I run like shiiiiiiit

Date: Sat, Nov 10, 2007

Nearing the 10k mark in hands now, 1 session away and I'm just getting shafted. Down 2 buy-ins to some Norweigan fishcake, TheGrinder87. You grind bad at 38/20 you piece of shit.

Anyway, to prevent myself moaning about bad beats and posting Sklansky Bucks graphs, instead go listen to Nine Black Alps because they rock, saw them supporting Biffy Clyro last night, speaking of which...

Read Full Poker Blog Post

Some hands

Date: Thu, Nov 8, 2007

After each session I'm going to try to post my analysis of the most interesting/toughest hands. Played a session a couple of nights back, 3-6 tabling, got about 600 hands in.

Read Full Poker Blog Post

NL Fishies, I'm coming to get you

Date: Wed, Nov 7, 2007

New Study Group, New Layout
I joined the study group after being really impressed with some of blogs by it's members. Their hard work at improving really motivated me to join in, and after only a few days I feel hugely motivated to push forward with my NL cash game play. Some of the blog links are for Card Runners or group members only so they're mainly for my benefit... but some of them will probably work for all too.

The old standard blogspot 2 column layout seemed a bit rubbish (really, I thought Amatay's new layout looked sexy and decided to steal it) so we now have a new one. Delicious. If you're interested in sticking 3 columns on your blogger, there's a great tutorial here. Took me about 10 mins.

New Goals - and recap
I recently wrote this introduction of myself for the study group, which gradually turned into a re-evaluation of my goals for poker. So, from the top...

I started making some extra $$$ doing casino bonii to help fund my degree in 2004/2005 when it was really profitable. After I graduated and the bonuses dried up I decided to move to poker to make some extra income. Soon after this I became hooked on the fantastic game and I've been working on improving ever since. I started playing poker properly early 2006 with a $100 bankroll at the microlimits, and ran that up to over $10k by the end of the year without re-depositing. Most of the profits came from poker bonuses and incredibly lucrative affiliate freerolls.

I bankrolled myself $5k at the start of 2007, but due to work stress, having to move flat, and splitting up with my girlfriend near the start of the year I never really got going early '07. During the summer I sorted out my finances and set myself a new bankroll of $2.5k with new targets for poker. I used to focus mainly on SNGs/MTTs but I'm progressively moving over to cash games. I play primarily on iPoker with 30% rakeback, 6-max $100NL and $200NL. I'm winning at both but not over a conclusive sample of hands, and I feel that I've got a lot of leaks in my game.

I joined CR a couple of months ago and have found the community and videos to be fantastic. It's given me a whole different outlook on the game, and I feel that I now have the tools that I need to learn how to be a top player. My goal is to achieve an hourly rate of $100+/hour including rakeback, by the end of 2008. I have a lot of goals to meet along the way, which will involve putting lots of hands in at $100NL then $200NL and upwards, and a lot of study. But this should be a fun and profitable process!

Now I'm really enthusiastic to meet up with similar like-minded players, and put in some hard work to get to where I want to be. I enjoyed reading the blogs of a lot of players in SSNL Grinders, and gained a lot of motivation from the hard work put in by players like
Chris and Marc. I joined the group to help motivate me to play more hands, to increase my links with poker buddies to chat over hands with at sessions or on messenger, and to help others in the group achieve their goals.

Bankroll
Not gonna be classing my bankroll as split across Cash/SNG/MTT/Live any more. My whole roll is now together. I'll still be playing a few SNGs/MTTs but the buy-ins will just come out of the overall roll, my focus will be be on NL Cash a lot more. The main reason for bringing the roll together is so that I feel comfortably (30x buyin) rolled at $100NL.

I'll be moving up to $200NL when I hit the $6k mark and when I have a large sample of hands showing that I've crushed $100NL.

... oh, this probably means I'll be ACTUALLY posting hands now. With strategy and decisions and dollars and everything. Interesting.

Current bankroll: $3,747

Read Full Poker Blog Post

October Review

Date: Thu, Nov 1, 2007

Crushed the $27s on Stars 6-tabling, ran like ass live... which is a given these days, and a sneaky wee profit on Blonde.

A bit of non-poker stuff, I'm officially a level 4 snowboarder after taking all day lessons at Xscape in Glasgow last weekend. I'd never been snowboarding before and it was fantastic fun, massively rewarding after a lot of hard work. Falling is pretty painful, but very much part of the learning! My mate got the worst of it though breaking his wrist and being relegated to the bar near the end of the day... jokes of stopping off at hospital on the way back from Glasgow were infact realised after he got his arm put in plaster in Edinburgh on Sunday night!

High Stakes Poker heats up next week with the minimum buy-in being set at $500,000. Esfandiari, Doyle, Negreanu, Patrik, Farha, Gold and Greenstien all taking part. The first of the big buy-in game will be on pokertube next Tuesday.

Cheers to people leaving comments, it's always nice to get some feedback or encouragement. Also, thanks to Amatay, Plan3tGong, etc for linking me up.


Live
Played a couple more circus freezeouts, that I probably blogged a bit about below. I bust out both of these running into aces after going pretty deep. Continuing to play well, not worried in the slightest that I haven't cashed in about my last 10 live tourneys.

Cash

Only played 500 hands or so this month, didn't even log a session until earlier this week! It was a beast of a session too, one of those ones where you log out an hour later a buy-in up after getting served up lots of delicious situations that you can't help but with good sized pots in. Then on the flip-side I played for a couple of hours last night and got slapped in the face with loads of situations that I couldn't help losing money in. Overall I'm happy with a megre $70ish profit over the 3 hours play at cash this month.

Only 2,000 hands away from the 10k mark now, and with the Stars bonus out of the way I'm clear to get fired back into cash games. I know I've said this for the past couple of months now, but expect lots of hand analysis and PT reviews this month!


SNG/MTT

Great month SNG wise, finishing nearly $725 up at the $27s on Stars. Cleared the $150 bonus too. I swung down over my last 10-12 SNGs so wasn't able to clear the $1k for the month, but that's certainly no problem. Not gonna repost stats/graphs/etc again, as they'll be pretty similar to the ones in the post below, except with a little downswing at the end. :)

Experimented with 6-tabling SNGs which seems to be the right amount for me just now. So I'm moving up from 4-tabling to 6-tabling for all SNG play in future. Buying a lovely new 20" widescreen monitor to hook up to my laptop in the new flat this month, so should be able to play 6 comfortably, 8 at a squeeze. Don't think I've ever want to go past 6 tables anyways.

Did a little bit of staking this month too, losing around $25 from that.


Numbers
+$60 BlondePoker (NL Cash)
+$12 BlondePoker rakeback
+$725 Stars (SNGs + MTTs)
+$150 Stars bonus
-$100 live

So $847 up for the month, which I'm happy with as I've not been able to concentrate on poker as much this month due to work commitments, and flat-hunting.

Bankroll check...
Live: £21 (I run baaaad - will top up to £100 from my Stars balance)
NL Cash: $1080 (11x buyins $100NL buyins)
SNG: $2625 (48 $55SNG buyins)

So my overall poker bankroll is currently $3747. My aim for the end of the year is really to play a lot of $100NL hands and maintain a good BB/100 rate. If I can do this then I start the new year where I want to be, with a $5k+ bankroll playing $200NL. All focus on logging loads of $100NL hands 'til the end of the year! Will be playing the odd SNGs and MTTs when I get bored of cash too.

Books
Bought a copy of Professional NLHE, only flicked through it so far bit it looks great. Overall not too much bookwork went on this month, although I did was quite a lot of CR videos particularly ActionJeff and Jackal69.

Digest
NLP related to poker by Zee Justin ~ This article was linked in the CardRunners low limit strategy guide and is absolutely fantastic. Explores how your subconcious and concious mind are used while playing and learning poker.
Fantastic SNG articles by Curtains ~ These are really top notch and cover things like continuation betting and playing trouble hands like JJ and AK. There are a lot of hands examples and quizzes. Some of the best free SNG articles out there for sure.
An Introduction to Re-Stealing by Jennifear ~ Great article exploring profitable spots to re-steal at in MTTs. Good examples of how different types of hands will match up against loose and tight call ranges.
Perspective by Assassinato ~ I have a huge amount of respect for this guy, he comes across as being incredibly mature for a 19 year old. Another great poker mindset based article.
What you should know before going pro by Ed Miller ~ Been reading a lot of Ed Miller's articles recently, some of them are really original. This is one of the best guidelines out there for players thinking about going pro. He draws upon his experience to discuss almost every aspect you should consider before going pro.

Goals
Last month:
* Hit 10k hands at $100NL
* Write in depth 10k hands leak review with a lot of HHs
* Stars bonus chase

This month:
Not too many big goals, as it's likely to be a busy month, with work being in crunch time and moving flat. I'd do well to...
* Hit 10k hands at $100NL
* Write in depth 10k hands leak review with a lot of HHs

Read Full Poker Blog Post

On a heeeeater

Date: Tue, Oct 23, 2007

I'm just running flaming hot on Stars this month. Only playing the odd bit towards the bonus each night but I'm really just crushing the $27s. Cruuushing them. I definately feel that my game has improved a lot, especially after a bit of study earlier in the month, but I also know that i'm running like a motherfucker at the moment too... Which is nice. 150 more VIP points left before I get at Stars before the $150 bonus, I'm $1,000 up for the month so far.

Here are some sick graphs/stats from Sharkscope...

I've played 52 $27 SNGs this month (that's around 10hours multi-tabling), about 2/3 18-man, 1/3 45-man. So this month on the graph is from game 600 onwards. Basically the massive upswing... wheee!

I'm running at 75% ROI, which is pretty awesome. :) I think 30-35% is sustainable playing 45s, maybe around 30% playing the 18/45 mixes.

This graph also shows that I'm getting close to beating my best ever month of SNGs, which funnily enough was back in October last year too!? Wierd. October FTW.


Also, Rangers run good... managed a great 0-0 draw against Barca tonight putting us in an awesome group position in the Champions League. A 3-0 in the Old firm game at the weekend too. I *heart* October!

Read Full Poker Blog Post

Quiet few weeks

Date: Mon, Oct 22, 2007

Not all that much to report on poker wise over the last week or so... I've barely been playing, mainly due to spending a lot of my time looking for a new flat. Got that sorted out now and I'll be moving down to The Shore at Leith next month (see above). Really looking forward to it.

Anyways, poker wise played no cash so far this month, just not in the mood. Continued with the SNGs while bonus chasing at Stars. Man I'm on such a heater.... Sharkscope shows my ROI for the month as like 100% or something ridiculously unsustainable like that. :D 90% of the way through the bonus, aiming to have that done for the end of the month. If I continue to run good through the rest of the bonus I could have a $1k month despite having hardly played at all... which would be delicious.

Played an OfficePoker tourney last weekend (I think) at Circus. I final tabled, but bubbled shoving KJ shortstacked and running into aces. I just can't win at that fucking casino! It'll come soon enough... :S However I went with a mate, Jason, and he took 2nd place in the first OP tourney he'd played. It was particularly sick when he amassed so many chips that he had a cardroom assistant stacking them for him while he continued to play. WP!

Rest of the month? I have to beast work, and sort out the move, so it's unlikely I'll be playing much. My only real goal for the end of the month now is to complete the bonus at Stars.

Read Full Poker Blog Post

Wee SNG Rave

Date: Wed, Oct 10, 2007

SNGs
Wheeeeeee $360 up tonight. Took down a 45-man, and came 2nd in an 18-man (both $27s). Boom! :) Ran up 350FPPs on Stars so far this month, played around 35 $27 SNGs so far, running real well! Up over $400 for the month so far on Stars, only 400FPPs to go 'til I unlock the $150 bonus too which I'll now easily clear.

Really enjoying SNGs just now, so I'm concentrating on them for a bit. Not played any cash at all yet this month. Been working late most weeknights, and playing footy/squash the rest... more in the mood for a few turbos when I get back rather than grinding. At the weekends I'm usually not in much of a mood for cash, usually end up playing live poker. Nae too bothered about this... I'll just play what I feel like playing.

More CR love
Been watching the Jackal69 (Phil Shaw) SNG videos on CardRunners, they're really fantastic. There's one where he plays the 18 and 45 man SNGs on Stars, which is exactly my game. Really good to get some insight on how to play the bubble compared to a STT or MTT.

Also been watching ActionJeff MTT/SNG vids. He doesn't chat as much during the videos (usually because he's playing another 4 tables on another monitor) but just watching the guys moves is prety phenomenal. Watched videos of him playing the Sunday tourneys a few weeks back and his moves are just awesome.

I had been watching a load of GreenPlastic and Sbrugby videos, but I figure I really need to clear out all of my leaks at the $100NL level. So I'm working through the Low Limit NLHE series by Brystmar. They're aimed at $50NL-$200NL, with a lot of good PT+PAHUD tutorials too. Brystmar does an awesome job with these, he's also got PDF files and articles on CR to accompany the Low Limit NLHE series of videos. They're definately gonna lock up my $100NL game so I can move up to $200NL confidently.

New Blogs
Added a few really sweet new blogs by guys from the low limit NLHE forums on Card Runners, which are really good. I'm really settling in to CR now, not posted much on the forums yet but they seem fantastic. Everyone on the CR forums seems to have a lot more focus/determination to improve their game than elsewhere, which is also evident in the blogs above.

Read Full Poker Blog Post

Stars Blogger MTT

Date: Mon, Oct 8, 2007

Read Full Poker Blog Post

September Review

Date: Mon, Oct 1, 2007

A lot of progress this month, some poor cash/sng results, but a final table on a 850-runner rebuy to pick the month up!

Also this month I've been using google analytics to have a look at traffic/referrals for my blog. One thing it tells you is what people typed in google to get to site... some guy got here by typing "long sng downswing". Fuck you google!!

Other cool software this month I got was PokerGrapher, and Skansky's PokerEV beta. I also found that Pokerhand converts iPoker PT hand histories real nice, so I'll be using that to post hands in future.


Live Play
Some more poker played at Circus, a couple more £30+3 freezeouts. Still playing pretty well there. I got down to the last 15 a couple of weeks back bust out in a big pot against a guy called Adam, who I've just noticed on P5s. KK vs his straight flush draw all-in on the flop and I didn't hold. I think we both played the hand well neither of us realising how strong each others hands were and in the end we were roughly a flip. Fortunately I still got a free cheese&ham toastie despite it being delivered after I hit the rail, that would have been a beat, for sure.

Cash games

So I got PT/PAHud setup real nice on BlondePoker. I'm really happy with the setup now. I'll take a screengrab and post it next time I play. Being able to 4-table with huds on the comfort of the laptop is ace. Means I'm able to get a lot more hands in.

First impressions of CardRunners. Townsends videos are really good, however it's kinda worrying that I've watched like 5-6 of his vids so far and he never wins, lol. Obviously he rocks, but it seems wierd that I'm simultaneously running bad too :S Hmmmm. No, but CardRunners rocks, seriously. It's the shit. It's without a doubt the best and fastest way to get good. I'm loving it.

Right, enough chat, more stats, pics. I played over 3000 hands this month 3 and 4 tabling, which I'm really happy with. Good volume means more rakeback too, I picked up almost $100 which was a nice bonus. Unfortunately I've been running like shit. :)


What's been going wrong? I'm not to sure. I know I'm making some mistakes, and I know I have leaks but I'm confident I'm still playing a pretty good +EV game, but just had a bit of a downswing this month. That being said I'm really looking forward to hitting the 10k hands mark this month and deeply analysing a lot of my hands and stats to find leaks

Here's a graph of all $100nl hands so far along with my running PT stats too...



SNG/MTT

Surprise score of the month came when I played one of only a few online MTTs this month. Final tabling the $8r on Stars a couple of days back for $800!


Went out in 7th shoving AKs UTG into aces. I was 6th in chips with an m of I think around 3, the BTN was shorter, but AKs is still an insta-push UTG here. No decision. I felt that I played really well all tourney. Just played really solid poker, very little bluffing. The field in this tourney was incredibly weak, I'm going to play more of these rebuys in future I think there's more value than the freezeouts, and even if you have your starting (double) stack at the end of the rebuy period you're still playing relatively deepstacked poker which is sweet.

Clocked in 38 $27 18/45 man SNGs on Stars this month, finishing with a $150 loss. Felt like I was certainly +EV all month, but the cards didn't fall my way.




















Got a $150 bonus at Stars ending in a 6 weeks so I want to continue firing out a lot of SNGs on there. I'm 70% through the bonus, so don't want to miss out on it. Will give me enough FPPs for a Stars hoody too. Then I think I might move a lot of my roll out of Stars, and play SNGs on another site. Gonna fire out a lot more of the $27 SNGs and take some shots at the $55s too when the fields look weak.


Numbers
-$300 BlondePoker (NL Cash)
+$85 BlondePoker rakeback
+$750 Stars (SNGs + MTTs)
-$200 live
-$250 CardRunners signup + 6 months subs (took from SNG balance)

Was on the verge of having my 1st losing month in a 18 months, but saved by the miracle $8r score. Sweet! Managed to pay for 6 months CR subs and still pull a little profit this month. Finishing $335 up - $250 to cardrunners, making a megre $85 profit. I'm happy to take a bit of a hit this month though, as I think the CR investment will really pay off in the long run.

Bankroll check...
Live: £81 (2.5x £33 freeze buyins) - ouch!
NL Cash: $1080 (11x buyins $100NL buyins)
SNG: $1750 (32 $55SNG buyins)

Books
Re-reading Harrington on Hold'em 1 this month, due to being utterly bored with the skanlsky NL book. HoH1 is much lighter reading so far.

Digest
I've spent most of this month reading the articles on CR, so not much to post here.

Goals
Last month:
* Play 3k+ hands of NL - done!
* Play more heads up NL - meh, played no heads up, but not really bothered.
* Get hud software properly setup for 4-tabling on laptop - done, and it rocks!
* Write new article - gonna forget the article and heavily write up my 10k hand report instead, this should include a lot of leaks I and others may have at $100NL. Gonna be a biggie.
* Sign up to CardRunners - done, and it rocks also! * Read through a lot of the new blogs I've added! - did this too, some great new blogs added.

This month:
* Hit 10k hands at $100NL
* Write in depth 10k hands leak review with a lot of HHs
* Stars bonus chase

Read Full Poker Blog Post

Best of the Blogs

Date: Sun, Sep 16, 2007

Been reading through a shitload of blogs since adding them over the last few days, still got a lot of the links to read through. Here are my favs so far...

Assassinato - Real good "life" blog from a high stakes online MTT player. Shows the ups and downs of playing online MTT poker as a profession.
Brian Townsend - This is a given.
Pay It Forward - New cardrunners students being tutored by Taylor/Brian over SkyPE. Regular hand, progress updates, interesting to see them improve.
Ryan Daut - Taylor Caby's protoge, won the PCA. Sick MSPaint skillz.
Tillerman - Ex pro-gamer from Glasgow, now full time high stakes cash game player. Some fantastic in-depth hand analysis, sick PT graphs and crackin banter.

Read Full Poker Blog Post

More live poker

Date: Sun, Sep 16, 2007

Played the freeze at the circus again last night. Made mistakes in a few hands, but chipped up a little and was about average stacked after the break. With the blinds increasing and my m getting low I open-shoved A6s from MP, get looked up by a LP player with AK, flop the 6 and double through. Then come the interesting hands...

Hand 1 - Short stacked flop play
Blinds are 400/800, I have 11k and have been moved to a new table a few hands ago. Folded to me on the BTN with KQs, SB has 8k and BB has 17k. I raise to 2200, SB calls, BB folds. 5200 in the pot, flop comes 469 rainbow, he checks. He's got 5.8k behind here and he has me just covered, I'm not certain I have the best hand here, but I figure I take the pot down most times if I bet. I'm not sure about this now though, as if he called from the SB he likely has a hand that currently beats me. I doubt he'll fold any PP, but should fold any ace. I bet 3800, he shoves for 2k more, I have to call. He shows ATo, wtf. Checkraising with A-high NH retard.

So what did I do wrong in the hand? Preflop is fine, but on the flop I had 3 options, check and take a free card, bet an amount I can fold to a shove from (2.5k ish), or move in. I'm not sure I have enough hands beat to move in here, and it'd leave me without much left, I don't think the risk/reward is there. I think betting 2.5k here would just be leaking off chips and wouldn't leave me enough behind to fire again on the turn. I should check here for sure, take a free card, and maybe find an opportunity to bluff on the turn/river. My fault was not wanting to release control of the hand to him by checking and letting him shove any flop, but with a weak hand and not much fold equity here I should just have checked. I've posted the hand on ITH here to get some feedback.

Hand 2 - KK no gut
1000/2000, I've got 11k after paying the BB. 15k is the average. Folded to the LAG BTN who makes it 8.5k with more behind. SB folds, I look down at KK and put him all-in. He calls with QJo, ~25k pot... flop JJx. :) Turn brought me a flush draw, 10 outs total, missed the river. Goodnight! This seemed pretty brutal but the hand played out real standard preflop and this time the I lost the 85/15. Can't really complain too much after the bug A6>AK suckout by myself, but was gutted nonetheless. MTTs are brutal.

Read Full Poker Blog Post

Brian Townsend = God

Date: Mon, Sep 10, 2007

Cardrunners
Signed up to CardRunners.com about a week back and have to say it's fantastic. Studied 2-3 of Brian Townsends videos so far and I can't describe how valuable they are. They're just absolute gold. I'd say Brian's first 2 videos are worth the signup fee alone. Been on a big poker buzz for the last few days as it's just fantastic to find something that I can clearly see is going to have a HUGE positive impact on my game. Not felt like this since I read Dan Harrington's books.

PAHud
Anyway, enough CR pimping. I set up Poker Ace Hud on the laptop at the weekend, and customised the layouts to work with the 6 and 10 seater mini-views on iPoker. (I'll post a screen grab of this next time I play) Then I set up the stats overlays to match Brian Townsends setup which seems really smart. Roadtested this on Sunday night and it worked real nice. My favourite part has to be that it takes minimal time to set up at the start of a session, you just launch PAHud and PT and you're good. None of the messing about like with GT+. It's perfect for my needs which are 3-4 tabling with the comfort of the laptop, now I don't think I have much of a need for my desktop machine.

$100NL
So I had my first cash game session tonight after doing a lot of study over the past few days, and with the new huds set up. I quickly settled in to the stats overlays on PAHud and really feel that they're allowing me to make much more informed decisions. Still taking a good amount of notes too, but instead of these being "LAG" "TAG", etc I can concentrate on specific ways opponents play hands. Like "led with a flopped set", "over-values tpwk", etc.

The session itself went really well and I could feel that I was running over tables. Maybe I was playing a little too aggressive but I was taking down so many pots pre-flop and on the flop by showing a lot of aggression. I was running up steadily on each of the tables I was playing on then bust a couple of short stacks for a $70 pot with QQ vs Ax vs Ax. Then came the fun...

Pre:
UTG limps, folded to me in SB with QQ, I make it $4.50, BB folds, UTG calls $3.50.
standard.

Flop: 4h 8d 4c ($10)
Sweet flop for QQ, standard c-bet for me...
Hero bets $7, UTG calls $7.

Turn: 4s ($24)
The turn locks me up a monster. The only hand I'm worried about here is 88, so I'm going to the felt now for sure.
Hero bets $16, UTG raises to $64, Hero shoves for $25 more, UTG calls $25 more.

Villain shows K8 for the lower full house

River: 8s ($202)
NAWWW! Ship it to the 5-outer superstar :(

Actually for some reason I found this hand pretty funny. I guess I think it's pretty funny that I played so well all session and played my absolute A game to take such a comedy beat like this! :) Not to worry, I played it well. Couple of hands after this I got rivered in a $75 pot on another table, and finished the session logging 400 hands, net -$73.

Staying Positive
Big plusses for this session were that I concentrated less on information that doesn't really matter. I didn't look at my PT stats while I was playing, didn't look at cards that I mucked to see if I'd have hit, I didn't have any distractions I just really concentrated on my game. I would have liked to book a win, but I understand the poker is a tough mistress and it's extremely important to be positive because I crushed the games I was playing. I could feel that I was running over tables and in complete control. I'm also really happy that I logged off a couple of mins after taking the 2 beats as I could feel I wasn't playing my A game any more. I think that takes a lot of self control. Way happy with that session overall.

Read Full Poker Blog Post

Saturday at the Circus

Date: Sat, Sep 8, 2007

Despite it being scorching hot, today was poker day! There were 2 £30 freezeouts on at Circus and I decided to play in both.

The first, starting in the afternoon, was hosted by Neil of OfficePoker. Great slow blind structure with 30min blinds all the way, got 41 runners. I bust out in the 3rd level with the following hand:

Bustout Hand 1
Blinds are 100/200, I've got about 7500. I pick up KK in ~MP2. UTG and UTG+1 limp, folded to me. For some reason I wasn't paying the correct attention and thought I was open-raising, so I made it 600. BB calls, UTG calls, UTG+1 calls. Eugh, don't flop an ace plsthx. 4 players to the flop and I've got position, 2500 in the pot. Flop comes 2c Tc Jh, checked to me, I make it 1800, BB folds, UTG folds, UTG+1 moves in. Stop and think time...

First a bit of info on the villain... he's played a pretty average game so far, he hasn't been particularly loose/tight... he just seems to be playing his cards in the early game. Also, I know he's an experienced player. He has me covered, I have to call 5100 into a 9400 pot, so I'm getting just short of 2/1. I think for a while, then make the call. He flips 8c 9c. Turn completes his flush and I'm gone.

My preflop mistake really hurt me on this hand giving a lot of weak hands the chance to call, instead of narrowing down ranges and isolating with my KK I'd likely be playing a multiway pot against wide ranges of hands. Was there any way I could have played the flop differently? No. The only hands that have me beat are AA/JJ/TT/22/JT. AA/JJ/TT are all unlikely as he's a good player and wouldn't have played them so passively, 22 and JT are really the only hands that realistically have me beat, even if he has JT my KK is only a 30/70. There are a number of other hands he could have too. AJ/KJ/JQs/FD/SD are all possible so adding them into his range makes this a much easier call that I'd have expected. By narrowing down his range by removing AA/JJ/TT I'm actually ahead against his range here. Easy call. In the end my kings were 45/55 against his 9c8c.

Cash Game
Helped run a cash game after this which was great fun. The atmosphere and people at the OP tourneys are always fantastic, and I really like the new casino too. Free food and drink, Scotland/England games on the plasmas, and rakefree poker is pretty awesome. Played cash for 4/5 hours, again this was a really fun game. Standard £20 max buy-in with 25p/50p blinds, so it's 40BB $100NL. But by the end of the game we're playing 6 handed with £400 on the table. Some great pots inc AA vs KK vs AKs preflop with AKs rivering a flush. RIGGED. A couple of £150 pots too, yum. Unfortunately I pretty much spent my time folding. The table was pretty aggressive and I never really got a decent sized stack so I wasn't able to play many hands for implied odds value. :( Maybe I need to gamble it up more in the early stage of these cash games to try to build a deeper stack. I'm not sure, anyway, I continued picking spots and ended up £10 down, which I thought was pretty good considering never really making any hands.

Bustout Hand 2
Played the £33 freezeout in the evening too, this had 81 runners for a 1st prize of just under £1000. I've been playing awesome poker at one of the tougher tables early on in this and have chipped to 5.5k (from 4). 3rd level, blinds are 100/200... Loose/passive MP1 limps, I make it 800 with AQo, CO thinks then asks me how much I have, then cold calls, everyone folds. So it's me and CO to the flop, he's got position and he's got me covered. So far he's seemed TAG and a strong player. Flop comes Ah6s7s, I lead for 1500 into the 2100 pot. He takes his time, then calls. Turn is the Ts. I think for a while, then check. He shoves, I call. He flips 66 for a flopped set, standard.

I guess I could shove the turn, I've got 3.2k left and there's 4.3k in the pot, but I figure at this point I'm not getting away from my hand. I've seen him make a move on a flush draw previously in the night and I know he's a good player so he should really shove at this with a wide range if I check it to him. I strongly put him on 66-JJ here anyway, so I'd rather pull in a few more hands that I have beat if he happens to have a spade with them. Maybe I should shove the turn here, I'm not too sure. I don't think I could have got away from this, preflop was standard, flop was standard, and by the turn I was committed. Can anyone else suggest me a better line? (bazclef@hotmail.com)

So down £73 today, but overall really happy with my play, and had a great day of poker. I think when I can say that after spending all day losing then I know I'm in the right mindset!

Read Full Poker Blog Post

New Foo's video

Date: Tue, Sep 4, 2007

Read Full Poker Blog Post