The UK is currently undergoing a heat wave. It may not be on the scale of some heat waves around the world, but we’re seeing temperatures in excess of 30C, which for the British is the equivalent of sitting on the surface of the sun.
I’m currently in an office with a fan on full, a pint glass full of ice and cola, trying to do some work so I can afford to buy an air conditioner. It’s not going that well right now.
Viktor Blom is currently based in London, and it’s even hotter there than it is here on the coast. How Viktor is able to sit playing top notch poker in this heat I just don’t know.
He played on Tuesday, and over 2287 hand was able to grind out a small profit of $31,884. He played against a plethora of opponents, and the day seemed to be a heads up day, with six different opponents meeting Victor on the virtual felt.
First up was Hac “Trax313” Dang. The PLO tables were kind to Viktor during this session, and over 207 hands, Viktor made $77,855. Next up was regular opponent Ben “Bttech86” Tollerene and Viktor sat against his nemesis not at PLO as you’d expect, but at NLHE. 703 hands saw Viktor add $311,241 to his bankroll, putting him up $389,096 for the day.
Next up was another regular to the Watch, Kyle “KPR16” Ray, playing as you’d expect FLO8. With two distinct session of action between these two, Viktor’s game was obviously on point as he added another $210,247 to his profit column for the day.
Here was where the day started to go against Viktor, and his next opponent was “Kagome Kagome”. The game was 2-7TD, and 429 hands of action resulted in Blom losing $61,576, and started the reversal of fortune.
Online legend in his own life time, Douglas “WGCRider” Polk was the next one to enter Viktor’s crosshairs. NLHE was the game of choice, and over 421 hands of action “WGCRider” was the one to come out on top to the tune of $387,8785.
Last one to play Viktor on Tuesday was the other Kyle, this one was Kyle “cottonseed1” Hendon. FLO8 was the name of the game, and after only 46 hands, Viktor ended his working day with a $118,008 loss to Hendon.
So from a running profit of $614,257, Blom was pegged back to a small $31,884 profit, mainly by Polk. The losses were concentrated in a small group of hands, that gives me some hope that this was an aberration in the new game of Viktor “Isildur1 Blom.
So, after a day of not writing an article due to the heat, I’m back in the office writing today’s article, mainly about yesterday’s action.
Viktor started off playing NLHE, as it seems he was going to do for the most of the day. Playing $500/$1000 $30k Cap against “Trueteller,” Viktor got stuck into the action for 106 hands, and came out with a $41,449 profit. We managed to grab some of the action, and have it for you in the video below:
Next up was the big villain of the day. Viktor played 505 hands against Alex “IReadYrSoul” Millar at $400/$800 NLHE tables. The matchup lasted nearly three hours, and ended with Viktor losing $239,471 to the young Englishman. At least both of the players had to deal with the same heat issue, so it was a fair playing field. Viktor was only able to take a profit away from two of the five tables the two played, while Millar was able to make large profits at the other three. We caught some of the action from this head to head matchup, and have put the highlights in the following vid.
Last up for the day was nice a reliable “KPR16.” Rarely does a day go past without Viktor and Kyle Ray playing each other. Today’s report of yesterday’s continuing Isildur1/KPR16 rivalry consists of two distinct matchups. Both of these went in Ray’s favour, and over the entire day, Kyle was able to take $210,867 from Viktor over 131 hands, and ended Viktor working day after the last session. We caught the action, and have some of the more interesting hands in the video below.
With the end of the last session against Kyle “KPR16” Ray, Viktor’s working day came to a close. He had lost $408,889 over the day, which combined with the pretty much breakeven day on Tuesday has taken his yearly profit totals to $3,718,897. Viktor is still leading the yearly leaderboard, with “cottonseed1” in second, about $200k behind.
The first warning signs of the day showed up after the first table of action with Millar, where Viktor dipped into a loss for the day, that was never recovered from. The second warning sign for Viktor’s prospects came when “KPR16” beat him for $156,865 over 69 hands and pretty much tripling Viktor’s losses for the day. In the next three sessions, Viktor spiralled more than I’ve seen for months. It was only over 131 hands, but it cost Viktor $169,050.
Even this spiralling, I’m still impressed with Viktor’s control. He only spiralled for a short time, six months ago, he’s still be playing, donating most of his bankroll to whomever happened to be able to get a seat at his table.
He really has become a better player thanks to whomever has been working on his mental game with him, and even though he lost over $400k yesterday, I’ve seen him do much worse. Given the provocation, I’d have expected Viktor to burn through at least double what he actually lost.
In short, I just want to say “Great job!” to this mysterious coach. While a more controlled Viktor Blom may be less interesting to write about, having one of the main ambassadors for one of the world’s biggest poker brands reduce his “degen” quotient can only be good for the industry’s perception as a whole.