Durrrr fights back with live challenge win over Ziigmund - 20/11/2009

Tom "Durrrr" Dwan came out on top of a fascinating 12-hour heads-up Pot-Limit Omaha battle with Ilari "Ziigmund" Sahamies at the Les Ambassadeurs club in London.

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Durrrr came into the clash on the back of a $22,500 loss to Marcello Marigliano in the opening challenge and needed to bounce back against his Finnish opponent. Overnight he resumed his online battle with Isildur1 on Full Tilt and after showing up without any sleep, the strain began to show towards the end of the encounter as he admitted to feeling delusional, and at one stage it looked like he would not be able to finish but he dug deep to not only keep the pace but to come out on top.

In a gripping clash between two of the finest exponents of heads-up PLO in the world, Durrrr showed his class to come back from holding just $127,000 after Ziigmund took the early advantage and forced Durrrr to re-buy. As the end of play approached, Ziigmund bet 60k on the river and Durrrr raised to 194k and Ziigmund called - on the 3h-Kd-Kh-8h-5d board, the American showed a full house with Kc-Jc-8c-7h to Ziigmund's Ac-Ks-7c-3d which ultimately led to Durrrr finishing the contest $68,000 to the good.

"It was a tough game but a great one at the same time," said Dwan. "There were some huge pots and in the end it could've gone either way really but after losing out against Marcello I'm delighted to have won today and I'm looking forward to taking on Sammy tomorrow.

"I was a pretty tired after playing 12 hour the night before on Full Tilt, but I think the fact I was playing Ziigmund and that the challenge is an important one helped me through."

It looked like it could have been all over early when Durrrr moved all-in with Qs-Td-8s-5h on a 5s-9h-3s flop with Ziigmund calling with As-Ah-6d-Js - but the 5d came on the turn to double Dwan though.

"I played badly in the last five hours and made six or so bad calls in the last half an hour - but we played for such a long time that I was a little bit tired, but it was a tough game but fun at the same time," said Ziigmund. "I was in front around 250k and Tom moved all-in, I was small favourite but Tom won it and then a few hours later the same happened with me all in and Tom the favourite but I won, so there were a lot of swings in the game. In the end Durrrr won $68,000 but really that's nothing in this game, it was one of the toughest I've ever played in and it was great to be involved."

The pair have logged countless hours on the internet but face-to-face their match took on a different dimension. As high as the stakes were they kept raising them as the natural gamble in them pushed the game to the limit. Starting at 500/1000 they sound doubled the blinds and did so again by the end, often that wasn't enough and they played with two blind straddles.

True to PLO form the biggest pots saw all the chips on the table go in, one of the biggest pot of the evening the pot reached 512k on the turn after Ziigmund had also re-bought, Durrrr was a 72 per cent favourite with three sevens and Ziigmund on a flush and straight draw - six of hearts on the river gave Ziigmund the pot and drew him back level. It was poker played at the highest level much to the delight of those on the rail like Roland de Wolfe, Tony G, Ian Frazer, John Duthie and Durrrr's opponent today, Sammy "any two" George. The railers certainly added to the jovial spirit despite the high stakes and on the table, with pots over 500k hinging on one card, neither the winner nor loser flinched and in between breaks in play they played Chinese Poker for $5,000 a point.

Durrrr completes the challenge against Londoner George from 2pm today (Thursday) - live reporting is available from www.matchroompokerforum.co.uk, where details of the opening two days can also be found.