Life behind the eerie glow of a 20" LCD

New Blog

2009-04-29T10:18:00.000-07:00

I've been signed as a LeggoPoker pro; I'll be producing videos, writing articles, blogging and posting in the forums on Leggo. My new blog can be found here.

Week 27

2008-12-14T17:02:00.000-08:00

This week was fairly hectic with exams and assignments. I've still got a bit of a cough as well. I have one more assignment to finish off and then I can start playing again.

Also, my LeggoPoker video was released on Friday and got a good response. So go watch that if you haven't already.

Week 26

2008-12-07T12:49:00.000-08:00

I've been really busy with college all week and managed to get sick on Friday so I've been too tired and unwell to play.

I did manage to watch a good few videos this week though, about 4 in total.

I'm going to be pretty busy all this week as well with more exams and assignments, I'm really looking forward to the break so I can get some decent hands in.

Week 25 and November

2008-12-04T10:09:00.000-08:00

Monday I had a soccer match in the morning, it was 4th year maths vs. 1st year maths. It's an annual cup that the maths society holds every year. We won 2-1.

Tuesday I watched a video.

Wednesday I played in the final against the 2nd years (they beat the 3rd years 10-2). We had lost to them last year so we were looking for a little revenge. We lost 1-0 having dominated the game, pretty disappointing. I also took a nasty fall after a bad tackle. Luckily, I managed to soften the blow with my face and get a couple of scratches above and below my eye, just in time for the ball on Thursday. I also tore my knee up pretty badly so I've been limping around for the week, stupid astroturf.

Thursday I went to the ball, had a great time.

Friday I was relaxing and recuperating.

Saturday I got in a session. I felt very tired towards the end of it. I can't wait until the Christmas break so I can get back into a routine again.

Sunday I got in a small session, felt like I was playing really well and running over people a lot.

I also found out I came second in the LeggoPoker competition so you'd better go pick up a Leggo subscription, if you haven't got one already, to watch it.

So here's the results for November:

I guess it's interesting that both my steal percentage and VPIP/PFR from the BTN have gone way up. There's just loads more nits and uncreative regs who aren't bothered about playing back at me.

There's nowhere near enough hands to do anything detailed but it's nice to be running hot again :).

Week 24

2008-11-23T13:16:00.000-08:00

Bankroll is up to $3,163.

Monday I spent the day putting the finishing touches on the Leggo video and recorded it that evening. While I was waiting for it to render I put in some more work on my 1000th boards.ie post, it's now 12 pages long in word. I really wish I wasn't so much of a perfectionist about everything, I spent two full days working on the video when I already had a lot of the content written out and months working on the 1000th post on and off.

Tuesday I watched a video.

Wednesday I didn't get anything done.

Thursday I went playing soccer in the evening.

Friday I watched a video.

Saturday I got in a good session. I finished off the 1000th post and posted it up, link here.

Sunday I watched a video and got in a decent session.

I didn't feel like I was playing well this week, too tired I suppose. At least I got a lot of work done on other projects, it's been a fairly productive week overall.

Week 23

2008-11-16T17:55:00.000-08:00

Didn't get any poker in but cashed out $500 so bankroll is down to $3,128.

Monday I watched a video.

Tuesday and Wednesday I didn't get much done.

Thursday I watched a video and went playing soccer in the evening.

Friday I went to a months mind for my friend and then out for the night after that.

Saturday I was at a Christening and then out again.

Sunday I was working on a video for the LeggoPoker competition. It's taking a long time to put together, it didn't help that I had to teach myself how to use PowerPoint either. If I can get all the content done tonight I should be able to record and submit it tomorrow, I should really stop procrastinating so much.

Week 22

2008-11-09T14:34:00.000-08:00

Bankroll is up to $3,628.

Monday I watched a video.

Tuesday and Wednesday I didn't get anything done.

Thursday I watched a video, it was one with Tommy Angelo as a special guest. Joe Tall was talking about how he used to play loads of 15 - 30 minute sessions in a day which allowed him to mentally reset and play his A game all the time. He was playing stud though so he didn't have to wait for blinds to come around so I'm going to try playing one hour sessions and see how that goes.

Friday I got in a session in the afternoon. I aimed for an hour but in the end I played an extra 10 minutes because a mega fish was tilting and randomly shoving 100bbs preflop. I watched a video and got in another one hour session. I seem to get in the same amount of hands that I usually do.

Saturday I played two one hour sessions. I went to my parents house to go out that night, myself and my younger brother got into a fight with some guy after he insulted Jennifer. We confronted him and his friend, he threw a punch, which gave me a pretty bad cut on my nose, but I got him back. The gardai (police for non Irish readers) showed up and broke it up and they called an ambulance for him. I didn't see him get taken away so I assume they were just cleaning him up a bit, his face was covered in blood. Two of my knuckles are a little tender and I've got a cut on my nose but we won the fight and that's the important thing.

I didn't get any sessions in Sunday as I didn't get home until late and I was too tired to play.

Week 21

2008-11-03T05:32:00.000-08:00

Monday I got in a session in the afternoon.

Tuesday I started coming down with a cold and was feeling tired and groggy all day.

Wednesday and Thursday I was very busy in college so no time to get anything done.

I watched Pok3rplaya's sample video for PokerSwat on Friday. I really hope the site goes well for them, there's clearly been a lot of effort put in. Aaron sent out a "Happy Halloween" update to keep us informed about upcoming plans, I even got a shout out in it :).

Saturday I put in a session in the afternoon, I started taking notes on Chapter 2 of the audio series but it's pretty long.

Sunday I watched a video and got in a session. I watched another video later and got some more work done on Chapter 2.

October Review

2008-10-31T17:45:00.000-07:00

Since last month it looks like my VPIP from the SB and UTG have gone up significantly, although the UTG stat is based on very few hands. These are more than likely bad trends.

Both my W$WSF and W$SD are down a lot, this could be just a function of running bad but it's also possible that I was playing noticeably worse due to tiredness. There's not really enough hands to say.

My aggression factor and aggression frequency are both down and, although my flop cbet is up slightly, my turn cbet is down a lot. It looks like I'm playing a little more passively in general and I definitely feel like my confidence is down a bit.

We'll just have to wait and see I suppose.

Week 20

2008-10-26T16:52:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is up to $3,257.

Monday and Tuesday I didn't get a lot done.

Wednesday I watched a video.

Thursday I had a busy day at college so no poker study.

Friday I watched a video.

Saturday I got in a session in the afternoon and did some more work on my 1000th boards.ie post. It's coming along pretty nicely, I need to write a couple more sections and come up with examples for some other sections. I'm pretty pleased with it so far though.

Sunday I watched another video. I played a session but Party started to lag a lot whenever the pop up to tell me that there was a seat available for a table I was waiting on came up. It meant I was disconnecting and timing out a lot so I gave up. I did manage to get another o.k. session in later on though.

My recent results have been pretty annoying but they're over such ridiculously small samples that they're completely irrelevant. However, having them strung out over a few weeks is making it feel a lot worse then it should be. Hopefully putting that down in writing will help .

Week 19

2008-10-19T16:47:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is down to $3,254

Monday I was asleep for a lot of the day so I didn't get a whole lot done.

On Tuesday I listened to the conference calls for Chapter 5/6 (it was combined) and Chapter 7.

Wednesday I didn't do much.

Thursday I put in a long session. A mega donk ran ridiculously hot against me, I lost 6 buy-ins and decided to drop down to $100nl to rebuild. I think going back to college has had a bad effect on my game, I'm way more tired now and tilting a lot more than I ever have before. I might cut back playing to the weekends and only when I'm refreshed and not stressed out. The same thing happened a little over a year ago and really shattered my confidence (and my bankroll).

Friday I managed to get into the gym, if I could get in two or three times a week I'd be delighted. I also started taking whey protein again.

Saturday I started playing but my internet cut-off so I listened to the conference call for Chapter 8 instead. I watched a video later on as well.

Sunday I got in a decent session in the afternoon and got $40 worth of a reload bonus cleared.

A disappointing week overall, I've spent so much time at $100nl that being back here is pretty frustrating. I'm not sure what I can do to help improve my concentration though, I'm just auto-piloting way too much and not thinking things through. Meh.

Week 18

2008-10-12T17:02:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is up to $4,687.

I got in a small session Monday afternoon. Later on I managed to get in a decent session, felt like I was running pretty bad at the start of it but o.k. later on. Overall I feel like I'm playing well, taking loads of notes, etc. I haven't posted a hand in a while so I thought I'd post this one against a 46/10/2 over 600 hands.

Party Poker, $1/$2 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 5 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
CO: $393.21
Hero (BTN): $200
SB: $169.45
BB: $200
UTG: $162.48

Pre-Flop: 8 5 dealt to Hero (BTN)
UTG calls $2, CO folds, Hero raises to $9, 2 folds, UTG calls $7

This is my 3rd hand at the table. I isolate the weak player in position, this is pretty standard but it's worth mentioning that overlimping is perfectly acceptable with this hand. However, my default is to raise.

Flop: ($21) 7 2 Q (2 Players)
UTG checks, Hero bets $14, UTG calls $14

The flop is pretty normal, not overly dry or overly wet. My cbet size will usually be around 2/3 to 3/4 pot. Here I have 8 high, my opponent isn't full stacked and won't exploit me for betting smaller with air and bigger with value hands, so I bet towards the smaller end.

I get a very quick call. This is a timing tell which usually means my opponent has a weak made hand or a draw.

Turn: ($49) T (2 Players)
UTG checks, Hero bets $38, UTG calls $38

The ten is a pretty good double barrel card. The best ones would obviously be an A or K but I expect my opponent to frequently have middle pair or worse, if he has a made hand, so the ten puts another overcard to his likely hands on the board and will be a scare card for him. My bet size is designed to be big enough to get folds but also leave enough behind to get him to fold to a river shove.

River: ($125) 4 (2 Players)
UTG checks, Hero bets $139 and is All-In, UTG folds

On the river all possible draws miss, I have 8 high and have to shove to fold out flush draws and stubborn weak one pair hands.

Results: $125 Pot
Hero mucked 8 5 and WON $262 (+$201 NET)

Tuesday I got in a session in the morning, I did some pretty spewy stuff at the start but improved as the session went on. I was getting 3bet a good bit so I started 2.5xing the BTN as a default and I picked up the blinds almost every time, it's amazing how unable the regs were to counter it, they were so used to 3betting and almost terrified to play a pot postflop OOP. Here was a fun river bluff raise:

Villain is playing 55/18/2.3 over 1.1k hands, I also have the following notes on him:
didn't cbet top pair good kicker hu OOP
donk bet OESD.
donk bets draws
donk bet called J8 on T94r

Party Poker, $1/$2 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 5 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
BB: $207.30
UTG: $203
CO: $169.90
Hero (BTN): $386.60
SB: $241

Pre-Flop: 6 8 dealt to Hero (BTN)
UTG folds, CO calls $2, Hero raises to $9, 2 folds, CO calls $7

Like the last hand I isolate the weak player in position. Again overlimping is perfectly acceptable with this hand, but my default is to raise.

Flop: ($21) 7 T 4 (2 Players)
CO bets $14.96, Hero calls $14.96

I flop a double bellybuster and backdoor flush draw and get lead into. This is the type of draw that we want to play passively because it's so hidden. Only having 8 high we also wouldn't mind taking the pot down now.

However, against this player we know his range is very heavily weighted towards draws, not only because we've seen him donk bet a draw multiple times but also because we've seen him not value bet strong hands before. The important point is that almost every draw he can have here is going to have a higher overcard then us and isn't going to fold. He may call a raise but if he were to shove over the top with Jd2d we'd be really hating the situation.

Turn: ($50.92) Q (2 Players)
CO bets $24.46, Hero calls $24.46

The queen is a blank which hits nothing, his bet size suggests a draw looking for a cheap river and, like on the flop, there's still no reason to raise.

River: ($99.84) A (2 Players)
CO bets $48.92, Hero raises to $338.18 and is All-In, CO folds

All the draws miss, his bet size is weak and we know he doesn't value bet thin. If we had any showdown value this would be a clear call. However, since we don't, and the ace is a good bluff card we can shove over the top and expect him to fold the vast majority of his range.

Results: $197.68 Pot
Hero mucked 6 8 and WON $484.94 (+$387.60 NET)

I got another session in later on, I did some spewy stuff at the start again. I'm going to have to stick up some post-its or something to remind myself not to spew at the start of sessions.

On Wednesday Aaron uploaded the conference calls so I downloaded them and listened to the conference call for Chapter 2.

Thursday I listened to the conference call for Chapter 3 and went to a removal in the evening. A close friend of mine hung himself, he was 23 and had a young daughter. The family asked his friends to write a speech for the funeral and the lads had started working on it but were having a bit of trouble making it flow and getting it altogether. So, since I'd gotten an A2 in English, I was asked to write it. I was very pleased with it, it turned out really nicely.

Friday I went to the funeral and didn't really feel like playing on Saturday either.

Sunday I managed to get in a small session in the morning and I listened to the conference call for Chapter 4.

Week 17

2008-10-05T12:49:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is down to $4,598.

Monday I listened to chapter 9 and started posting some questions in the forum, basically whatever came to mind.

On Tuesday I went through Chapter 1 and started taking loads of notes, pretty much anything that was said I took down.

Wednesday I finished off writing the notes for Chapter 1, posted some more questions and got a load of work done on my 1000th boards.ie post.

Thursday I watched a video. Friday I put in a decent session, kinda swingy but o.k. I played a second session later but had to stop when Party decided that it didn't want me to type in bet sizes anymore.

Saturday morning Irish Broadband thought it would be a good idea to cut off my broadband for a few hours. When it finally came back on HoldemManager wouldn't open for me so I played hudless for a little while until Irish Broadband decided to cut off my broadband again while I was 5 tabling. It's o.k., I was far too tilted to play anymore at that stage anyway. I started taking notes for Chapter 2 and put in another session.

Sunday morning I put in a good session. I got in another session later on, I was getting kinda tilted towards the end, doing some pretty spewy stuff.

Overall it was an o.k. week, I got a lot of work done at the start but the end of the week was pretty frustrating and tilt inducing.

September Review

2008-09-30T16:05:00.000-07:00

Again it looks like the biggest problem with my stats is I haven't played enough hands. I probably did 8k hands a week back when I first started this blog and now I'm struggling to do it in a month.

Overall I think the stats look pretty sexy, my flop AF and cbet% have gone back up to a respectable level.

My turn cbet% is going in the right direction but my river AF isn't great, although it's a small sample for that.

Besides that there's been little bits of fluctuation here and there but nothing terribly interesting. My VPIP/PFR has stayed around the same level as last month, maybe this is my new style.

My won $ without showdown is still negative but I'm not terribly bothered about that.

I've decided I'm going to set a new goal. I completed my previous goal and since then I've put in about 10k hands so maybe some motivation will do me good.

I'm going to try to hit $20k by Christmas. I've got experience at $400nl already so I don't expect to have any psychological problems with moving back up, etc. Balancing time spent studying the game with time spent playing is something I'll have to improve if I want to achieve this though.

Week 16

2008-09-28T12:40:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is down to $5,443.

I played a session Monday after college, didn't run very well at all. I had a fish cooler me twice for 100BBs each in the space of 3 hands, and then hit and run. I didn't feel like I was playing that great anyway tbh.

On Tuesday Party launched their new software which fucked up SpadeEye so now I can't table select. I opened up a few tables just to try out the new style, I didn't like it very much, at least it's possible to go back to the "classic" view. I cashed out $500 as well.

Aaron (aejones) has just launched his new site, www.memoirsofaejones.com, for his audio files. He'd agreed to sell them to me individually before but we were both on holidays and lost touch so I PMed him again to see if I'd still be able to get them individually. He said it would be a bit of hassle but he'd do it and also offered to give me a substantial discount if I got all of them together since I'd inquired previously. I decided to take him up on the offer and get them altogether, it's putting a pretty big dent into my bankroll but I'll still be able to play 200nl and I don't really want to keep annoying him for each new chapter. I also played a $55 tourney on Stars.

Wednesday I watched a video and was able to get the $4k over to FullTilt to pay for the audio files, I listened to two of them. It's pretty difficult to keep concentration without something to watch and I can't read forums, etc. without having to rewind the audio every couple of minutes to pick up what I missed. It probably would have come out a whole lot better as a PowerPoint video, even if it was only a few different slides with summaries or whatever. Content is obviously excellent even though these first two were on preflop play which tends to be fairly dry and boring most of the time. I've also heard a lot of it before from various sources so it's, mostly, nothing groundbreaking but I guess it never hurts to have the fundamentals drilled into you again. There are, of course, one or two little gems which should have a significant effect on my winrate though.

Thursday I watched a video and listened to another two chapters of the audio files. Chapter 3, playing 3bet pots, was........thorough. That's probably the best way to describe it. It goes way beyond just dry texture vs. wet texture. A high boards vs. Q high boards vs. 9 high boards vs. etc, rainbow, two tone, mono tone, good cbet spots, good barreling spots, reacting to raises, bet sizing, how to play different hand strengths, typical hand ranges for villains in different spots, perceived ranges and probably some other stuff I've already forgotten. It was almost always brought back to balancing and reasons why given for the majority of things. I had to rewind several times because I'd constantly miss stuff.

Chapter 4, playing 3bet pots without initiative, was really good as well, possibly the best one so far. The conference calls aren't up yet but I'm really looking forward to them.

Friday I listened to chapters 5 and 6, which are on postflop play, and tried to get HoldemManager working with the new Party update but now I can't get HoldemManager to turn on at all which is fairly frustrating.

On Saturday I reinstalled the earlier version of HoldemManager. Party are after fixing their hand histories so it should work again as well as putting a player list in the lobby so hopefully SpadeEye should be updated soon. I listened to chapter 7, psychology with gp333 as a guest, I'm usually not big into the whole leveling thing but it was still really good. I also listened to chapter 10 on leading and dealing with leads since I had another coaching session with Tri that evening and that was one of the topics we were going to discuss.

The coaching session went well, we talked about the article he'd sent me called line variations, stuff on river checkraising, minraising/gayraising and donk betting. We looked at a few hand examples, discussed any questions I had and got into a big argument on 3betting. Our next session is on 3betting (and probably postflop play in 3bet pots as well) and, even though I've got 3bet theory coming out my ears at this stage, it will be nice to hear more of his thoughts on it as his approach is different to the one I use and both BobboFitos and aejones recommend (although their opinions are slightly different on some parts). So even though I had a big argument with him on it I'm going to try and keep an open mind about his approach even if I don't adopt it myself.

On Sunday I installed the update for SpadeEye and put in a decent session which went well. I listened to chapter 8, deep play with BobboFitos as a guest, and then put in another small session.

Next week I hope to finish the audio files and get through the conference calls which should be up soon. After that I'll go through the audio files more slowly and start taking some notes. It should be much easier to find things I want to ask about or have elaborated that way. It'll also make it easier to revise and refer back if I have it in print. Hopefully Party manage to not fuck up their software for a little while so I can actually get some hands in.

Week 15

2008-09-21T15:59:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is up to $9,800.

I cashed out $700 on Monday. I started playing The Godfather on PS2 and ended up not getting any sessions in Monday or Tuesday. That was pretty stupid since I was close to clearing a $250 reload bonus but it looks unlikely I'll get it cleared now.

Wednesday I put in a decent session, running well with regs making loads of spewy plays at me. Didn't have time for a second session.

Thursday I was playing Godfather again and went to a going away party for a friend that night so I didn't get any sessions in. I was too hungover to play on Friday as well.

Played a small session Saturday evening, I felt really weird, didn't feel in control or in the zone at all. I was getting in unusual spots, not sure what to do half the time, having to think about basic decisions. I just decided to quit early, hopefully it's only temporary. I watched a video though. My CardRunners subscription ran out, I'm going to leave it for a while before renewing, it's pretty hard to keep up with 3 training sites.

Didn't play at all on Sunday either. It's been a pretty bad week for getting anything done, I still have to organize a time for my next coaching session. I'm back to college tomorrow, last year I only played at the weekends and I'm not sure if I'll be getting in any hands during the week this year either. I'll see how my timetable fills out and try to find some good times for a session or two.

Week 14

2008-09-14T13:36:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is up to $9,675.

Monday I had a frozen raspberry, fresh strawberry, whole grain summer fruits, apple juice and honey smoothie. Session was going very well until I got nut flush draw + two overcards in vs. top set in a 3bet pot 200+BBs deep and didn't suck out. I was happy with how I played, felt pretty in control and was getting away with a lot of stuff.

Tuesday went o.k. again, felt like I was running well but seemed to be getting played back at a lot. Had a sweat session with SlowHabit in the evening, ran pretty well, had a lot of fun and learned a good bit too. One thing I realized is that I tend to just auto fire cbets when it's a good spot for it (good board texture or backdoor equity, etc.) and don't just give up a small pot or two every now and then. By doing that I would improve my image with the donks I'm pounding on and, because they're less frustrated, they'll play back at me a little less and let me pick up more pots in future. The other argument is that I should just pick up the EV now and worry about future implications later. It was nice having somebody sweat me, even though I timed out a good bit, verbalizing my thoughts before every action helped a lot.

I didn't get a chance to play on Wednesday as I had a meeting but I did watch a couple of videos. CR and DC seem to be releasing a load of good content the last couple of weeks, having a set schedule and using series seems to work really well. I still have a soft spot for Leggo though, I love that they answer my questions. Tri (SlowHabit) sent me an article called "Line Variations" for us to discuss in our next session. It talks about 4 different plays you can make and basically gets you to think about what you're doing instead of just being a robot.

I didn't play at all on Thursday either, I really need to put in two decent sessions tomorrow. I went back through some of the hands in the sweat session and sent them to Tri with a couple of questions and he emailed me back a few hours later. I watched a video in the evening. I'm being pretty lazy at the moment and I have a bit of stuff to do between getting UCCPokerSoc set up for next year, writing my 1000th boards post and searching my database for some hand histories for my next coaching session. But the games are usually very good on Fridays so I gotta get some hands in as well.

I couldn't get to sleep Thursday night. I watched a video, had a strawberry, banana, peach yogurt and tropical juice smoothie and went back to bed about noon on Friday, woke up a few hours later and played a long (for me) session. It started off pretty poorly, was getting sucked out on, value betting into better hands, etc. It turned around after a while, I coolered a nit with AA > KK 200+BBs deep which was very nice.

Saturday I watched the Liverpool vs. United match and managed to get in two sessions afterwords. I'm glad I got in a few more hands in the last two days. The sessions went well which is always nice.

Sunday I watched a couple videos and got in a decent session later on. I'm getting used to not knowing how I'm doing until the end of the week. I find that I'm quitting sessions because of how I'm feeling rather then how much I'm up or down which is a lot more profitable and a lot less stressful.

Week 13

2008-09-07T14:09:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is up to $7,238.

Monday morning I played a small session, I've decided to take the $won and BB/100 off my HoldemManager because I find I let short term results effect me too much. At the very least it should make it more awkward for me to find out anyway. I'll put it back on at the end of the week when I'm posting my stats though. I went to the post office delivery office to collect my LeggoPoker tshirt and hoodie that arrived while I was on holidays and played a second session when I got back. I paid another $50 for hand histories for the next month and started a $250 reload bonus I was offered for being inactive for two weeks. The offer was for 50% up to $500 but I only have 15 days to clear it and I didn't want to have to force myself to clear a big bonus. This way I should be able to clear it pretty comfortably.

Tuesday morning I tried to do a video but struggled to get 4 tables running, by the time I did I wasn't in the mood to do it so went for a break instead. I bought a smoothie maker at Argos, I got the idea off RoadSweeper's blog. I bought some juices (orange, tropical and apple), wholegrain yogurts (plain, raspberry and summer berry), honey, oatmeal, frozen fruits (strawberry, raspberry and summer fruits) and some fresh fruit (oranges, bananas, pears, pineapple and melon). Going to try mixing things together and seeing what comes out :).

I started with orange juice, frozen summer fruits, a bananna and some honey. I found the frozen berries very bitter so I don't think I'll be trying this one again. I managed to get a video recorded during my second session.

Wednesday I had a frozen strawberry, plain yogurt, banana and oatmeal smoothie. With a small bit of orange juice and honey. Much nicer taste even though there was a bit too much oatmeal in it. Played a decent session and then had a frozen raspberry, raspberry yogurt, banana and apple juice smoothie. This one was very nice. Didn't get in a second session but watched about three videos.

Thursday I woke up pretty late as I'm in a bad sleeping pattern since coming home. I played a pretty long session in the afternoon and SlowHabit sent me his comments on my video in the evening. He feels like I pot control too much, put too much emphasis on showdown value and tend to auto pilot with strong hands without putting my opponents on a range first. So definitely some pretty important leaks to fix there. I didn't play a second session as I was going through what he sent me and asking follow up questions.

Friday morning I had a fresh strawberry, raspberry yogurt, banana and orange juice smoothie with a little honey. Very nice again although there were a bit too many seeds in it, probably from the fresh strawberries and the raspberry yogurt. I got in a decent session, felt I was cbetting a bit more and not caring as much about getting my bottom or middle pair to showdown. I tried to pay more attention to my opponents range when I had a big hand but I'm not sure I put enough thought into it. Didn't play a second session but watched a couple of videos.

Saturday morning I had a pineapple, pear, apple, orange, banana and tropical juice smoothie. Nice to have something a little different to the strawberry/raspberry combos. Only got in one session again, I really need to start getting up earlier and starting earlier.

Sunday I got started pretty soon after I got up but didn't get up until about 2. Played a decent session and ran pretty well.

Here's an interesting hand.

Party Poker, $1/$2 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter

SB: $370.35
Hero (BB): $203
UTG: $210.95
MP: $282.08
CO: $390.87
BTN: $106.50

Pre-Flop: Q A dealt to Hero (BB)
UTG folds, MP raises to $7, 2 folds, SB calls $6, Hero calls $5

MP is playing 19/14/2.3 over 13k hands and the SB is playing 29/12/1.4 over 290 hands. MP is opening 17% first in from that position and the SB is calling opens 22% of the time.

I decide to flat because against MP I feel that squeezing would sort of be turning my hand into a bluff and with good relative position I'm going to have a lot of spots where I can check raise with overcards and back door draws. I could squeeze to isolate the SB and if he was a bit looser then I think the upsides of isolating him would outweigh the risks of turning my hand into a bluff against MP. I also expect MP and the SB to have dominated aces and queens a decent amount as well although that's a concept which would usually apply more to AJ/AT.

Flop: ($21) 2 T J (3 Players)
SB checks, Hero checks, MP bets $15, SB folds, Hero calls $15

I flop a gutshot and two overcards and check to the preflop raiser. MP cbets 71% of the time but has a turn cbet of 33% with a river cbet of 73%. I also have a note which says that he slowplayed in a limped pot and checked AQ on A76 as the PFR OOP. What this tells me is that this player will cbet with air very frequently, almost never follow up on the turn without a hand and will often check the flop with top or middle pair for pot control.

We have a weak but hidden draw , two overcards and a modest amount of showdown value. The K is a pretty disguised out which, if he does have a big hand, he'll have trouble getting away on. If I hit an A or Q my hand will often be best and I might be able to get a small amount of value on the river if the turn checks through, if he does bet the turn it would put me in an awkward spot, I think I'd probably call and fold the river but it would be close.

If the turn and river does get checked through I may have the best hand against a suited connector type hand. I think check raising is reasonable as well but this is a type of draw I'd prefer to play passively whereas something like As7s I'd usually play aggressively although that's also a hand that can be played passively.

Turn: ($51) 8 (2 Players)
Hero bets $38, MP folds

The 8 is a hidden bluff out which means that even though I was drawing to a gutshot, I can represent that I was drawing to a flush draw, so all the spades give me more outs to try and win the pot. If I check I would never check raise as I doubt he's going to bet the turn thin at all, I wouldn't be surprised if a turn bet was a flush only.

So I expect the turn to check though a lot of the time but a river bet isn't going to be that great as a bluff because he can be pot controlling any number of made hands which will happily pay off one river bet to show down their hand but may be more inclined to fold the turn fearing another bet on the river. So by donking the turn I can leverage my stack.

I would probably bluff any spade card and probably bet really small on a A/K/Q/9 to gain a crying call from a J but I think check folding an A/Q would be o.k. too. I wouldn't bet any board pairing card but other cards would be closer and more timing/feel dependent.

Results: $51 Pot
Hero mucked Q A and WON $86.45 (+$64.45 NET)

Looking at my graph for the week it's been very breakeven, just up and down accross the 0 line the whole time. I've got a sweat session on Tuesday which I'm looking forward to. I also highly recommend getting a smoothie maker, I've always struggled to eat enough fruit so it's a great help.

Late August Review

2008-09-06T18:44:00.000-07:00

Sorry this got so delayed but between getting sorted after coming home, bad sleeping patterns and basically just being too lazy to upload all the photos I haven't gotten around to it until now.

There isn't really enough hands to do anything more specific but a couple things to note:

My steal % has dropped pretty significantly which has caused my VPIP and PFR to both drop about 2%, might be a lack of confidence or maybe the games are a little more aggressive.

My flop cbet% is down about 5% which I'll explain tomorrow in my weekly review is probably a leak and what I plan to do about it. My turn cbet and river cbet are both up significantly which, although it's going to be correlated to my lowered flop cbet%, I'm pretty pleased about.

My W$WSF has gone up a little, which is pretty good considering I'm down this month and was up considerably last month. I think this is caused by firing more double and triple barrels. I've finally been getting a little better at pulling the trigger on my triple barrels.

My WtSD has gone up, most likely because of my lowered flop cbet%, I'll get to that tomorrow. Although my lowered AF might also indicate that I'm calling too much. And my W$SD has gone down because I'm not running hot any more :(.

My 3bet% went up slightly, especially from the BTN. I'm happy with that although I think I may have been 3bet isolating the maniacs a little too loosely in some spots. I'm going to tone that down a bit.

I got the latest installments of Bobbo's Bible while I was on holiday, I've read them twice so far.

So here's a few photos from Fuerteventura. There was clear skies and hot sun almost every day bar 1 or 2 slightly cloudy days. Luckily we were close to the ocean so there was a nice breeze all the time, although it did pull a bit of sand with it every now and then.

Here's me and Lauren at a steakhouse we went out to on the second night. We didn't go out every night because we didn't want to get sick of it too early and other times we'd have to get an early start if we were going somewhere or else we were too tired after coming back.

Any time we passed one of these cars or horses or whatever else Lauren wanted to go on it.

This one was at a three story shopping center we went to. Despite all the shops there wasn't a huge amount of great clothes there.

Here's a few shots from a zoo we went to, it was a huge outdoor place and the sun was scorching which made walking around to see the all the animals pretty tough but we slogged through.

There was a swimming pool three doors down from us and even though there was usually a decent amount of people there it was never packed so we didn't have any trouble finding places to lie down.

This was at a European restaurant.

Me and Lauren posing.

Me and Jennifer after drinking too much.

We were coming back from a nice local restaurant and decided to have a go on the trampolines; my one was really digging into me, I think I ate too much.

We went to a big water park on the last day, all the sun tan got washed off and we all got badly burnt. Here's some action shots.

Talk to you tomorrow.

Week 12

2008-08-15T14:11:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is down to $7,042

Monday morning I lost a little under a buy-in and a half. Lost another 4 buy-ins when I got back. I played way too long, pretty much on tilt because I couldn't get anything going, meh pretty stupid really. I found myself getting really annoyed with the donks when they sucked out and wanting to bust them (well, more than I usually do). Really unhealthy attiude. I'm on a 15 buy-in downswing now, wow they really flew by .

Tuesday I took a break. I've gotten onto aejones about his audio files a couple of times but he was in Vegas, then Michigan and now he's in Hawaii so it's proving pretty difficult to get hold of him. BobboFitos has updated his ebook and he'll be releasing the updated version on the 25th as well as setting up a private forum on LeggoPoker for discussion, which I'm looking forward to. I logged onto AIM a few times last week to try and contact him about coaching but he never seems to be on there. I got onto SlowHabit about coaching as well, paid $1275 for a 5 hour package. Details here. I think it's extremely important that I continue to improve, the games aren't going to get any easier and if I want to make some really good money I'm going to have to invest. I like learning poker theory anyway, I don't know how to describe it, it's just interesting I guess. I also don't like knowing that there's loads of important poker theory but not knowing what it is.

Wednesday I was really busy all day dealing with holiday stuff so no time for a session.

Thursday I played a very small session. I was trying to do a video for my first coaching session but my trial had run out on Camtasia so I tried reinstalling it which worked before but that didn't work. I uninstalled it and downloaded it again but that didn't work, then I tried uninstalling it and removing the registry keys but that didn't work either. I eventually gave up and downloaded CamStudio instead, it took me a while to set it up and get it working. I went through 12 test runs trying to get it to capture in the right place and get the audio working. When I did get it working I tried to get 4 tables running but even though I was on the waiting list for 15 tables at one stage I could only get two tables going at once, and they were pretty meh anyway. I had to go into town to do more holiday shopping so I couldn't wait much longer and gave up.

Friday I managed to record a video but there were loads of jumps in the video and the audio which made it pretty much unwatchable, I'm going to have to try again when I get back, or pay up for Camtasia. I made a buy-in and a half, which was nice. I'm going on holiday tomorrow so that's why I'm posting this week early as I'm not sure how much internet access I'll have over there. I also downloaded a few videos from DeucesCracked which I hadn't gotten around to watching yet. I got a digital camera for my birthday so hopefully I'll have a few pictures when I get back.

Week 11

2008-08-10T11:13:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is down to $9,110.

Monday morning I didn't get in a session, I was woken up pretty early to catch a spider so I felt too tired to play. I finally got around to watching Greg's "Wellness" video on LeggoPoker and he recommended going to this to test your reaction times and see how alert you are. I got "Bobbing bobcat" most of the time but managed to hit "Rocketing rabbit" once, that suggested I probably didn't get enough sleep last night. It was a very good video and hopefully I'll be able to improve at least 1 or 2 areas of my life.

I brought Lauren into town and when I got back lost 3 buy-ins at $600nl and half a buy-in at $400nl. I had a fish river my flopped sets twice in the space of about 10 hands which was very frustrating. I decided to quit after that, after seeing my reaction times I hadn't planned on playing at all, probably should have gone with my first instinct. Ah well, my first -2k day, woohoo. I cashed out $1100 as well which now means I'm just slightly underrolled for $600nl but I'm not down that much on my shot.

Tuesday morning went really badly, kept getting sucked out on, fish rivering flushs on me, etc., etc. Meh, I guess I was due a bad run , happy now cooker? Dropped 3 buy-ins at $600nl and 1 at $400nl. Not going to play anymore $600nl for a while at least. I managed to clear my $100 reload bonus as well.

Wednesday I decided to take the day off and have a break from poker. I also bought some whey protein which Greg recommended.

Thursday I dropped a little over half a buy-in at $400nl and broke even at $200nl. I had gotten a $200 reload bonus but I only have a week to clear it and I need twice as many points as I've gotten any other week so it's pretty unlikely that I'll get it cleared in time. Didn't get in a second session.

I didn't play at all on Friday, just laziness basically, or maybe I wasn't in the mood. I watched a couple of videos though.

Saturday it was my birthday so I took the day off. I did watch a couple of videos though.

Sunday morning I won a little under a buy-in at $200nl and broke even at $400nl. I felt I was playing well, making some well time bluffs, taking tonnes of notes on the fish which I used to exploit them later. In the evening I lost 2 and a half buy-ins at $400nl, I think I played too long, I got a bit tilty with one fish who disconnect protected on me and then ran like the sun. I obviously e-mailed Party about it and they didn't ban his disconnect protect which pissed me off even more. I 3bet shoved over his c/r in a 3bet pot and ran into his set, decided that was a good time to quit.

I also cashed out $4500, that should hopefully cover the rest of the holiday. Which means I'm underrolled for $400nl now, no harm in moving down for a while anyway.

Week 10

2008-08-03T12:55:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is up to $19,939.

Monday I took the family to Dingle. We went to the aquarium out there. We were planning on seeing Fungi the dolphin as well but the weather was pretty bad and we probably wouldn't have had time anyway. Had a nice dinner in Tralee afterwards.

I would have some photos but I bought a camera up there and all the photos came out black so that was a bit of a waste. I had brought a camera with me but I couldn't turn the flash off so I couldn't use it inside the aquarium. There should be some photos on that but the film isn't finished yet. I think I'm just going to buy a digital camera and be done with it.

Tuesday I made a little under 3 buy-ins at $400nl. Won another 1 and a half buy-ins in the evening.

Wednesday I won 3 buy-ins in the morning. Very busy in the afternoon so no time for a second session.

Thursday morning there was very little action going, I got onto a $200nl table and lost a buy-in. I was playing very spewy and overaggro, even more so then usual!!! I was annoyed with my play, although it probably wasn't terrible, but the money felt pretty meaningless, I guess that's a good thing when playing poker.

I managed to get some $400nl tables running, still playing a little too aggro and not running great, value betting into better hands and stuff. Started playing a bit better, getting away with more stuff and finished up just under a buy-in at $400nl. Had to go shopping and do my monthly review so no second session.

Friday I made a little over 2 and a half buy-ins before the tables started to go dead. Decided that was a good time for a break.

I came back and started playing again but the tables went fairly quiet after a while. My bankroll was over $19K at this stage so I decided I'd see if there were any good $600nl tables going. There weren't a lot so I added some 200nl tables as well. In the end I made a little under a buy-in at $200nl, another buy-in and a half at $400nl and broke even at $600nl. I got my holiday flights booked as well, we're going to Fuerteventura on the 16th for 2 weeks. Going to need to cash out some more money for holiday stuff soon.

I got a $100 reload bonus Saturday morning, shouldn't take me too long to clear. I won a little over a buy-in at $600nl but lost over 2 and a half at $400nl. Finally managed to get myself back into the gym as well.

When I got back I lost my $600nl winnings and made back about half a buy-in at $400nl.

Sunday morning I made about half a buy-in at $400nl and broke even at $600nl. In the evening I made just under a buy-in at $400nl.

July Review

2008-07-31T10:46:00.000-07:00

I've come up with a theory, I'm going to call it the "RedJoker Running Hot Measurement". It says that if you're winning money from blinds you are running hot, QED. So you can forget all your EV graphs, flop set percentages or any other stats, if you're winning money from the blinds you run good.

A few things to note compared to last month:

My 3bet% from every position has gone way up. The majority of that is caused by 3betting fish lightish in position (and sometimes OOP) both to isolate and get them to play more straight forward postflop. Most of the regs have wider opening ranges as well so 3betting IP (and sometimes OOP) becomes more profitable until they adjust.

My Button VPIP has gone up 3% and my SB VPIP has gone down 3%, that's a pretty good sign. Although my UTG VPIP went up slightly while my MP VPIP went down slightly, there's less hands here so it's more likely to be variance. It's probably not a huge problem anyway.

I'm still losing money in non showdown pots but it doesn't seem to be as heavy as last month, it's something I probably still need to work on.

Both my WtSD and W$SD have gone way up, probably just from running hot.

I got in 10,000 less hands which is a bad sign, I think getting in quality hands is more important then getting in a lot of hands. I'm not going to force myself to play more then I want to, just going to stick to playing when I feel like it.

My Flop CBet and Turn CBet have gone down by about 2.5%. My River CBet has gone up a lot but that's going to be a function of my flop and turn cbets, if I'm firing less on the flop and turn then I'm going to have stronger hands on average when I get to the river. I'm a little disappointed about my turn cbet%, I think I need to look out for more spots to double and triple barrel, I definitely feel that I don't triple barrel anywhere near enough. My increase in river cbet may mean that I'm value betting thiner which is a good sign.

My flop and turn AFs dropped while my river AF went up. I'm pleased about the direction of my river AF but not so much the turn. Same reasons as above. And in the case of the river it may mean that I'm finding more folds instead of paying off too much.

Time for some filters. I'll use the second HoldemManager article to go through my results.

Overview:

Steal attempt made:

Blind defended:

Heads up on Flop:

1744 hands, 239.39bb/100.

Heads up on Flop not the PFR:

594 hands, 77.01bb/100.

Multiway Flop:

1052 hands, 193.39bb/100.

Multiway Flop not PFR:

791 hands, 155.34bb/100.

Pocket Pairs:

Suited Connectors below KQs:

Suited Connectors below KQs, did coldcall = true:

47 hands, 1019.12bb/100.

Unsuited Connectors below KQo:

Unsuited Connectors below KQo, did coldcall = true:

24 hands, -28.79bb/100.

This seems to be mostly calling from the BB against a SB opener, I think I'll start adding these hands to my light 3betting range instead.

Week 9

2008-07-27T11:48:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is up to $15,194

Monday morning I dropped a buy-in at $400nl but made 2 and a half buy-ins at $200nl. $400nl was a lot more aggro, which I expected, but it was also pretty mindless. One reg 3bet my CO open from the BTN with JJ and flat called my 4bet, that was a pretty good indication that some of the regs didn't really know what they were doing. There were still plenty of 50%+ VPIP fish but waiting lists were a bit longer. I think getting used to the new bet sizes and larger swings will be the main obstacle I'll face. It's nice playing a couple of $200nl tables at the same time, it definitely helps soften the swings.

In the evening I made a little under 2 and a half buy-ins at $400nl and broke even at $200nl. Lol, it feels funny refering to $75 as "a little". I felt I played o.k. in general. Hopefully I'll be more comfortable in a few days.

Tuesday I had to import two days worth of hand histories (200nl - 600nl) which ended up being 250,000 hands and HEM was only importing at ~15 hands/sec. That meant I didn't have a chance to play when I woke up so I brought Lauren into town instead and by the time I got home and had something to eat I only had an hour and a half before going playing soccer. I think I'm going to leave the hand histories to import overnight from now on.

I lost half a buy-in at $400nl Wednesday morning, there wasn't a whole lot of action and I don't think I ever had more then 3 tables going at once. Waiting lists at 200nl and 400nl are pretty long now and since I'm pretty picky about seat selection (I only sit in one of the three seats to the left of the fish) it makes getting onto tables fairly hard.

Second session went better and I managed to get 6 tables of $400nl running, that's the most I'll play at one time although I prefer playing 4 tables most of the time. I won a little over a buy-in and a half. I cashed out $900 as well. Went to play more soccer, fitness has definitely dropped but still got the touch .

Thursday I was moving back home so no time for poker but I did get a chance to watch the two videos from the new LeggoPoker pros, they were both excellent. I also get a new leather chair, it's an early birthday present from Jennifer.

Friday I lost a little under a buy-in at $400nl and the same at $200nl. I had updated to the latest version of SpadeEye and it stopped scanning jackpot and speed tables. With the jackpot up to around $700K that meant there was about 9 normal tables and a tonne of jackpot tables. Took me a while to find out I just needed to change the filters. After all that I didn't feel like playing so I took a break.

When I came back I decided to update to the latest version of HoldemManager, my virus protection kept telling me there was a virus in one of the files and not running HoldemManager for me. So I wasted my entire evening trying to get that working without success. I went to play a poker tournament in the Bank for a change of pace. Ended up coming 3rd for €140 but then lost €350 at €1/€3. Pretty meh day all things considered.

Saturday I woke up fairly late and went back to trying to get HoldemManager working again. I excluded the RVG software folder from my virus protection and that did the trick. The new version is really impressive and there's so many new HUD stats it's insane. I spent a while 1 tabling and getting the HUD set up, went to 4 tables and played for a small while before stopping. Up 1 and a half buy-ins at $400nl.

I thought this hand was interesting.

Party Poker, $2/$4 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 4 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter

UTG: $1,379.10
Hero (BTN): $781.60
SB: $402
BB: $576.80

Pre-Flop: 2 4 dealt to Hero (BTN)
UTG folds, Hero raises to $12, SB folds, BB calls $8

I open to 3xBB otb against two tightish players. The BB, who is playing 24/17/3.4 over 11K hands, calls. He has a 3bet% of 6.2%.

With my smaller open he can flat some more stuff profitably. Depending on what he likes to 3bet his calling range probably includes a lot of small to mid PPs, SCs, suited two gappers, suited broadways, strong off suit aces and broadways and maybe some suited aces as well.

Of course he'll 3bet some of those hands with different frequencies and depending on how many tables he's playing or what mood he's in he might fold some of those hands so his calling range isn't going to include all those hands 100% of the time.

Flop: ($26) 5 7 9 (2 Players)
BB checks, Hero checks

The board is rainbow but it's pretty connected. It hits 55 - 99 pretty hard as well as some of his SCs and suited two gappers. It's also a board where he can c/r bluff with things like QJs or KQo and have some overcard outs when called.

I decide to check back and give up on the hand, obviously I have no showdown value but I don't mind just giving up on a hand from time to time. It's important to show your opponents that you're not just auto cbetting 100% of the time.

Turn: ($26) 8 (2 Players)
BB checks, Hero checks

The 8 improves some hands, makes the board even scarier, etc. I check continuing to give up on the hand facing any aggression.

River: ($26) 9 (2 Players)
BB checks, Hero bets $16, BB folds

Again the 9 improves a lot of hands but he hasn't shown any interest up to this point. I make a sort of "post-oak" bluff which doesn't really represent a whole lot (maybe a pot controlled 9 or something) and if he's paying attention he might even call with A high or any pair.

However, it's extremely unlikely he has a huge hand at this stage, I'd expect a 6 or 9 to have bet at some point so he can have an 8, 7 or 5, which I fully expect him to call with, but he can also have things like Q high or K high and he can also fold A high or a small pair since my line could potentially be pot control and now thin value or even not so thin value.

Results: $26 Pot
Hero mucked 2 4 and WON $40.70 (+$28.70 NET)

I also decided to go through the new HoldemManager articles, they looked o.k. besides a couple of spelling errors. Some stuff I'd disagree with but I doubt this was targeted at me, I think it's fine for a beginner and should help them plug some big leaks but there were far too many absolutes used, too many axioms thrown around and too much looking at filters in isolation. There was also no explanation for why some of the advice was given, axioms like "always raise or fold" are really bad and, while they'll help plug some leaks for a weaker player, they can often stunt a players growth. What's worse is not explaining the theory behind these "rules".

In particular, the fuzz rule stuff was pretty poor imo, if I was to fold top pair every time my cbet was raised, playing 29/22, I'd probably get run over. Even if the call was slightly negative EV I should probably still be making it to discourage opponents from bluff raising my cbets in future and also to force them to fire multiple barrels against me to win the hand. If they have a high cost to bluff me then they'll be less inclined to do so in future and will also fire more barrels when I have strong hands I'm not folding. So for this reason calling a flop raise and folding the turn (which we're told is a HUGE leak) can be fine and even necessary unless we're going to start calling raises with air in order to float.

I'm probably being overly critical tbh; it's a very good idea and should add tonnes of new functions to HoldemManager as they create new filters. The articles will be extremely valuable for micro and some small stakes players as well.

Party Poker, $2/$4 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter

UTG: $400
MP: $832
CO: $400
BTN: $447
SB: $824.65
Hero (BB): $551.60

Pre-Flop: Q Q dealt to Hero (BB)
UTG folds, MP raises to $20, CO folds, BTN calls $20, SB raises to $70, Hero raises to $551.60 and is All-In, 3 folds

Results: $180 Pot

This is somewhat standard but since we're 138BBs deep I think it's important to go through the mathematics involved.

MP is 24/19/2.9 over 5.1K hands.
BTN is 65/12/1.1 over 339 hands.
SB is 21/17/3.3 over 2.3K hands and has a squeeze % of 6.0% over this sample.

When everybody folds I win $114.

I'll assume that my opponents play perfectly so the SB will continue with QQ+/AK+ (the SB needs 42.13% to continue) and fold otherwise, MP will continue with only QQ+/AKs (MP needs 44.55% equity to continue) and I'll assume that the BTN never has a hand he can continue with.

So MP will continue with 1.3% of hands and I'll have 28.524% equity against that range. And SB will continue with 2.2% of hands and I have 39.917% equity against that range.

MP opens 21% of hands so he'll continue 1.3/21 = 6.19% of the time.
SB squeezes 6% of the time so will continue 2.2/6 = 36.67% of the time.
The other 57.14% of the time I win the pot.

6.19%[(28.524% x $645.6) + (71.476% x -$547.6)] + 36.67%[(40.207% x $595.6) + (59.793% x -$547.6)] + 57.14%($114)

6.19%[($184.15) + (-$391.4)] + 36.67%[($239.47) + (-$327.43)] + 57.14%($114)

6.19%(-$207.25) + 36.67%(-$87.96) + 57.14%($114)

-$12.83 - $32.25 + $65.14

= +$20.06

I've overlooked some double counting when they both have monsters but it's not hugely important. It's also worth noting that MP has to worry about the two players to act behind him so may decide to fold AKs or the other combo of QQ, particularly since I've shown so much strength. This gains me EV. The BTN might do something stupid with 88 or 99 etc. and give me huge amounts of EV. And sometimes the SB will fold AK since I've shown so much strength. Regardless this is still a +EV shove.

So we know that shoving is better then folding. I think calling is very awkward, we may keep in the BTN who's likely to put money in badly postflop if he hits but the risk of getting called by players who'll correctly read my range as extremely strong and are unlikely to put money in badly postflop makes calling less appealing.

There's also the option of 4betting to a smaller amount. However, in this situation I'll pretty much never be bluffing so I don't expect to induce bluffs and shoving is pretty much the same as 4betting small since I'll be committed to calling a shove if they do. The topic of 4bet sizing is an interesting one. Here's a recent thread on boards where Digiman was asking about some preflop spots and there were some unanswered questions about 4bet sizing.

The main reason for not making 4bets pot sized is not to induce light shoves, although that's a nice result, but to allow us to 4bet bluff without being committed. Say we open otb to 3.5xBB with 100BBs, the SB 3bets us to 12.5BBs, which is pot + 1BB and the standard size for an OOP 3bet. If we made a pot sized 3bet to 38.5BBs and the SB shoved we'd need:

(139.5BBs)(X) + (1-X)(-61.5BBs) = 0

X = 30.6%

30.6% equity to call the shove. Against a "standard" range of QQ+/AK all PPs and SCs have that much equity so if we 4bet bluff with 65s or 22 then we'd be committed to calling a shove. Obviously that sucks so we don't want to do that. Instead we'll make our 4bets to ~2.5x the 3bet and being sure to keep them less than 33% of the effective stack. Personally I try to keep them around 27BBs - 29BBs, this has pretty much the same fold equity of a shove but also allows me to 4bet bluff if I feel there's a good spot for it. Of course, if I have a hand I'm 4betting for value then I can just make a quick call if shoved on.

In the QQ hand digiman posted I'd probably 4bet to $111 and call a shove. This bet size shows that I'm far too cool to move my hand when typing in bets and it's extremely important that my opponents realize how cool I am.

Sunday I made just over 3 buy-ins at $400nl which also meant that I smashed through the 5 figure mark for the month, which I'm pretty pleased about. I felt I didn't start out great, made some questionable calls but felt that I got much more in the zone later on, made some well timed check raises and stuff. Feeling a lot more comfortable and, although multiplying by 4 is retardedly awkward, I've gotten a bit better with the bet sizing as well.

I got $131 for some promotion Party were running for the month. Played another session and lost half a buy-in at $400nl. So a good start to my shot at $400nl and I'm reasonably happy with my play in general.

I'm going to add some more blog links to my sidebar, usually I go around asking people to swap links but those RSS feeds are way too convenient so I'm going to put up ones I read regularly, anyway feel free to link me up, etc., etc.

Week 8

2008-07-20T13:27:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is up to $13,214.

I cashed out another $500 Monday morning and dropped a buy-in. Didn't play a second session as me, Jennifer and Lauren decided to spend a few days in my parents house since they went to New York and Boston for a couple of weeks. I brought the laptop and monitor with me and, although their broadband is a LOT slower, hopefully I should still be able to get in some hands while I'm here.

Tuesday I didn't get started until mid afternoon and decided to put in one longer session instead of two. The games were pretty aggro with plenty of light 3betting, I don't mind it too much since I'm capable of adjusting to it reasonably well, but it really cuts into my ability to play pots with the donks since my opens are getting played back at more and the donks can't play as many pots. It was a pretty swingy session and after 800 odd hands I was up $40 and just couldn't be bothered to play any more.

Wednesday I got up pretty late, Digiman asked me to sweat him while he was playing HU so I did that for the afternoon. I was too tired to play an evening session but I watched a couple of videos.

I couldn't get to sleep until Thursday morning so that put me into a bad sleeping pattern and I woke up way too late to start playing. I did play a couple of tourneys in the evening though, finished down $50.

Friday I brought the family to Fota. We had a great time. Sorry about the picture quality, bought a cheap disposable camera there, but I fixed them up a small bit.

Picture with Mommy and her new white tiger.
Big cheesy grin.
Picture with Daddy.The peacock's hiding in the dark (or the camera's a piece of crap).
Look Ducks!!!
A helpful sign for the Dublin visitors.
More cheesy grins.
We finally get to go to the playground after looking at all the boring animals.Here's me and Jennifer minding Lauren at the playground.
Back to Nana's house!!!!

Saturday I made a little over 3 and a half buy-ins in the morning. Made another buy-in in the afternoon. I spent $50 getting a month worth of hand histories for Party Poker. There's a guy on 2+2 who's datamining all hands at 200nl+ and you can pay him $50 for access for the next month. He'll be doing iPoker and other sites soon and you can get a discount if you get multiple sites. Pretty handy for moving up or changing sites.

Sunday morning I made a little over 6 buy-ins. Made another buy-in in the evening.

I'll mix in some $400nl tables next week and see how things go.

Week 7

2008-07-13T12:25:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is up to $11,635.

I didn't play at all on Monday. On Sunday Jennifer had gone to Bantry with Lauren and some of my family as there was some music festival on. I was recuperating most of Sunday and they didn't get back until late so I didn't get to go home until Monday. I'd got myself in a bad sleeping pattern over the weekend so fell asleep when I got home.

Tuesday morning I made over 2 and a half buy-ins. Had a very swingy second session including running KK into AA 183BBs deep. Finished up winning a little over 1 buy-in, so a good day overall.

Broke even Wednesday morning. I had a meeting in the evening so no second session.

Only put in a small session Thursday morning as I had to go grocery shopping, made a buy-in and a half. Didn't feel like playing an evening session so played some donkaments instead, dropped $140 but got to watch 2 videos and finish off the last 5 chapters of my book while I was playing, lol donkaments are so tedious.

I won a little over 8 and a half buy-ins Friday morning. I was running so hot it was ridiculous, just couldn't miss. I made just under 3 buy-ins in the evening. My first $2K+ day.

Here's a spot where a flop 3bet bluff didn't work. Villain is 19/15/1.7 over 158 hands.

Party Poker, $1/$2 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter

BTN: $262.80
SB: $304
BB: $307.40
UTG: $264.65
MP: $567.46
Hero (CO): $467

Pre-Flop: T 8 dealt to Hero (CO)

2 folds, Hero raises to $6, 2 folds, BB calls $4

I open T8o in the CO, it might be a small bit marginal but the players left to act were all nitty so I think it's fine.

I make my open 3xBB instead of 4xBB. I'll do this when the players left to act are tight and/or likely to have wide 3betting ranges. This gives them less incentive to 3bet and leaves me more options if they do decide to 3bet. If they start widening their calling ranges then they'll have to play more marginal hands OOP which most of my opponents are unlikely to be comfortable with.

Flop: ($13) 5 9 5 (2 Players)
BB checks, Hero bets $9, BB raises to $28, Hero raises to $75, BB raises to $301.40 and is All-In, Hero folds

Paired board so pretty dry, with the flush draw I like to make it about 2/3 pot. I get check raised which, because of my smaller open, may include more suited connector type hands then usual. So something like 8c7c/8c6c/7c6c might be in his range as well as 75s/65s/54s. The bulk of his range is still made up of pocket pairs so 99 is definitely in there too and probably the main part of his value range.

However, this is a paired board in a 6max game CO vs. BB so the golden rule in these spots is "nobody ever has anything". More importantly we're slightly over 150BBs deep so his range for stacking off is going to be pretty small and I can put a huge amount of pressure on him by 3betting. Although, his low AF might indicate that he doesn't get tricky very often which makes this 3bet less good, but it certainly doesn't hurt my image :).

Unfortunately, he picked up a hand this time but I still think my play was o.k.

Results: $163 Pot

Saturday morning I lost a little under half a buy-in. Lost another three quarters of a buy-in in the evening but managed to clear my $100 reload bonus.

Sunday morning I made 2 and a half buy-ins. I got $56.38 of rakeback from GJP. I decided to sign up to DeucesCracked for 6 months as well, for $148 there's very little point not having it. Made another 4 buy-ins in the evening session.

Here's an interesting double barrel spot. Villain in this hand is 22/17/3.8 over 567 hands.

Party Poker, $1/$2 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 5 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter

BTN: $227.80
SB: $542.90
BB: $200
UTG: $175
Hero (CO): $484.35

Pre-Flop: 9 Q dealt to Hero (CO)
UTG calls $2, Hero raises to $9, BTN folds, SB calls $8, 2 folds

Really standard isolate with Q9 soooooooted.

Flop: ($22) T T 3 (2 Players)
SB checks, Hero bets $12, SB calls $12

Very, very dry board. Great for cbetting and we can make a pretty small cbet and expect to show a profit. About 1/2 pot would be my standard here.

His call represents 44 - 99, maybe something like 43s that he made a loose call with preflop hoping for an overcall , and sometimes a slowplayed 33 or T.

Turn: ($46) 3 (2 Players)
SB checks, Hero bets $34, SB folds

This ordinarily isn't a great double barrel card because the board hasn't changed a lot and I'm not repping a very large range by betting. A 3 or overpair would often check back here for pot control.

However, we're against a competent player who, I'm pretty confident, knows this isn't a great double barrel card. He's put in a very tough spot with 44 - 99 and I expect him to be capable of making laydowns.

Results: $46 Pot
Hero mucked 9 Q and WON $78 (+$57 NET)

I got onto aejones about his group coaching program as well, details here for those that don't know what I'm on about. Basically, there's 10 audio files with skype conversations that answered some of the beta tester's questions on the material. They're sold at $500 per file and there's a private forum to ask questions in once you've bought them all. Obviously it's not cheap, in fact it's ridiculously expensive, but if you thought the hand analysis on this blog was good so far.....

With my bankroll where it is I guess I should make some plans for taking shots at $400nl. I'd like to move up with at least 30 buy-ins which is $12K but I've only played 21K hands at 200nl since moving up which isn't a lot. I'm going to give it another week at least. I guess I could cash out some money or something.

I saw this visitor locations thing on Mr.Plough's blog so I added one to mine as well, lol this blog is going to look so spammy soon with all the crap I'm adding.

Week 6

2008-07-07T13:31:00.000-07:00

Bankroll is up to $7,338.

Put in a small session Monday morning, I felt I was playing a little overaggro and spewing a lot in general. Lost a little over a buy-in. Made 2 and a half buy-ins in the evening.

I made 2 buy-ins Tuesday morning. I joined that Xpert Eleven thing and spent the afternoon doing that so no second session.

I did get to play my 3rd round HU matches with Reg (cardshark202) though, we started out 3 tabling and I took down one of them pretty quickly. Reg had tried to run a bluff while I was holding KK and that crippled him. We two tabled for ages, it was a really good game. At one point I had a 3-1 chip lead on one table and a slight lead on the other. I made a bad stack off with 87s on the turn on 7632tt in a 3bet pot and ran into KK. So the momentum swung in Reg's favour and he built up chip advantages on both tables.

I got pretty short on one table, got caught 4bet bluffing and soon had to 4bet shove my 66 into AQo, Q on the turn made it one game each with Reg holding a slight chip lead on the last table. We played on for another while longer, in one big hand I called Reg's 3bet with AQs, raised his flop cbet on A93tt and he shoved with 86. That gave me a 3 - 1 chip lead and Reg had to leave in about ten minutes. We agreed to continue tomorrow if we weren't finished by then. Reg managed to claw his way back and we ended with Reg on 2,455 and me on 1,545.

Here's an interesting hand from that game.

Poker Stars, $21.25 + $1 NL Hold'em Tournament, 5/10 Blinds, 2 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter

Hero (SB): 1,680
BB: 2,320

Pre-Flop: (15) J 7 dealt to Hero (SB)
Hero raises to 30, BB calls 20

J7o is pretty marginal but we're 168BBs deep and on the button so I think it's fine. A 100% BTN PFR would probably be close to optimal this deep but for metagame reasons I feel it's o.k. to fold some of the weaker stuff.

Flop: (60) T 3 4 (2 Players)
BB checks, Hero bets 40, BB calls 40

The board's normal, not overly dry or overly wet, it's fairly good to cbet on and we have no showdown value so I go ahead and make a cbet.

Reg's calling range is probably something like any ace, any pair except for overpairs which would have been 3bet preflop and draws which he decided not to c/r.

Anything stronger I'd expect him to c/r.

Turn: (140) K (2 Players)
BB checks, Hero checks

This is the "classic" double barrel card which is why double barreling here against a good player isn't great. I'd have to fire a third barrel to get him off anything and even then I'd probably struggle to take him off a pair or even ace high.

River: (140) 5 (2 Players)
BB checks, Hero bets 100, BB folds

This is an interesting spot I think. The 5 isn't a great card because it hits a large amount of Reg's range here, it completes a lot of draws and gives something like 65 a pair or 54 two pair. However, once he checks I feel that it's extremely unlikely this hit him hard, it might have given him a pair but I'd expect any two pair or completed draw to lead for value.

My line looks like I pot controlled something on the turn and I'm now going for value with a T or weak K (although I'd very often bet a K on the turn for the same reasons that I felt double barreling wasn't great) or that I checked behind with a draw I didn't want to get c/red off which now hit.

It's also a very unusual line to take as a bluff. The typical bluff line would be to double barrel and then triple barrel sometimes so it's very difficult to give me credit for a bluff here. Going through some of the hands on Thursday Reg said that he folded QT in this hand.

Results: 140 Pot
Hero mucked J 7 and WON 140 (+70 NET)

Wednesday morning I made a little over 2 and a half buy-ins. In the evening I finished the HU match with Reg. It went on for over an hour and a half back and forth, each of us building up small leads and then swinging back the other way. Reg said on MSN that he just wanted the game to end and seemed to adopt a far more aggressive style. I dropped down to about 1200 in chips to his 2800. I opened KK and Reg 3bet, I put in a 4bet and called his shove with TT. T on the river wrapped it up :(.

Thursday I didn't put in a morning session but lost a little under 2 buy-ins in the afternoon. I started into a $100 reload bonus as well, I've got two weeks to clear it and it's not a lot of points so I shouldn't have any trouble getting it cleared in time.

Friday morning I dropped a small bit over 1 buy-in. In the evening I played a few tourneys, came 3rd/4th in a HU one for $304 leaving a profit of $177. I was down $512 from tourneys last month so it looks like I'm clawing my way back, another couple of months and I'll be able to give up these stupid cash games and focus on the tourneys .

Here was an interesting hand against a 43/12/4.3 over 102 hands.

Party Poker, $1/$2 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter

BTN: $177.80
SB: $212.55
Hero (BB): $200
UTG: $233.85
MP: $215.45
CO: $200

Pre-Flop: 5 8 dealt to Hero (BB)
4 folds, SB calls $1, Hero raises to $8, SB calls $6

Loose semi aggro donk limps in from the SB. I'd expect him to raise anything half decent so his range is a lot weaker then a fish who never raises. 85o is definitely a weak hand but I felt an offsuit two gapper was enough to raise and give me initiative going into the flop, I'd expect him to limp fold a decent amount as well so that's always nice.

Flop: ($16) 2 K 6 (2 Players)

SB checks, Hero bets $10, SB raises to $20, Hero raises to $65, SB folds

The board's very dry but I'm not sure how aware he is of that. Against a competent player I'd usually take a bet3bet line with air on this board fairly frequently since it's so hard to have anything on this board and I don't expect to get 4bet bluff shoved on at $200nl.

However, against a donk this isn't really a line I'd take too often since I expect him to call far too often. In this case though I had a note which said: "check min raised BvB with air". So I felt like this was an o.k. spot to make a play.

Results: $56 Pot

He folded and said he had KT. I'm not sure whether he did or not but it brings up an interesting point. I'd never expect a competent player to c/r there with KT because it's in a WA/WB spot and bluff catching or calling and getting value on the river if the turn checks through is by far the better play against a competent player who'll rarely fold better and rarely call with worse. If they did c/r with KT there it would have to be with the intention of inducing bluffs and getting it in.

However, if this guy was aware of his image (which he's probably not but bear with me) then check min raising with KT becomes a semi o.k. play. It's unlikely I'm going to fold any K to him and if I had decided to value bet QQ - 77/any 6 I may find it difficult to fold to a min c/r. It's also rare that I'd float or 3bet bluff against a fish. In reality he was probably using the "raise to see where I'm at" pseudo logic or even a "I have top pair, top pair is a good hand, I raise" logic.

Saturday morning I made a little under 3 and a half buy-ins. I had to go to a 21st in the evening which meant no evening session and no Sunday sessions either. I saw this hit counter on Digiman's blog so I decided to add one onto mine.

I'm pretty unhappy with how few hands I got in. It was raining all week which was fairly depressing and might have made me not feel like playing as much. Nah j/k, I'm just a lazy bastard.

June Review

2008-06-30T13:06:00.000-07:00

6max:

So I've tightened up a little since moving up to 200nl, lol I'm such a nit now.

Doing a lot more 3betting, far more TAGs and LAGs with loose ranges so more spots for it. My 3bet% from MP - BTN are much higher then those from the blinds, I think 3betting IP >>>>>>> 3betting OOP.

I've managed to get my SB VPIP down significantly and I've started making money from there which, although probably largely due to variance, is very nice.

Looking at the graph I'm running above expectation, which is great, long may it continue :).

My non showdown winnings were going downwards at the start which was probably while I was getting back into the swing of things again, they started moving upwards after about 4K hands so I think that's a sign that I was getting comfortable.

When I moved back up to 200nl it started going downwards again but it seems to have stabilized and hopefully I can get that to start moving upwards again. It took a nasty hit on Saturday but, being in the middle of a 5 buy-in downswing, I was almost definitely playing suboptimally.

I'm pretty happy with the amount of hands I got in, including HU it's about 27K which is fairly good imo.

I guess I could run a few filters or something. I'll use Pokey's post although I'm not able to do some of the filters in HoldemManager.

Steal attempted (unopened, position is CO or BTN, action is raise):

Blind defended:

In SB and steal defended = true:

In BB and steal defended = true:

Pocket Pairs:

Pocket Pairs Coldcalled (MP, CO or BTN):

When I filter for SB or BB it shows me up a little under $2k in 200 hands so I think it may just be variance.

Suited Connectors:

Suited Connectors Coldcalled:

Offsuit Connectors:

Offsuit Connectors Coldcalled:

Most of the damage here was caused by this hand against a 87/46/1.6 over 236 hands.

Party Poker, $1/$2 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 5 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter

SB: $292.30
BB: $207.05
UTG: $420.65
Hero (CO): $322.80
BTN: $263

Pre-Flop: Q K dealt to Hero (CO)
UTG raises to $8, Hero calls $8, 3 folds

Flop: ($19) 4 Q T (2 Players)
UTG bets $12, Hero calls $12

Turn: ($43) 9 (2 Players)
UTG bets $28, Hero calls $28

River: ($99) 7 (2 Players)
UTG bets $98, Hero calls $98

Results: $295 Pot ($2 Rake)
UTG showed K J (a straight Nine to King) and WON $293 (+$147 NET)
Hero mucked Q K (a pair of Queens) and LOST (-$146 NET)

There doesn't seem to be a filter for c/ring. I'm not sure how PokerTracker did it but as a guess:

Out of 2762 times I saw a flop OOP I check raised 60 times or 2.17%.
Out of 1342 times I saw a turn OOP I check raised 14 times or 1.04%.
Out of 858 times I saw a river OOP I check raised 4 times or 0.47%.

So about 1.57% overall.

But if I did it by times when I checked and there was a bet the percentage would be much higher, 5.64% for all streets.

Overall it looks pretty good and no major leaks anywhere.

HU:

Dear God that's fucking brutal, I don't even want to talk about it.

How the fuck can I be losing money on the BTN at HU???? Hyachachachachacha.

Week 5

2008-06-29T17:07:00.000-07:00

6max:

HU:

Bankroll is down to $5,905

I went back up to 200nl HU Monday morning, broke even. My button VPIP went down to 67%, folding the button is the new opening the button imo. Played a bit of 6max in the evening, made half a buy-in, but the tables were very quiet so I went to play some HU instead. I ended up dropping a little under 2 buy-ins there.

I cashed out $500 and moved another $500 to PokerStars for when I get the tourney bug. Ended up playing a few tourneys in the evening, down about $100.

Tuesday morning I played a little 6max, dropped half a buy-in. Dropped another 3 buy-ins at 200nl HU in the afternoon but managed to clear another $10 from my bonus, woohoo.

I won 3 buy-ins at 6max on Wednesday, hit 2 straight flushes with JTs as well. Only had time to put in one session though.

I took a day off on Thursday, only watched one video.

Had a good day Friday, didn't put in a morning session but won 5 buy-ins in the evening at 6max so I'm happy with that. Played a few tourneys that night, didn't cash so down about $170 from them.

Dropped a little over 5 and a half buy-ins Saturday morning at 6max. I was sneezing a lot in that morning, probably hayfever or something, and that made me feel a little groggy. I felt like I made some pretty poor calls in spots and I just couldn't get anything going. I won back a buy-in in the afternoon.

Sunday morning I decided to make a 6max video to apply for the leak finder series on CardRunners, won a little under a buy-in. The video took forever to render so I didn't get a chance to put in a second session. Read another chapter in my book though.

My bankroll seems to be going backwards at the moment and I'm not getting in a lot of hands either. Going to have to get the finger out and put in some effort. I think I'm going to stick to 100nl HU from now on until I get some coaching or something. I should really cut out the tourneys as well but it's an o.k. way to pass a few hours, I can play them tired and I should be massively +EV in them so I don't mind too much.

Week 4

2008-06-22T14:43:00.000-07:00

6max:

HU:

Bankroll is down to $6,778

I spent most of Monday morning trying to get HoldemManager to import from GJP, turned out I just needed to update to the latest version. Ended up dropping a little over 3 buy-ins at HU which isn't a great start but not to worry.

Made a little over a quarter buy-in at 6max, I was down 2 buy-ins at one stage but then poker became easy again.

Another b - r - utal day of heads-up, down a little under 4 buy-ins. Looking at the graph it shows that I'm running almost $1K below expectation for the 2 days. I'm going to drop down to 100nl to rebuild. I'll stick to 200nl 6max though.

6max went a lot better and I won over 3 buy-ins. I'm going to move another grand over to GJP.

I finished fooled by randomness Wednesday morning and proceeded to lose another 3 and a half buy-ins at 100nl HU. I'm on a 10 buy-in downswing at HU which, while not unusual, suggests I need to do something differently. At the moment I've been opening 100% of buttons unless my opponent is a massive fish, I think I'm going to tighten up a little bit and see if that helps. Here's some interesting discussion about the pros and cons of opening 100% on the button. Lost a little under 2 buy-ins at 200nl 6max in the afternoon.

Thursday I took a day off, watched a couple of videos, read two more chapters of my book but mostly just relaxed.

Friday I decided to play 6max in the morning because I wasn't really in the mood for HU, I won a bit over 2 buy-ins. In the afternoon I won another 3 buy-ins, my first $1k day. Finally popped my cherry .

Didn't get a lot of hands in Saturday morning, broke even. Dropped a buy-in in the afternoon. I played a couple of tourneys on Stars later on but didn't cash.

I couldn't get any tables going on party Sunday morning so I went to play some HU instead, won 6 buy-ins at 100nl which was very nice. I brought my button VPIP down to 74%. I didn't get sucked out on at all and even managed to put a bad beat on a short stack, great success. I played a little 6max in the evening and broke even.

So a bad start to the week but made it back and pretty much broke even. I've also cleared $30 of my $500 deposit bonus on GJP. I can't remember any interesting hands that I played, hopefully there'll be 1 or 2 worth discussing next week.

Week 3

2008-06-15T17:04:00.000-07:00

My bankroll is up to $6,866.

I managed to get my small blind VPIP down to a nitty 33% as well.

Sunday night I got a cleaning bug and tidied up a load of my room. I'm going up to my parents on Wednesday so I'll probably finish cleaning and move a load of stuff I'm unlikely to need very often up there. It's strange how once you're into a routine you have way more time and energy for stuff. During the school year I was really lazy but now I seem to be getting loads of stuff done. I used to go to the gym about 4 times a week but that was about 5 years ago now and I've never been able to get back into that routine, hopefully once I've forced myself to go a few times it'll get easier.

Monday morning I played round 2 of the boards heads-up tournament with Oscar (Bohsman), I won 2 - 0. It was a good game, he missed some big draws in crucial spots which definitely helped me.

I won a little under a buy-in at 200nl, I felt I played o.k. I might have over adjusted in a couple of spots although, with the amount of hands I play, when I feel like I'm being played back at I usually am. There were lots of nits, which is great, but a couple of decent ones as well who were adjusting to me. Some of the fish I played at 100nl tightened up a lot at 200nl which was annoying. I cashed out $200 as well.

Second session went well and I won another 2 buy-ins. The tables were getting quiet and I didn't mind booking a win so I only got in about 500 hands for the whole day. There were 3 aggro regs on one of the tables I was playing at which was nice since I got AK twice, however the fish I was there for tightened up a lot, probably because he wasn't getting a chance to limp that much. I played a few tourneys on stars, didn't cash.

Tuesday morning was very quiet so I added in a couple of 100nl tables as well so I could get some hands in. I made about 1 and a half buy-ins at 100nl and 1 and a half at 200nl. I was playing pretty tight (by my standards) but I wasn't getting that many hands. Made a bad stack off against a nit as well, doh. I may struggle to clear this reload bonus in time.

Second session there was more action but I ended up dropping 2 and a half buy-ins.

I had an insanely head wrecking start to the day Wednesday, 1 guy called my 4bet OOP with JJ and flopped his set against my AA. I had a fish call me down with trips while I was value betting top pair. The same fish called me down while I was value betting top pair and the board four flushed on me, then it happened again against another fish only this time I had two pair. I had to play 1 or 2 tables of 100nl for a while again, and broke even there. I can't complain too much though since I finished the session up 3 buy-ins.

I didn't get a chance to put in a second session as I had a meeting. I got "Fooled by Randomness" by Nassim Taleb back from a friend and started into that.

Thursday morning was very quiet so I didn't get started until about 2. The tables didn't really pick up until about 3 or 3.30. I made a quarter of a buy-in but managed to get in about 450 hands which gave me a little under 100 party points and put a nice dent into my reload bonus. I needed 1250 points to clear the bonus and with the rest of today, Friday and Saturday to go I've still got to get in a little over 600 more points so I'll hopefully get it done in time but the lack of action in the mornings is a big problem. It's all very dramatic if you ask me. Will RedJoker clear his reload bonus in time and save the world or will the evil Anurag Dikshit fuck him over?????

Find out the exciting climax.........after this hand:

Party Poker, $1/$2 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter

SB: $335.65
BB: $247
Hero (UTG): $462.75
MP: $203
CO: $208
BTN: $308.50

Pre-Flop: A T dealt to Hero (UTG)
Hero raises to $8, MP folds, CO calls $8, 3 folds

Preflop is standard, all AXs are an open for me from any position. I get a call from the CO who's playing 20/14/3.7 over 474 hands. His slightly passive stats indicate that he probably has a fairly wide coldcalling range here. Something like 22 - JJ, 45s - KQs, 64s - KJs, KQo, AQo and maybe some suited aces or two gappers as well. Sometimes he may even turn up with some offsuit broadways or connectors as well.

Flop: ($19) 5 3 Q (2 Players)
Hero bets $10, CO calls $10

I flop an overcard, backdoor flush draw and two backdoor gutshots. This is a pretty dry flop so I can bet a little smaller. Anywhere from 1/2 to 2/3 pot would be my standard here and I'd usually mix it up a bit.

The small bet is designed to sometimes take the pot down cheaply without risking too much and induce calls from weak made hands; 66 - JJ, 54s/65s and complete air looking to float. This bet size will get bluff raised a decent amount as well but that's fine because, if I feel that his frequencies are skewed, I'm comfortable 3bet bluffing and I don't expect anybody at 200nl to be capable of bluff shoving over that.

I'd make the same size bet with made hands as well because there's very few draws on this board; 64s/67s.

Turn: ($39) 6 (2 Players)
Hero bets $34, CO calls $34

The turn is an interesting card. The reason for making a small cbet to induce light calls is because I'm going to be following up on a huge amount of turn cards. I'd check back a Q or a non spade 3 or 5 most of the time though. This bet will fold out most underpairs and floats which make up a large portion of his range. So, even though they're ahead on the flop, they're putting their money in almost dead since they have to fold the turn.

The 6 is an interesting card because it's not really a great card to double barrel, it improves a lot of his 1 pair hands; 54s and 64s now have a pair and OESD, 67s has a pair and gutshot, 65s has two pair, 66 has a set.

However, it also gave me the nut flush draw so bombs away. My bet sizing is a lot bigger here because the board is now much wetter and I don't want him to call with weak made hands or float me again. If I had a strong made hand I'd bet this big for value against a pair of queens which I fully expect him to call with.

River: ($107) T (2 Players)
Hero checks, CO bets $80, Hero folds

I'm very unlikely to triple barrel a dry board because I don't expect anything in his range which called two streets to fold on the river. I've spiked second pair so I might now have some showdown value and had a decision to make about whether I wanted to block bet small on the river, check call or check fold.

Having called two barrels his range is likely to be AQ/KQ/QJs/QTs as well as the pair + draw stuff and, every so often, a slowplayed monster. I don't expect him to turn the small pairs into a bluff on the river and there's not a lot of pure air in his range so block betting and check calling don't seem great.

Results: $107 Pot
CO mucked and WON $184 (+$132 NET)

There was lots more action when I started my second session, made another half buy-in and, more importantly, another 150 party points.

Made another 1 and a half buy-ins Friday morning. Broke even in the evening but grinded out a lot of hands so shouldn't have any trouble clearing the bonus tomorrow.

I won a little over 2 buy-ins Saturday morning, lots of action on the tables for a change. It quietened down a lot during my second session, made another half buy-in and cleared my bonus. Bit of an anti-climax in the end.

I didn't play at all on Sunday, I needed a day off and it's father's day so I decided to have a break.

I'll move $2k over to GJP tomorrow and start playing HU. I'll probably play in the mornings if there's more liquidity since I only play 2 tables of HU at a time but I'll play 4 at 6max and sometimes 5 or 6 if there's good tables going.

Week 2

2008-06-08T11:02:00.000-07:00

Here's position stats and a graph for the month so far:

Bankroll is up to $4743 so I'll take a shot at 200nl tomorrow.

Monday morning started out poorly, I dropped about three buy-ins. I got check (min) raised a lot, probably should have folded a little more than I did though. Towards the end some of the better regs sat down at some of the tables and I didn't really adjust very well, should have tightened up a bit more. Live and learn.

I cleaned up my desk as well. I have enough distractions with SpadeEye and HoldemManager, no need to have anything else annoying me.

The second session went far better and I finished the day with a profit of a little over half a buy-in. I felt I was hand reading much better. There were 4 times that nits check raised or raised me on dry boards, I 3bet every one and they all folded. Easy money. I think the red bull definitely helped me so that's being added to the routine.

It was a weird day, I hit quads three times. I also had a fish call two barrels against me with ace high no draw.....unfortunately he was good. I had another fish call two barrels against me with king high, my ace high was good though. I must be doing something right I suppose :).

Tuesday morning I dropped a bit over 2 and a half buy-ins. A lot of the damage was caused by one fish who just couldn't miss. I got a mini fridge, it's an early fathers day present. Finished the day down a little under 3 and a half buy-ins.

Wednesday started off really well, couldn't miss and quickly ran up 4 and a half buy-ins. I got in a couple of marginal squeeze spots with JJ and TT and I'm not sure I'm happy with how I played them, dropped 3 buy-ins, won it back and finished off the day up a little over 3 buy-ins.

I couldn't play a second session as Jennifer (my girlfriend) had to go away so I was baby-sitting for the evening. I'm not sure it's called baby-sitting when it's your own child, probably parenting or something like that.

Thursday morning was pretty quiet, couldn't find a lot of good tables. I only got in about 300 hands before my break, made about half a buy-in. I got in another 500 hands when I got back, not great but again it was kinda quiet. Won another 2 buy-ins, made a couple of good hero calls which I was happy with. Got very lucky against a fish as well.

Here's an interesting hand. Villain is 52/4/2 over 23 hands.

Party Poker, $0.50/$1 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter

Hero (BTN): $100
SB: $61.11
BB: $98.07
UTG: $21.50
MP: $39.88
CO: $140.33

Pre-Flop: 8 A dealt to Hero (BTN)
2 folds, CO calls $1, Hero raises to $5, 2 folds, CO calls $4

I isolate with A8o otb, fairly standard most of the time.

Flop: ($11.50) 2 8 3 (2 Players)
CO checks, Hero bets $7, CO calls $7

His range for limp calling is pretty wide here. I flop TPTK on a moderately wet board. My bet size is about 2/3 pot which I feel is fine for this board, probably could have been a little bigger though.

Turn: ($25.50) Q (2 Players)
CO checks, Hero bets $18, CO calls $18

Turn is an offsuit queen which is pretty much a blank but may be a scare card for him. I'd probably double barrel here sometimes but not often. I considered checking to control the pot, sometimes induce a river bluff and get him to call a river bet lighter.

However, I felt there were enough draws and weaker made hands in his range that value betting and checking back the river would be the better play. I bet about 3/4 pot on the turn, if I was double barreling I'd usually bet a little bigger but he doesn't know that and I want him to call with draws, weaker 8s and maybe 44 - 77.

River: ($61.50) 4 (2 Players)
CO bets $110.33 and is All-In, Hero calls $70 and is All-In

An offsuit 4 peels off and he overbet shoves. The 4 isn't a fantastic card because 34, 44, 56 and A5, are all in his range here. However, there's lots of missed flush draws and other missed straight draws that he can be bluffing. I also felt that he may check if he had hit a disguised draw but maybe not. He may even be turning Qxhh into a bluff here which briefly crossed my mind. Anyway, I made the call and was good.

Results: $201.50 Pot
Hero showed 8 A (a pair of Eights) and WON $198 (+$98 NET)
CO showed 5 4 (a pair of Fours) and WON $40.33 (-$59.67 NET)

I felt pretty tired after my second session, I'm not sure I'm cut out for grinding everyday. I may have to take a day off one day during the week, it'll give me time to study the game as well which I haven't had too much time for recently. I think I'll do this on Thursdays, it was pretty quiet, I have to do grocery shopping anyway and I'll be refreshed for the softer weekends.

I got onto Ian and set up an account with GreenJokerPoker, so once I've cleared my two reload bonuses on party I'll start playing HU over there. I have a few options, I could do HU every second day, for the second session each day or I might do Monday to Wednesday HU and Friday to Sunday 6max. I haven't decided yet. I also reread the first 5 chapters of Bobbo's Bible, my third time going through it.

Friday started well, made over 4 buy-ins. One hand really pissed me off though. I decided to slowplay my set just to mix it up a small bit. For some reason villain (25/17/2.2 over 101 hands) decided to check back the turn and min raised the river. I was considering shoving but I was completely confused as to what his range could be and what worse hands he'd call me with. 5 seconds left and I hit call. I was pretty unhappy with how I played this hand but maybe I'm just being results orientated.

Party Poker, $0.50/$1 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter

UTG: $105.50
MP: $98.50
CO: $98.50
BTN: $73.54
SB: $83.75
Hero (BB): $185.93

Pre-Flop: 9 9 dealt to Hero (BB)
UTG raises to $4, 2 folds, BTN calls $4, SB folds, Hero calls $3

Flop: ($12.50) 8 9 2 (3 Players)
Hero checks, UTG bets $7, BTN folds, Hero calls $7

Turn: ($26.50) T (2 Players)
Hero checks, UTG checks

River: ($26.50) 5 (2 Players)
Hero bets $18, UTG raises to $36, Hero calls $18

Results: $98.50 Pot ($3 Rake)
UTG showed 8 8 (three of a kind, Eights) and LOST (-$47 NET)
Hero showed 9 9 (three of a kind, Nines) and WON $95.50 (+$48.50 NET)

Second session went fairly awful, lost it all back and broke even for the day. Very frustrating. I decided to go play a live tourney in the Bank Casino for a change of pace, didn't cash.

I broke even Saturday morning, started off with a couple of bad beats AK < 94 and AK < AQ both AIPF but made it back. Made 3 buy-ins in my second session and cleared a $100 reload bonus. I got through the next 2 chapters of my book.

I started off my $250 reload bonus on Sunday morning, made 2 buy-ins and another 1 and a bit in the evening. So a nice end to the week after a neutral start.

Looking at my position stats I seem to be losing quite a bit from the SB, I think I'll have to tighten up a good bit from there, although 18 hundred hands is hardly conclusive. Otherwise I'm happy enough with my overall game.

The reload bonus will probably take most of the week to clear and I'd prefer to play 6max at the weekend so I'll probably start playing HU the week after.

First Week

2008-06-01T13:29:00.000-07:00

I'm using the term "week" pretty loosely here since it's only been 2 days. However, I've decided to do my updates on Sunday nights and I had a couple of interesting days getting settled in so I might as well put it up.

Posting stats over 2K hands is a little meaningless but I'll throw them up anyway. If there's any other stats you'd like me to add just let me know.

Next week I'll put up position stats as well as there should be a much bigger sample. I'll probably put up a graph too. The bankroll is up to $3749.

I spent most of Saturday morning setting up the HoldemManager hud. I had a bit of trouble getting SpadeEye to datamine in the background while I was playing though, it kept on lagging up the whole system. Since HoldemManager's hud won't launch on the table until a hand's been played that's going to be a nuisance, somebody please correct me if I'm wrong. Tables where all the players are unknown are great for finding fish so I'll probably have to clean up all the crap on my computer.

I had a good start to the day, running up a little over 5 buy-ins. I went for a break to get some lunch and started up another session. This one didn't go so well and I dropped about 4 and a half buy-ins. There were some coolers, second nut flush < nut flush and top two pair < bottom set on draw heavy board. There were also some bad beats, AA < KK and AKo < AKs both AIPF.

That may have tilted me slightly but I think the real reason I did so poorly was tiredness. I've mentioned before that I've had problems playing tired but if I want to get in any decent amount of hands I'll probably need to put in a second session a day. I think I'll have to start taking proper breaks, go to the gym, take Lauren (my daughter) to the park, etc. and hopefully come back refreshed. Otherwise I'll have to start taking midday naps and if the summer is any bit warm that's going to be uncomfortable and difficult.

I spent Sunday morning cleaning off my hard drive and most of the afternoon playing. Made about 4 buy-ins and decided to have a break. SpadeEye seemed to be working much better. I brought Lauren into town to pick up some stuff and got a 4 pack of red bull which should help to get the most out of the last few hundred hands each day. I left the computer to defragment while I was away but when I came back it still wasn't finished so I didn't get a chance to put in a second session.

I'll probably have to reformat the whole thing eventually but that's a lot of work so meh.

RoadSweeper mentioned that I should discuss some hands. I can't remember too many interesting ones but I thought this hand was somewhat interesting.

Party Poker, $0.50/$1 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter

MP: $104.83
CO: $118.23
BTN: $73.83
Hero (SB): $100.50
BB: $100
UTG: $113.63

Pre-Flop: 3 A dealt to Hero (SB)

3 folds, BTN calls $1, Hero calls $0.50, BB checks

Button's playing 71/15/2.4 over 150 hands. BB is unknown. I think calling here is fine, maybe a little marginal and if I wasn't in the mood to play it I might fold.

Flop: ($3) 8 9 3 (3 Players)
Hero bets $3, BB calls $3, BTN folds

I flop a pair so I lead out. I look for pretty much any excuse to bet in limped pots so bottom pair top kicker is as good as any. I'll often have the best hand but won't usually be called by much worse. It's more of a bet to take down the pot and a sort of 5 out semi-bluff if you will. Check calling would be fairly awful. The board's pretty wet so if I hadn't flopped anything I'd usually check fold. Check folding wouldn't be bad here either anyway.

Turn: ($9) K (2 Players)
Hero bets $7, BB folds

I get called on the flop by the unknown BB. His range probably includes any 8 or 9, as well as flush or open ended straight draws. If he's really bad it could be wider then that with any pair, gutshots and complete floats or if he's really nitty he may even fold some of the 8s.

The king is a pretty interesting card. If he has a pair of 8s or 9s I'd expect him to check behind if I check and maybe do the same with some of his straight draws. If he bets it's likely to be a flush or strong pair+. I'd expect to get to showdown a good bit if I check but I don't think I have too much showdown value.

In the end I decided to turn my hand into a bluff. I expect him to fold all 8s or 9s on this board as well as his straight draws. There's a chance he raises a flush draw on the flop and a flush or pair of kings is definitely in my range here.

Results: $9 Pot
Hero mucked 3 A and WON $15.05 (+$11.05 NET)

So a couple of things to sort out and problems to address. Overall I was kind of happy with my game, it's changed a lot in the two month break so naturally there'll be some teething problems. A lot of times I wasn't really thinking about my opponents' ranges that much and sort of auto-piloting but hopefully, once I'm more comfortable with my new style, I'll have more brain power available for reads.

Anyway, the stuff I got today included a dvd and a bottle of wine so I better head away before my girlfriend drinks it all.

Hey

2008-05-30T14:17:00.000-07:00

My exams are finally finished so I'm returning to poker after a 2 month study break.

This is the first time I've written a blog so I'm not sure what sort of stuff I'll be putting up but the plan for now is to post weekly updates of my results and maybe a more detailed review at the end of each month. If anybody has any suggestions, please leave me a comment.

My bankroll is currently at $3,240 and I'll be playing 100nl 6max until I hit somewhere between $4,000 - $5,000 and I'll probably wait for between $5,000 - $6,000 before taking shots at 200nl HU.

Bit about me:
I'm 21, I live with my girlfriend and 3 year old daughter. I'm just finished my third year of a four year degree in financial mathematics in UCC.

Poker story:
Played live tournaments for a couple of years in pubs and later casinos.

Played online tournaments and a small bit of cash as well on Irish Eyes after getting €20 free online credit from UCCPokerSoc.

Switched to cash games as my main game in February '07 after FutureDoc85 on 2+2 offered to help me out. Started at €10nl and moved up to €20nl. Moved my roll to PartyPoker in June '07 and started at $50nl. Moved up to 100nl fairly quickly.

Around this time I'd started a dealing job in a casino in Cork which involved me working 10pm to 5am 5 nights a week. This caused me to play extremely tired and I dropped 17 buy-ins at 100nl and another 8 at 50nl before finally realizing why I was losing. I bought a 6 month CardRunners subscription around this time.

I started to only play at the weekends and this continued when I went back to college. I gradually regained my confidence, got a couple hours of coaching from Slider on 2+2 and moved back up to 100nl. I learned how to play HU and started playing it on CakePoker.

I spent a lot of time at 100nl because I was only playing at the weekends and cashed out about $4,500 from December to March. I also bought a yearly subscription to LeggoPoker and another 6 months of CardRunners around February.

Near the end of March I was taking shots at 200nl, I bought BobboFitos' ebook but haven't played at all during April and May.

I'm really looking forward to being able to put in some solid hours for the first time in over a year, hopefully I'm not too rusty ;). The goal is to pay for a family vacation at the end of the summer.