"Back-to-Back Benziger" Snatches Another Last-Minute Victory

March 24th, 2013 - The win was narrower this time around, but Donkey Kong phenom Ross Benziger cut through the field for the second time in a row to successfully defend his title as the king of the Kong Off wildcard division in the second installment of Eric Tessler and John Salter's Wildcard Rematch tournament.

"Von Dummpenstein" again pulled ahead right at the finish line, coming just a hair short of a million with 990,100.

Second place finisher Jeff Wolfe repeated as well, but with a score of 973,100, Wolfe not only topped his first Wildcard Rematch standing by over 100,000 points, he also squeaked by Benziger's score of 972,600 from the first tournament to claim the "beat Ross" bounty.

1-1 record holder Phil Tudose spent much of the day attempting to secure the "biggest 1-1" bounty and succeeded with 13,100, then went on to score 969,500 to take third place in the tournament.

While the top three spots ended up going to Donkey Kong veterans, Iceland's Svavar Gunnar Gunnarsson, a relative newcomer to the competitive Donkey Kong scene, actually held the lead for much of the day and made himself known in this tournament as a force to be reckoned with.

About 8 hours into the tournament Gunnarsson finished a strong 896,900 kill screen game but was unable to submit the score due to a patchy, incomplete video stream. Undaunted, he made his way through all 117 boards for the second time in the same day to put up an even better 919,100.

Gunnarsson, who made the Icelandic news in February for being the first of his countrymen (and possibly the first European) to play Donkey Kong to the kill screen, proved that he will clearly be a factor in any future online tournaments (or should he make his way to the States to play live at the Kong Off in Denver).

The final leaderboard boasted a whopping six scores above 900,000, showing just how strong the field is getting, and blurring the line between the Kong Off "main event" players and those in the wildcard division.

Sobering to realize that the top 10 scores emerging from a single 24-hour tournament—one that specifically barred the participation of the very best players—still managed to utterly beat the tar out of the all-time top 10 of a decade ago.

To put it into perspective, the Donkey Kong world record in March 2003 would have been just barely good enough to take 7th place on Saturday's scoreboard.

Motivation, community, and determined competition: it changes everything.

I would personally like to thank Eric and John for another great tournament, and for the shout-out in the article about the Wildcard Rematches that recently appeared on the Twin Galaxies front page. Though I feel that I underperformed with my 647,700 13th-place finish, it was a blast to finally be able to compete against other players "live" (if not in person) for the first time.

Final Standings

("N/A" represents players who were registered for the tournament but either did not play or did not submit a score.)

Place	Player	Best Score	Gap
1	Ross Benziger	990,100	0
2	Jeff Wolfe	973,100	17,000
3	Phil Tudose	969,500	3,600
4	Svavar Gunnar Gunnarsson	919,100	50,400
5	Jon McKinnell	905,700	13,400
6	Ethan Daniels	904,900	800
7	Jeff Harrist	874,400	30,500
8	Ben Falls	819,000	55,400
9	Robbie Lakeman	764,600	54,400
10	Eric Tessler	714,500	50,100
11	Joseph Carroll	708,900	5,600
12	Daniel Desjardins	694,000	14,900
13	Chris Psaros	647,700	46,300
14	Daniel Dock	612,400	35,300
15	Mitchell Elliott	608,400	4,000
16	John Salter	494,400	114,000
17	Ken House	456,100	38,300
18	Todd Lalonde	437,900	18,200
19	Brian Allen	350,400	87,500
20	Kaayla Illusivefx	274,500	75,900
21	Colman Paolo	266,800	7,700
22	John McNeill	265,800	1,000
23	George Strain	252,800	13,000
24	Nick Sheils	244,800	8,000
25	Allen Staal	235,800	9,000
26	Craig Ziegler	179,400	56,400
27	Donald Rubin	82,700	96,700
28	Michael Stastny	68,700	14,000
29	Ed Deitman	27,300	41,400
30	Andrew Gardikis	N/A	N/A
31	Craig Rout Gallant	N/A	N/A
32	Daryl Kiddy	N/A	N/A
33	Estel Goffinet	N/A	N/A
34	Jonathan McCourt	N/A	N/A
35	Matt Douglas	N/A	N/A
36	Mike Groesbeck	N/A	N/A
37	Steve Grunberger	N/A	N/A
38	Steve Wiltshire	N/A	N/A

Prizes:
$250 1st place - Ross Benziger (990,100)
$100 2nd place - Jeff Wolfe (973,100)
$50 3rd place - Phil Tudose (969,500)

Bounties:
$100 first to 1 million - UNCLAIMED
$50 first to beat Ross Benziger's reigning 972,600 - Jeff Wolfe (973,100)
$50 first kill screen - Jeff Harrist (12:30 PM)
$50 highest 1-1 score - Phil Tudose (13,100)
$50 most boards on last life - John McKinnell (45 boards)