Breakeven

So I've played quite a bit this last week, though I've been ill so not as much as I'd like. Came pretty close to some big cashes, took down a small tourney for 1.3k, final tabled the pp 20k again, but most of the sessions i've played have been breakeven (which is pretty odd for mtts).


I'm off on my travels tomorrow, so no more poker for me this month. Really pleased with how march went, had 7 4-figure cashes, and ended up ~$10k in profit. as I said in my last post, I really needed a decent start to this whole thing to get me on my feet, went pretty much exactly as planned (slightly better in fact!) so yeah, feeling good. I really think that I'm going to progress a lot as a player in the next few months. The last year has been pretty flat in terms of progress, but I feel that I'm ready to start putting in a lot of hours, and spend a lot of time analysing and improving my play. I've got a cardrunners subscription which has already helped loads, and over at pfu we've started a replay section where we look over entire hhs in the replayer for analysis. I just did one for the 75$ mtt at fulltilt that I finished 6th in a few weeks ago, already noticed several fairly major leaks. Sweet! (well, assuming I block them...)

Also considering getting a coach when I get back from travels at the end of april. There's a few I'd be interested in advertised at the CR forum, and I really think it could help me. Wouldn't be a long term thing (can't afford it!) but 10hours or so of help from a top online pro would amost certainly do me the world of good. going rates are $100-200/hr so it wouldn't be a decision I'd take lightly, but I think it'd pay for itself pretty quickly.

Anyways, that's all for now.

Runs good

(picture taken from pfu - thanks sqrl!)

Been a good couple of days, with 3 decent final tables; $50mtt - 6th, cashed for $1200, $16mtt at stars - 2nd for $3300 and somehow I managed to come second in a $10 1r1a for $2700, depsite it being the only tourney I was playing for 4 hours and so me being incredibly wasted. Ya know, to pass the time. Was pretty funny! I have vague memories of some pretty huge suckouts, which of course made me giggle like a school girl. Ah, goodtimes. tbh I actually was playing pretty well, just got lucky in some spots. I totally lost it HU though, fairly decent player just crushed me, had nothing left in the ole cheese tank. Or something.

So I'll be grinding for the next 10 days or so, and then things kick off in april:
~1-4 april: visiting friends in france and switzerland (+skiing! never been, excited)
9-14th: Irish open in Dublin. Obviously this is going to be awesome.
16th-25th: Hitch-hiking to Zadar, Croatia. Really looking forward to this too.

Will be nice to get out of the country for a bit! Anyways, glatt all.

Good start.

So that's my main score for the last few days. Been playing this tourney for like 2 years, finally took it down, feels awesome :D Apart from this I've had a few frustrating days of no results, and 1 final table, $75mtt, finished 6th for ~$3k. Was probably the sickest exit in any tournament I've ever played - allin on turn with top set, he rivers the gutshot. $16k for first. Was absolutely livid at the time, but still feels nice to rack up some scores - have about 8k online now, bit of breathing room. aaaahh deep sigh of relief.

Got most of my totals from all the poker clients I've played at, not as bad as it could've been. About $12k less than the last total I counted up, which isn't wildly off what I thought, lost about 10k over xmas, and ignoring another few k isn't unlike me... but anyways, onwards and upwards. Let's get that 12k back ;)

Right!

Time to sort my shit out. The last 3 months I've been pissing about, not keeping records, and generally hemmoraging money all over the place. Time for direction, organisation, focus.

The big bit of news is that I've left uni, at least for now. Assorted medical and personal problems meant that xmas was a write-off in terms of uni work (and poker...sigh, byebye bankroll), so I'm months behind on work. That wouldn't be too much of a problem in itself, but the crux of it is uni really isn't what I want to be doing right now. It was always a filler as I had no clue what I wanted to do after a-levels, and I never really enjoyed it. I'm not in a place where I can just get through it for the sake of it - I need to do things I enjoy and am motivated in or else I'm just going to grind to a halt.

I should clarify that I'm not leaving uni to be a 'poker pro' or anything. Although I suppose poker will be my only income for a while... I'm in a lucky position being fairly well off financially and having zero responsibilities, so I'm going to do what I've wanted to for a while - lots of travelling and teaching english. Hopefully going to teach in dakar, senegal for 6 months this winter, if not there are hundreds of teaching organisations all over the place. I was diagnosed with S.A.D. (I think this is the reason the last two years I've gone all tilty and dropped $10k in januray/february) a few months ago, so my plan for the next few years is basically: poker + stuff I enjoy in the uk for 6 months in the summer, travelling and teaching for 6 months in the winter. Man, I hope it's as good as it sounds.


So, on to the poker. Well after the xmas crash I've been hovering around busto online, and putting in a load of sngs on ipoker. Almost earnt my GUKPT seat, which is nice, though have been running pretty bad, which is less nice. I'm now truly sick of sngs, so it's back to mtts for the foreseeable. Slowly getting back into them the last few days, no results to speak of yet. This would be a really really nice time to run good; little bankroll, big life changes, self doubts... cue 100 buyin downswing :P Probably will make some major redeposits at some point unless I have some big scores soon.

Decided it was about time I actually worked out how much I am up (hope it's up!) at poker, lifetime. I have a horrible feeling I'm in for a nasty surprise... I'm very guilty of ignoring/rounding down losses and exagerating wins. I've requested my complete deposit/withdrawal histories from all the sites I've ever played at (took bloody ages), waiting for the results now. Finger's crossed.

Sorry for super long post, it's been a while. Good luck at the tables!

Back to the grind, some live donkaments

So I've been grinding the sngs again at ipoker, which have been going pretty well, almost got a workable roll for the limits I want to play there again, which is coolio. I want my GUKPT seat!

Played 2 live sessions last week. One was £10r, which I ended up dealing for as no one else wanted to which was fairly stressful, and didn't really give me a chance to concentrate/play much. Bust out pretty standardly (KK < 55 < 88), but got £20 and a free meal for dealing so not all bad. Ended up waiting around for AGES for a seat at a very juicy £1-1 cash game, but only got it at like 4am as it was winding down. I was pretty tired too, ended up dumping a quick £50 and leaving.

Next was the £50r, which was probably the worst I've ever run live. AK < A3, AK < J3s, AQ < 64s, top 2 < turned gutshot, £50 a pop. Managed to chip up a bit before end of rebuys, another £50 for the addon (in for 250, sigh). Chip up some more after the break, then get KK. few limps, I raise, some calls, J63r, I bet, get check-shoved on, call, he flips 36s. Sigh.

Gonna play it again tomorrow though, very fishy. And nice stakes-wise too (assuming I dont sink £250 every time...), dont particularly feel like playing cheap tournaments if i'm making a trip and using up an evening trying to make money. And I'm sure not going for the atmosphere, lets face it - gamblers are either dull or annoying. Usually both. Ipods are an awesome invention.

Anyways, glatt y'all.

lots of downs...then an up

So i've been doing that whole tilt thing again...which has been pretty costly. Low point was playing $500 and $1k hu sngs in ipoker. dropped 3k there, probably down about 7k the last few weeks overall. Which sucks majorly - I'm a stupid twat. Been having a very rough 6 weeks anyway, with an array of personal and medical problems, so my head really hasn't been in the right place. I've withdrawn whats left of my battered bankroll (about 2k), have been depositing every now and then for mtts when I feel like it's not too bad of an idea... but i havent felt like grinding at all, so ive been playing the odd mtt session, but less games and higher buyins, so down about another 2k from those - not that much for $200 mtts. was playing ok, probably shouldn't be playing them, but oh well. Decided I really want to get out of this stupid country and play a live event somewhere, so have been playing sats for things including the irish open which I played a sat for yesterday...

and took down a seat! weeee




In april I shall be visiting the land of green, guinness drinking leprechauns surrounded by shamrocks and fiddles... and any other stereotypes you care to think of. So that cheered me up greatly; dont know why but sort of feel like I might settle down now. I've been gambling looking for a big score, now I actually got one (shock horror) maybe i'll be a bit more sensible. Bought time too, need to get back on the sngs for the bigslick promotion, dont want to get 1/2 way to a gukpt seat and then quit, would be such a waste.

...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.