Nosebleed round-up

Player of the week: Gus Hansen

Poker loves a good comeback story and you’ll struggle to find a more popular benefactor than Gus Hansen.

The Great Dane has struggled on the high-stakes tables in recent years, down more than $4 million since 2007. But barely six weeks into 2011, Hansen’s banked just over $2 million and this week he made more in 40 minutes than you or I will see in a lifetime on the felt.

In a PLO bloodbath against Rui Cao, the Dane won $350,000 in a measly 100 hands of $500/$1,000 action.

But Gus wasn’t the only high-stakes star crushing it this week. Dan ‘jungleman12’ Cates is down just $86,000 on the year after a $326,000 winning session across both his Full Tilt and ‘w00ki3z’ PokerStars accounts.

Cates was joined by fellow Full Tilt regular Ilari ‘ziigmund’ Sahamies on the rival site, playing under the name ‘Ilari FIN’, as he looks to overturn the downswing that has dominated his game since November last year.

ziigmund, once a consistent performer among the high-stakes fraternity, finished 2010 $2 million out of pocket, and is already down by roughly $200,000 in the past six weeks.

Hand of the week:

Our hand of the week comes from Isildur1’s four table annihilation of Eugene ‘MyRabbiFoo’ Katchalov, during another profitable SuperStar Showdown for the Swede.

After taking an early lead in the 2,500 hand bout, Isildur1 crushed Katchalov’s hopes of a comeback with a $31,500 suckout.

Their stacks were fairly even when Katchalov five-bet all-in on a 8s-4d-3h flop with pocket Jacks, only for Isildur1 to make the call with 8c-Td for top pair. A 4-1 underdog, Isildur1 clawed in the pot after spiking an 8h on the river, and the Swede was quick to apologise to his wounded opponent.

Isildur1: sorry
MyRabbiFoo: all good 🙂

Katchalov never fully recovered from the cold deck, and just a few hours later he was $111,750 out of pocket.

Winners

Gus Hansen $640,043
Matt Hawrilenko $503,676
unotindangr $344,596
Lindqvro $264,614
DIN_FRU $234,592

Losers

fishosaurusREX -$752,064
harrington25 -$336,930
O Fortuna PLA -$334,639
compris -$236,851
Rui Cao -$205,982

*as of Feb 17