So, who won the match between Isildur1 and Tony G?

The second round of the Superstar Showdown / Isildur1 Challenge went to Isildur1.

After 2,500 hands of play, the mystery Swede emerged with a total profit of right around $45k, good for the victory and his first mark in the win column for the Superstar Showdown.

Unfamiliar with the Superstar Showdown or Isildur1? Get more information on both at the official PokerStars Isildur1 site.

The win came after a roller coaster of a match that saw Tony G take an early lead only to have Isildur1 steamroll his way back to a massive advantage, primarily through winning a $100k+ pot with the rivered nuts.

Read a full recap of the match here.

The swings of the match forced the pair to abandon a few tables during the course of the match, as too much of the total money in play pooled at just a couple of tables.

At one point late in the match, the players were down to just one table with tens of thousands of dollars between them. That table broke and reassembled at three other tables following a brief break.

Anticipation for the match wasn’t quite as high as for the first match of the Superstar Showdown, which pitted the mystery Swede against nosebleed regular Isaac Haxton. Haxton took that match, and $41k+, from Isildur1.

That didn’t sit too well with Isildur1, who talked openly of his disregard for Haxton’s abilities in an interview following the match.

One might have expected an amplified war of words between Isildur1 and noted coffehouser Tony G, but the short lead time for the match combined with the holiday season seemed to dampen both the Stars PR machine and (somewhat amazingly) the self-promotional fervor of Tony G.

Hype or no hype, the two sat down across from one another at 4:00 PM PokerStars server time. As prescribed by the rules of the Superstar Showdown format, Tony G and Isildur1 placed $150,000 in escrow with Stars as their bankroll for the match. The two competed on 4 tables of heads up poker, with blinds of $50/$100. Two of the tables were NL Holdem, and two were Pot Limit Omaha.

Those who were expecting a verbal war in the chat were disappointed as both men remained largely silent. Below is a video of some hands from early on in the match:

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Note to Stars: Please add some other method for conveying the current status of the match than arbitrary notes in the chat. A simple text line on all of the tables would be just fine.

There’s been no official word on who the next challenger for Isildur1 will be; we think the smart money is on Phil Galfond, aka MrSweets28.

For full coverage of Isildur1, including Isildur1 Challenge updates, check out our Isildur1 poker news page. To learn more about Isildur1 from the source, visit the official PokerStars page for Isildur1.