Odds On Racing - Harness Racing

Student hits $4.18M Online Jackpot
Senior upends virtual card shark

February 18, 2010

In a five-hour online game of one-on-one, pot-limit Omaha last December, 21-year-old Cornell University senior Brian Hastings earned a pile of winnings and a name for himself in the world of online poker.

Hastings, an economics student from Hanover, Pa., took away $4.18 million from his match against Swedish player Isildur1, whose true identity is unconfirmed. Isildur1 had already garnered a lot of attention before the game with Hastings, making headlines in poker publications for his big wins. Before the match with Hastings was over, poker blogs were buzzing with Hastings' name.

Hastings established a new high for online poker winnings in one day Dec. 8, using a combination of skills honed by years of serious playing and careful analysis of his opponent's style.

To prepare to take on Isildur1, Hastings and two other poker players reportedly analyzed thousands of Isildur1's hands for weaknesses in his play, though Hastings was on his own in the actual match. Hastings chose to take on Isildur1 "because he was getting a lot of action. He was willing to play anyone who wanted to play," he said.

The intensive analysis of Isildur1's game stirred controversy, and one of Hastings' partners in the research received a mild reprimand from one gaming site. Hastings declined to talk about the research, but Cornell sociology researcher Kyle Siler compared it to the work a stock trader does to evaluate investments.

"It's technically a violation," Siler said. "It's kind of a moral grey area. It could be seen as collusion -- the guy who lost is furious. But it's a very small edge, like tells."

Tells are behavioral cues that can reveal something a player tries to hide, such as a bluff or a good hand. Hastings' success would be difficult for a casual player to replicate.

"It's not an overnight thing," said Hastings, who has played online since he was 17, and now plays 10 hours a week. "It takes a lot of work."

Siler published a paper the same month of Hastings' headline-making game outlining how the more hands players win in online poker, the more money they typically lose in the long run, particularly at low-stakes, novice-level games. But players at Hastings' level don't follow the same trend, Siler said.

"Brian Hastings is playing at a level that's an exception to that rule," Siler said. "I found that as one moves up levels and becomes more and more high stakes, the number of mistakes your opponent makes decreases."

The key to success in poker is not just skillful playing, but control over one's emotions, Siler said.

"In addition to skill, you have to work on your emotions," he said. "You have to be more risk-loving, and love adversity. It's not just card skills, it's (emotional) strength."

In online poker, players can play multiple tables at once, but otherwise the game is the same as live poker. Poker sites such as the one Hastings was using when playing Isildur1 are illegal to operate within the United States, though it's legal to play as long as players report and pay taxes on their winnings. The sites are most often operated from the Caribbean or Europe, Hastings said.

Hastings will graduate from Cornell in December, but plans to remain focused on poker for the next few years, he said. This summer he plans to play in tournaments in Las Vegas. Winning big in online poker isn't new to him, as he's been supporting himself and paying for college this way. Most of the $4.18 million pot will go into investments, he said, though he splurged on a Megatouch machine, bought his parents a trip to Italy and donated some of his winnings to charities.