Gossip Column: Phil Galfond Wins Another €19,099 Against ‘VeniVidi1993,’ Matt Glantz Willing to Contract COVID-19 For $250K

Its been a crazy few weeks with the Coronavirus pandemic wreaking havoc worldwide. With the disease still going strong, not much has happened in the poker world, other than a lot of live poker tournaments either getting canceled or postponed.

However, some exciting news came through for Phil Galfond on March 13 when the 24th session between the Run It Once (RIO) founder and the online beast ‘VeniVidi1993’ saw the former winning €19,099 more, taking his losses down to €634,087.02.

While Galfond is undoubtedly on an upswing, another top pro Matt Glantz seems to have completely lost his mind. The poker pro on March 8 tweeted that he was willing to get infected by the COVID-19 virus for $250,000.

Phil Galfond Wins Another €19,099 Against ‘VeniVidi1993’

After a short hiatus, Phil Galfond finally resumed his Heads-Up challenge against online phenom’ VeniVidi1993’ on March 4. The PLO legend had suspended the ongoing match in early February after being stuck almost €900,000 across 9,927 hands.

In the very first session following Galfond’s return, he managed to register a profit of €183,481.38, making up for almost 20% of his losses. His run good seems to have continued, and in the latest session played between Galfond and ‘VeniVidi1993’, the former managed to book another profit, this time for €19,099.65.

This was the 24th session played between the duo, who have by now played 15,200 hands of their 25,000-hand challenge. ‘VeniVidi1993’ is still leading overall by a large margin, but Galfond has trimmed the deficit by almost 30%, bringing it down from nearly €900,000 to €634,087.02. The two have less than 10,000 hands to go to complete the challenge, with Galfond risking €200,000 in side action to the €100,000 of ‘VeniVidi1993.’

Heads-Up Challenge Results To-Date

The challenge between Galfond and ‘VeniVidi1993’ will continue at 12 PM (ET) on Saturday, March 14.

Matt Glantz is Willing to Contract Coronavirus For $250K

Prop bets in poker can be quite crazy sometimes, but when someone is ready to willingly contract a contagious virus for $250,000, that is next level insane! The poker player in question is the former WPT champion, Matt Glantz.

The high-stakes mixed games specialist on March 8 tweeted his willingness to get infected by the virus in exchange for the six-figure sum. He stated that he would document his experience dealing with the Coronavirus. He also promised to self-quarantine himself as to not spread the virus to anyone else.

Willing to contract the #coronavirus for $250k. Will immediately go into self quarantine as to not to spread or infect anyone else. Will document entire experience daily.

Always put my money (I guess body now) where my mouth is.

HMU to negotiate exact terms. Let’s do it!

— Matt Glantz (@MattGlantz) March 7, 2020

The tweet received a variety of responses. While some were willing to do the same thing as Glantz for far less money, others thought Glantz was out of his mind.

I’ll do this same thing for significantly less if anyone wants to save some cheese.

— Brandon Meyers (@oncommand) March 8, 2020

I’ll do it for $250

— Nick Marchington (@NickMarchington) March 8, 2020

OOL

— Joey Ingram #passion (@Joeingram1) March 7, 2020

You’ve lost your mind. Someone check on Matt please, he’s obviously on drugs

— Veronica 2.0 (@Angry_Polak) March 7, 2020

Eventually, high-stakes gambler Blake Stevenson aka ‘EmpireMaker2’ on Twitter, decided to take Glantz up on his offer.

100% going to pay you to do this let’s figure ok the best way https://t.co/RikgaZajhL

— EM2 (@EmpireMaker2) March 8, 2020

Even after some back and forth, the two gamblers couldn’t decide on an appropriate time frame to give Glantz to contract the virus and prove a positive test. Stevenson offered a week, and Glantz said he needed three. Stevenson revised his offer to two weeks, but Glantz still wouldn’t budge.

pic.twitter.com/IJsY0kAr0K

— Matt Glantz (@MattGlantz) March 8, 2020

Glantz has yet to receive another offer.