October Review

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.