High Stakes 2009 Review: Antonius Rises Above the Rest

With a close to $9 million profit, Patrik Antonius has taken the online high stakes throne of 2009. Meanwhile Gus Hansen has dug himself the deepest hole in 2009 with a deficit of over $5.5 million.

Action at the nosebleed stakes in 2009 really went through the roof according to Highstakedb.

While the start of the year was promising, it was nothing compared to the very last few months.  Railbirds on Full Tilt Poker witnessed top pros losing or winning millions in a single night.

Even $500k pots suddenly became average, as players started competing for pots reaching 7-digit numbers. Amidst this turmoil rose the biggest winners of 2009, as well as the biggest losers.

The throne goes to Antonius

Patrik Antonius (pictured right) has sealed a 2009 annual chapter in his poker career with a profit of nearly $9 million. It took him 185,440 hands across 3,127 sessions to achieve this figure and whereas he spent most of the year rising steadily, he did have one major downswing in November.

It was the time when Isildur1 gained momentum and sent the likes of Tom "durrrr" Dwan back to the depths of the "lower limits". Antonius went heads-up against this uknown player and reached an overall profit of slightly over $10 million by November 22nd. This was also the day that Antonius won the largest pot in online history. However, he then lost around $4.5 million at the nosebleed stakes in the following week.

The downswing didn't last for long though. Antonius got back on track to add $3.5 million to his pocket and end the year just shy of the $9 million mark. Even though the vast majority of Antonius' profit came from Pot-Limit Omaha, he found himself in the red in the durrrr Challenge, stuck by over 900k against durrrr thus far.

Second place went to Phil Ivey (pictured left) who recorded a profit of over $6.3 million after having played 99,544 hands in 1,558 sessions. Ivey had a rough start to the year, down by -$2.5 million in February. But he worked his way back up and spent the next 6 months breaking even and then stocking up $2 million in black.

Ivey's rapid rise started in September and just like Antonius, he peaked on November 22nd. At that point he was up by $7.44 million, but a loss of $1 million in December brought him to where he finished at the end of 2009.

Brian Hastings secured himself third place on the winners list, mostly thanks to a single session against Isildur1 in which he won $4.2 million. His overall profit for 2009 is just above $4.7 million, after having played 32,013 hands in 464 sessions.

Another notable name on the list of winners is Mark Vos, a "hit and run" expert. He earned $2.1 million across 779 sessions in which he played a total of 13,200 hands. A modest number of hands but enough to secure him the 10th place.

See the top 10 winners' rankings for 2009 below:

2009 High Stakes Rankings Top 10 High Stakes Winners
Rank	Name	Profit
1st	Patrik Antonius	$8,973,946.28
2nd	Phil Ivey	$6,337,702.07
3rd	Brian Hastings	$4,731,848.03
4th	theASHMAN103	$3,648,198.69
5th	Ziigmund	$3,060,679.91
6th	trex313	$2,641,250.02
7th	Brian Townsend	$2,400,819.15
8th	howisitfeellike	$2,235,756.00
9th	Cole South	$2,128,686.40
10th	Mark Vos	$2,101,160.80

A dreadful year for Hansen

2009 was seemingly going to be a good year for Gus Hansen (pictured right), as he earned $3 million in January. However, he soon started losing heavily and spent the rest of the year playing catchup, ending each coming month in the red. It was hard to say how deep the hole would go. After a total of 256,418 hands across 5,775 sessions, the numbers stopped at close to -$5.8 million.

Hansen tried to dig his way out of the hole but eventually realised that he needed to take a break and analyse his game. It remains to be seen what changes has he made, or what his plans are in 2010, in order to find his way to the top once more.

Tom "durrrr" Dwan (pictured left) also had a bad year, but unlike Hansen, he ended it in deficit mostly due to No Limit Hold'em heads-up marathon sessions against Isildur1. The latter proved to be a specialist in this game; too special even for likes of durrrr. While other pros hurried to the safety of PLO, durrrr stood up against Isildur1, until he was forced to step away from the $500/$1,000 NLHE tables and rebuild his bankroll.

With most of his money going into Isildur1's pocket, durrrr ended 2009 down by over $4.3 million. He played 281,660 hands in 3,666 sessions and took part in virtually all of the big action that took place on the nosebleed stakes. His sessions against Martonas and Isildur1 in particular, will remain one of the most memorable clashes in online history.

Sami "LarsLuzak" Kelopuro is not far behind durrrr with a loss of over $4 million across 120,312 hands in 2027 sessions. Most of his losses came from the early months in 2009, after which he became relatively inactive on the nosebleed stakes.

See the top 10 losers' rankings for 2009 below:

2009 High Stakes Rankings Top 10 High Stakes Losers
Rank	Name	Profit
1st	Gus Hansen	$-5,575,624.38
2nd	durrrr	$-4,345,852.45
3rd	LarsLuzak	$-4,094,276.11
4th	David Benyamine	$-2,242,501.28
5th	Isildur1	$-2,216,177.41
6th	David Oppenheim	$-1,370,882.75
7th	rospodin	$-1,326,359.70
8th	Slick Puppy	$-1,270,776.00
9th	papa ninja	$-1,245,031.65
10th	KObyTAPOUT	$-1,243,985.45