Towards the end of last week, a challenge was laid down on Full Tilt Poker, it was for $1,000,000. The two players? Patrik Antonius, and Rui Cao.

Most of you will have heard of Patrik, he was a member of the Full Tilt stable of pros before Black Friday, is a former tennis player, a regular on poker TV shows and has been involved in some of the biggest online poker hands in history.

Patrik recently came 3rd at the Aussie Millions for a cool $600k, but has had a swingy time of it online. Before today’s action he was currently down about$143k

Rui Cao may be a little more of a mystery to you. He’s a high stakes cash reg, and a former “Team Limpers” instructor at Full Tilt. He was born in 먹튀검증 China, before moving to France in his childhood. He is currently playing from the UK, and has been having a neutral start to 2013. Before this challenge he was down about $82k, but was climbing out of a much deeper downswing.

They were playing on Full Tilt last Wednesday, when Rui offered the challenge to Patrik in the Chat Box:

“Patrik Antonius: ok

Rui Cao: by the way

Rui Cao: wanna play a challenge?*

Rui Cao: lets say 1M freeezeout NL PLO and deuce?*

Patrik Antonius: it depents what kind of

Patrik Antonius: this would be online?

Rui Cao: yes

Patrik Antonius: i would do that

Rui Cao: ok lets say next tuesday?

Rui Cao: so i can wire the money

Rui Cao: ok

Rui Cao: lets do 300 deuce

Rui Cao: 100 BB

Rui Cao: 400 plo

Rui Cao: 10 buy ins

Rui Cao: 200 400

Patrik Antonius: i dont know the day so far i can play but we can agee to do the challenge

Rui Cao: 300 holdem

Rui Cao: can u be sure u can do it?

Rui Cao: so i wire the money

Patrik Antonius: yes i can give you my word on it

Rui Cao: ok 300 at 200 400 nl

Rui Cao: 400 plo

Rui Cao: 300 deuce

Rui Cao: ok?

Patrik Antonius: how about 400 in holdem 300 in deuce and 300 in plo?

Rui Cao: 350 holdem 350 plo

Rui Cao: 300 DEUCE

Rui Cao: its fair i think

Patrik Antonius: ok thats fair

Rui Cao: do you have

Rui Cao: skype

Rui Cao: or whatever so we can discuss

Rui Cao: some things

Patrik Antonius: yes can you get my phone number from someone so i can give you my skype then?”

So, with the action planned over 3 different games, and with each player putting up a million dollars, this isn’t the kind of event that tends to happen every day.

This isn’t the 1st time these two have battled over large sums of money. the battled back in May 2011 on Full Tilt Poker at the $500/$1000 PLO tables. Rui lost $800k to Antonius in a single session.

The 1st session in this heads up battle happened last night, at the £1.5k/$3k 2-7 TD tables on Full Tilt. It didn’t last long, and the 1st hand set the tone for the action. Rui Cao won the $15k pot, and then continued to bleed Patrik over the next 350 hands and about 3 hours.

With the first $330k part of Antonius’ $1 million already in Rui’s account, we are eagerly anticipating the PLO and NLHE rounds.

With both players being of such a high quality, we can’t say with any certainty what’s going to happen in the next rounds. Both players are among the elite, but we’d probably give the NLHE edge to Patrik, while the PLO really is going to be a coin flip in our estimation.

We are hoping we can grab some of the hands from these sessions, and if we do, we’ll bring them to you on FTR.