Whataaaagwan

Hey!

A quick update today as I'm sort of rushed, so much in fact that I can't play tournies tonight!

Well, I've played on and off since the last post. Being back home now, I've been around and getting drunk/too hungover to be playing a lot lately. I was quite determined in my last blog entry to have a really hardcore SNG grind session, but then the reality hit me that 9-man SNG's are just insanely boring lol. The thing I like about MTT's is the changing dynamics and huge payouts. When playing SNG's everything seems same old, so much in so that you can play 100% perfect poker if you learnt ICM (basic push-shoving) to an art. This got very boring very quickly. I managed to make a bit of a profit but as I was only play $5 sng's this was nothing too special at all.

Anyway, back to why I am so busy! Tommorow I'll be heading up north to the Nottingham Norweigan Poker Championships. Although I'm not a Scandi or will be playing any tournaments up there I will be playing the juicest cash games on the planet! Last year was just mental, including the whole tabling straddling (so most people were all in blind), 4 way all ins with A-high winning and such-like. I've withdrawn £600 from Boss to play around with. I'll sit at the £1/£2 tables with £100 each time and hope I don't go busto too fast! So that will be Tuesday and Wednesday night sorted.

I'll drive back home on Thursday and then straight onto a plane to (not quite so) sunny Barcelona! My friend is staying there working at a programming company so I thought why not take advantage of the cheap Ryan Air flights and free accomodation. I'll be taking my camera so hopefully get a few nice photos up. It will be a nice break from poker before the Pokerstars SCOOP begins the following week.

On the online front, I played last night and went deep in about 4 tournaments. Managed to come 4th in the $33 on party poker (despite being 1/4 but loosing 3 big races). I also came about 80th/4000 in the $27/$35k gtd on full tilt, 427/30,000 in the $11 tourny on stars for like 3 buyins (lol). And 36/3348 in the $5rebuy loosing a huge pot with JJ to 10 10 which was slightly lame. But then again, welcome to donkaments ;).

Hope all is good for everyone else. I'll update with how Norweigan cash games go! Hopefully it will be on a very positive note!

Update on the party poker sng grind!

Hey,

As it turns out I won't be playing any more party poker SNG's this week as I'm leaving to visit a friend in Cheltenham soon for some partying and to have some generally degenerate drunk times. I've now completed 40% of the $100 bonus so it's coming along quite nicely. Last night I managed to play 50 of the speed SNG's to be down like $25. Bit lame but due to the nature of them needing to be all in alot you can imagine it's pretty swongy. In total I've played 130 games running at 16% ROI which is quite good. However, as said its a minute sample size. I think I'll look over a few of my pushing decisions to check that I'm making +ev shoves. I'll also have a look at an ICM calculator as I'm sure this is a leak in my game as yesterday I did seem to bubble ALOT.



When I return on Friday, I'll be hammering the Full Tilt 45 mans trying to win some goodies in their SNG March Madness competition that is going on over the weekend. Other than that, Sunday will be a typical day on the grind where I hope I can run good and take down a massive tournament!

I've only played a single digit amount of SNG's on full tilt (for which im down $50 which isn't so terrible as I was mainly playing $33-$27 games at the time). So I'll be able to update at the end of the weekend with a graph showing how I did in those tournies! If it can look anything like my friend Cjcgrafic (sharkscope him on full tilt) who has moved out to a SNG house in Texas for 2 months, then I'll be a very happy bunny.

Laters all!

The Latest Tourny Schedule

My nightly Boss tourny schedule is as follows:

7:30pm: €22 / €3500gtd deepstack

7:45pm: €5r / €1500gtd

8:35pm: €11 / €3500gtd

8:45pm: €11 / €2000gtd PLO

9:00pm: €27.50 / €4000gtd

10:00pm: €11r / €7500gtd

As I'm playing so few tournaments I'm really going to put the effort in to concentrate on every hand going down on the tables and get some good notes going on the players. This should help me to see results fast!

Springfest on PKR

This week I've been trying my luck on the infamous PKR. As can be expected due to software restraints that making multitabling nigh on impossible, and the computer-game like feel the standard of play on the site is really bad. Most good regulars on other networks rely on multitabling, tracking software and the like to earn their wages. But PKR seems to just be a sheltered pond of fish, far from the sharky oceans of Pokerstars and Full Tilt at any rate!

So I deposited $100 on the site to give the final week of the series a bash. There seems to be a bit of an overlay and also if I play over 3 events I get into into quite a nice freeroll. So that look's good too!

The first tourny I entered was the $33 pot limit holdem tournament. I managed to cash in it for $68 which was meh, but the structure began to get disgustingly bad near the end with the average stack on my table being around 9-10bbs. There were no antes either and as it was Pot Limit rather than no limit, you can only shove first time round if you have less than 4 big blinds. This meant pumping pre and in many cases shoving any flop. Tactically, I think it then becomes more optimal to reshove wider and call more OOP. For instance if the CO full pots with say 8big blinds, and you have some marginal holding like 9-10 suited in the big blind. With the good odds you get and the fact that if you hit you KNOW you're going to get paid off, calling becomes more profitable. So that was a bit of fun. It would have been nice to final table as first was getting on over $3k but alas! Another day I'm sure ;)

The second tournament I entered of the series was today: $6 PLO 6-seated rebuy. As you can imagine this was wild with several players on my table playing every hand and misunderstanding the concept that you need to play with 2 cards out of your hand not 3. After spending like $50 on rebuys (yeh it was that wild!)I managed to get a pretty big stack before the addon after getting the 2nd nut flush all in vs the table chip leader who had the bare ace in his hand assuming that he could just use 1 card from the 4 dealt to him. Next time it would probably be to his advantage if he read the rules first! I built up a progressively big stack throughout the tournament, but lost a huge pot with a set vs a flushdraw/overpair (which is very standard in omaha)and subsequently lost AAxx to a rundown in a big 4 bet pot 20 places off the money. Not too bothered though as it was actually quite fun and there seems to be a slightly more personal feel being able to chip shuffle and boo your opponents on the virtual felt than you get on say, stars which I find to be very impersonal.

Tommorow I'll give the $20/$15k gtd a go and see if I can cash big there!

Besides PKR I've been playing on loads of sites mainly 4 tabling. Although I have to say I think due to the sheer volume of the sites (8 in total) I'm playing on, my quality of play has been reduced and I'm not concentrating on reads inbetween hands and note taking. As a result of this I think other than PKR, for the rest of the week I'll be sticking to just playing on the boss network and really trying to get good notes on the players. On crypto I had built up quite a collection on a lot of the regs and knew how many played. This helped me alot and may be one of the factors for my success on the site.

I think that boss is nice. The tournament structure is good. Maybe the payouts could be a little wider say like 14%, as at the moment it seems around 8%ish which means cashing is quite a rarity. It also seems quite impersonal in comparison to crypto as there is less banter at the tables and no customisation. The names are also written small so it's hard to remember who's who. But if I just stick to this for the rest of the week and get some good notes going I'm sure it will all be fine and I'll learn to love it!

Other than that, I'll balance the MTT grinding with partypoker speed tournaments (and will show my sharkscope on Friday be up or down - no pressure to myself). I'll continue with the PKR Springfest series this week. And on the weekend I'll be playing the 45mans on Full Tilt for their SNG March Madness promotion to see if I can bag any prizes!

Good luck at the tables all!

Going to bed with a smile on my face...

Hey!

Uni term is finally over and I drove back down South today. The roads were suprisingly empty and the weather was amazing. I had got my car waxed the previous day so it was glinting in the sun with the windows down and it was such a nice drive back. It's really nice to be home in a clean house again! Not that I don't love Nottingham where I study at uni and my flat mates. It's just that flat will not stay clean! When I say it's not clean, this isn't leaving an odd magasine lying about. This is beer bottles, cigarettes, leftover food all over the floor. It's honestly a hazard site, I'm suprised we haven't created some new viral strain that will wipe out humanity. Oh and for those that know me, it was also really good coming back for a Sunday roast!

Having chilled with the family and settled back in I loaded the tables up in the evening and see what I can make from my shattered roll. I decided to play the $11/$2.5million on stars, $11rebuy on stars, $22/double deuce on full tilt and just fill the rest up with tournaments that were registering so that I was 4-5 tabling. Now that I'm playing on so many sites it makes mass-multitabling almost impossible due to overlay/different layouts etc. It also occured to me that my tournament game is far far far from an optimum. As such, I don't think I can be playing robotic 10 tabling+ as I'm sure those rushed decisions would be poor. After my recent downswing I've really been trying to analyse each individual situation and get as many reads as possible. Whether this is a better strategy than getting sick volume in I don't know. At least looking at the bankroll statement at the end of every night isnt as bad if I only min-cash in a couple afer playing 30 tournaments!

So tonight I also loaded up a couple of the nightlys on Betfair ($22 and $11 respectively) as well as a few on iPoker, the midnight oil on OnGame and the €3500 gtd deepstack on the boss network as well as a few on stars/full tilt.

I only cashed in one tournament tonight after 2 bubbles on Pokerstars. But was that a cash to be proud of!



This was my first tournament I'de played on the DTD software since their move and I really am not going to complain at all! A slight cause for concern is that although this is a "deepstack" tournament, I arrived on the final table as 2/10 with just 21 big blinds, so the average was just over 10 big blinds. The final table wasn't too tough and I ended heads up vs the toughest opponent on the table. Heads up was over very fast after getting it on with 67 on a a377ssxx board vs k5ss. So he was drawing very thin and I held! Ship it!!

So so so happy now. It's so relieving to finally take down another tournament. It feels like it's been so long and as a tourny player it's what we live for!

Hope everyone took advantage of the nice weather this weekend! Speak soon!

Changes Changes Changes...

Hey!

The past week poker has been more on the back-foot. I've played selectively live and the occasional online tournament but the volume has definately decreased. After my recent bad run it gets increasingly depressing going deep and loosing massive, important coin flips time after time on final table bubbles or just really deep. Regardless I made two final tables on party poker, which has to be a good thing!



The $33 freezeout was a bit of a disappointment as I came in 2/10 but was surely after 9/9 when queens couldnt hold vs QK all in preflop! But that's tournament poker for you ;).

Instead I've been having some nice success live. Tonight, I went down to DTD at around 1amish to see if there were any juicy games. I sat down with £100 at a £1/£2 table with reloads in my pocket if needed. In the first hour I came to a £250ish stack after cold-decking the gentlemen to my right when I flopped a set of queens on a Q86 board vs his pair of kings. Nothing could have really been done there but I'll take it. It's nice to run good live at least!

The table broke a few hands later, so (foolishly?) I decided to remove my buyin for the day and freeroll the £2/£2 dealers choice game. Hahaha! Paduki?! Super Stud?! English...you speak it motherfucker!?

I started off playing really tight and checking out the players. Automatically spot the wealthy Greeks pot, pot, potting every street. I quickly learnt the rules of the games, but it takes a little longer to understand ranges and relative hand values. For instance, paduki is a 3-draw game where by the objective is to have the 4 cards in your hand all being off-suit and non-paired. The nut hand is a rainbow a-4. Now I may be originally dealt a 2h 4d 10s 6d with just the suited 6 on the first drawing round. I was stuck whether to discard two or one here. This probably made me a bit of an under-dog in these games, so I played a lot tighter than most whilst observing and having fun getting to grips with the games.

I managed to double through vs a regular there in Super Stud. This is a game that is played similar to hi-lo however you are dealt 5 cards down and choose the 2 you want in the hole and the one shown up and discard the other 3. Confusing? Yeh it was lol! Anyway I was dealt 10 10 10 x x and obviously decided to play my trips. The table was very aggressive so I limped under the gun planning on shoving any pot bet. Everyone called but no raise this time. I managed to get it in on 4th street repping a flush and boated with the last hidden card which was nice vs a busted flush draw/low. So I was kind of lucky he bricked and kind of lucky I paired. Not sure of the %'s remotely but I guess we were flipping on the last card.

Unfortunately my £250 stack dwindled £150 playing 6 card omaha hi when i turned the nut straight (with nut redraw hearts) but the river paired forcing me to tank/fold having put a large portion of my stack in. Kindly the fellow showed me the boat when I passed.

In the end, I walked out up £130 on the night, which is by no means bad! It was good fun to play the mixed games, but I must be such a fish vs a decent line out and the variance especially in some of these draw games must be ridiculous! People complain about the variance in normal omaha. Try adding 2 more cards lol! The sucksouts and resuckouts are pretty crazy.

Anyway, back to the online front. I shall be returning my online grind next week when I go home for the Easter holidays. Unfortunately it seems Nottingham break up earlier than most uni's so none of my mates will be back for a week. I guess this means I should be able to get in good volume anyway! And hopefully good profits! I have decided to respread my rolls meaning I will have money on the following networks (breath)...iPoker, Boss, Ongame, Betfair, Party, Stars, Full Tilt.

Previously I've taken the line of having say £100ish on a few sites and playing my usual buy-in shots and redepositing if I bust it taking money out one of my other accounts/live funds (which is super likely playing $55 freezeouts with a $140 roll etc.). However, this is really quite demotivating if you have to redeposit like 3/4 times a month on some sites as you don't cash in 10 tournies running or whatever (which is super standard). So instead I'll try and just boost the rolls playing low stakes cash (zzz) or preferably sng's to rebuild my rolls if they start to dip below a certain point.

Sorry for the long dribble session I've just forced upon you! Hope all is well for everyone at the tables! Good luck!

Live Cash: Why do I ignore thee!?

Live cash has been so profitable for me in the past but I seem to not put the effort in to hunt these cash games down. They are so so so much more profitable (and fun) than online cash games. Tonight was no exception. I was lucky enough to greet a few drunks and wealthy gamblers at my £1/£2 table tonight at Dusk Til Dawn which was super-fishy compared to usual. Nevertheless I got stuck right in and built up to a £500ish stack.

I sucked out majorly with my first £100 getting it in on a 10 9 2 board and cracking pocket kings to a maniac. He wasn't impressed. But at the end of the night lost over £100 with flush over flush so I guess this all levels out ;).

During the day today I continued my SNG grind on party poker 9 tabling the speed games. I think these are also very profitable. If there is one thing that I've learnt this year so far due to my downswing is that exclusive tournament play without being backed or without using a 200 buy-in rule really is a big risk and you have to be willing to face up and move down stakes if you hit a bad run. I mean everyone gets them. I feel like I'm particularly unlucky whilst in reality, if I didn't have a loosing month or two playing exclusively multi-table tournaments I'de have to be blessed by the Gods or have a super-user account!

I think in future therefore, as I want to continue having tournaments as my speciality and main-game to also have SNG sessions and live cash sessions which with significantly reduced variance will help me to cope with the inevitable swings associate with large field tournament poker.

On a non-gambling front, I watched the film Into The Wild . It's so awesome, seriously. Here's a trailer for anyone interested.



I have to also point out my favourite two songs at the moment.



and



Hope everyone enjoys them! Good luck at the tables all!