...and that's a wrap.

So I guess it's time for the mandatory '2008 roundup' post. Pretty good year in terms of results...

Fulltilt: $3600
Rileys: $0 (50 deposited)
Ipoker: $6250
Pokerroom: $0 ($600 deposited)

total online: $9850
LIVE: +$1250

2008 total: $46,150
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $76,750


Had a great run towards the end of the year in the mtts, ran like crap in the sngs but not too devastating, and started tilting and turning to the cash tables. Ups and downs! Don't really feel like I improved much as a player this year though, and next year I plan to work on my game more if I get the time. 2009 goals copied from pfu:

- If I do play full time for a prolonged period of time like this summer, get a Cardrunners subscription and spend some time analysing and improving my game.

- Start actually building my roll instead of cashing out all the time. Get my roll big enough to play the majors regularly ($20k minimum)

- Get my first 5-figure score. Been close a few times, would be nice to nail one.

- Get to at least 1 GUKPT tournament via the bigslick promotion, try to sat into others, play well in them.

- Stop tilting and donating at the cash tables.

- I'd like to have a $50k year since I was just short this year, but I don't know how realistic that is as I probably wont play as much. Guess that's just a thought rather than a goal.



Well, that's that then.

oh noes...

Looks like that pesky 'tilt' thing is back (leaning tower? tilt? geddit? ...never mind). Been playing some cash, 2/4-10/20 CAP and shortstacking. Silly. Up ~1k overall, which is pretty amazing considering how much of a donk I am. Bust my PP roll, ran my pokerroom roll up to 1750 (and sensibly cashed it all out just now) broke about even at fulltilt. I really enjoy the CAP games there, but I really suck at them. Hopefully making this post and thinking about it will stop me playing any more... might take a break for a while.

One thing that helps me put things in perspective is that playing 3/6 or 5/10 with what's most likely a bunch of cash regs is almost certainly -ev for me, even shortstacking or trying to find other shortstacks to play against... in which case, I'm not just gambling, I'm taking a pretty bad gamble. It's probable that I have a higher expectation (tho obv still negative) playing roulette. And since I have an absolute 100% no casino games rule, how come this is allowed?

Lets hope the pleasure side of my brain starts listening to the logical side...

Fulltilt: $2700
Rileys: $0
Ipoker: $6400
Pokerroom: $0 ($1750 withdrawn)

total online: $9100
LIVE: +$1250

2008 total: $46,050

Rebuy tastic

So I had another decent mtt session, went deep in pretty much all the mtts I played, had a few small cashes, went very deep in a $30r and $25r on ipoker, busting the 25 in ~15th. I final tabled the $30r as chippo, though only had 12bbs, so was a crapshoot really. The table was halariously tight so I was shoving a lot, and bust 2 shorties with 94o which was fun. Got HU pretty even, then lost when villain open shoved for 4x pot with OESD, I snapped with top pair but couldn't hold, so I took 2nd for $2400. It really helps running so good in mtts when I seem to insta-drop 10 buyins whenever I even think about playing sngs.

EDIT: another great (and in parts frustrating) mtt session again tonight, really deep in a load of tournies. Got to the final few tables of a few for some cashes, got to the final table of a $100 mtt on ipoker but manage to bust in a huge cooler when in 2nd in chips to the chippo QQ < AA which sucked. $600 there, and then I donked up a $50 turbo tournament that lasted 1hr 15mins for 250 people lol, won it for $3.6k. Mtts love me at the moment!

Fulltilt: $2700
Rileys: $400
Ipoker: $6750
Pokerroom: $700 ($3000 withdrawn)

total online: $10550
LIVE: +$1250

2008 total: $45,750

sng pain

So the pain has continued, and I'm on a ~80 buyin downswing. Which is always fun. My worst downswing buyin-wise (tho not in terms of $$$). Im still in profit tho which is something, at 3.8% roi... meh. But I'm feeling ok cos I just received my rakeback for last month - £1017 :)

Decided to play mtts today, got 2 final tables, 7th in a $100 for $350 and 3rd in a $25r for ~1200. So a decent session, up about $1k, but both very frustrating exits, especially the rebuy, where I lost a pot that was almost all the chips in play to a 3outer vs an insane lagtard 3 handed. Basically a $2k 3-outer. But anyway, feels nice to actually win some monies.

Fulltilt: $2850
Rileys: $500
Ipoker: $5200
Pokerroom: $600

total online: $9150
LIVE: +$1250

2008 total: $41,350

Moan.

So I'm running like crap again. Guess I can't run like god forever... sigh. Was down some over the last few hundred sngs, then lost 30buyins ($1.5k) today. *blerg* Was a bit tilty and played a few $200 games (which were ridiculously soft - I scoped all the players, there was 1, I repeat 1 player in profit, most of them $5k+ losers) and broke even apart from the rake, but I'm just running terribly in the $100 games. So I might stick to the 50s and 30s for a while, until I find my feet again. Feeling the creeping tilt starting to overtake me brought back bad memories of early this year... don't want to do anything silly.

Not particularly related (ie not because of tilt) I've played a few sessions of cash after watching a strat video made by a couple of cash regs over at pfu. Was playing mostly .5/1, and am pretty confident I can beat the games decently. I'm not going to play any more for while until I'm 100% tilt-free to be on the safe side, but it's nice to feel a bit more comfortable about my cash play.

About 1/3 the way through this sng thing, so am pretty confident I can see it out, which will be pretty cool, the GUKPT will be fun. Shame my roi has plummeted from 34% to 8% in a week, but I was aiming for 5%, so meh. And my roi in the 50s, the only level I have a decent sample size in (~500) is about 15% which I'm pleased with.

Anyways, barring a 100 buyin downswing in the next 2 days, november will still be my best month to date, so am happy really. Just annoying to have a crappy end.

Fulltilt: $3000
Rileys: $500
Ipoker: $4650
Pokerroom: $600

total online: $8750
LIVE: +$1250

2008 total: $40,950

One better...

So I lucksacked another mtt score :D This time finally managed to actually close it out, which feels awesome. Was the $50 20k at fulltilt. Started well, but then nothing much happened during the midstages, and I got a bit bored as I'd bust out of my other games. Got to the money, and then things started to look up after I opened shoved 20bbs on the button with 44 and obv hit against KK cos that's how I roll, and then just cruised to the FT. Played good on the final table, and then got hu against a crazy lag, and made some superstar calldowns, including calling a pot-sized allin with 3rd pair on the turn with equal stacks - basically calling allin with 3rd pair for $2k :) he had the draw and missed, and happily I scooped the $5.8k for 1st.



Had another losing session on the sngs, which brings the roi down a bit, but its still above 25% I think, and mtts have been awesome, so can't complain. Oh and I just played the poker society live game and luckboxed my way to 2nd.

November is a good month for poker.

Fulltilt: $3000 (4550 withdrawn)
Rileys: $500
Ipoker: $6850
Pokerroom: $600

total online: $10950
LIVE: +$1250

2008 total: $43,050

Mtt score

*imagine new picture of smiling cat here*

Decided to play some mtts last night - was home ill so had a bit of time to spare. Went deep in a few games, bust out cruelly in a $25r on ipoker (allin on turn for massive chiplead with 15 left with KK vs KT on QJxx board, he dings his 6-outer). I was doing ok in a $109 mtt, but felt like absolute crap by this time, and was playing poorly. Didn't bust though, and starting concentrating again the final few tables. Ninja-shortstacked the whole way until about 8 left, then picked up some hands and went to 2/3. Then my internet cut out. Cue cheesies slamming his head against the desk for 10 minutes bemoaning his luck at final tables. I blinded out of course, but still managed to come 2nd :D ship the $4k and change. weeeee
Annoying I couldn't take the shot at the win though.

Sngs still going good too, so november's already my best month to date. Still 2 weeks to fit in a horrific downswongz though...

Fulltilt: $2000 (3950 withdrawn)
Rileys: $500
Ipoker: $7600
Pokerroom: $900

total online: $11000
LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $38,500

More running good

Sngs are still going awesomely. Started mixing in a few $100 games - played 6, cashed in 5, won 4 lol. Always helps to run good in the expensive games!

I was aiming for 5%+ roi in these games. I'm at 34% at the moment. Whilst I know this isn't my true winrate, having an roi of nearly 7x my goal over 320 games is making me think I was underestimating slightly! I mean, at this point I'm pretty sure I can gaurantee a 10% longterm roi in the $50 games, at least for the time being. I can play at least 15 of those an hour. Including rakeback, that's ~$100/hr. That's madness! imo.

*warning: longish, cliff notes at end*
I've never wanted a 'career'. I've never been motivated profession-wise, and I'm at uni for something to do more than anything. I don't graduate for a few years yet, but I have a year out next year (doing a languages course, get to spend the year abroad), plus my girlfriend graduates this year, and it's all been making me think about, like, y'know, the 'future'. And stuff. As I say, I'm never going to join a coorporation and work my way up or anything. So what am I going to do? Really I just want to play music, travel, start writing again. Which made me think...why don't I just do that? Screw the whole 'get a stable job' thing.
I don't want to be rich and have fancy things, I just want not to have to worry about money, and I feel so lucky to have found poker - something that lets me do that.

So I'm thinking I'll play poker for a while, hopefully save some money (already got some savings too), and then travel around, maybe teaching english - whilst researching my year abroad I found loads of voluntary organisations requiring english teachers. How cool would that be? Just travelling around the world, seeing loads of amazing places - but not as a tourist (I hate being a tourist - partly why I'm doing a language course). If I run out of money, hopefully poker will still be there! Or maybe I'll spend half of each year travelling and the other half pokering. Something like that anyway.

So yes, there's my grand 'life plan'. I think I'll need to force myself to be proactive about it though, I can tell if I'm not careful I'll slide into a lazy degenerative heap and just play poker, forgetting the very reason I'm playing poker in the first place: to do the things I enjoy without worrying about the bills.

cliff notes:
-Poker is awesome.
-I'm never getting a job.
-Don't lose sight of why you're trying to make money - don't let work/poker consume you.


Fulltilt: $2100
Rileys: $500 ($2500 withdrawn)
Stars: $0
AP: $0
Ipoker: $6600 (crazy strong $$ means this is smaller than it should be as my balance is in £. I think... I really don't understand the economy/currencies/basic maths)
Pokerroom: $1150
Betfair: $0

total online: $10350

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $33,900

A good week, and a frustrating finish

So I final tabled the pacific 100k yesterday. Played pretty good for the most part, was a crapshoot by the final few tables, I was shoving like crazy and was getting away with it mostly :) then on the final table, 3/8, my aces go down in flames for a big chiplead at a terrible table, and there goes a very good chance at the $25k for 1st. Arg. So I was pretty gutted at the time of course. Was eyeing the top 3, 5-figure places, looking for my biggest cash to date. Twas not to be I guess. The $3k is welcome though...


Had a losing session on the sngs yesterday - pretty irratating since it probably would've been a slight winning session if my power cable hadn't broken and made me lose some games at crucial moments. But then today I played 23, and made 16 buyins, so can't complain :D So I'm up ~$3k on sngs this week (which is silly good imo) so it's been a pretty sweet week. Played 200, so another 12 weeks or so. If I can do half this good for the next 12 weeks... sweeeetness would ensue.

Fulltilt: $2100
Rileys: $500 ($2500 withdrawn)
Stars: $0
AP: $0
Ipoker: $3850
Pokerroom: $1150
Betfair: $0

total online: $7600

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $31,150

Sng goodness

Been playing an hour or so a day since monday, trying to get in my 20/day quota for this ipoker promotion. Happily, I've been running real good :) up $2.3k over 150 games, which is pretty awesome. And with the dollar getting stronger, it's like £1400. woop! Also the stronger dollar means I need to play less games to reach £7500 which is cool too. I'm sure it'll all come crashing down fairly soon, but I'll enjoy it while it lasts. Tripled my roll at ipoker in 5 days! 6 winning sessions in a row - never had anything like it.

Anyways, so yeah, this is just a brag post really. Go me!


Fulltilt: $2150 ($1500 withdrawn)
Rileys: $50 ($100 deposited)
Stars: $0
AP: $0
Ipoker: $3150
Pokerroom: $1150 ($2000 withdrawn)
Betfair: $0

total online: $6500

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $27,550

I feel like a pig shat in my head...

Had a few too many last night... fun night! No poker for me today though.

*groan*

Played 2 sessions since last post. Felt like I played pretty well the first one and had lots of near misses, but didn't manage to bag any scores and ended down $600-700. But yesterday I ended up winning $500 in small cashes, and reaching 3 final tables, 2 for $500 each and the third I took down for $1700 :) So that was nice.

I've decided to go for a promotion I've been told about - if you can generate $13k of rake from november until the end of march you get a £1000 seat at a GUKPT event of your choice and £200 expenses. It's more of a staking deal since the site gets 25% of any winnings and you have to wear logos and stuff, but still, I've wanted to play a gukpt event for a while, and this seems like a good way to do it. Good motivation too - I'll need to play ~2600 $50 sngs in that time, which works out at 130 a week. Which is a lot considering uni work, but I'll just go nuts over the xmas hols. I'll make $4k in rakeback alone! Guess I'll aim for... 10k total, which is like ~5% roi, should be doable.

Need to get pokertracker working again, I stopped using it on fulltilt because I couldn't get it to move hhs once it'd finished, so it took 20minutes reimporting thousands of hands everytime. But I think it should work for ipoker, and I think it's pretty important I get it working, especially seeing as I'll be playing at least 9 tables. I can get away with playing mtts without it, but getting even a tiny extra edge can mean a lot when I'm putting in this much volume of sngs.

Anyways, I'll stop rambling. I have a hangover to nurse and the screen is making my eyes hurt.

Fulltilt: $3550
Rileys: $0
Stars: $0
AP: $0
Ipoker: $1500
Pokerroom: $3250
Betfair: $0

total online: $8300

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $24,150

I'll be back...

...right now! Just finished my first session of poker in over 2 weeks. It was a pretty small session, broke about even, meh, whatever. Actually got the internet a few days ago, but haven't really felt like playing...which is weird.

Looked into some opr stats of mine and found that my roi for mtts isnt really that great... about 30%, with an average buyin of $50. Which works out at roughly $60/hr which is good, but I feel I should be doing better than that really. Or at least I definitely could be, and it feels stupid/lazy not to try and do the best I can. I think partly it's the huge gap between my B+/A game and the rest of the time (really really huge), but also I haven't put any effort into bettering my game in a long, long time. Haven't read any poker books since HoH a year ago, browse and post on the odd strat forum, but not often. I don't mind too much now, since I don't have much time for poker (this year at uni is going to be much tougher than last year) but next summer/next time I play a lot I'll probably get a cardrunners membership or something. 50% I'd be happy with, and I don't think is unrealistic. So I guess that's a long-term goal.

I'm not unrealistic in my poker goals, I know I'm never going to be a top tier player, but I can definitely improve a HUGE amount from where I am now. I remember working out my hourly rate this time a year ago and it wasn't much different from what it is now. I'm playing the same limits with the same bankroll. I should've made a lot more progress than I have this past year.

So anyways, with that ponderous thought, I'm going to bed. What with somehow not feeling much like playing poker and having loads of work, I probably wont be posting much... GLATT I guess.

Fulltilt: $3900
Rileys: $0
Stars: $0
AP: $0
Ipoker: $1900
Pokerroom: $950
Betfair: $0 ($500 withdrawn)

total online: $6750

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $22,650

blerg

Not been going so great. Lost $1k on wednesday, which is the biggest 1-day loss I've had for a while. Dropped $600 playing sngs, and then played 2 $200 hu games and lost them both. Which was pretty stupid. They were both fairly poor players, but my head wasn't in the right place, and dropping $200 in one game is still too much for me. So yeah, took the day off on thursday, played last night and made a bit (won a $10 turbo mtt on betfair) but got really deep in 3 tourneys and managed to bust them all which was really frustrating. Played a few games just now but got bored and it's a lovely day outside, so I'm probably going to go out instead.

Looking forward to going back to uni on monday, think I'm getting tired of poker for now. If I was ever going to do this full time for more than a few months, I think I'd need to force myself to have one or two totally non-poker days a week so I didn't get like this - bored and more prone to tilt. When I'm fresh it's great, I feel good, play good and can expect some nice results, but when I'm tired of it all evening winning (which doesn't happen often) is tainted. Sounds odds but I need to be more strict in taking time off, I stil have the urge to play when I'm not playing, but then when I start playing I want to stop. Weird, huh? Guess that's the gambling side of it. But I've made ~9k this summer (~2 months) which I'm happy with, paid for my holiday, rebuilt my online roll and have enough withdrawn so I can eat next year. Which is always good.

Anyways, probably wont play much over the next few weeks. Gonna have to get back into the habit of getting up before 12, studying and... well, not playing poker. I don't know how I'm going to manage!


EDIT: Was finishing off a $26 90player at ft when writing this post - just took it down for $600 :) which is a nice boost, and a nice way to close out poker for the summer. Adios for now.

Fulltilt: $4100
Rileys: $0
Stars: $0
AP: $0
Ipoker: $1550
Pokerroom: $1000
Betfair: $0 ($500 withdrawn)

total online: $6650

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $22,550

Fulltilt million challenge

So I got up a 5am yesterday on 3 hrs sleep to go to london for the fulltilt million challenge. Got there at the start time - 10:30, and ended up waiting outside for 40 minutes while they registered everyone, and then another 45 minutes in a TINY room which was supposed to fit like 150 people?? So that was pretty sucky. As one guy sitting next to me 'the words brewery and pissup come to mind...' The actual room was pretty cool, laid out nicely, although again pretty packed, observers and tv crews all over the place (yep, I might be on tv... woo lol). Play got underway well past 12, 5k starting stack, 30 minute levels (missing out a few like 150/300...) Nothing much happened until 100/200, where I nearly doubled with trips vs trips lower kicker. Nothing much more, made a few steals, then lost a big flip, and was crippled, out in 45th or something. Meh. Oh well, at least I get $500 for turning up.

Been mostly playing sngs, which have been, ok, breaking even on them roughly. Also started some HU sngs, which have been going really well. Mainly pleased with me keeping my head, been playing well, and not tilting which has always been my main problem with HU. Probably up 400-500$ on them. The main thing which has helped is the sharkscope searches I bought - I just check everyone I play HU, and don't play the profitable players. Easy!

Fulltilt: $3850
Rileys: $0
Stars: $0
AP: $0
Ipoker: $2950
Pokerroom: $850
Betfair: $150

total online: $7800

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $23,200

FT FT

Weird session this evening. Started off great, and had a few deep runs going, and then it all went wrong... had a big chiplead in a $75 mtts near the bubble, then lost AA < QTo AIPF to have double 2nd place, then AKs < AA for a big pot, and then 2nd nut boat vs nut boat to basically bust. Min cashed in that. Few other tourneys went in a similar vein, until I just had one $50 15k at fulltilt left. Ended up broswing the interwebs and drinking beer waiting for it to bust, but it didn't - ended up coming 4th for 1900 :) Bust AJ < AT, but got fairly lucky in parts... like getting it allin on the turn and hitting my 2 outer on the river with 15 left for huge pot, so can't complain!

Kinda feel relieved more than anything, was soooo tilty after busting the $75 tourney I thought I was going to explode.

Fulltilt: $2750
Rileys: $100
Stars: $0
AP: $0
Ipoker: $2950
Pokerroom: $950
Betfair: $150

total online: $6900

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $22,300

Slow and steady wins the race...

Had a few poor sessions, but recently had a decent session on the sngs and a 90-man win at fulltilt. Up to 150 of the jackpot games, and am almost exactly breakeven (+$500 with RB/bonus). Still too small to tell, but I have a feeling it might be too hard to beat the extra $4 rake for a decent amount... getting an 8% ROI normally is breakeven here, a decent 10% is netting you $1 a game. Not sure that's worth it...certainly not without the incentives. It's weird...there are some players who play those games A LOT, like 12-tabling 6hrs a day, they seems to play ok, and on sharkscope they've played 7-10k games. And are down like 10k. One guy is down $24k over 7000 games. wha?? Seems mental, who grinds like that, for that long at those stakes and loses $24k? I don't understand it. I can understand people who play $400 HU games for the thrill, and lose a ton, but to grind out $60 sngs for hours every day just doesn't seem to fit somehow... maybe these guys are just desperate to win the jackpot.

Anyways, I'll play a few hundred more, see if it's viable, and then most likely just play the regular sngs there. And carry on with the mtts of course. Oh and I deposited on betfair for a promotion they had, some WSOPE freeroll. Starting to wish I hadn't though... still need to earn 250 more points in the next few days.

Fulltilt: $1100
Rileys: $150 (200 deposited)
Stars: $0
AP: $0
Ipoker: $3200
Pokerroom: $1000
Betfair: $150 ($400 deposited)

total online: $5600

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $21,000

Sunday...

Just finished the sunday sesh. Went pretty meh. Had a pretty bad session earlier dropping $500 on sngs, and spending $550 on sats for 2 $200 seats, so although I'm up on this session, I'm down on the day. Had one small cash for $280, and came 2nd in a $5r for ~$1k. Went better than it could've.

Fulltilt roll is crazily low, might actually have to redeposit :/

Fulltilt: $700
Rileys: $0
Stars: $0
AP: $0
Ipoker: $3150
Pokerroom: $1100

total online: $4950

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $20,950

Ok day

Had a couple of deep runs, finishing 14th in a $55 mtt on pokerroom, and 21st in one on FT, and had a final table with I busted 7th for $380. Slightly frustrating, but most of them were coolers, didn't take any beats in them so don't feel too annoyed. Doing pretty well on the jackpot sngs, up ~$450 on them today. Just a matter of time before I get a run going, 6 top 2's should be doable, especially since I haven't been playing them much - am going grind them alot more from now on I think.

edit: decided to track these sngs, just pulled up my tourney histories; I'm almost exactly even over 67 games (up $7 lol). Bonus/RB mean I'm up a couple of hundred overall. Obviously tiny sample, but I thought I'd done better than that... I'll play a few hundred and see. Maybe the extortionate rake isnt really beatable for a decent amount.

Fulltilt: $1500
Rileys: $0
Stars: $0
AP: $0
Ipoker: $2450 ($3700 withdraw)
Pokerroom: $1000

total online: $4950

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $20,950

This always happens...

I go on a bad run and stop blogging because I'm temporarily annoyed at poker, then I post when I get a decent win :)

So yah, been on a pretty horrific downswing this week. Down 3k maybe? Maybe more, havent kept proper track. Just not going well at all, then had a pretty bad sunday yesterday, though I've been playing well I think. But started today well with a bit of profit on the sngs, won a 90player for ~$600, fted a $15mtt for $450 and won the pfu session which might not be particularly profitable but is a great confidence boost as the standard of play is very high.

And to finish it off, just finished 2nd in a 10r 35k on ipoker for $4.2k yay!

hold the phone...wait just a minute now...I think...yes! WOOP! Broke 50k FINALLY!!

weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

Man that monkey's been on my back for sooo long. Take THAT stupid monkey. Erm, anyway, I'm pretty tired.

Sleep. sleeeeeeepppzzz...

Fulltilt: $1850
Rileys: $50 ($600 deposited...why do I carry on giving this place my money?!)
Stars: $0
AP: $0
Ipoker: $5700
Pokerroom: $700

total online: $7650

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $20,600
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $51,200 <<<< BOOM

Good session

Came 2nd in a $26 90 player for ~$350 and 4th in a $7 rebuy for ~$450. GL to cottlad from pfu who's still in. Would've been cool to be HU for the win, but never mind. Also had a nice profit from the sngs on ipoker.

Mostly playing good, though bust a few tourneys stupidly, really need to work on concentrating the whole time and not phasing out/blowing up/being a donk. Still, nice to have a good session.

Fulltilt: $3200
Rileys: $
Stars: $0
AP: $0
Ipoker: $2250
Pokerroom: $850

total online: $6300

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $19,250
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $49,850 <<< so close again!

arrrrrgggg

Just finished unbelievably frustrating session, but I'll write about the last few days first.

Had a pretty terrible sunday. Satted into a load of big majors - $300 big deal on pokerroom, sunday warmup, PP 80k, 250k on ipoker, and played the FTOPS 24, and a ton of smaller ones. Cashed in one (one!) for $150 or something. Was pretty damn tired and not playing well at all, towards the end was tilting so bad was just open shoving every hand of the last few tourneys to get it over with.

Played again monday feeling better to begin with but started feeling a bit of the tilt set it, and again towards the end of session started to get 'lets bust this ****' syndrome. So had a break today and started playing this evening and felt a lot better, playing well and not tired, and no tilt. Having said that, bust most of my tourneys fairly early, ended up with a minor cash in a $75 (lost huge pot QQ < 88 to put me in top 5 with 60 left and then a big flip TT < AJs against the table donk) which left me with 2 games - $26 mtt which I again bust on a flip and a $33 8.5k on ipoker. Ran really well last few tables, won a few sizeable flips and 60/40s (and 40/60s) to give me a huge chiplead going into FT. FLopped quad aces early on to have 1/2 the chips in play 8 handed, cruised to 3 handed with 2/3 chips, then promptly lose A4s < J8o and AJs < A9o to the same guy within 3 hands to go joint 2nd, then shove 10bbs with A2s, and get called by new chippo with JJ and thats that.

WTF? How to I not take that down? Or at least get HU for a minimum cash of 1.3k? ARG.

Having said that the ~$800 is very useful, and makes up for some of the losses of the last few days. Coming 1st makes up for all of it and puts me over 50k total. Sigh.


Fulltilt: $2950
Rileys: $
Stars: $0 ($150 deposited)
AP: $0
Ipoker: $1550
Pokerroom: $900

total online: $5400

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $18,350
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $48,950

Running good.

Well it seems like the 2 week stretch of pain has reversed - just finished a 6hr session, winning a $26 90player for ~$550 and coming 2nd in a $33 10k on pokerroom, for $1500. *big grin*

It's great remembering what winning is like again. Also awesome that I have a roll on the 3 sites now, dont have to worry about redepositing... for a little while :)


Fulltilt: $3600
Rileys: $50
Stars: $0
AP: $0
Ipoker: $1000
Pokerroom: $1550

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $19,300
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $49,900 << sooo close...

Decent session

Just finished a nice session, winning a FTOPS main event seat (T$535 if I decide to take the money), PP 80k seat and placed 2nd in a $20 mtt on ipoker for ~$1k; ended up about $400 + seats overall. I've been thinking about sats recently... surely I really really shouldnt play the ftops game? $500 is like 15% of my roll. But I won my seat right? meh. I'll probably unregister. Maybe I should stop playing sats (unless I'm just playing for the T$), except for ~$100 mtts that I'm happy taking shots in, like the PP 80k. In fact, yes. That.

I've just unregistered.

ok.

I'm tired.


Fulltilt: $3250 ($1000 withdrawn)
Rileys: $50 ($200 deposited)
Stars: $0
AP: $0
Ipoker: $1150 ($300 deposited)
Pokerroom: $150 ($300 deposited)

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $17,700
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $48,300

Just seen I've made nearly double the £1200 I spent on hols since getting back about a month ago which is pretty awesome. Obviously I've spent money too, but it feels great to have made some monies and to have a $4K+ roll again. Am feeling good about poker atm :)

weee

Long day yesterday. Played 2 sessions, which lasted ~5hrs each. First one ended up getting deep in quite a few, again busting a lot, (more KK < AQ/AJ) but made the final table of a $5 rebuy, busting 5th for ~$500. Bust kinda stupidly, which was disappointing, but a decent cash. Only ended up a few hundred on that session though - deposited on pokerroom and ipoker, lost quite a bit from each.

Then the night session, once again got deep in a couple - 16k freezout, which I ended up busting in 27th/1100 (SIGH) on a flip, and a $5 6max rebuy. I had a MONSTER stack (300bbs+) just after the rebuy period (1st hand after break managed to get it in good with TT on 85xcc board for 250bbs...<3 rebuys) cruised along chipping up, then down to last 3 tables I lost KK < Ax AIPF for big pots 3 times (2 of them were runner runner). Survived each time though, scraped to final table where my luck changed and won K2 > K8 and A8 > AK to take me to HU. We were 40bbs deep when hu so it was a grind, opponent was good but no match :P Ship the $2100!


Soooo satisfying. I've been getting deep a lot, feels great to finally close one out. Seems I've been getting deep in a lot of rebuy tourneys. They're great, allow for lots of play and the ones on FT don't have too many runners and so dont go on for 9hrs.

Been playing well and putting in a lot of volume, though I'm noticing leaks I think... late stages often around a 10-20bb stack I tend to 3bet allin alot over late position raises (with any hand I'd open raise with basically), but I think i'm doing it too wide. Lots of players tighten up insanely in the late stages, and I consistantly find myself getting called and being dominated. Also people have taken to open limping big hands with shortish stacks behind them (maybe just me? lol) to induce the shove. Which I often do...

Anyways, probably going to carry on what i've been doing - if I can keep getting to final few tables with this regularity hopefully some more nice scores are on the way.


Fulltilt: $4000
Rileys: $0 ($150 deposited)
Stars: $0 ($300 deposited)
AP: $0 ($300 withdrawn)
Ipoker: $50 ($500 deposited)
Pokerroom: $0 ($250 deposited)

Wow. Didnt realise I made that many deposits. And lost them all. Hm. Need to bankroll manage better on new sites.

LIVE: +$1200

2008 total: $16,950
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $47,550

This is getting silly.

Yep, did it again. Got deep in a bunch of tourneys and bust like 14th in all of them. ARG. 2 of them were rebuys ($5 and $20) bust 12th in the $5 running A7s into AK and 20th in the $20 when KK < AQs AIPF for 40bbs. Also bust a few 90player fts early against 4 outers, etc.

It's so frustrating...I can feel a big score coming, I'm playing great for the most part, just a matter of time. Wish it would hurry up though, I'm starting to worry about my bankroll again.

oh and in the last 90 player of the night I mentioned yesterday, I busted 8th losing 2 40/60s in a row, whcih I was fine about, except I missed 1 hand getting a drink - had kings, 2 allins, I would flop quads, lol.

Sigh. Back to it tomorrow I guess.

for the love of god...

man I hate this game sometimes. Got down to final few tables in a $20 rebuy and 9.5ko on ft, bust both, the ko QQ<99 for huge pot, the rebuy was in top 3, then guy who was shoving at least once, usually twice per round for 15-20bbs and had stolen my blinds lots open shoves the button, I call bb with a8 for 15bbs, he flips a9 - sigh. Think it was a good call though. Then run AK into AA and i'm crippled.

Also final tabled a 90 player, bust out first hand of the final table AK < AT, and got to final 2 tables, busting again.

AAAAHHHHHH

last game still going, ft of a 90 player again...just lost big pot though, down to 7th.

Sigh.


doifgjoerihgoinro'mv'oimbnoengpaeijr'fpoaijeroigjaokdmfv'aeijr

Live donkaments ftw!

Well I've been in sheffield for the last few days sorting out uni stuff. Got my keys to my house for next year, which is great, except when I got there there was no phone, no internet and no hot water. And I lost my mobile. It felt very odd being totally disconnected from the outside world... you kind of take it for granted normally. Also meant I had to unregister from the FTOPS events I'd satted for which was very annoying as I was looking forward to them, but I might buy in to some others instead with the T$.

Anyways, went out to the casino every night with a mate who plays a lot. In short: £50 1r+1a, ok stack at end of rebuy, card dead, ninja-shortstack, chopped a pot after guy slowrolled KK preflop against my A6 allin shove, he flops a set - flushed board ftc (I laughed lots), went out A6 < AK aipf, flop a 6 river brings the resuck, bust 14th, top 8 pay.

£10r, halarious, 1000chip rebuys, didnt rebuy, ok stack at end of rebuy, ridic card dead, double with AA, miss 15 outs in a big pot, bust standard in 14th top 10 pay. (pattern at all...?)

£30 + £20r, didnt rebuy, ok stack at end of rebuy, redic card dead, ninja, etcetc but this time chip up a bit with some nice hands and then win monster pot 11 handed (with JJ, 3 way allin on 359 flop - they flip 66 and A4...), chippo going to FT, obv cheesies ftw :P Ship the £800!

So that was pretty satisfying. Promtply lost a buyin and a half in a super juicy £1/£1 game, so all in all I think I ended up about £450 just for poker, although probably more like £350 for the trip overall, including taxis/food/bought some dvds, etc. Still, pretty happy with the result. Was slightly anxious on the train home carrying my laptop and nearly £1k in cash though!

So, online I'll carry on satting to bigger events, hopefully have a decent sunday. And I'll probably research the live scene in bristol a bit more. Live play bores me senseless but I cant argue with the potential for money making, the players are just so piss poor. Shame they're so bloody irratating too.

Fulltilt: $2200 (including ftops T$)
Rileys: $50
Stars: $0
AP: $250

LIVE: +$1200 (includes some older cashes, total is minus expenses, e.g. taxis)

2008 total: $16,150
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $46,750

Just realised how much I want to break 50k. I've been hovering around 45 for months now and I want to actually show some progress. Tentative goal for the summer...

More frustrations...

Keep coming close to decent scores, made the final table of a bunch of smallish mtts and bust out 7-9 in all of them. Also had a 20buyin downswing in the sngs, which is always fun. Been 12 tabling the $33 games on fulltilt for the sng madness promotion. I lost $600 playing the games, but at least I made $20 for coming 6th in one of the 2hr slots, so that's ok. *sigh*

So I'm going to give the sngs a rest for now. Really feel like a decent mtt win is around the corner. 2 FTOPS events coming up, plus I'm going to a casino a few times next week for a £50 1r+1a, and a £10 rebuy, so hopefully I can put in a good showing there too.

I'm up $1550 since coming back from hols, so am on track to make back what I spent. Hopefully I'll do significatly better though.

Fulltilt: $1800
Rileys: $50
Stars: $0 ($1000 withdrawn)
AP: $250

2008 total: $14,550
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $45,150

frustrating but decent sunday

Played the million on stars, the brawl, 750k and 40k on fulltilt, 80k at pacific and the 75k at absolute, and a handful of other random ones.

Made two decent runs. Got deep in the brawl, down to 90, then lost a massive race to put me in top 5 with JJ
Then was the million, played a ninja shortstack for hours, got aces at a few timely spots and had average chips with 300 left. My bustout hand:
raise to 2.2x with qks, bb calls. Flop 9Tx with the flush draw, guy bets small, I raise big, he calls.

Turn A, he checks I ship it, he tanks and calls with... 95s (with the flush draw). I miss.

BAH! Should've raised a little less on the flop to give me more FE on the turn, but still, very annoying. 95s? grrrrrrr

Anyway, cashed for $1k in that. So I definately feel it could've been a lot better, but having a winning sunday is a nice change. If I keep it all online I'll actually have a bankroll again which is a great feeling, although I need to withdraw some as I have very little cash available.

Fulltilt: $2.2k
Rileys: $100 ($300 deposited)
Stars: $1000
AP: $100 (200 withdrawn)

I also have $500 coming when I turn up at the million challenge tourney in london.

2008 total: $14,850
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $45,450

millions!

So I've had a fairly good few days. Nothing huge, just a few smallish wins to get my BR at fulltilt out of the dangerously low area it was a few days ago. I also won a seat in the million pound challenge there:

http://www.fulltiltpoker.com/million-pound-challenge

Sounds awesome! Apart from the $1k, I go to london to play a tourney with the other 80 winners of these tourneys, top 6 get £1k, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 50k, and the winner plays phil ivey, patrick antonius and gus hansen HU for up to a million pounds! I probably wont win anything at all, but it'll be fun - I'll get to meet the pros I assume which'll be pretty cool in itself.


Got a biggish sunday today - 80k at pp, 75k at AP, brawl+750k at fulltilt, plus plenty of other smaller games. Would be great to have a nice cash and get a bit closer to robusto.

Lets go!

Overslept...

Well, I majorly overslept this morning. My sleep experiment thing is fairly strict, and it basically means I messed it up, and undid most my 'adjusting' of the last week. Which really sucks. I also managed to miss an appointment with some window fitters for my dad's house. Epic Fail. So I'm thinking I might give the polyphasia a rest until next week, and I can have a few days of proper mtts, without having to sleep half way through them. I might start blogging about the polyphasia a bit more too when I start it again...might remind me to set my bloody alarm this time!!!

I've been playing a few mtts and some sats, got seats into the sunday brawl and the 750k at tilt, and also FTOPS events #1 and 3. So thats something, hopefully I can get at least one half decent cash in there somewhere. I literally cant remember when my last 4 figure cash was. Which is ridiculous. I could just unregister and get the tourney $$. Which I probably should, I'm basically spending $850 on mtts. Thats the problem when I play sats that I can unregister from, I'm playing the sat because I cant afford to buyin, therefore when I win the seat, I shouldn't play because I'm still not bankrolled. Oh well, I'll just pull a halfrek and win both FTOPS events, and all will be good.





One time?

oh the pain

Well yesterday I lost ~35 buyins, in 80 games, in 2 hours. After that I rocked in the fetal position muttering and twitching.

I'd been on a good run beforehand, so it leaves me down about $100 since last post. Still, fairly depressing. I've no doubt I can crush these superturbos but this kind of variance is nuts - if something similar happens again I could get near busto at fulltilt which would really suck. So maybe I should go back to mtts. Except my weird sleeping pattern kind of prevents it - I'd have to take breaks in the middle of games.

Meh, this sucks.




Edit: Big congrats to idi0 at pfu, who just took down the fulltilt 40k for $15k! Fantastic result. Am very, very jealous :)

Slow progress

Been fairly swingy, probably because I'm playing lots of the super turbos, which are just insane - I can play 40/hr easily. Had quite a few breakeven/losing sessions, but just finished a good 90minute session, and am up about $400 since last post. Probably played about 10hours or so.

*waffle warning* - mostly thinking on paper, may be tedious.

While AP's recent 'fame' thing is actually worse in terms of incentives, I might try and concentrate on it. Think I might play an absolute TON next month (for which there might be a 2k bonus in diamond form...?) - like 4 hours a day minimum, 7 tabling (when I can, the traffic isn't that high at ap all the time, so I can fill it in with the super turbos at tilt) If I can play 40sngs a day I should make the diamond elite thing. Which doesnt actually look that good, but whatever. All it takes is 15/hour for 3 hours, should be fairly doable... just motivation is the problem I guess. However, I'm doing a crazy sleep thing at the moment (google polyphasia), just for fun, but it means I have loads of free time, so hopefully I should make it.

Having said all this, I just figured out I could make at least $40/hr playing the super turbos, and the 40/hr figure is based on only playing the $15s, which I dont, and it's based on a 7% ROI (it's 9% atm - I like being cautious...). So it could be quite a bit more than that.

Ahh, decisions decisions.


AP: $750
FTP: $1100

2008 total: $13,400
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $44,000

Time for the grind!

Right! Back from hols in france and spain which was great, but left me £1200 poorer and I'm in serious need of some monies. Basically planning to do exactly what I did last summer, grind sngs, a few mtts mixed in - I'm even moving back to AP (I know, I have no morals...) so hopefully it'll be an exact match of last summer...including the profits.

A good start, just played some super turbos on FT which are great (start with 10bbs :P great fun) and made $50, then deposited onto AP, played 2 $20 6man and won them both, a nice welcome back ;)



PP/rileys: $-
AP: $500 ($400 deposited)
FTP: $950

2008 total: $13,000
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $43,600

downs

Well, my forray into horrifically underrolled cash inevitably went pear shaped, and I ended up losing a load and then cashing out some, leaving just a few hundred online - had exams and stuff, so shouldn't have been playing anyway. Seem to have my head screwed on ok now, and am playing well. Have come painfully close to a few big scores; last 50 in $50 MSOP mtt, lose HUGE pot TT < 34s; down to 11 in $26 mtt, 3k to first, lose huge pot for chiplead KK < AK; final table of PP20k, 5k for first, lose huge pot AK < AT to go out in 8th etcetc. However, i'm confident one will come soon, i'm playing the best I've played for a while, just some bad situational luck stopping me from solidly getting back on my feet.

Just took down a $24 90player KO sng on ft for ~$600, which is a great help - more than doubled my current online roll! That's kinda depressing...but i'm on the way up ;)

PP/rileys: $200 ($600 deposited)
Stars: $- ($500 withdrawn)
FTP: $800 ($400 deposited)

2008 total: $12,950
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $43,550

What, me, run good? Surely not...

firstly, lol at me taking a few weeks off :)

Decided to carry on trying the shortstacking vs other shorties for a while, though obv not at 5/10, and am running good for once. Including the 5/10 I played last week I've played ~2000 hands, and am up a little under $3k. Should be more actually, made one or two mistakes which probably cost me ~$500. But never mind! I will learn.

Most of it (Apart from the 5/10...running 75PTbb/100 there lol) came from 2/4, though some from 1/2 and 3/6. Withdraw some more, still not convinced this is going to work out... but we'll see. Might sling a few hundred on pacific again, stars is ok, but the cash games at PP are much better. Heard good things about some other sites too - I'll see how things work out.

PP/rileys: $-
Stars: $2500 ($1150 withdrawn)

2008 total: $14,950
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $45,550

took a shot... :D

Funny evening. Kinda went insane... Started off by playing about with a few hundred I had on pacific, (got bored of trying to grind it up lol) got it up to 400 playing 2/4, then jumped into a 5/10 game :D Got it up to 600, then down to 500. Then quit, and promptly lost it playing 3/6 HU. No biggie. However, the 5/10 game I was in was full of shortstackers - me included, but I was shortstacking better than them. It seemed very profitable, (coughandIwastiltingcough) so I decided to shortstack with my stars roll, mainly against other shortstackers (table selection was the key)...at 5/10. In short, I won $1700 :D Minus the 200 from pacific means $1500 profit on the evening.

So...I obviously need a break from poker. Playing levels for which I have 3 buyins isn't the best bankroll management in the world lol... But it did seem super profitable. I'm tempted to look into it, though probably at levels I can afford. But not for a few weeks - I have exams anyway. So I've withdrawn my winnings from tonight, gonna buy myself an amazing amp and looping pedal for my guitar and come back in a fortnight.

Man it feels good to run well when taking a shot. FINALLY!


PP/rileys: $- ($150 deposited)
Stars: $2500 ($1700 withdrawn)

2008 total: $13,800
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $44,400

Good day

Was down a few hundred this morning, but then won another of the $60 45mans, which makes 2 wins...and considering I've only played 2 in the last 6 months, I think that's pretty good going! Ran good in it - nice to run good in the more expensive games for once.

FT: $-
PP/rileys: $200
Stars: $3700

2008 total: $13,650
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $44,250

some swongs

Day after last post I dropped 600-700$ just running bad, then had a frustrating sunday, though I didn't lose much. Had a good day today though, won a $60 45 man, and some other cashes, which nearly made it back - just down a few hundred now.

Sunday was annoying though, felt like I turned a corner in my mtt game, but then didn't really 'feel it' on sunday, bust out of loads early with undersets, big pairs, etc, and just didn't get rolling. Didn't play all that badly...but not that well either. Plus I have this bad habit of it I only have a few cheap games left I just go nuts to try and bust or accumulate a huge stack - I get bored basically. Not really sure how to combat this...

Anways, today was good. Positive mental attitude!!

FT: $-
PP/rileys: $250
Stars: $2800

2008 total: $12,800
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $43,400

Close

A few near misses today, came 18th or something in a $26 mtt for a measly $50, and then had a top 10 stack in the $10 rebuy on stars coming up to the bubble, but then lost a few hands that I played badly, and bust shortly after. Still, up a few hundred from the multi-sngs, so thats something.

FT: $50 ($1000 withdrawn)
PP/rileys: $400 ($1000 deposited)
Stars: $2800

2008 total: $13,000
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $43,600

Long time no post

So! Back to the blog. Bout time I started updating again.

Still haven been able to really settle down. Played turbos for a while, decided to try HU sngs, which went fine for a while, then I got bored, sucked at some mtts, had another quick and painful try at cash, etc. Bust my FT roll (well, withdrew 1k, bust the rest). Played the $1000 wpc event at pacific in which I sucked. Down about $1.5k since I last posted - I just generally havent been playing well recently. Until yesterday when I felt I played well and won a small mtt at PP for ~$350 and came 7th in a $8 rebuy for $1k, so hopefully things are beginning to turn around. I think when I'm on form I could be a good mtt player, I just have week/month long patches where I'm playing my B/C game and I get stuck in a rut. Since I had my heater at the beginning of the year, I'm down about $4.5k, which sucks. But it could be worse - I actually thought it was worse before I crunched the numbers, so I feel ok about it.

Anyway, I'm going to play mtts for a while, with some multi-table sngs too. Nothing too big, my bankroll is recovering from 6 weeks of losing. So probably just the ~$26 games. Hopefully I can string together some decent cashes and get back on track. I need to make some money - going travelling this summer and I have no readily available monies to pay for it.

...yet! :)


FT: $50 ($1000 withdrawn)
PP/rileys: $400 ($1000 deposited)
Stars: $2500

2008 total: $12,700
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $43,300

Good day, bad week.

I shouldn't post 'pokers going ok' posts. The day after last post I dropped $1k, playing $30 turbos. HOW?!?! I played like 60 games. Craziness. 30-buyin downswing in 60 games. BOOO turbos.

On the upside, I actually cashed in some mtts this sunday. Played quite a few games, satted into the million, FT 750k, and the 80k at pp, and played a 200k at titan and 40k at ft, $10 stars rebuy and a few others. Out of those I only cashed in the million, busting in ~500th for $700 or so, and the $10 rebuy for $150. I also found $50 at my sunpoker account and used it to play a smallish mtt and took 2nd for $750, so a decent profit for the evening.

My FT roll is crazy low, considering it was at 6k 3 weeks ago and I haven't cashed out. *vomits slightly* I'm sure I can beat these turbos. They're soft. I don't really know whats happening. If I don't get out of this rut soon Im going to have to rethink all this.

FT: $2450
PP/rileys: $450
Stars: $1600
($750 withdrawn from sunpoker)

2008 total: $14,200
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $44,800

Poker stops hating me for now.

Played 1 session with mostly $60s after my last post, and after dropping yet another ~400, I've dropped down to mostly 27-38 games. Thankfully, these have been going great - made back that 400 and about 600 more, my stars roll is getting more healthy.

Not been putting in as many games as I'd like because of travelling back home for the holidays, but did about 72 today which is good, about 24 yesterday and 50 the day before. Going to try and keep it up for now, leave mtts for a while.

FT: $3850
PP/rileys: $500
Stars: $1050

2008 total: $14,350
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $44,950

Sundays suck.

How do I manage to not cash in a single mtt AGAIN???

SO MANY COOLERS AARRGGG. And some fairly shocking play. but jeez, could one 80:20 go my way once please??!?!

Played the million, satted into the FT $500 million, played a bunch of others. Lost count of how many horrific hands there were. Doubled up in the FT million with quads vs fullhouse which was the one saving grace to let me hold onto my sanity, but then just lost huge pots with KK, ace flops, QQ and king flops, made a terrible calldown purely from tilt. I literally would've bet money that he had AK. Basically out now. AA < QQ for top 20 stack in the 80k on pacific, flopped top set vs flush/straight a bunch of times. Poker doesn't like me at the moment. But it wasn't all luck...my deepstack play basically sucks. I think I need to play cash, and that would then hugely improve my deepstack mtt game. But I'm going to play cash for a while at least, so I guess that's not really an option. Maybe I'll get some coaching sometime in the future.

Not that the shortstack shove fests that are turbos that I should be good at are going well either. Meh. BOO.

Ok, rant over. Going to start my high volume few weeks tomorrow with 72 sngs. That's my plan anyway. ...I'm kind of at a loss. This downswing is making me doubt if I can play. I know it's just come after a big upswing, so it's a bit of a shock, but literally I've had 1 or 2 winning sessions in my last 10-15. I really think I'd like to get some coaching for cash games at some point, it would make my overall game so much better. I've come across quite a few concepts recently that I'd been blissfully unaware of...and they've made me realise how much I suck. Eh, whatever, I'll stop feeling sorry for myself now. I've lost nearly $4k in like a week though, so I think it's justified. Time to move down limits for a while I guess.

I just doubled in the FT million with 99 > JJ - maybe things are changing. Final table one time?

...Ha, nono, top two < quads.

FT: $3900
PP/rileys: $500
Stars: $400 (another $600 deposited)

2008 total: $13,750
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $44,350

Easter cometh.

Still not going great. Well, it started off good, made 700$ playing 1 set of 12 turbos just after last post, but have since lost that and then some. Which kinda sucks. Feel like I'm playing ok though.

Played a ton of sats on the weekend and didnt win ANY so in semi tilty mode I registered for a bunch of the sunday majors :S which I'm not rolled for. But hey, taking a shot every now and then isnt so bad... except that I didn't have a single cash. Byebye $800.

Just finshed 2 12-turbo 'sets' and ended up $350 or so, so thats something. My roi for the %60 games is hovering between 5-10% at the moment over ~130 games, which is fine, I'd be happy to sustain that. I'm also going to move most of my playing to stars, since their incentives are so much better, even without the rakeback I'm getting at fulltilt. I could get supernova without too much trouble i'm pretty sure.

Got 3 weeks off for easter, so i'm probably going to put in at least a week of high volume playing. I want to get totally robusto for the $60 turbos ASAP.

FT: $4450
PP/rileys: $650 ($3400 withdrawn...some deposited a while ago)
Stars: $600 (800 deposited - will deposit more probably)

2008 total: $15,100
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $45,650

Down some.

Played a few dozen more $60 turbos - not running great in them at the moment. Down about $500 in them, and about $1k over all since last post. Im not too concerned in terms of results, simply that if I hit a serious bad run (say 50 buyins at the turbos, which is easily possible) it would undermine my confidence heavily, and take a large chunk out of my bankroll. I'm not really fully rolled for them anyway, and I'm a bankroll nit, so I'm going to move back down, and try 12-tabling the $33 games. I'll rack up a few thousand games and see how things go.

Nothing to note on the mtt front. I watched some PFX hand histories today, and one in particular of a competant LAG - it was just awesome to watch. He was totally running over the table, it redefined the phrase 'table captain' for me. It made me think that this style, at least in higher buyin games (was a $320 buyin) must be the most effective. He lost some huge races, but he had tons more chips than everyone else so it didnt really matter. I'd really like to try and cultivate a similar style, but it's difficult at the levels I play at... I sound like the donks complaining about playing bad players cos they don't respect raises :D But it's true that a hyper lag style wouldn't be as effective in lower stakes. Something to think about anyway. I don't understand how people get so good at so many variations of poker, it seems like there's a lifetimes worth of learning in mtts alone, never mind sngs/cash/omaha/stud etcetc. Guess some people are just super clever. Or have a lot of time on their hands.


I've redeposited a bit on stars (and will deposit a bit more), and when I get my money from pacific, I'll chuck $1k onto 2 more sites to give a nice range of mtts to choose from. Also I'm sure there are fishier sites than FT for sngs. Maybe back to absolute or pokerroom, or somewhere new like mansion, bodog or party. I really want to get back on the sat trail and play a couple of big sunday tourneys.



FT: $5200
PP/rileys: $3350
Stars: $350 ($450 deposited)

2008 total: $16,400
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $46,950

More mtt goodness!

Was in almost exactly the same situation as a few days ago - the final table of the $26mtt at FT, and the final 2 tables of the $75mtt at FT. Bust out of the $75 in 12th or something, but managed to take down the $26mtt for $3.5k! Running so well in mtts at the moment. $8k this week, coupled with my $10k week about a month ago, it's been a pretty great start to the year!

Felt like I played well today. Watched some stinger and muddywaters mtt cardrunner vids and picked up some really useful tips, particularly on aspects of my game that I felt were quite solid before. Feel like i'm playing well at the moment, and luckily variance is on my side. For now.

Also played 15-20 $60 turbos. Thought I'd move up there permantly, unless I get a reason not too. Lost a bit, but we all know turbos are variance monsters.


Been giving some money to various charities to reduce the slight guilt of earning a living off other people losing... some to a lukemia charity, as my cousin had lukemia - she's been cleared now, but the cheomotherapy has left here with spleen/liver damage, etc, so it's a topic that I care about. If I ever did this as a 'job' after uni, I'd certainly be giving a percentage to charity.


Anyways, gotta be up early tomorrow.

FT: $6050 ($2500 withdrawn)
PP/rileys: $3400

2008 total: $17,400
Grand total (since 01/03/07): $47,950

End to my first year of poker!

First year playing poker
Time: ~800hrs
Profit: $44,450
$/hr: ~$55/hr.


*cue cheesies reminiscing about poker/lessons learnt*

Not really :) I'll go easy on the waffling. But I will say that I'm very pleased with my first year's playing, and glad I had a great end to it. February was by far my best month, earning just over $12k.

I think I've found my niche for now, and am looking forward to this year! Now that I've been playing for a year, I think I'll start tracking results in terms of calender years, ie: 2008 results. So...

2008 total: $13,900

FT: $5050
PP/rileys: $3400


Lets hope the coming year is as good to me as the last!

Dropped a bit.

Just played a few mtts and sngs, down about $150. Some good play + unlucky, some bad play...wasn't really feeling it to be honest.

Just been checking my cashouts at pacific, and ~$20k of my winnings have come from there. Which is pretty amazing considering I barely grinded sngs there at all, and they only have 1 tournament a day that I play (which I obv dont play every day) Played there a bit more earlier on, but still, I'm sure I've put in a ton more play at other sites. I'd really like to find out my ROI in the 20k/80k mtts there - it must be pretty high.

Anyways, I'm tired.

FT: $4900
PP/rileys: $3450


Grand total (since 01/03/07): $44,350

Good times!

Registered for a $26mtt, then had a nap and was going to wake up in time to play. Woke up an hour late with half my stack gone! Also registered into a $75 knockout mtt. Long story short, I end up final tabling both of them. Bust out in 4th in the $26 one for $1100. Made a few badly timed moves, and then went out AQs < JJ. But still a nice cash.

In the $75mtt - won 2 HUGE pots with 2 tables left which put me into the chiplead going into the FT. Played kinda standard really, just cruised into HU. Went into HU with a 5:1 chip defecit, but had aces twice and doubled both times, then we got it all in, me with top pair, him with OESD. He hit on the turn, but I hit my runner runner flush on the river! I finally win a big(ish) mtt. So that was for $3600~ (including bounties)

YAY!

I'm off to the pub.

FT: $5000 (2700 withdrawal)
PP/rileys: $3500


Grand total (since 01/03/07): $44,500 (I made it)

Quick session

Just played for 30mins - 6 turbos and ended up ~$200, which is nice. Did the same yesterday and won $150 but then played a $100hu for some reason and played like donk. At least I left the computer straight away. So just $50 yesterday. Im going to start recording my different bankrolls here cos Im getting all confused. Pretty pleased with my FT roll, it got down to $900 a week or two ago, so I'm glad it's looking more healthy.

FT: $3150
PP/rileys: $3500
AP: -

Grand total (since 01/03/07): $39,900

Nearly there. Got a week to make $100 - hope I make it!

Nothing much happening

No real results to speak of. Played quite a few games last few days. Sngs going ok, but can't get deep in an mtt, so small profits. FT roll nearly up to $3k. Going to try and have a $5k+ roll there, with maybe $1k on pacific, and another $1k on absolute, if they offer me a nice bonus to lure me back! Got a load tied up at pacific at the moment from the 80k cash, so need to try and get that sorted.

Grand total (since 01/03/07): $39,650

Meh.

A good day really. Just a bit disappointing, had my FTOPS event 15 today, lasted 20 hands. Sigh. QQ < Jd9d allin on 9xdxd flop. No way I can fade that many outs in a tourney over $50.

Never mind, rest of the day made up for it. Had a satellite tourney for event 15 which I'd already sub-satted into before winning my seat so I got $200 cash for that, and came 6th in a $26 mtt for ~$450. Broke even in sngs, so a $650 day, which I can't complain about in any way.


Have finally gotten around to reading 2+2, in particular the mid and high stakes mtt sections. Some great stuff in there obviously, tho when they start talking about bluff-shoving KK on a Qxx flop it kinda makes your head swim! I don't feel too out of my depth tho, just a few maths things I'm not so sure about.


Grand total (since 01/03/07): $39,600

Going ok.

I've been ill so not playing much, but last 2 days I've been playing the odd mtt, with mostly 33$ 9-man turbos, 6-tabling. Running well at them, up $500 over 20 games. Nothing to note on the mtt front... well I've been playing some multi sngs and just came 2nd in a 24$ 5 table for $270.

Dropped 600$ on monday night, played a load of mtts and things and just ran lousy. But since then I've made back that, plus the -$500 I forgot to knock off on the last total... so it almost stays the same:


Grand total (since 01/03/07): $38,900

I'd like to make it to $40k by 01/03/08 - a years passing since I started tracking my results properly. £20k in a year is...well, huge for me. And considering I was travelling for several months, and have been at uni for 1/2 of it, I'm extremely happy.

Of course saying this means now I go on the mother of all downswings and tilt off everything I ever owned ;)

Woop!

A good evening! Correction: my best ever evening poker-wise :D

Took 3rd in the pacific 80k for $7.2k! Chuffed to bits. Was a bit unlucky actually (as I always seems to be deep in mtts? one day I will win one) as we got 3 handed, me in joint 2nd, the 1st hand the other 2nd guy loses some chips. Next hand he's in sb, I'm bb with AQs, he shoves for 10bbs (was 95% sure he would, I had a super tight image and he'd been stealing lots) I snapcall obv, he turns KTo, flops 2 pair. grr. Next hand I shove sb with 4bb and QTo, chippo flips A4, I'm done.

Played pretty well I think tho, was very card dead during the FT (apart from some crucial kings for a double-up) so had a super tight image, but used it to good affect 6-4 handed, made quite a few good moves - stole a lot of chips. So a little annoyed at the ending, but still, $7200! Biggest cash by over $3k.


Time for happy sleep.

Grand total: $39,000

Good and bad results.

First the bad. I still suck at cash games/controlling tilt. Bust my pacific account that was at $600 before I started (though it was at $2200 at one point). Which sucks. Also had a tilty sessions a few nights ago losing ~$800 at AP, again playing cash. So, basically, the NO CASH rule has been reinstated. Which, as I said, sucks. My head just really isnt in the right place for them right now. Maybe ever, maybe cash games just dont suit me as a person.

Anyways, on to the good news. After realising cash wasnt going to work, I didn't really feel like playing sngs, so I thought I'd play more mtts. Ive always done pretty well in them, but just havent played many. So I deposited $600 onto fulltilt, (and I also withdrew my AP roll of about $3k, just to be 100% sure I wouldn't waste it on cash. There aren't many good mtts there for me) about a week ago. The FTOPS is coming up, so basically I've been trying to sat into a few events, and for the past week, it'd been basically the sngs paying for the sats, and no winning in the sats, so I broke about even. (though I won a seat to the sunday brawl, out early KK < TT) then tonight I won a seat to event 15, $215 double stacked short handed, which should be awesome; I really enjoy shorthanded play.

Also tonight I went deep in my AP $50 usual, the $20k at pacific and a $75 mtt at fulltilt. I'm tempted to say i'm disappointed as I was in a great position in all of them, but ended up busting out in 15th or something on AP for $70, and bubbling the FT of the 20k for $170, which was frustrating seeing I was chippo for a while leading up to it. But I can't really complain...came 2nd in the fulltill mtt for $2880 :) Opponent HU was playing very well and I was reeling a bit, then got it all in AK vs KJ and he rivered the straight. Standard. So that sucked, but hey, its still a nice cash and a good evening of poker.

So mtts are the way forward for me atm. I'm definately not going to pay more than $75 on one game, preferably no more than $50, and play lots more sats into the bigger events. I'd like to get a seat in 1 or 2 more FTOPS events if possible.

Anyways, need sleep.

Cash games ahoy!

Well I kinda broke even for a while after 'the' friday, and decided to give sngs a rest, and take up cash games. dun dun dah! I decided to start with $50nl just to ease myself in, and I bought PAhud and semi-learnt how to use pokertracker properly. Got off to a good start, up 5 buyins in 1000 hands or so...then played some 100nl and won some there, lost some back at $50nl. Then I compacted my database at PT, and i didnt know that meant i couldn't view my results (why didn't it tell me?!?!) so now i'm not sure...

Had a bit of a tilty session last night and this morning (last night because i was drunk and in a bad mood, this morning because of last night and repeated coolers) but I lost maybe $100-200 so nothing major. Then, of totally sober untilty mind, I decided to play some 1/2. It sounds sort of twisted, but my logic was that if the money matters to me, then I'll play sensibly (and therefore be a winning player rather than a lunatic). I'm rolled for it anyway (just about) and was playing at pacific where the play is lovely and fishy. So yeah, just finished a very good session of ~3 hrs, winning about $1350, mostly on 2 $200nl tables at pacific and 1 $100 table at sunpoker (which i recently deposited at, I get rakeback and they have good redeposit deals there). So that's pretty awesome. Also won the biggest pot of my life:

Me: $500~
aggrofish: $450

Im in MP with AKo. Crazy aggro fish limps in EP, I make it $8, 1 callers behind me, aggrofish calls.
Flop is K54, pot = $27.
fishy checks, I bet 22, 1 fold, fishy raises to $52. I call.
Turn 7. 2 diamonds on board.
villain overshoves for like $380. I call fairly quickly and he turns over 66, and my hand holds.

Ship the $900 pot :D

Villain had been open shoving for a full stack preflop, and shoving lots of flops and things, so I think the call was fairly standard, especially with the flush draw out there. It's nice when you run well though, was totally different to this morning.

I think basically my main issue with cash games is tilt. When I'm playing well and focused, I feel I'm definately a winning player, certainly at 1/2. Don't have much experience past that, but 1/2 seems very beatable. But when I'm tilty or even just bored/unfocused, I cant beat $50nl for a profit. It was nice to have a really solid session where I feel like I played well and was rewarded, got some confidence back, and made me believe I can beat cash games again. I just really need to get better at stopping when the first signs of tilt set in. In fact, I'm going to make a big sign right now to stick above the computer to remind me to walk away if I feel tilt. Problem solved! Ha, yeah...

Anyways, a good day in the end. I think i'll stick with cash for a while, see how it pans out. I'll play mostly $100 at sun/absolute, and $200 at pacific. I've also downloaded sky so I'll see what happens there. I'd like to get to $15-20k online before I move up to $2-4, and show a decent profit over a fair amount of hands, which will hopefully be before the end of this year.

Won a bit.

Played some, won a bit. Just came 5/122 in my usual $50 mtt at absolute for $390, meaning im up maybe $150 for the day. Took out the weekly $300 on monday...and deposited it on stars lol, had an mtt itch to scratch. No results there.

Put all my results from friday into my stats page...ewwww, my hourly and roi are all screwed up. Oh well. serves me right i guess.

Since 19/11
Sngs: 442
Amount won(sngs): $2889
Amount won(mtts): $3542.75
Total: $6842.75

Grand Total: $30350

So yeah, friday kinda sucked... and then yesterday I had a stomach bug which
has been going around - not fun. Wasn't going to play yesterday anyway, needed a bit of time off... Feeling mostly better today (Though still have only eaten like 10 grapes in over 36hrs) Just played 5 sngs, won 3, came 2nd in the others, for a profit of $400, so well on the way to making back the $1k I dropped on friday.

-No more 200$ games.
-$100 games are ok, but only when I'm definately feeling focused and ready.
-No playing when distrated, ie watching tv, certainly not the higher buyin games.


Just need to put it behind me and carry on as normal really.

wow so sick

Somehow turned a $1k+ day into a $1k- day. $2k loss in 3-4hrs. AAAAHHHHH. Wasn't playin great but jesus christ did I run cold. oag;ijaerng;kajerng;kajerng;kajerno;jha

never lost anywhere near this much in one go. Big hurt. PLayed 20 sngs and cashed in 2. 2!!!! Soooo many coolers was rediculous. Shouldn't have have played the 200$ games really, but i didnt play badly, i wasnt tilting much (ie it didnt affect my play) maaaaan why cant i catch a break when I take a shot.


AARRRRGGGG

good start

Great day today, up about $1000 in 2 hours. Might even be my best ever day for sngs, which is great considering how little I played. Played quite alot of higher buyin games, won a $100 10-man on pacific, a $100 6-man at absolute, and 2 $65 6-mans, and some other cashes. Would've been more if i hadn't managed to lose the chiplead and bust out in 3 hands on the bubble of a $100 6-man, 1st hand was the bb calling allin for 11bbs with 24o... think it was a misclick, but still annoying, next 2 hands were standard. But im not complaining really, i got fairly lucky myself in places. So in the 4 days of 2008 (only 2 of whih I've played) i'm up $1500. woop!

Think I'm going to start withdrawing $300 a week regardless of my results. Usually I'd only withdraw after a big win, but I think regular withdrawals is a better way, plus the extra money a week will cover living costs and I'll set up some standing orders to savings accounts and things; the gradual-ness of it is better than sporadic lump sums I think. It's only 5% of my online roll, and I should be able to at least reach that most weeks. I may even up it to $500 if things are going well, but we'll see.

Not on home computer so will update records later.

happy xmas/new year!

Been a swingy 2 weeks. Didn't play much up to xmas, but then won a satellite into the $1k 100k probounty tourney at AP. Very funny satellite, as soon as I entered I realised I didnt want to play, and so played crazily and ended up taking it down. Played the actual tourney which was good but didnt cash, came 34/~100. Felt like I played pretty well though, grinded up to double my starting stack, but hovered there until I had to start risking my stack, and lost a race 55 < JTs. Still, happy with it, will try and play more big tourneys like that.

Then had a 2-day downswing/tilty patch, losing $800 which wasnt fun. But the last 3 days have been earning it back and a bit more, so no damage done. Am going to steer clear of most $100 games since I'm not quite ready for them yet. Except for those at pacific...the play is just so bad. Very very weak tight. Playing one today, we're 4 handed (the 6max games pay to 3rd, meaning less variance so thats another reason I'm happy playing them) one guy with 1.5k raises to 300 with 50/100 blinds, I shove with TT for less than double, like 550 or something, and the guy writes into the chatbox 'ffs' then theres like a 10 sec wait, and then 'i guess i cant pass' and calls flipping over AQs! Even if I show AK he has to call... I think they play like this because they've worked their way up from the low stakes at pacific and all the low stakes fish are major LAGs so just playing tight passive works fine. So yeah, I've been playing them quite a bit, only up like $60, but they're definately profitable.

Poker new years resolutions: Just don't tilt really. I know precisely when I'm tilting, I just need to get better at walking away. Don't think it's too big a problem, just something that needs a bit of work.

Maybe try and get profitable at cash...? I know thats where all the money is really. I'll see.

Anyways, here's to a money-filled 2008.


Since 19/11
Sngs: 397
Amount won(sngs): $3287
Amount won(mtts): $3374.75
Total: $7062.75

Grand Total: $30550