full Tilt Poker. Well, Ilari was so happy that he even made a new blog entry out of it.

Like we told, Ziigmund was able to crush Benyamine completely, Ilari won over $400k only from Benyamine. Later on he got into a PLO heads up match with Phil Ivey and got $200k out of him as well.

Now Ilari is bragging about his 1-million day in his blog. He tells that it was the first sober day in a long time. Normally he’s playing in hangover, so it was a bit of a chance for him. His spirit seems high, well, who wouldn’t be happy after winning a cool million?

Looking through Highstakesdb, Ilari is up $2.47 million on Full Tilt Poker only. Ziigmund seems to have a great year so far.

Source: Coinflip, Highstakesdb

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Sahamies + Soberness = 1.000.000$ Profit

Sahamies Running Hot Against Benyamine

Ilari Sahamies and David Benyamine clashed on two Full Tilt Poker 7-game tables. Benyamine was able to dominate at the beginning, but in the end it was Sahamies who was able to win it all.

Benyamine’s start was great in the heads up battle and he was able to win in Hi/Lo games quite much. After the game changed to NL Hold’em Sahamies squeezed a nice $247k pot. Sahamies held Jacks against Benyamine’s Tens and “Ziigmund” started to dominate. Benyamine had Tens on the other table as well, but it was Sahamies who won the pot ($90k) again. “Ziigmund” hit his three-outer with AT and Sahamies was already over $300k up.

Benyamine was reloading small sums and Sahamies was up $150k-$200k for a long time. Sometimes it seemed that Benyamine had his whole bankroll on the two tables.

David Benyamine (BB): $85972.00
Ziigmund (BTN/SB): $268134.00

Pre Flop: ($1500.00)
Ziigmund raises to $3000, David Benyamine raises to $9000, Ziigmund calls $6000

Flop: ($18000.00) 5d Tc 8c
David Benyamine bets $14000, Ziigmund calls $14000

Turn: ($46000.00) 5c
David Benyamine requests TIME, David Benyamine checks, Ziigmund checks

River: ($46000.00) 6c
David Benyamine requests TIME, David Benyamine bets $37000, Ziigmund calls $37000

Final Pot: $120000.00
David Benyamine shows Jh Ah (a pair of Fives)
Ziigmund shows 7c 7s (a flush, Ten high)
Ziigmund wins $119999.50

Sahamies and Benyamine played almost 900 hand before the heads up was over. Sahamies crushed Benyamine on both tables and sat out with a nice $683k stack, so “Ziigmund” won over $400k from Benyamine. Does Benyamine’s break up with Erica Schoenberg tilt him that much, or is David just running bad?

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Sahamies Running Hot Against Benyamine

Matt Glantz Wins PokerStars EPT London High Roller Event

American Matt Glantz emerged victorious in the European Poker Tour’s (EPT) London High Roller event, banking £542,000. Glantz bested Erik Cajelais in a tournament that attracted 75 runners.

Cajelais entered the final table as a commanding chip leader, owning a stack of 893,000, well out in front of Glantz, who came armed with 647,500. Glantz had a wealth of experience, however, finishing fourth in the $50,000 buy-in HORSE Championship during the 2008 World Series of Poker (WSOP) for $568,000. That final table, of course, featured Scotty Nguyen, a 2009 Poker Hall of Fame finalist, emerging victorious while allegedly inebriated. Also that year, Glantz took third in the World Championship Mixed Event for $184,000.

Cajelais, meanwhile, was fresh off a win in the £2,500 buy-in Pot Limit Hold’em / Pot Limit Omaha contest during the 2009 WSOP Europe festivities, which were also held in London. In that event, he defeated Mats Gavatin heads-up and earned £104,000. Also appearing at the Pot Limit final table were Men “The Master” Nguyen, Hoyt Corkins, and Chris Bjorin, who went on to finish sixth in the WSOP Europe Main Event.

Just after the dinner break, Glantz prevailed in the High Roller tournament. Here is how its final table shook out:

1. Matt Glantz (United States) - £542,000
2. Erik Cajelais (Canada) - £326,000
3. Eugene Katchalov (United States) - £193,000
4. Adolfo Vaeza (Uruguay) - £141,000
5. Leo Fernandez (Argentina) - £104,000
6. Ilari Sahamies (Finland) - £74,000
7. Dennis Phillips (United States) - £60,000
8. Shane Reihill (Ireland) - £45,000

Phillips has been on fire over the past year. After finishing third in the 2008 WSOP Main Event for $4.5 million, the truck salesman grabbed 45th in the 2009 installment, earning another $178,000. He won a $500 buy-in tournament during the Venetian Deep Stack Extravaganza in Las Vegas in April and has become one of poker’s top ambassadors. Phillips, along with a half-dozen other pros, descended on Capitol Hill for the Poker Players Alliance (PPA) Fly-In held during National Poker Week. Phillips toured the Walter Reed Army Medical Center and also played in a charity poker tournament.

Sahamies, nicknamed “Ziigumd” in the online world, is the front man for the Cake Poker Network site Power Poker. Sahamies appeared on Season 5 of the GSN cash game show “High Stakes Poker” and was part of the winning squad in the inaugural Caesars Cup. Fernandez, along with Phillips, is a card-carrying member of Team PokerStars Pro. In April, Fernandez finished sixth in the Latin American Poker Tour’s (LAPT) Mar del Plata Main Event for $63,000. His employer, PokerStars, sponsors the EPT.

WSOP November Nine member Phil Ivey was the first player sent packing from the High Roller event. Others who hit the skids on Day 1 included Tom “durrrr” Dwan, Dave “Devilfish” Ulliott, Chris Moneymaker, Greg Raymer, Barry Greenstein, Vanessa Rousso, Luca Pagano, J.C. Alvarado, and Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier. After his victory, Glantz told PokerStars officials, “It feels great. It’s just been my day.” In the final hand, Glantz’s A-2 held up against Cajelais’ Q-J.

The £5,000 buy-in EPT London Main Event is currently underway. This time around, the tournament attracted 730 players, which PokerStars claims is the largest poker event ever held in the United Kingdom. Only 596 players took to the felts in 2008, representing a growth of 23%. A total of 58 countries are represented, including 138 players from the United Kingdom, 131 from the United States, 63 from France, 45 from Germany, and 42 from Italy.

Patrik Antonius The Biggest Winner Yesterday

After “martonas” made his comeback to Full Tilt Poker, the high stakes games have been really good. Patrik Antonius made a nice profit and “martonas” ended up to be the payer.

The games were quite usual for “martonas”. He swinged up and down, all around and everywhere. He was part of several large pots but eventually lost almost all of them.

Several hundreds of thousands of dollars went to the pockets of “POKERBLUFFS”, Tom “Durrrr” Dwan and Patrik Antonius as “martonas” was swinging around. Railbirds could find Ilari Sahamies and Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond playing as well.

Few hands from the session:

Sahamies has AA and flush draw against “Durrrr’s” wheel, $230k pot

Antonius has top pair, but “Durrrr” shows his over pair, $334k pot

Both “OMGClayAiken” and “martonas” has a hand, $296k pot

“Martonas” wants to flip against Antonius, £304k pot

“POKERBLUFFS” turns a set against Antonius, $136k pot

Biggest winners:
1.Patrik Antonius $512 169
2.POKERBLUFFS   $488 094
3.durrrr                $236 358

Biggest losers:
1.martonas            -$487 908
2.theASHMAN103   - $477 712
3.DIN_FRU              -$200 000

Source: highstakesdb

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Patrik Antonius The Biggest Winner Yesterday

Weekend’s Biggest Winner: Ilari Sahamies

Ilari Sahamies was the king of the weekend on Full Tilt Poker high stakes games. “Martonas” did a nice comeback as well.

For once Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies was on a heater and won $485.534. Looks like Ziigmund has managed to beat his long-lasting tilt. David Benyamine was one of “Ziigmund’s” victims as Ilari was able to win eight of the biggest pots against him. Benyamine dug a hole worth of -$757k.

During the weekend Swedish “Martonas” was able to win about $150k. Let’s hope he is back for good as the action on Full Tilt is really good when he is around. He is known to have huge swings.

Also Gus Hansen had a pretty good weekend as he managed to play break-even sessions, so at least he’s not losing anymore.

Some hands during the weekend:

Ilari flops a full house, Ahston Griffin hits trips, $194k pot to Ilari

“martonas” hits nicely, $118k to “martonas”

Di “Urindanger” Dang hits his flush against “martonas, $159k pot

Source: highstakesdb

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Weekend’s Biggest Winner: Ilari Sahamies

Record-breaking Pot In The Million Dollar Cash Game

Tom Dwan and Phil Ivey played a record-breaking hand in the Full Tilt Poker organized Million Dollar Cash Game. This giant hand came after the 20-hour long session was nearing its end and there were only Dwan, Ivey and Patrik Antonius sitting at the table.

Blinds were $1000/$2000 + $200 ante when Tom Dwan opened from the button. Ivey raised from the small Blind, Antonius folded and Dwan paid. Ivey bet $40.000 to a Qc5c3D flop and Dwan called again. The turn was 4h and Ivey bets and Dwan raises to $240.000. After some consideration from Ivey he goes all-in and Dwan made a insta-call with the nut straight (6h7h) leaving Ivey drawing dead with Ac2h.

It was not the only monster hand for Dwan as a bit earlier the young star lost a $500.000 pot to Antonius when Antonius cracked Dwan’s aces with kings. Biggest loser for the session was Ilari Sahamies (again) who lost 1,3 million dollars to other players.

Tom Dwan has now won two of the biggest televised poker hands in history. Last year Dwan cracked Barry Greenstein’s aces and won $900k in High Stakes Poker.

Million Dollar Cash Game is going to be aired in the British Sky Sports in January.

Source: Bluff Europe

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Record-breaking Pot In The Million Dollar Cash Game