life and times of a grinder

Still Here - I Know its been a long time

2011-11-13T10:48:00.001-08:00

Still Here - I Know its been a long time

2010-12-30T06:17:00.001-08:00

Still Here - I Know its been a long time

2008-12-06T04:51:00.001-08:00

July & August updates soon !!

2008-09-02T22:25:00.001-07:00

New Coach and First Session

2008-07-27T09:48:00.000-07:00

So last night...Sat i had my first lesson with my new coach tubasteve off deauces cracked

It was a really interesting session , First off i played 2 tables for a while , whilst steve
sort of watched , trying to analyse my play without interfering , hope that wasnt too difficult
for him

There were a few interesting spots , but i think one of the most important things , if not the
most important thing was during the discussion we had at the end of the session , Steve was just
commenting about how 2 guys with ironman markers had just played a hand pretty standardly ,
i mentioned to him that i would rarely 4 bet AK and i think he said that was a BIG leak or maybe
he said HUGE whatever the comment was that sounded the alarm bells

He kindly did me the favour of explaining exactly how it was a HUGE leak , We pokerstoved AK versus a
pretty tight range , only 6% of hands for the relevant 3 bet from villain AK turned out to be A
very slight favourite about 52 48 , assuming the 4 bet had taken place we were able to fold out over
50% of the villains 3 bet range , we did however lose 10% equity and our hand was now a 60 40
underdog , but it was at the expense of 50% of his hand range !!

So that was the HUGE leak explained . Later in the evening i was in the cutoff with AK obviously raising
the 16/12 button 3 bet me , so after the session with Steve i waited a little and 4 bet
the button went all in , i called and was up against KK , luckily an ace came on the flop and
i won , im not sure if that was how it was meant to be and ill post the hand to my coach later
but that was how the hand turned out .
We touched on a couple of other things and i realized i am a book buyer but not a book reader as i had all
the books recommended but had only really glanced at them , anyway i am straying from the subject a little

The point of the post was really to illustrate how important it is to have somone able to pont out
things such as the AK situation . I mean i just would nt of ever 4 bet unless Steve had picked up on it

Not sure if this is exactly how i should have played it

www.pokerhand.org/?2953265

Anyway later all

Update

2008-07-20T11:55:00.000-07:00

so its been a short while since my last post so ill try and update everyone on whats going on

the repair to my pc is taking a little longer than expected so i have to use my laptop

this means i can only play realistically for me just the 2 tables so i have only played around 3500 hands although its at 3bb for about $100 so thats not too bad

on the studying side of things i have read the first 5 chapters of poker mindset
and its pretty cool to say the least , i really am developing the habit of trying to
make the right decision , and am less aware of the results

i also have been revisiting my pre flop play and have hopefully got the right mix
my post flop is improving too so more good news

and i have a new coach , yet to start my first lesson but thats too come

anyway , trying to keep up with all the blogs , will post some hands soon

later all

Just Posting

2008-07-11T15:01:00.000-07:00

Ok so its been a little quiet the last couple of days

Worked out that i can read a book whilst cycling at the gym. Awesome !!

It wasnt that i was allowed , just that the bike i was on had a suitable
handlebar rest , So i can study whilst at the gym now , and it was the poker mindset i was reading , so after reading the chapter 2 i immediately re read the part about studying , my weak spot . Sadly after getting back to the office i went on Lost Book Tilt !!! No kidding !!!

However although i lost about a buyin during the evening , i was very conscious of the fact that i was having a bad run of cards and that most of my decisions were ok
i think , tilt had ended by then

The following day , i found the book so i was well pleased ,
When i got home in the evening my computer had stopped , so i had to take it to the computer repairman

Thnakfully the laptop is ok so i can play a little , although there is no hud

Anyway , trying to keep the momentum going with the posting on my blog , and have even made some comments on others

Feeling good at the moment , about the game

Later

Help Wanted and Needed !!!

2008-07-07T15:19:00.000-07:00

I have recently been trying to open up from the cutoff and button, the problem is I am a little unsure of my preflop range from these positions

Here’s a few things that I am not sure of

Suited hands in the cutoff or button . What is the range here , would I raise a hand like Q7 in the cutoff or do I do it on the button or at all ?

I know it is player dependant but if I am going to open up I will have to raise more regardless of the players

How about J2 suited on the button , I would raise k7 suited from the cutoff and the button , but is that correct ?

The next area is when I have these hands and I am going to raise but get raised first , for example K10 suited I would normally raise from the cutoff and the button and depending on the table utg+1 but what if I am on the button and get a utg+1 or cutoff raiser ?
do I fold ? do I call ? What do I do ?

As well as the suited hands what about 1 gappers or 2 gappers and how far down do I go , currently I will raise 56off and up from the button in an unraised pot , is that correct ?

Then what about the higher cards when in a raised pot ? how about A10 or KQ do I fold raise or call , it is these marginal hands that I stuggle with

On the C betting side of things , what sort of percentages do you C bet against , I used to C bet all the time , but now I try for somone who folds over 70 percent, is that too high ? , should I go lower whats the right percentage

Sorry about the length and number of questions but I need answers

Later All

Graham

Question ?

2008-07-06T12:37:00.000-07:00

www.pokerhand.org/?2852869
www.pokerhand.org/?2852926

just confirm that i shouldnt be doing this sort of thing ?
i mean ive been playing long enough , i think !!

Poker Thoughts and Reflection

2008-07-06T01:58:00.000-07:00

So at the end of May the plan was to Reflect and comment on the year before . In true style that didn,t materialise So a little later than originally planned and more a reflection on my learnings and shortfallings and some general ramblings here is something

During June I got to realize that I call too much , particularly large turn bets when I am on a draw , looking back through June I can see this is a big leak !! Hopefully someone can confirm this

Another thing that I felt happened apart from the usual bad beats was I got involved with short stacks to much and my play against them was pretty much to feel they were committed and just get it all in at some stage , again I fell this is a leak

Whilst reading the blogs I came across an entry from Greg all about results and being results
Orientated , as with most things I sort of don’t get them straight away , they sort of slowly filter into me , and at some stage during June it finally all filtered through

So now the important things for me whilst playing are the decisions , I am less worried about the results or the variance to a degree and far more concerned with the decisions I am making
So that is a good point

I will high light some week points in my poker life and hopefully this will stimulate my brain a little . Firstly I don’t really study , I play , don’t ask me why but I just do , id much rather play than pick up a book or watch a video , I have and I do both , but not as part of any plan , and maybe theres a thing there , NO PLAN !!

Wow I just realized another really important thing , I seldomly review hands !! how can I have forgotten that !! that’s a nother thng I need to work on !!

“And One More Thing “ !! in the words of Jackie Chan’s Uncle ( you have to watch the cartoon !! )

I don’t sweat or blog enough !!

So at some stage of the month I intend to formulate a plan or timetable for my poker playing
And studying and try to work it into my lifestyle

Although the above doesn’t run in a particular order within this entry it should be way way at the top . This is a big leak , Lack of Discipline , like I said I play more than I study

Please comment with ideas on the above !! and how you do these things

Edit …man I need to make a plan…a proper plan…

PS… any tips on hand reading

Ok .. This entry probably reflects my poker life , Unorganised… that’s probably the best word to use

July Goal - ORGANISATION

June

2008-07-05T11:25:00.000-07:00

Ok ...A couple of things ... At the end of May i had been playing 50NL
for a year... The plan was to reflect and see what i had an hadn,t learnt
and where i feel i am at present regarding this game...

First the results ...

12 months at 50 nl

2008-05-31T01:23:00.000-07:00

Yep thats how long ive been playing 50nl now

Im going to take the weekend off and try to make some sense of what ive learnt
over the last year !!

Whilst i appreciate that i could probably do this at any time , it does seem like a suitable time to do this

I will try and evaluate my strengths and weakneses and work out a strategy
for the coming year

One thing i am sure is that i lack discipline in my poker life and this is one area that is a leak for sure and one area i really need to work on

Later all

May - And 12 months at 50nl Cash Games

2008-05-31T01:09:00.000-07:00

Still a long long way to go !!!

Ok I have finished for May , I am on a downswing so although my results seem good i feel like shit !! Honestly !! Feel like losing when i am winning !!

Here is the evidence !!

5206452151043684818" />

May Goals - Of Sorts

2008-05-08T23:27:00.000-07:00

This month i want to try and consolidate from my April performance
One thing that stands out in May already is that i focus better when playing only 2 tables .

I find it easier to pick out the weaker players ( although my hud stats indicate this anyway , its good that i can pick them out from ther play too )

I also find it easier to pick spots to isolate them and am prepared to make riskier decisions against them.

It obviously also gives me more time to put players on ranges too

So that sort of the first goal

The next goal is to try and get more sweats conversations in with players
This is one of my weak spots but i had a short conversation recently and it gave me a couple of hints / ideas

One was , whilst reviewing top winning , losing , tricky hands , to try and put yourself in your opponents position , so play his hand as opposed to yours , this was a new idea for me so i was quite pleased

Another little pointer was about limpers who limp after a raise and a limp
ie i raise 4x say the sb calls and the bb calls , obviously if the bb has a premium hand then he should be squeezing , so if he doesnt squeeze maybe we can give him a more defined range ( maybe )

So thats the second goal

Later

April In Words - of sorts !!

2008-05-05T11:15:00.000-07:00

Well after the results the previous month i was alittle worried about April
and as has been pretty much been standard i started off with a losing run

I could not really put my finger on anything in particular although i know for sure that early in April my small blind completion was horrific easily beating my button play

I continued to study my excel spreadsheet desperately trying to find the leaks and then thought the only answer was a session with my coach. After a few days of trying to arrange a lesson he sent me an email suggesting that i was a little anal about my spreadsheet ( my words not his ) and that it may be distracting me form the real task which was playing poker and focusing on the hands more .

After a few minutes deliberation , i had to come to the conclusion that he was right
It pretty much coincided with my upswing and therefore felt his theory had strength
around this time i also reduced the number of tables to 2 or 3 and tried to focus on playing against the weaker players more if possible .The combined results seemed good
and i went on a 10 buyin run which for me is quite good ( unheard of actually !! )

Then a small downswing when i got it all in deepsatcked with the Ace high flush only to run into a royal !! . The remaining 3k hands i think was spent watching people fold as i was dealt AA after AA and KK after KK many any times , i am surprised i didnt tilt on lots of ocasions but just concentrated on the hands . I did in fact quit on a few occasions when i had been dealt AA twice And KK twice and people just kept folding . I couldnt bear it . I finally managed to grind it out to $500 dollars and stopped as i was feeling pleased

Well That was April !!

2008-04-30T15:48:00.001-07:00

Comments on the month to follow !! But as i have had a better month i feel like posting . None of this " you only sing when youre winning " mularky here !!

Comments Please

2008-04-14T23:14:00.000-07:00

http://weaktight.com/161616
http://weaktight.com/161617

Ok heres another 2 hands i feel i misplayed

How should i have played the trips

With the kings , the guy was 18/16 , i felt the 10 was in his range
and by the time i realized he wasnt slow playing it was too late

When should i have realized his hand was weak ?

Comments Please

2008-04-14T22:55:00.001-07:00

Ok , quick description of play ,
In hand 1 im utg with JJ raise the villain and get an all in bet , i have been at the table for about 2 hands

http://weaktight.com/160790

So after a few more hands the stats come up , he is 68 20 i have seen him do this min raise about 4 or 5 times
so i pretty much know hes hasnt a huge hand

I have also seen him c bet too , the question is , does anyone not call this all in bet ?
from what i have seen of him and also his stats , i must call

http://weaktight.com/160796

I suppose my final question is , would anyone call his all in bet with JJ ?

Later guys

SIGNS OF SUCK !!

2008-04-10T23:00:00.000-07:00

I think Greg has a lot of insight into this game

Calling flop bets OOP
Calling three bets with the wrong hands
Calling with offsuit broadways
Excessive Aggression with weak made hands
Excessive blind play
Excessive c-bets
Not betting the best hand

Where To Start !!

2008-04-09T23:07:00.000-07:00

Ok Where To Start !!

March was probably one of the worst months i have had since i started playing cash games last June ans it has taken me this long to recover in order to post to my blog

I had high expectations of myself and they certainly did not materialise

The first problem i had was losing my poker tracker records which sort of tilted me
for a few days .

Then i had 2 weeks where i lost al the time at 50nl , lots of tilt play which stemmed from a bad beat that i could not cope with. Forunately for me i won a few hands at 100nl and one big hand at 200nl where i probably only played 15 hands AA held up against QQ

My major problems are calling down hands that i really should not be in to start with and also my small blind play is very poor and i am playing way too many hands
from this position.

On thing i have noticed though was that my big wins and big losses sort of netted themselves out so i am confused as to where i lost the money , thinking back probably in calling turn bets too much then folding on the river ,

This month tarted off a little better but i am still a couple of buy ins down at 50nl and sadly i have turned into a nit playing 17 15 or 16 14 i know thats no way to play for sure .

Anyway hopefully i can recover and post a better month this month

Apologies for the lack of updates but i just didnt have it in me

Anyway Good luck at the tables

Graham

Hand Ranges Additions

2008-03-15T02:38:00.001-07:00

Hi These are hands ranges of an unknown person !!! lol !!!

Im sure it doesnt matter at the stakes i play at present

Does anyone have any additions or would anyone replace any hands
The yellow represents the utg ranges and the blue represents the late pos range

i thnk this is your standard 20 /18 type player

Hand Ranges Additions

2008-03-15T02:38:00.000-07:00

Dissapointed !!

2008-03-08T00:33:00.000-08:00

Well this week has been a bit of a dissapointment to be honest and i just need to get this off my chest !!

Although its not really the week but , mainly this morning , Saturday am , that has me feeling like this

I try to play FT early in the mornings and late at night if i can and this mornings session went pretty crappy , i ran KK into AA early in the session.

Now i will nevere ever ever fold KK preflop NEVER !!! but i just resigned myself to losing , i was on the button the guy play 11/8 in the bb had 3 bet my $2 dollar raise , i 4 bet him to $17 he went all in ! AA for sure so i had too call

This must have tilted me as i made to poor calls afterwards whilst trying to regain my money ( thats an obvious sign of tilt !! )

One was to a guy playing 74 / 40 on a K7Q9 board rainbow ish he went all in with
his $285 stack after my double barrel bet of about $8 , i was convinced he had nothing....mmmmmm trip 9s are not nothing . I had K7

Strange as i very rarely make thes donkish type calls

The second one was a sb raise when i was holding AQs , i re raised to $6 and he went allin , His AK held up !!

Hopefully ive gotten these stupid calls out of my system , hence the need to write about them

Earlier in the week i deleted my pokertracker database but luckiilly i had recored the daily play in my spreadsheet . Here are the results so far , im am dissapointed !!

So all in all a pretty donkish week . Im just going to go outside and scream really loudly !!

Donk Hand 1
www.pokerhand.org/?2232852

Donk Hand2
www.pokerhand.org/?2232850

Random Story - Relevant Though

2008-03-02T02:30:00.001-08:00

I come from a Rugby town . Gloucetser ! I think at one stage in recent history , Gloucestershire had more Rugby teams per square foot and per poplation than anywhere else in the world , I think that may still apply.

However my love was football so as a pretty talented footballer it was difficult getting any sort of recognition . As a teenager who loved the game i probably spent as much time playing rugby as i did football !!

As i grew older , late teens early twentys , i was fortunate to play with a group of
pretty talent players , one in particular shone !! sadly he was a little small at around 16 17 18 when most pros would be picked . As a gruop of friends we all had varying levels of succes at semi pro footbal .

It sounds really strange but seemingly weeks after his 21st birthday our talented friend suudenly shot up from around 5ft 5 to a massive 6ft 1 , outrageous !!

Anyway this could do nothing but improve his chances of making it to the dizzy heights of proffesional football , we had all heard of Kevin Keegan back then
started playing pro football at 23 !! so we still had a chance

Finally despite a series of unfortunate events i.e postponemnet of a trial , acceptance of a trial and then the sacking of the manager who was about to employ him , he finally made it ( thats a story about determination , maybe another time )

After about 8 to 9 months we were wondering when he was going to play his first game . The season in which he was signed had almost finished , he said he didnt know and that it may be the following season . When we enquired as to what he had been doing his Frustrated cry was " Theyve stuck me in the F&$+ing GYM " They said im to weak

Jsesus !! was our answer , man this guy in our eyes was nt weak no way , but anyway that was what they had done to him nearly a whole season in the gym developing his physique . We could nt believe it, but hey who are we to question professionals !!

So in our wisdom off we went to the gym and incorporated it into our schedules

The relevance !! for goodness sake i here you cry !!

WELL !! weightlifting at the gym is all about pumping iron !! right !! WRONG

Weightlifting , Bodybuilding is not just about pumping iron , in factsome people would argue its only about 50% the other half !! well thats down to dieting and discipline too

If we took my time available to play poker in my current climate , man would i be pumping some iron , and seeing the results right !! Wrong again

Im pumping iron all right but there is not much dicipline and im on a poor poor diet .

So one of my goals this month is to review my hands and study nearly as much as
i play or at least 25%of the time . Poker is as we all know not just about playing
which i have been guilty of in the past but hopefully not in the future

Man that was a long story for a short point !!

February....Results & Progress

2008-03-01T03:10:00.000-08:00

Well February is over and here are the obligatory figures !! Sadly the presentation is not the greatest , however the content is there

Firstly i want to apologise for the lack of updates and blogs and for my poor participation within my group , Hoever i hope ill be forgiven as i have been concentrating on a shed load of hands this month ( for me that is !! )

Since i started playing NL back in June / July one of my biggest challenges has been to reduce the difference between VPIP and PFR , i have tried everything , at least i thought i had !!

Towards the end of January i had sort of had enough , not of poker !! but of not being able to work this out . I was convinced there was no need for any coaching whatsoever until i had sorted this out !! And i was also convinced that the comment that misanthorpic got on one of his posts in January about how a coach could sort out a few problems etc etc was completely wrong .

How wrong i was !!

Late in January i arranged to sessions with a coach to see if he could help
I have had coaching on a few occasions previoulsy but they sort of took a cut and played your hands for you , that sort of thing .It never really worked for me .

Anyway this was different !! within a session i had already been set upon my path
to reducing the difference between my VPIP & PFR although it was through changing my style a little . Im not sure what went on but it really changed my understanding of the game .

I had a great start to Feb and reached a high of 7 buyins only to experience a 10 buyin downswing from my peak until the second coaching session when he re corrected some of my mistakes which i had been slowly falling back into and the rest of Feb was pretty comfortable , at least thats how i feel

I feel a little enlightened and cannot wait for March and although i have said this many times i am hoping March will be the real deal

I intend to get in more sweats take part in my forum more too anyway that the update for now

Heres to March everyone and Good Luck !!

Gis A Job... I can do that !!

2008-02-19T09:19:00.000-08:00

"I was a great tilter. I knew all the different kinds. I could do steaming-tilt, simmering tilt, too loose tilt, too agressive tilt, too passive tilt, playing too high tilt, playing too long tilt, playing too tired tilt, annoyed tilt, injustice tilt, frustration tilt, sloppy tilt, revenge tilt, underfunded tilt, shame tilt, distracted tilt, scared tilt, envy tilt, this-is-the-worst-pizza -ive-ever-had tilt, i-just-got-showed-a-bluff-tilt and of course the classics: i-gotta-get-even-tilt and i-only-have-so-much-time-to-lose-this-money-tilt, also known as demolition-tilt."

The Enlightened Tommy Angelo !!

VP$pip PFR Catagorization

2008-02-09T04:25:00.000-08:00

Hey Check out Inspirions recent post on player categorization
Looks good

Short Piece

2008-02-09T01:09:00.000-08:00

Im going to do research and write a small piece about emotions and how they relate to poker , and how we can sometimes feel like were losing when really were are winning , obvioulsy the reverse can apply and we can be winning when really we are losing

It will hopefully be a lot about state of mind and how we can make efforts to control it and maybe even change it and there maybe a few other ideas in there to

I have been motivated a little by reading a few blogs and realizing how useful they can be , Whiskey Chasers is always informative and fun to read , but its also a record !! A record of things that have happend . I used to keep a diary of all the
good things that happend during the week and then review them at the end of the week . So if my Friday was a bad day it would not mean i had had a bad week as i had all these other good things going on throughout the week that i had forgotten

Anyway this is just jabber so ill leave it for my piece

Later

Just a Couple of things

2008-02-07T00:02:00.000-08:00

As i am sure we are all doing , i have been working on my game recently , one area ,
although its difficult to work on , more like waiting for the opportunity , is the sueeze play .

I have introduced this recently into my game and came accross these 2 examples
although on the 2nd hand i didnt actually make the play

www.pokerhand.org/?2060858

www.pokerhand.org/?2060864

The major reason for this is that there was a shorty who had called the raise and
it was my feeling that if i did raise he would just go all in with the remainder of his stack , and i didnt fancy my chances in a coin flip with 3s . Im not sure if that was the right play , but thats what i did .

This brings me on to another point and maybe an example of how my game is improving . I remember reading the Justin Bonomo piece about how people learn and i sort of though...if this situation i.e. the 3s had happened to me earlier in my developement AND the result had been that i had lost my hand...i would have learnt INCORRECTLY that the squeeze doesnt work

Obviously i would have needed a couple more failures to reinforce this. But i just
goes to show how easily we can learn the wrong things and it was just sort of pleasing that i was aware of this at the time .

Obviously checked out Dodgy,s blog as per normal and loved the question . I have never thought to myself "what do i find difficult when playing opponents and then
decided to try it out against my opponents" so thanks very much for the thought
Martin , much obliged

Anyway Good Luck at the tables !!

February Focus Points

2008-02-04T23:29:00.000-08:00

My Main Focus Points

W$WSF

BUTTON PLAY
CUTOFF PLAY
NOT COMPLETING SB LIGHT

Do You Know Who i Am MoFo !!

TABLE IMAGE

My Guns !!

3 BETTING
DOUBLE BARRELLING
FLOATING
SQUEEZE PLAY
VALUE BETS

Whoops !!

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

February has started off ok so far , i had a little bit of luck too !

Man check out my pair of Tens and the squeeze play that didnt work !
What pair of Tens i hear you ask !

http://www.pokerhand.org/?2037850

By the time i had realized it was too late !!

Off to the Opticians !!

Results - Looking Ugly

2008-02-02T05:44:00.001-08:00

Well that went well then !!

Obviously not , As usual there are positives

1 i played over 11,000 hands , which for me is quite a lot , so thats good
2.........hang on.........there must be another

MMMM nothing springs too mind

Anyway , to be honest i felt like i was playing ok for most of the time
there was a really bad start , which i sort of recovered from and then went on a 14 buyin downswing ,and the a semi recovery

Part of the downswing was due to 2 session of 8 tabling madness where i was convinced that i could recover as i was playing ok !!! yep... i honestly thought that

My aim in Januaty was to reduce the difference between my PFR and VPIP
as well as continuing on from December , However i think the problem in my game is i am too tight from the Cutoff and the Button .

I think if i had aimed to open up more from these positions more and maybe called a little less that would have solved my problem .Any way thats what i will be working on over the next few weeks.

During the month i became an analytical madman and started analysing everything
possible . Check out my daily Excel figures !!

Also did a couple of sweats with Baz which were cool .

Anyway despite my poor results i think this has been a learning month and like
Rasputin i am learning the hard way ( its good for the soul , you know )
and i am becoming more comfortable with my play . i hope..

On a lighter note my wife is back from Cyprus and i think the news is positive . Her Father,s cancer whilst progressive is treatable and they are starting straight away
They think the results will be noticable immediately and could extend his life by 2 or more years . Which for an 82 year old is i suppose is good

Anyway Good luck at the tables for Feb

Blogging

2008-01-29T23:40:00.000-08:00

Hi I should be able to blog a little later on with an update on the month
just been really busy though , ooking after my son this week

Later

Graham

Weekly Update

2008-01-20T11:40:00.000-08:00

Well another week finished and i am sitting here once again looking back on the week and reflecting...

Poker wise my week is definately split into two parts Mon - Thur and then the weekend . This weekend i think has been pretty succesful . I have spent a lot of time digesting information from blogs . Marcs time management piece and Gregs downswing control have been pretty interesting this week. I also read some of the guys blogs and realized that i am too results orientated , and have managed to not worry too much about this

The Mini forum that Pete has created is pretty awesome really , whilst we may not have a massive audience , it certainly provides immediate and constant replies , occasionally on the cr forum you may not have always got an opinion or replies to posts whereas with ours you pretty much get replies from everyone which is cool to be honest

Obviously not suggesting that this is replacing anything but its nice to have a tight nit group forming that you can rely on to give answers and provide questions

Also been checkng out a few other blogs , I can honestly say poker wise its been a pretty relaxing weekend . Easily met my target of 2.5k per week so far and whilst the resilts have not gone my way , i am certainly feeling comfortable with my game

Finally got the floating bit as well , im not sure on which blog i read it but it was written so simply that after i tried it out a few times with success i just got it , really pleased

Life wise there has been a bit of variance . Im not sure how my wife is coping with
the news about her father , the major problem is that she is so far away and whilst
they are a huge family its very difficult for them all to co-ordinate movements back and forth to Cyprus . The other problem they have is that the information that keeps
coming from the doctors is sometimes contradictory and / or confusing for them , so there are ups and downs every couple of days , one thing for sure is that he is very ill

I dont want to get all emotional about stuff as this happens to people all the time but
death cerainly changes your view on things and puts things into perspective or maybe not , but hey thats just life

Spent a lot of time on and off throughout out the weekend with my boy , playing here and there in between poker relaxing so all in all its been a pretty cool week , i think . Ahh thats sure to get the doomswitch going for sure anyway

later

Hands to analyse - Feel free

2008-01-15T23:45:00.000-08:00

youre welcome to look....these are hands for me to reviewbut youre welcome to comment...i feel i have definately lost money on these hands...more than i should have...but ill do a summary underneath each one

www.pokerhand.org/?1946923
i think this is the hand i am msot dissapointed with as its preety player dependant...i have history with this player and should have realised something was up when his re raise came...whilst i am not sure if i would have got away i now think the call of his minraise was a mistake...i feel that if i re raised him i certainly would have got the message...he is a very passive player

www.pokerhand.org/?1946925
so i have QQ i re raise the 2 limpers in the hope of either isolating one or making them both fold....i get 2 callers...the flop i dont know about...is this a good flop for me...should i have checked...i dont know...am i being over aggressive with this hand...what would i have been called with that i can beat 1010 ? JJ ? i think thats about it...but if someone bets whats my play 3 handed is always tricky...the pots big is someone going to take a stab at it ? i am unsure on this hand ...think its variance

www.pokerhand.org/?1946931
so the guy flops a set...i have TPTK and lead out...i get the min raise...i have no stats and cant remeber if ihad any...anyway i dont think the re-raise is bad...but he minraises again...i am thinking i could have called the original min raise and possibly checked the turn...and waited to see what he did

www.pokerhand.org/?1946934
whilst i feel i played this hand nice and aggressive to the river ...i really think it is obvious that he has the 3rd ten...there would be no way he would bet all in without the goods...i think...i could have saved myself $22 probably

www.pokerhand.org/?1946936
Standard unless somone tells me otherwise

www.pokerhand.org/?1946939
ok another hand where i feel i could have had some sort of pot control.Imo im not sure of AK is strong enough for an all in bet . I certainly think that i could have called and maybe check folded...but i dont know...opinions please.personally i think i gace money away here

www.pokerhand.org/?1946944
cooler... f me i hate these !!

www.pokerhand.org/?1951881
another cooler wtf

www.pokerhand.org/?1951891
K10 versus trips

www.pokerhand.org/?1951896
ok i think this is an interesting hand...i raise on the button and get called by the bb..this is a standard call i feel as i could easily be making a play...the c bet is pretty standard again but the raise...what does it mean ?...looking back i think its a i have a big hand raise !!!...and it looks like im going all the way !!!...i think a fold would have been acceptable under the cicumstances...

www.pokerhand.org/?1951899
another cooler i think...i think i may try raising these $1 raises a little higher
i mean what the fuck is he doig calling with 10J ?...and then again calling the turn bet f me...i have him on a flush draw and want hin to pay was igutted when he turned ovev the 10J

www.pokerhand.org/?1951900
although this is not a cooler as such its definately variance of some kind...standard raise and cbet...iagain i think the min raise here is a sign of
strength. i should have spotted it and maybe checked called of check folded
the all in bet was a poor decision

weaktight.com/83256
this is a poorly played hand...i must have been tilted here ...i cant see why onearth i am calling thses bets...the guy is short stacked and for this reason i think his range tightens so a Q is definately there...really should not have called the all in bet DONK !!!

www.pokerhand.org/?1951908
cooler...at least its not all bad play !!

www.pokerhand.org/?1951910
well this is bad play i am sure...for starters i should not have called this stupid $1 raise from now on its raise or fold these...i have TPTK the guy leads out and i call...he bets the turn and i call that too..DONK...then he makes abig bat on the river and i fold...really poor play...there was plenty of opportunity too make a play to find out where i was...i needed a plan but didnt have one

www.pokerhand.org/?1951911
another cooler...i knew he had a weak ace and the river bet confirmed it...anyone fold the river here ?

Video

2008-01-13T10:50:00.001-08:00

omg i made a video

just in case there is anyone out there who wants to see how i play , and sound !!

i had a few problems , firstly the hud didnt appear on the vid but i can assure you
that i can see stats , also it crashed towards the end when i was trying to go through my pokertracker stats

grinders is the password

please any advice welcome in a nice way , until i get a grip of these things

later

Video Upload Pending

Poorly Played Hands

2008-01-12T01:17:00.000-08:00

Ok here are 3 hands that i pretty much masacered last night . I think i need to know how i should have played them correctly

Hand1 Villain is very new to the table

I standard raise the flop and get re raised...I thought that as he was new to the table he may be making a play...I decided to re raise my ak...

The first question i need an answer to is... is AK stong enough to 4 bet with
im thinking its pretty much player dependant ? Is that correct ?

Anyway its a long time before he calls...The flop has hit no-one...i think my only chance here is to bet out...the fact that he tought so long before calling me on the 4 bet means he must put me on a premium hand

Sadly he called and showed KK

How was my play by street ?

www.pokerhand.org/?1928666

Hand 2 Villan is 17 /14

I pretty much messed this hand up i tried a min bet raise and then just had to call

How should i have played this one and when should i have know i was beaten

www.pokerhand.org/?1928670

Hand 3 villain was quite loose 33/14

I flopped 2 pair . I know i am way ahead but how do i win the pot ? Does anyone ever overbet a $1 dollar pot ?

Hes called the turn bet which has helped him and i just have to call the river
I just didnt have the guy on A3

The thing is with this hand is that i am way ahead until the river . How and Where should i have won this pot . This one sucked i know !!

www.pokerhand.org/?1928676

Apart from thhes hands i think i am good with my game . I have had a great respons from the group so far to my posts . I think petes idea on expansion was awesome

Im also going to keep regular posts on my blog and make sure i am hitting everyone elses

Any thoughts on improving fell free to add

Good Luck All

2008-01-09T11:52:00.000-08:00

Ok , i have some history with this guy , he is pretty passive and i have bluffed him out of a couple of pots with pot sized bets .

I was nt really focusong at the time and when he min raise me i thought it was a little odd

I thought about the possibility of AJ when he bet the turn but i just didnt want to believe it , a rush of blood and its all over .

Really dissapointed with this hand . I certainly should have lead out !! but i had him on a weaker hand AQ AT or AJ !! i should have listened

Does anyone else play like this sometimes , i mean FFS whats going on here ?

Later All

www.pokerhand.org/?1916772

January Update

2008-01-09T05:48:00.000-08:00

As with pretty much everyone i seemed to have started off with a pretty big
downswing that sort of got re versed and then i went on another downswing

I dont want to say that the downswing is down to variance as that is just an excuse ( i think )and i want to take responsibility for my play . I was going over my big wins and losses , i am not sure if that is a good way to look at things but i have 10 big wins to 9 big losses . The problem is that the losses have been bigger than the wins ( Typical )

One of the other problems i have been having apart from the coolers is that i seem to be getting played back at an awful lot .

I have been trying to work out the strategy for dealing with this sort of situation
if there is one . EG I have KQ s on the button , i get 1 caller , the flop comes rainbow something like 47J . As i always do i c bet this flop . But then here is the problem . I get minraised !! what do i do now ? Sometimes i call and then i get no help on the turn and feel like i have to check . Villain then makes a pot sized bet and i have to fold .

This is a situation that i seem to come across frequently and would like some advice on what is a good line to take

Ill post a couple of hands that i was really disappointed with , my biggest loser for definate , but i just wanted to get a post up to keep the momentum going .

I am currently on a 5 buyin downswing over 3k hands
The frustrating thing is , is that fell i am playing ok or at least comfortable with my play . How can this be ? I 5 buyins down for christ's sake , Madness !!

Anyway later all

2008 Goals and Progress

2008-01-06T01:21:00.000-08:00

Ive been thinking for a while now about my goals for 2008
Obviously i want to move up and stuff like that...but probably due to the
fact that i play part time i need to be more realistic about them

December was probably more than likely my best month so far in this Poker
Eperiment / Obsession / Battle / Relationship... that i have going on !

I want Poker to provide a secondary income if possible , i mean thats the reason i
play , If i re examine my December results i was running at about 10ptbbs over 5500k hands . $500 personally i want to make it around $1500 . Now i think that 10ptbbs is a little unrealistic therefore i have decided that 7.5 is a better figure @50nl

So i have set my goal @ $1500 per month . Now @ 50 nl and 7.5 ptbbs i would need to play 20k hands . Realistically i can mangage 10k hands per month although i need some adjustments . However that is only going to net me $750 per month and my goal is $1500 !! So i need more adjustments

15000 hands @ 100 nl @ 5ptbb = $1500 i think please correct me if i am wrong

So here are the adjustments and changes i need to make to my game over the next few months

1. I need to play more hands ? In order to do so i am going to start 4 tabling again maybe go over Verneers 6 table video again and while my roll is comfortable try a couple of 6 table sessions Maybe

2 I need to step up in levels . To be honest... i cant honestly say i have ever had a lot of success at 100nl so this is a subject that needs to be broached . I will look into getting coached over a period of a month once i hit 7.5ptbbs @50nl over 10k hands .I think it is important that i hit those 2 targets first... but i will do some investigating regarding coaches...in the meantime i will concentrate on planning properly and structuring my playing sessions

3 Finally ths study group seems to have sprung back into life and hopefully we will embark on another chapter in our developement

On poker this year to be honest i startde the first session 4 tabling i ran KK into something and felt like every cbet was re raised and that every raise was re raised too . I ended my first session down over 3 buyins . On a couple of occasiins i nerly got back to even but have hit some sick coolers.

Anyway i still feel like my play is good and so il put it down to variance

Update Soon

I Lied !!

2007-12-31T14:33:00.001-08:00

Im Done With 2007

2007-12-30T15:28:00.000-08:00

Ok so thats it for 2007 for me . I have posted the majority of my monthly
figures in a previous post . But here are Decembers final results

Its certainly been an interesting year poker wise . I started off in January winning 2 $30 party tournaments with about 300 players for about $3500 . I decided to join cardrunners in a bid to refine my tournament skills an by May / June im playing cash games 50nl

To be honest until recnetly i hadnt felt like i was really achieving much but this month i certainly have had the ive got it moment at 50nl at least

In the strategy section of CR i posted my Stats for the year and got some informative replies about my game . There must have been some Freudian thing going on as on of the replies mentioned STRATEGY !! This is what i have been missing .

I think it was highlighted in a qui by Verneer when he asked what a particular Raise should be after 1 limper My answer was 4BB plus 1 BB for the limper Correct answer

However , there was no reason behind it It was just a robotic thing to do . But it is to isolate the limper , drive out any weaker hands that may be waiting to limp

I think i have been playing poker without any real strategy . I often fail to recognise the strengths or weaknesses of other players and frequently would just play the cards . As opposed to the opponents . I also am working on my hand ranges more too

Any way i think i mentioned that i may take a stab at 100 nl but i think i may stick to 50nl in Jan to see if there has been a movemnet in my play or if it was a lucky month ?

I am over 8.51 BB/100 this month and i know that is good . I have also been very disciplined with my play this month only a couple of times did i stray into 100nl territory

Anyway Happy New Year All

Heres To 2008

December Update - Still Playing

2007-12-29T18:07:00.000-08:00

<

I really dont think its fair to post hands like these but WTF !!

www.pokerhand.org/?1870202

On This Table ? again WTF

2007 Summary

2007-12-29T01:57:00.000-08:00

Ok . here are my results at 50nl over the last 7 months . I started playing nl in June after a ssnl grinder sugesstion .

The thing im after with these figures is to see if i can spot any leaks from these figures or maybe a reason why i have suddenly started to win this month !!

On the subject of this month i know there has been a significant change in my style but i am maybe looking for something to bacl it up !

September , October and November i know i can include a substantial amount of tilt and inconsistent play due to the change in my lifestyle and lack of order in my life
after selling my chip shop . Anyway these are the figures

June

July

August

September

October

November

December

General Update

2007-12-27T00:13:00.001-08:00

Well its been a few days since my last update. There's not been a lot happening . The xmas break has been quiet and relaxed and i been fortunate to play a little poker.

Had a little go at 4 tabling again but found it a little to busy for me at present !
Its odd really as i used to 4 table all the time ! 3 tables are no problem but the 4 i find just a little to quick at present .

There haven't been to many big hands for me to lose money on so that's cool and i have been slowly grinding away . Gonna see if i can hit 6k hands this month.

I'm still being disciplined in playing 50nl at the moment so that is good for my BR but I'm sure ill have a little stab at the 100nl before the end of the month

Anyway here are my figures so far this month

Opening Bank Roll $1 438.92
Hands 4934
$ Won /lost $367.16
Closing Bank Roll $1 806.08 7.91 BB

I think im quite pleased at the moment and i am hoping there has been a significant
improvement in my game . But only time will tell here

Anyway Good Luck at the Tables

Graham

Developing Progress

2007-12-23T01:28:00.000-08:00

I am not sure if i have mentioned it here , but over the last few weeks i have been
trying to refine my play. I been reading verneers blog for a long while now and i always notice that his winning sessions are relatively bigger compared to the number of hands he has played

This got me thinking that he must be doing something fundamentally different ( obviously !! ) whilst playing . I re read a few of his blogs and studied a video again and got back to the playing for stacks thing .

I'm sure he is prepared to play more against some players than others . So i started to pay more attention to particular players who's hud stats were v loose and whose play seemed weak .

I'm not saying i was going to go all in against these players with any 2 cards , but certainly i would be more aggressive , and if i thought i was ahead of their range i would certainly be more prepared to play for stacks !!

Anyway it seems to be reaping rewards . I have had a winning weekend so far despite a massive tilt incident !! .This is one of the intangibles that Dice talks about in the little interview with Verneer .

Here's how it goes . Got home Friday Night , my eyes were very tired after a busy day on the computer all day , but looking forward to playing poker , After tea i have to get my boy to bed but we spend some time together before hand FIFA 2002 is our game at the moment , We plat 2002 as its the last FIFA with the mighty LEEEEEEDS on it . He thrashes me as usual !! Then its a bath and bedtime story . We are on Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince at the moment . We have a deadline of Xmas Eve to finish it but maybe a chapter or two away realistically . So we read two chapters in an effort to get on schedule

By this time my eyes are fucked i mean they really hurt , i spend a few hours with my wife chatting , she goes to bed , i watch a bit of WWE , research for my boy . he likes to know whats going on !!! lol !!!

Eventually i decide to go and play some poker , get 3 50nl tables up and start playing . The screen seems really bright tonight for some reason !! ( Duuhhh... you re eyes fucked and glasses no where to be found ) Getting a little impatient so i fire up a 100nl . im not sure what time it is but i have dimmed the screen and turned the light off so i shut down a couple of 50 nl and just have 1 50nl and 1 100nl

No action...eyes hurting...the player on my right is pissing me off... i can feel the tilt already whilst writing this !! ) Ahh JJ this will piss him off... The short stacks playing as well . MMM not sure i like the flop . What... hes bet fuck it ill call... Hes bet again...fuck it ill call . Jesus my eyes are really hurting . Fuck me the short stacks all in. Hes called AAAhh Fuck it ALL IN....Shit hes got KK

Computer off

here's the hand

http://weaktight.com/64019

No thought here ... pure tiredness and shit play

anyway that's how i donked off $100

back to the weekend and after Friday night i got back into my new style , attacking some weak players and winning instead of donking off chips

So after that long story here's where we are

Opening Bankroll $1 438.92
Hands 4302
Dollars WON/lost $ 332.78
Closing Bankroll $ 1 771.70

one i am really pleased about here is that last night i won a $100 pot at 100nl to even out the one i lost on Friday so im even at 100nl . This means my winnings here are purely at 50 nl so i think thats good

Anyway maybe the last post before xmas , but be sure to check out Inspirions blog on cr aod Dodgygykens and Verneers , these guys are definitely people we can learn from big time

good luck the tables

2007-12-22T03:40:00.000-08:00

to 100nl

2500 -325 2175
2175 3000 -325 2675
2675 3750 -750 3000

to 200nl

4500 -750 3750
3750 5250 -750 4500
4500 7500 -1500 6000

Progression

2007-12-20T23:12:00.000-08:00

MMM not sure what the title is supposed to mean ... but over the past few weeks , i feel my play has changed for the better...

i have been reading a few blogs and studying them as well as watching Fabians video...i always notice that when verneer posts his figures he has always seemed to win quite a lot compared to his session number of hands...

for me that sort of suggests that he is doing something fundamentally different
whilst playing...i went over a few of his videos and stuff and i think / know he is
prepared to play more aggressively against particular players than others

i have sort of been trying to tighten up early and play more aggressively against weaker players especially from lp...i think i am making progress...

tonight will be the big test as the weekend is usually when i tend to lose through the bad beats and coolers so i will be paying particular attention

anyway heres an update

starting bankroll $1438.92
hands played 3599
S WON / lost $258.50
closing bankroll $1697.42

good luck at the tables

oh check out inspirions blog its cool

A reminder for me !!

2007-12-17T10:41:00.001-08:00

Progress - December

2007-12-16T23:42:00.000-08:00

Ok This is more for myself than anyone else
Just a record of my progress hands played etc etc

Bankroll Start December $1438.92
Hands played 3 303
Dollars Won / Lost $ 152.67
Current Bankroll $1591.59

I am a little dissapointed , had a poor weekend mainly due to a little tilt ,
went down as low as $102 due to some short stack suckouts , but made a sweet comeback .

Anyway progress on the blog

Later people

Stairway

2007-12-16T10:42:00.000-08:00

Verneer pointed me to inspirions blog and this... Basically i must get to 3k before i play $100 nl... The plan is thus... get to $2500 withdraw $500... from $2000 get to $3000 withdraw $500... from $2500 get to $3500 withdraw $500... Start $100nl with $3000

Sounds cool !! Doesnt mention about stabs at $100 nl though... looks like they are not included.. Thats sad but... i need the dicipline to be frank...whos frank by the way ?

I also want to admit to sucking at blogs at present . This will change . I Certainly have not stopped reading blogs and am still playing pretty frequently . My paint has for some reason stopped working but i will get over to image shack later so ill paste stuff properly

I was up $300 after about 2400 hands nearly 21ptbb but had a cooler on friday night and a little tilt session brought me down to $189 which is not bad but somwhat demoralising after my start . Still, thats... nahh i hate cliches

Later people

2007-11-27T14:53:00.000-08:00

Ok here is a first i think !!

These are my top 10 losing and 9 out of my top 10 winning

I am going to go through them and analyse my play !! Be warned i suffer from tilt
so i am going to work out how many are coolers and how many are tilt

Then the same with the winning . ie how many i have played well and also if i have coolered anyone

For info on some of the HHs there are 2 sets of hole cards . I am player G1RAY not always the hero . I dont know why it does this

Losers
www.pokerhand.org/?1746957
I am not sure if this is a cooler !! KK and the guy hits trips My all in bet certaianly means ill get called by better hands though. Looks like i should have made a pot size bet to see where i am . Probably could have worked out i was behind but not sure i could have folded

www.pokerhand.org/?1746962
This looks like tilt to me !! I cant see why on earth i am all in with tens here
i think maybe the guy had been pissing me off . So i gave it the all in beat my tens !! Which obviously he did . Poor play

www.pokerhand.org/?1746967
Another obvious poor play from me . How could i think my A10 was ahead . This must be another tilt play . For some reason sometimes i have problems believing that an all in bet at this level probably means that the guy has hit his trips
Hopefully i can learn from this one !!

www.pokerhand.org/?1746973
Another KK loser . I remember thinking a lot about this one . I just cold not put him on an 8 after my re-raise hence the call bit of a bummer . I must realize that an all in bet must mean something !! However calling a rr with J* is pretty donkish i think . But not as donkish as my call !!

www.pokerhand.org/?1746979
Rivered !! I think i can handle this one . i was pretty sure i was ahead of this guy and was pretty please when i saw the K6 not so happy when the 6 fell on the river though . At least i was ahead !!

www.pokerhand.org/?1746987
Not quite a cooler although i had the nfd and a straight . I was trying to slow play this but have since learned not too !! My call on the river though is pretty donkish , Probably a disappointment call that i had had such a strong hand on the turn which i had played wrong

www.pokerhand.org/?1746990
Here is another one where im not sure if its a cooler !! I think i have got to get it in here , thats what i think OR should i have thought more about his raise
i dont know here !!
www.pokerhand.org/?1746995
I think this is pretty standard . I knew he had a strong hand maybe AA but cant fold here !!

www.pokerhand.org/?1746999
Not sure what to make of this hand . At the end of the day do i want to get it all in with AQ here ? maybe not . looking back i think maybe i could have folded !
but ill need a comment or 2 on this one , to help me here

www.pokerhand.org/?1747003
I have no idea WTF !! this is obviously a tilt call , i must have taken a bad beat on another table to play this like i did . I dont really like A% at the best of times os i have no idea why i played like a moron here !!

Thats the hbyh summary , ill have a look later and come to some overall conclusion
on my biggest losers

Winners
www.pokerhand.org/?1747007
www.pokerhand.org/?1747012
www.pokerhand.org/?1747015
www.pokerhand.org/?1747019

www.pokerhand.org/?1747031
www.pokerhand.org/?1747039
www.pokerhand.org/?1747050
www.pokerhand.org/?1747058
www.pokerhand.org/?1747063

Comments on my losers welcome

Blog Update

2007-11-25T01:54:00.000-08:00

Ok

I think this past week has gone ok . We had a session with verneer and i think this went ok

We are not the most talkative group . But i think that may be because verneer is so good its better to sit and listen

Trying to get back into the routine of posting blogs . However i wish i could get out of the routine of talking a stab at $100 and then Either hitting a cooler and or Spewing

I am not sure what this one is ?

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1736579

My target number of hands is 5k 2 tabling . This will equate to 10k 4 tabling so i will be happy with that this month

I have been following the blogs so the next step is to start posting some comments

as usual

good luck at the tables

Too Long !!

2007-11-20T15:28:00.000-08:00

Man its been way too long Again !!! since my last post
Since i have reduced the number of tables too 2 i have obviously played
less hands than i normally would .

This month has seen me actually winning !! So far about $180 after 3500 hands
I really suffer from tilt sometimes Usually after about a 50 to an hour log session
when i have been really card dead . Ill decide to call it a day and then pick up
pocket kings and my decision to go all in has been made . Or i ll call down
a stupid hand .

I am pretty sure that my pre flop play is ok pretty tag to be frank
and im slowly working on putting people on ranges

Our study group has just started to make some videos and review them
and we have hopefully some cool stuff ahead

Heres a couple of hands that really messed with my head

www.pokerhand.org/?1721881

www.pokerhand.org/?1721887

i posted the one above on the forum

www.pokerhand.org/?1721881

Update Update Update

2007-11-10T16:25:00.000-08:00

Ok here we go

Since the last proper blog back in October i have had a hectic time. For those of you who don't know i sold one of my Chip Shops about 10 Weeks ago . What you don't know is that 10 Years before that i worked as an Assistant Accountant for a Large Security Company.

During the months preceding the sale of my shop i hand been doing Temporary Accounting work at a Local Government Office and was due to start a Permanent Job . Nice Salary an extremely cushy lifestyle sort of 9.30 till 4.30 plus one of my oldest friends was the Principal Accountant so all seemed sweet.

Then about 3 days after my last blog i got an approach from an agency about a position in a town where i used to Work , I said send me some more details and they promptly replied telling me it was for the company i worked for before i went into the Chip Shop business . They said it was an Assistant Accountants role and after reading the spec i told the Agency that this was virtually the same role i had 10 years ago

This was on the Wednesday before i started my new job on the Monday . I asked them what the next step was and they phoned me back and said could i start Monday !!
Fuck Me what a predicament

Any way after lengthy discussions with my Wife and Boss/Friend i decided that the offer was to good to refuse and took the plunge . And so its been 5 weeks now and fuck me have i been working. It seems that my old boss the Financial Director has
not changed one bit, in the 6 months he has managed to lose 2 Accountants with about
5 years experience and 2 Assistants as well and has an Accountant who has been there for just 3 months controlling the Department where i used to work

This poor guy has been so used to the temps doing the work for him so that now they have all gone he is really struggling . I mean work isn't really in his nature which doesn't bode well for his future i feel . Me on the other hand i have been working to pretty much 8 most evenings now as there is so much work to do and judging by the
state of Novembers Month end Schedule there is tons to do .

So that is pretty much why i have not been blogging . The last couple of weeks i have been in at 8.30 ish and in bed at 9 Knackered . And as a result my poker has suffered

To be honest it has been suffering since i left the Chip shop . My levels of concentration have been sadly lacking and once you check out my river aggression it pretty much explains my losses during October. Not wishing to make excuses but some of my play was i thought pretty good but i have not been able to take a bad beat without pretty much losing a stack soon afterwards .

Anyway check out the figures

So there is a lot of Tilt in here which sadly comes from my lack of schedule
I had a few goals in November that i was nowhere near achieving but it looks like a
pretty poor performance to me. There were some positive .Managed to get a couple fo study sessions in with a study group . Watched a verneer 6 table 100 nl which helped my game a lot and one of his posts about his dog was very interesting and hopefully that will help me with my main goal at the moment which is Hand Ranges .

November is going ok . I have won a $100 from just over 1300 hands and i am now only playing 2 tables until i am happy with my hand range forecasting

Any way apologies for the lack of posting but i have been busy and i have still been following all the blogs . around 25 of them for me and here's hoping this will give me a little momentum .

Good luck at the tables

Blog Update

2007-11-06T13:35:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone , sorry about the lack of blogging

I am still here and stil playing .

Just a load of thgs happening in October that i could
not control

Really time cosuming .

Short Summary

2007-10-06T10:38:00.000-07:00

Ok here is a quick summary of the month so far and a few goals that I have set and I am determined to achieve. Actually one that I am determined to achieve

1 - Opponent Hand ranges - For some reason I am finding it difficult to put players on ranges. Therefore, I have decided to cut down to two tables until I have achieved a reasonable level. The reason why I have cut down to 2 tables is so that I can try and record notes for every hand that I play and give the opponents ranges .This is a fundamental part of the game and I think until I achieve this I wont progress much further .

2 - My hand-playing goal is not going to be massive this month due to the above. If I get to 8000 I think that will be an achievement 2 tabling.

3 - I have sort of stolen this from Marc I think... in that I am going to make at least a hundred posts on the CR forum. I have already started and as I am two tabling, I can find that I can post as well. Lol... the trick is to make sure people can understand them though, otherwise ill get no answers.

4 - A small group of us have started some review sessions. The first one went really well and I am going to make sure I am available and prepared for this. It will be a great method for improvement.

5 - Finally I checked out losberts Poker Tracker analysis the other day and found it very, very constructive. I am going to do the same for myself

As for this month... Well I finished my last session and had played 1310 hands. I sopped on this particular hand as I was dealt AA !!! I thought it was a good time to stop as it was the first time in those 1310 hands. Man that’s card dead for you, Anyway played 1310 V$PIP is at 14.05 I know this is low but I really have been card dead. PFR is at 10.69 some work to do here I know and imp going to get it up to 25% of the V4PIP . Also i have won $23 which is a plus as usualyy by this time of the month im down around $300 . Lets hope it stays that way !! mmm maybe less of the hope...hey !

I know I have played only 1300 hands but 1 figure I am proud of is my fold to sb this is 95.24% so no limping out of the sb for me so far !!

One final thing, got to the last 5 in the Blue Square GP qualifying Tourney
Three get the $2750 package but I finally went out in a desperate utg raise and my fours got crushed by the chip leaders AA gutted, but im going to get one of those packages
For sure

Anyway really looking forward to this month

Good Luck at the Tables

Where Too Now ?

2007-10-01T04:23:00.000-07:00

Well September has been a truly disappointing month . And to say im pissed would be an understatement . To be honest i had sort of resigned myself to losing around $350 this month and was looking to write a summary last night but i though i would play 2 tables of 100nl which i think i can cope with .

Cooler no 1... When my KK got it all in with AQ on a 5 10 Q flop Villain bet $24 into a pot of the same size i raise all in for my stack and they called turn was a J and the river was a king...nice

Cooler no 2... i had AA after raising the flop to about $30 the shorty raise on a flop with 2 spades to $64 all in which i obviously called only for him to hit his flush draw on the turn...talk about kicking when there down !!

So that put my monthly loss at $-534 my figures are as follows and as my paint still isnt working this will have to do

Hands 13476 $-534 V$PIP 19.67 PFR 12.52

Looking at those stats im thinking its obvious that the problrm is im not raising enough and when you look at my sb figure which is close to 26% its easy to see im limping from the blind straight into trouble . If you take my small blind posting figure out of my stats...its still red !!

So the only target i have sort of hit this month is the hands played !! However that was only because i tried 8 tabling in order to get the hands in !! On occasions this seemed to be going ok however i was finding that i was calling with marginal hands too much and it was easy for tilt to set in !!

other factors are that I stopped taking notes and my 3 betting was virtualy Zero . I also didnt work very much on hand ranges .

On the positive !!! . There is a positive i hear you say !! Well theres got to be one somewhere ?!

I think its this .Obviously the above is pretty much why my figures are as they are so at least i am aware of it !!

I opened a Blue Square account so i could try and win an online entry into the Grosvenor Tourney in Walsall . The thing is there are so few satellites there that i got bored and decided to play 100nl and managed to win $200 . I also entered a Stars $15 DS and manged to get $320 in $ws so my bankroll is sort of ok . I say sort of as i dont count my stars bankroll as thats for tourneys and relaxation when i cant be bothered and play micro limits whle watching TV and the blue Square is not counted either as thats for tourneys also !!

My FT bankroll has taken a hit !! and that hurts . I have some rakeback which i will sort out later but when i play FT or AB thats when i am really concentrating on playingand my results suck !!

So Where do i go to now !! I am ging to take a Week off from playing the 4 table or cash games . I am going to play 1 or 2 tables of 50 nl or maybe 100 nl if i do decide to play and i will try and put people on hands . Ill do a bit of reading . Im going to review a lot of my hands to see if i can see where the leaks are , although i know calling down pots with marginal hands or draws is one of them and this is costing me money big time .

I also think there is a session with a few of the other bloggers which i will try and get too and i have a live game on wednesday at the local rugby club .

I will post some goals later in the week . I think at least if i start later in the week i cant get off to a bad start ... i hope... and as confidence is really a big part of anything i do it would be nice to get off to a good start .

Anyway there appears to be some thoughtfull stuff above so it will give me something to work on . Also if i havent posted during the week dont worry im am always reading the blogs .

Its a really tough thing blogging about stuff when you are really dissapointed in your play .

Anyway Good Luck at the tables

Stuck - I think

2007-09-26T03:34:00.000-07:00

OK as with a few other bloggers i have been neglecting my blog over the past few weeks .

Although i had not planned to do much last week in the way of poker i managed to play approx 4000 hands although not much progress was made in the way of recouping my losses . In fact i probably lost more .

After reading Spark99s blog i decided that one of my problems was the lack of hands i play .

I mean since June I have racked up about 45k for a profit of $850 yet in comparison to some that is what they play in a month !!

So my solution was to buy another monitor and try 8 tabling lol . I'm not sure how its going as i am short on comparisons . Last night though i played over1700 hands for a loss of $73. I had a couple of coolers which was a shame as i thought i handled the tables OK .

The problem i think i am having is knowing where i am in this game at the moment
As i have only played cash games seriously for 4 months and with that only about 45k hands.

I am going to make a few posts on the Cr forum to find out about leaks and the most common ones that occur .

Anyway result's so far hands 10,571 V$PIP 19.75 PFR 12.48 $-393 pfr needs to improve here

Another set of stats which i will enquire about on Cr are the $ lost when went to showdown , for me , in the blinds its $-1309 , when not in the blinds its -$409 is this a leak ?

This is the sort of thing i really need to know !

Half Way Through September

2007-09-17T00:48:00.000-07:00

Long Blog !!

So Its just about halfway through the month , and probably a good time to review things to get an indication of how its been going so far .

To be honest last week was difficult , AGAIN , my first session lasted about an hour and a half , i was card dry and by the end of the session i went all in with ak on a rag board to be called ny JJ and by then had lost about 2 buyins . That was Tuesday and then Wednesday morning i played a 100 nl heads up game and lost a buyin when my AK on A 9 4 board failed against 10 10 when the guy hit a 10 on the turn .But i think i played the hand ok , so no complaints there .

For the rest of the week i struggled to find the right time to play and decided to just watch a couple of fruity pro videos , re jigged my hud and basically tried to work out what was going on with my game and things .

The answers i am pretty much sure lie in my timetable . The tables are much harder earlier in the evening uk time and then there is the other problem of getting into a table at Absolute at that time . It seems as though everyone is looking for a 50 nl table and you cant get one for love nor money !!

This means that the table selection is poor and much harder to 4 table , for me anyway . So i had to make a few rules and change the format . If i play early in the evening i will only play 2 tables and 4 if i play later in the evening . The 2 tableing helps me with hand ranges which i am struggling with at the moment , but that is the area i need to work on so thats not a problem .

Anyway so far this month i have played a dissapointing 4462 hands which meant i played only 1624 hands since last week and 683 were last night !! Her i felt i had a good session on Absolute winning about a buyin . My V$PIP and PFR are 19.65 and 12.51 so i can work on that . Position stats are much better although from the first week my sb is dreadful. I am at -$297 but that has been below -$400 so i see that as a sort of recovery form my poor start to the week .

I played a couple of sit and gos and a couple of tourney as well only small ones but it sort of made me realize how much of a grind the cash games are and how you must be prepared mentally and physically too. You must make sure you bring your A game to the tables . I thik August took a bit out of me and i am still coming to grips with my new lifestyle so this is effecting my play also .

I am pretty sure i had not been enjoying my poker over the last coupl of weeks and that may have been one reason for the poor play . This was confirmed when i played acouple of SnGs and i really enjoyed them along with the tourneys . I just needed a smallbreak and a little change of scenerey . This may continue into this week but ill see how it goes .

I Dont want to sound drepressing or anything like that but im learning a few lessons at the moment that are uncomfortable to me ( like losing $ ) but i think they say that the most succefull jockey's are also the ones that have lost the most races ?
At least i think they say that .

Anyway im not making any big plans this week , im just trying to play around with scheduling the games , i have been reading all the blogs . Spark99 form the PIFs is worth a read as he just stepping up to 100nl . Also im going to buy the full tilt book and Professional no limit holdem which i havent got yet to see if i can pick up some hints and tips

Just one hand to post that i played this morning . I was in MP and raised it up like you do . Standard c bet and then this re raise . I mean i was toying with the idea of calling , but i just couldnt think he had though i had missed and was re raising with air i mean this is a big re raise ( i thought ) i put him on trips to be honest or is this an aggressive flush draw raise . Thoughts please

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1490703

Seat 1: Deadly5s ($10.50)
Seat 2: UrWifeLovesMe ($49.75)
Seat 3: Suburban BAyy ($56.45)
Seat 4: soltana ($50.95)
Seat 5: HERO ($48)
Seat 6: DMJET ($45.90), is sitting out
UrWifeLovesMe posts the small blind of $0.25
Suburban BAyy posts the big blind of $0.50
The button is in seat #1
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to HERO [9s Ts]
soltana folds
HERO raises to $1.75
Deadly5s calls $1.75
UrWifeLovesMe folds
Suburban BAyy calls $1.25

*** FLOP *** [4s 5d Td]
Suburban BAyy checks
HERO bets $4.50
Deadly5s folds
Suburban BAyy raises to $12
HERO has 15 seconds left to act
HERO has requested TIME
HERO folds
Uncalled bet of $7.50 returned to Suburban BAyy
Suburban BAyy mucks
Suburban BAyy wins the pot ($13.80)

Good Luck At The Tables !!

Interesting Insights

2007-09-10T02:08:00.000-07:00

If you have read my last blog youll probably know that i had been having a turbulent week . Thats probably the best way to describe it . Sadly my paint programe is not working so i cant show screen pics.I have all the details and have been reviewing the last 9 days and they have shown up some interesting insights into my play last week.

My figures are as follows. Sadly i have only managed to play 2838 hands so far , after a manical start i slowed right down . I 1 tabled 100 nl and on occasions 1 or 2 tables the 50 nl in order to bring some sanity back to my week .

My VSPIP is at 20.54 which is slightly higher than it should be . The disorganised routine that i had lead to me probably playing looser than i should .

My PFR has dropped by about 25% to 12.47 . I think the major reason here is lack of confidence and calling raises more as opposed to raising. this was really interesting to discover as although i probaly was aware i wasnt paying that much attention

I have lost $191.97 to date , i had been down to -$323 , but i am expexcting this to change and become a positive . This will give me a good indication into my ability at this level

Another poor figure is my Small Blind % which is currently 30.30 . Again this illustrates how your play changes with lack of confidence . Its obvious i am completing the blind in order to hit a hand to win back my lost $ , -EV for sure here.

So while reviewing the last 9 days i got an insight into some interesting factors about my play and its also reminded me of a story about the guy who had this really , really expensive piano , but it was out of tune and had not been tuned for a a very long time . He obviously called the piano tuner who spent an absolute age
tuning it . He presented him with the bill and said " Ill see you in a weeks time then " the guy nearly fell off his chair " what do you mean , youll see me in a weeks time " he replied " I thought you just tuned it !! " . The Piano tuner then went on to explain that the strings were set in a certain position and would return there quite soon . They would need fine tuning over the next few weeks and then gradually over the coming months the time in between tuning the strings would increase as they adapted to there knew positions .

Its a little bit like somone going on a massive run and then saying " right thats it i , wont need to excersice ever again , i done my run and that will last for a while " it doesnt work like that . Things have to be worked on constantly and its the same with this mad game of poker . You constantly have to adjust your play to how it should be and this is done by annalysing how you are playing

Another thing that i am going to do is a weekly review . At least that way i can fool myself into thinking if i start winning this week then i will be winning in order to help the confidence . As i think somomone once told me there is not much difference between real and pretend feelings

Good Luck At The Tables

Reflecting on Bad Play

2007-09-05T06:30:00.001-07:00

Well its been a poor start to September for me so far , sadly , mainly due to my poor play . It certainly has got me thinking more and more about this game of poker .

A few months ago before this cr experiment i would try and sneak a few mins here and a few mins there of poker , my lifestyle was such that it was easy to play for short spells at a time , but this lacked preparation and goals , the former absolutely essential when playing .

This resulted in a pretty inconsistent set of results over several months . I am very keen to move up to 50 / 100 nl and so i had a lesson from a coach . This pretty much involved watching his style and replicating it which i did with success .

Around the same time the blogger experiment started and i had a disatorous July
I think down to lack of preparation and maybe overconfidence .

August was a turning point , although i did nt move up i certainly grinded out some results and the way i did this was pleasing . I could feel myself learning and understanding all the time .

So whats gone wrong ? i here you ask . Routine is my reply !! You may have caught on that i have been working in chip shops , nearly ten years now !! 30 000 bags of spuds later , i have sold the one where i worked . Whilst it was long hours i would come home at about 11pm and then start a little rolutin of playing poker , reviewing a session and then blogging and then the same again .

Now i have sold the shop i get home at around 5.30 ish and look to play a little bit here and there through the evening , no planing , no preparation , NO PROFIT !!

I have managed to lose 5 buyins so far which is a lot for me , admittedly there have been have been a couple of $100 dollar all ins , one on a tripp 5 i lost to a higher kicker and another when i had ak on an AK9 board only to lose to trip 9s , however on aech occasion the guy goes all in and i call . Without being funny it is obvious that i am way behind on both occasions but i still call like a fish . Oh and i played a hu $100 game against a guy called sbrugby dont know who he is but he did quite well against me . Personally i think he was playing well below his limit !!
LOL

Anyway i think the point of this post is to remind myself that you cant just mess about here , there and everywhere when playing poker and expect to win . It has to be the PPPPPP way proper preparation prevents piss poor performance.

More posts later in the week I may even post some resu;ts if there not too embarassing

GL All

September Goals

2007-09-03T04:02:00.000-07:00

Its been a busy weekend for me this weekend and havent managed to play much , pretty knackered if i must say .

Here are my September goals

Play 12000 hands and win +$650 or
Play 16000 hands and win +$950

I have put down 2 lots of hands this month as im not sure which is the more realistic . There has been a pretty big change in my lifestyle with the sale of the chippy , so i am not sure how things will develope this month . I know for certain that I will need a strict routine in order to suceed and this may take a week or two to develope

I am going to use September hopefuly to consolodate and get a solid month in.
I am going to maintain my Position and V$PIP / PFR play this month

I will be concentrating more on hand reading

I am also going to focus on my c betting an introduce floating too my game

These will be my goals for September

15 000 Hands !!

2007-08-30T07:01:00.000-07:00

Ok so here we are at the end of August . Its been a week since my last post but i have had lots of life stuff going on and wanted to get to 15000 hands hence the delay i also wanted to get to $800 but this is close enough got a bit obsessive .

And after approximately 1 YEAR i have finally sold one of my chip shops . Praise the lord !!

Sorry but i could not get the paint programme to work a second time for the exact figures so this will have to do

15068 hands 1116 $100nl 13842 $50nl +$416 $100nl + $312 $50nl + S72 HU
V$PIP 19.47 PFR 14.17

Thats all good , but check out my button play !!

And so we go on , results wise i think things have gone pretty well , although there are still areas where i can improve massively , and I'm not completely happy with the path i took to the month end results ( could have done with out the bad start !! ) .When i look at the goals i set for August i have pretty much achieved what i wanted to . The power of Goal setting i do believe

I am amazed at the difference playing in position has made to my figures
i mean check out my button play !! I was obviously aware of position when studying other peoples pos stats , but when you see it on your own , that's when it hits home .

The number of hands that i have played is also pretty cool . If you take into account that i work from 9 - 4 in an office and then go and run my chip shop that hopefully will be sold next week . That's a goal achieved !!

Another important factor in my improvement in this game , is the continued support of all the other bloggers in this developing group . I must say i was a little sceptical early in July as to the effectiveness of this , and this combined with selling my chip shop and a severe bout of overconfidence led to the disaster that was July .However i have learned my lesson the hard way .

One of my September goals will be to improve my ability to decide where to get action as opposed to winning the pot . A point that has been helpfully made on some of my hands recently . This will be combined with the improvement of my player range reading which is needed in order to achieve the first goal .

I am pretty sure that the range issue will be a fundamental area in my overall improvement in September . I am also going to incorporate this in my use of floating which is an area i need to work on

Anyway here are the result for the month of August in no particular order and a great big thank you to all who have posted on my hands and all who have maybe just read them .

Graham

?

2007-08-23T16:19:00.000-07:00

Believe it or not i have been struggling over the past few days . I have been trying to push a little to hard after good starts and then slowly become frustrated . Whilst this is not a good thing at least i have been aware of it . I could fel myself going on tilt when i hit trip 2s and then on a 10 2 Q flop there were runner runner Qs and the guy went all in !!

Absolutley loving the new skin on Absolute . had to adjust the hud which was a bit tricky but hey ho

I ll try and get some comments posted but it seems no one has blogged too much recently
probably me included

Anyway tonights results

NL 1 59 hands +$11.8 $VPIP 13.56 PFR 3.39 Card Dead Honest !!
Nl 50 290 hands +$24.9 $VPIP 20.92 PFR 14.14

I di find absolute quite laggy on the 25 / 50 to be honest maybe that swhy i was a little looser than usual

August to date

11,536 hands +$482.46 V$PIP 18.94 PFR 14.3 af 5.25 2.19 3.05 3.84

Just the one hand that i wanted some comments on please

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1403648

August Update

2007-08-19T23:56:00.000-07:00

Ok here are some stats for the month of August so far

I really didnt feel up to playing much Sunday , but as is always the way i
spent a little time messing around on the computer and ended up trying a bit of heads up . Couple of hit and runs netted me about $40 dollars , im not sure i lke hit and runs !

I opened an account on absolute as ive heard there rakeback and reloads are good.

Also watched the Bystmar $50 100 4 table video.

I have managed to improve my V$PIP and PFR which i think are ok at the moment

Just the one hand here . Initialy i thought it was a cooler , bit after a short instant message , it was pointed out that maybe i could have played it a little differently and that also the river bet , could have meant a whole raft of things .

I think i just got carried away and stopped thinking after the turn as i thought i
had the best hand and that it was unbeatable . Important to study the board at every point i feel .

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1390063

Nearly reached my August total for hands played , but ill continue at the same pace and see where it takes me . I will revise them slightly and maybe add another goal

I think i may drop down to 2 tables for a couple of sessions in order to concentrate on hand reading and putting villains on ranges

Anyone got any good tips here ?

Good Luck All

2007-08-17T19:17:00.000-07:00

Hers a question for all the 50 / 100 nl ers

Is this a standard sort of bluff... not my all in... but the guys re raise of my c bet
http://www.pokerhand.org/?1382652

And wtf is this all about ?... F me man i only re-raised you... ! I mean should i be looking to get it all in with AKs
http://www.pokerhand.org/?1382659

Anyway after a mad sweat session with DWarrior... where i managed to get myself on the end of several sticky situations last night and overall lost 2 and a half buy ins i thought tonight would be a little different... but after losing over 2 buyins somehow in a couple of hundred hands i decided to 1 table 50 100 nl with a modicum of success .
ABOVE

So refreshed i decide to play 1000 hands tonight , back on the 25 50 nl and managed to win 3 buyins... ill post some of the hands on the BB hand page to view

I know its time for bed when i cant see the 3 clubs on the board and go all in with my straight . F me and i have a coloured deck !!!

Any way tonight 983 hands +$157.3 V$PIP 20.14 PFR 15.46 a little higher than usual the eraly session was pretty poor

August 8757 +$293.8 2.90bb/100 V$PIP 18.28 PFR 14.76 flop AF 5.37

Graphs and stuff later !!

Good Night !!

2007-08-15T16:53:00.000-07:00

Ok another session over . Tried 5 tabling . Just a little difficult to keep turning my head . Played another 350 hands for +$24.5 ao that makes tonight s total
589 +$121 V$PIP 17.15 PFR 14.74

Aug 7297 +$274.4 V$PIP 18.18 PFR 14.68

Short Winning Session

2007-08-15T12:35:00.000-07:00

Just a pretty short session early in the evening 169 hands +$97.5
Its always nice to get off to a good start .
I was running hot and it would have been more but for the short stacks !!

Dam those short stacks

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1374176

Session Over !!

2007-08-14T18:40:00.000-07:00

Ok somone help !! I cant get the graphs to appear at the bottom of the page !!

So here we go

Right so i finished tonights session on a wicked hand which is my first big bb hand
check it out

The 2nd session didnt start off too well . Just finished watching DodgyKens video and decide to put the short stack all in. In future i try and do that a little earlier.
Like before hes hit his straight !!

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1371574

Then a tricky spot with JJ and after my experience the other night I thought i was behind. Was this a good fold ?

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1371580

This was pretty weak i think . Should i have C bet the flop . I just thought my 4s were weak . Is this marginal ?

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1371592

I went into the tank a little here !! Hated the flop...thought trips all over...
But this is a must bet situation...i closed my eyes...drew back the curtain...lol...f me !!

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1371603

so after tonights session 737 hands +$87.80 V$PIP 17.07 PFR 14.63

It feels like ive been away for weeks !!

2007-08-14T16:26:00.000-07:00

Well i went away on Sunday to a Big Fat Greek Wedding ( They are the best Weddings )
I know my wifes greek !! and to be honest with the routine i had gotten into , it now feels like ive been away for weeks !! It really does !!

Last night i played about 400 hands but got into a real pickle with this one , i think i was a little tired as well , but thats a poor excuse . The only thing i was pleased with is that i didnt stack off

Re raised the jj and he called C bet and he min raised.... I should have folded there
i was way behind...then when this small bet came i was convinced he was on a flush draw so i reraised hoping he would fold...then his all came and id realised that i should have folded when he min raise my c bet...thats the only good thing imo !!but corrections and opinions are always welcome !!

www.pokerhand.org/?1371082

Just wondered what people though of this hand i would not normally call with this hand but there was a shortish stack involved...i also think that these sort of connectors play well in multiway pots...i got priced in on the draw...and the rest is history
what do you think

www.pokerhand.org/?1371058

Another poorly played hand i think...i mean i was playing for the flush...had the straight draw as well...however when it hit i started to worry...blocking bet did not work !! But is this an easy fold !!

www.pokerhand.org/?1371072

Anyway off for a break and then maybe another session !!

Blogging

2007-08-13T05:19:00.000-07:00

Man i go away for one day . Just one day !! and already things are changing
i have bloggers left , right and centre bringing up new blogs with their big hands etc etc ...

This more than anything goes to show how important these blogs are .

So if you read and leave comments or just read .

Thanks very Much

ps do i start a new blog completely and then link it in ? How ?

also i want to do the profile thing ! How ?

sorry for being a little thick here

Greeeeeeeeeennnnnnnnnnnnnnn

2007-08-11T15:14:00.000-07:00

Have some of this !!

and this is looking better except for the sb but its green !!!

Kings making a comeback....but i thought i played it well....nice ace

www.pokerhand.org/?1359445

So tonight session went well $ wise . I am now in the green . However there were a few tricky situations that i got into . Rob Racing words ( i hope ) about a few situations during the session making all the difference ring very true i feel.

Any way tonight 625 hands $90.75 no excursions into the 50 100 tonight !!

These were the hands i feel i want comments on

www.pokerhand.org/?1359480

So i raised with the 3s . Obviously i must make a continuation bet . Im sure this would be expected although by checking i could perhaps show weakness on this flop

I get the call and then make a pot sized bet . The thing is can i get any more money here ? I am pretty sure that people would not worry about the odds for the flush here at these stakes ? or maybe i m wrong please correct me ?

www.pokerhand.org/?1359502

Again on this hand i raise . I have been raising this guy all the time and im pretty sure hes expecting it so i dont .

The spade comes on the turn and so i make a value bet to increase the pot .
I hit the flush and then i am struggling with what to do . I am thinking i want to get a call so my bet should not be to big , but obvioulsy not too small .

I am also thinking there is an outside chance he has pocket 8s and slowplayed them on the turn

I suppose what i am wanting here is a way of being able to put this guy on that hand as i feel i could have bet more if i had known . Thats obvious i know... but do you know what i mean ? if i could have put him on chasing a flush too i may have stacked him off ?long i know !!

Finally my last hand

www.pokerhand.org/?1359540

My worry here... is that i am looking to make a good fold or find out where i am

So i make the raise .... he re raises hes 28/14/3 i think a while . my thinking goes like this....i want to know where i am with the queens....if i call the re raise and the flop is not good or has an ace ill have to make a cbet on a crappy flop or fold....so how can i find out where i am now....my answer was to re raise as shown

now his all in im am pretty sure tells me exactly where i am.... i think

But is my thought process ok should i have been thinkg about finding out where i was
or should i have called and seen a flop ?

Pissed Off Actually

2007-08-10T18:41:00.001-07:00

May as well have one of these !!

So near and yet so far . Well not quite . Couldnt quite do it !! Maybe tommorow !!

But the AA and KK situ really pisses me off . Hey Ho

M

Nearly There

2007-08-10T17:18:00.000-07:00

Tonights first session was interesting to say the least
ended the 25 /50 sesison about $40 up had a few interesting hands
couple of donks stacked off against me

www.pokerhand.org/?1356407
www.pokerhand.org/?1356411

Then i ran into a tricky hand . really tried to make some sense of the min raise
had a quick chat with dodgyken afterwards . still unsure myself and timed out

www.pokerhand.org/?1356380

This hand was a little more straightforward in that i wanted to know how to get the most out of him , but im not sure i played this right ?

www.pokerhand.org/?1356387

Anyway , as per usual , or not actually , i thought i would give the 50/100 a little go . I mean there are only so many bad beats one can run into arent there ?

www.pokerhand.org/?1356374

So in disbelief , i played this hand on tilt WTF

www.pokerhand.org/?1356367

After that i didnt want to risk too much , so i did this ! Crazy lazy was 45/25 and had been raising at any opportunity , mainly in position though . Obviously i re raised , and then this . I dont know what people think but i just felt i was behind

www.pokerhand.org/?1356399

So after all that 334 hands +$99 im only $8 dollars away form augusts starting position . The only thing is do i try and win it back tonight ??

Wait and See !!

LMFAO

2007-08-09T23:57:00.000-07:00

Well at least i managed to stop after that last KK hand
Just have to put it down to variance
Probably shouldnt have called the river bet .

Anyway tonight will be my last 2 sessions for a couple days
So hopefully i can get somewhere near break even

An if i get 4 bet with KK !!!! i am folding !!!!

I would be interested to know what other peoples results are with AA and KK ?

See you at the tables

Fucking KK

2007-08-09T16:02:00.000-07:00

Fucking KK about my 15th hand on 50 / 100nl

www.pokerhand.org/?1352465

What the fucking fuck !!

Fucking KK

2007-08-09T15:50:00.000-07:00

oh so i went and played 50 /100 nl as you do when youre titlting 2nd hand is KK
how much do you think i won Fuck All !!!!!!!!!!!!

Fucking KK

2007-08-09T15:43:00.000-07:00

tonight session 346 hands lost $60.10

another pretty average session until the last hand when i though i could make it up
with KK but hey you guessed it versus AA All in lost my $50 thats knocked the shit out of me So far KK has cost me $126.5 the 15 times i had it And AA the 15 times ive had that guess how much ive won ? $26.45 For Fucks Sake

2007-08-08T16:30:00.000-07:00

Ok so far this evening ive managed 562 hands 4 tabling . Thats approx 2 50min sessions
managed to eek out another $12 in this session although it would have been more if whilst selecting table i donked off $18 to some jerk going all in every hand .

Went in with AK and he called me with Q8 obviously the 8 came on the river . But hey ho

My poker tracker crashed as well whilst playing as i think im up a little bit more on the cashier screen

Here are my stats so far

Anyway just the one hand where i thought i could have got more ! I just didnt want him completing his flush draw cheaply if he had one .

The other question was should i be playing this hand ? I know its marginal but i am trying to play more in position

www.pokerhand.org/?1348613

UTG V$PIP 0%

2007-08-08T12:59:00.000-07:00

lol this made me laugh . I have been trying to get my utg figures down and although i did not do this intentionally my utg V$PIP was zero . Going to check the hands but just looked at fruity pros new vid and utg he was a nit .

Any way tonights first session was 306 hands for a profit of $48.75 things were going quite slow until i hit trip 5s and then a short stack decide to to call when i put him all in with ak on an ak 6 board . He was holding A8 ????!!!

A vSpip of 17.41 and pfr of 14.24 so i am quite pleased so far . Just a few hands but i will list them later mainly to do with folding

Not Really Much Progress

2007-08-08T01:37:00.000-07:00

Well , last nights session was pretty uneventful for some reason
played 520 hands and lost $7.30 . Still thats probably the way it goes .

Managed to resist the temptation of some river calls so that was good
and my utg and mp position stats were much lower ,although i was still completing the small blind too much

My AA 4 times and KK 2 times managed to win a massive $5.80 and $3.00
so far this month out of the 3286 hands i have had AA 11 times for $23.4
and KK 13 times for -$79.85 Thats not right im sure ?

So my results for August thus far are 3286 hands -$71.70 on a positive note though my $VPIP and PFR are running at 17.68% and 14.18% and as one of my goals is too reduce my $VPIP so i am quite happy with that . Will concentrate more on my postional play over the next few days if possible

To be honest it looks like August is not going to be the breakthrough month i wanted it to be . But hey , still a long way to go !!

A Winning Session And i hate coolers !! again !! or were they ?

2007-08-06T16:14:00.001-07:00

Well first session tonight and i played 396 hands , more than usual for a session but i was feeling good , and then bad , and then good again .

At first i thought this was a cooler , but was it ? I mean he went all in , but could you put him on AA ? there was no way he had any other trips ? Should i have seen this ?

www.pokerhand.org/?1341025

This hand i tried to limit the losses , after his min raise i thought about going over the top again but then thought he may have the j But should i have called ?

www.pokerhand.org/?1341040

A bad beat , but should i have really called ?

www.pokerhand.org/?1341032

I wanted to know if these were played ok or if i want to improve do i need to play these better here. Be gentle with the comments please ! Actually what the fuck !!
if its shit then tell me !!

But at least it was a winning session + $2.80 FFS

Not So Mad

2007-08-05T16:34:00.000-07:00

Still a little tough to find the tables so ive called it a night . Started to call a couple of times when i knew i was losing thats a sure sign to stop and so i did . Also ive not had much sleep since thursday and its begining to tell

Ok 2nd session i managed to win another $31 dollars it would have been more but for some poor calls . But here are a couple of laydowns not sure if they should have been
Hope i played these ok

Hand 1.. 1st villain was 34 / 3 and was called by 2nd villain 13 / 8 me ? OOP

www.pokerhand.org/?1337738

Hand 2.. No figures on the villain but he was short stacked and could only see getting it all in at some stage here

www.pokerhand.org/?1337743

August so far hands 2389 $-63.15 V$PIP 18.46 PFR 14.82 Sort of pleased with both my recovery from the start of the week and also my discipline .... 4 lots of 2 sessions then reviews and posts . Cool.... however rest assured i wont be getting carried away

See You At The Tables !!

Sunday Night Madness

2007-08-05T14:56:00.000-07:00

FFS my first session didnt start off so well . Trying to get a 25/50nl table is virtually impossible , and then when you do its the same old story . My 70 / 7 table turns into a unbeliveble 10 /10 !!!! anyway enough of the moaning .

As im am trying to play 4 table 300 hand 45 - 60 min sessions with a review maybe you can understand that after 150 hands i was a little upset in that i hadnt even managed to get a decent table . Just chopping and changing . Man is dodgykens advice important on table selection worth adhering too !

Anyway after 277 ended up $11.65 up . Only one hand i need advice on or should i say am asking advice on which i have listed . It came immdeiately after i was dealt AA and had re raised a raiser and a caller . The caller being on the button after the AA hand

I called the raise and then bet the flop . Suggestions please . I really did not know what to do , Should i have just played this with a standard raise and then a cbet?

www.pokerhand.org/?1337338

Testing

2007-08-05T13:50:00.001-07:00

Well im not sure how i got this here but its here , ill soon sort it

Anyone fancy commenting on my position figures ? I know its a really small sample

2nd session Grinding it out

2007-08-04T17:54:00.000-07:00

Ok the 2nd session tonight went ok . I try to play 2 sessions a night 4 tabling approx 300 hands each time over 45 - 60 mins .I then review the session and then a post. Its 2 in the morning here for me so its late . Anyway

Hand 1 - raised with AKo and then there was a reraise to $4.5 3 x my raise . I jst did not like it so i folded Villain was 15/12

Hand 2 was pocket queens i made the raise got re raised and so i re raised him (is that a 4 bet or 3 bet ?) anyway a cbet won the hand after he called

hand 1 www.pokerhand.org/?1334519
hand 2 www.pokerhand.org/?1334527

so the combined 2 session result was played 622 won $67.4 V4pip 18.01 pfr 13.02

August so far 1926 hands -$106.15 $vpip 18.74 pfr 15.26

Just a few comments ... i certainly find it a little easier with this vpip . i tend not to find myself in so many tricky situations and it makes playing in position easier too , as im finding myself tossing away marginal hands

Also if anyone knows how to export the pt reports ont blogs please help

A Winning Session And i hate coolers !!

2007-08-04T15:50:00.000-07:00

For some reason pokerhad org is not working so im gonna post a couple from the pt hand history

hand 1 trip 5s - did i play this all right , always get kinda dissapointed when i dont win loads with trips

Seat 1: bbyndsnwshs ($44.30)
Seat 2: grahamwhite ($50)
Seat 3: jcrib4 ($21.25)
Seat 4: EMOOO ($79.85)
Seat 5: iluvfree ($50.50)
Seat 6: Merbau ($16.05), is sitting out
EMOOO posts the small blind of $0.25
iluvfree posts the big blind of $0.50
5 seconds left to act
grahamwhite posts $0.50
The button is in seat #3
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to grahamwhite [5s 5c]
bbyndsnwshs raises to $1
grahamwhite calls $0.50
jcrib4 folds
EMOOO calls $0.75
iluvfree calls $0.50
*** FLOP *** [Tc 5d 7d]
EMOOO checks
iluvfree checks
bbyndsnwshs has 15 seconds left to act
bbyndsnwshs bets $2
grahamwhite has 15 seconds left to act
grahamwhite raises to $6
EMOOO folds
iluvfree folds
bbyndsnwshs folds
Uncalled bet of $4 returned to grahamwhite
grahamwhite mucks
grahamwhite wins the pot ($7.60)

hand 2 - is this a correct fold

Seat 1: ZeRo115 ($82)
Seat 2: nemesis08 ($95.15)
Seat 3: Vedocorban ($50)
Seat 4: nineball8 ($9)
Seat 5: Amateurs ($75.20)
Seat 6: grahamwhite ($83.95)
nineball8 posts the small blind of $0.25
Amateurs posts the big blind of $0.50
The button is in seat #3
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to grahamwhite [6c 6d]
grahamwhite raises to $1.75
ZeRo115 folds
nemesis08 folds
Vedocorban folds
nineball8 raises to $9, and is all in
Amateurs folds
grahamwhite has 15 seconds left to act
grahamwhite folds
Uncalled bet of $7.25 returned to nineball8
nineball8 mucks
nineball8 wins the pot ($4)

ok tonight session number 1 was a winning one at last played 295 hands won $42 although i had one cooler AA lost to JJ when he hit trips that cost me $24

So far in my 1500 hands AA has lost -$13.40 and KK has lost -$94.35 lol

1st session Coolers

2007-08-03T16:53:00.000-07:00

I m pretty sure this guy had AA i just knew it ! should i have folded my KK ?

www.pokerhand.org/?1331394

And im pretty sure i played this just fine !!

www.pokerhand.org/?1331385

A fancy play . Too fancy !!

www.pokerhand.org/?1332403

man these hurt

Anyway , after the 1st session last night i ended up $130 dollars down . Pretty dissapointed to be honest but on the whole i thought i did ok apart from the hands
above .

It got me thinking though . Is it worth maybe staying out of big pots early in a session in order toget a good start . Its really difficult to get back in the grind after a big hit , it knocks your confidence and sometimes alters your playing style , especially when you know you have got to grind it out just to get back to where you start ? Comments please

So the 2nd session went better and manage to win just over a buyin and a half on my 4 tables ending down $60 dollars for the evening

The question i need answering her re this session is that i managed to build a $140 stack on one table . In tourney play i am quite good at using this stack . But how do you do so in cash games . Anyone know of any articles ?

So last night 605 hands - $60.25

August to date Hands 1304 $vpip 19.10 pfr 16.33 Af 5.21 $-173.55

Ok its doesnt look to good so far but honestly i dont think i have played too badly
I can put these losses down to approx 10 hands which i need to cut out

Need some help in posting the pokertracker reports

OMG And i actually thought i was getting better

2007-08-03T02:51:00.001-07:00

Ok Here are my losing hands from last night . I had to post the all as i need to know if these are big leaks . I dont understand how i can feel i am playing weel yet lose so much . I know there is a ridiculous number of hands here but i would really apppreciate some comments on the 3 bets if at all possible ! I mean have i got them all wrong ?

Hand1
Just a cooler !!

Seat 1: dstevensou19 ($39.05)
Seat 2: pain23 ($178.35)
Seat 3: drunk_onion ($115.45)
Seat 4: kKIRKHAMMETTt ($14.35)
Seat 5: grahamwhite ($55.15)
Seat 6: kkalashian ($23.15)
grahamwhite posts the small blind of $0.25
kkalashian posts the big blind of $0.50
The button is in seat #4
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to grahamwhite [5d 5s]
dstevensou19 folds
pain23 folds
drunk_onion folds
kKIRKHAMMETTt has 15 seconds left to act
kKIRKHAMMETTt calls $0.50
grahamwhite raises to $2
kkalashian calls $1.50
kKIRKHAMMETTt calls $1.50
*** FLOP *** [Qs 5h 7h]
grahamwhite checks
kkalashian bets $21.15, and is all in
kKIRKHAMMETTt folds
grahamwhite calls $21.15
kkalashian shows [Qd 9h]
kKIRKHAMMETTt is sitting out
grahamwhite shows [5d 5s]
*** TURN *** [Qs 5h 7h] [4h]
*** RIVER *** [Qs 5h 7h 4h] [Jh]
kkalashian shows a flush, Jack high
grahamwhite shows three of a kind, Fives
kkalashian wins the pot ($45.90) with a flush, Jack high

Hand 2 – Looking back im not so sure I should be re raising with 88 but his figures were 20 / 10 maybe a little to low for the pfr
However once I had made the re raise was I right to make the cBet and correct in folding

Seat 1: schemr ($33.35)
Seat 2: YankeeRomeo7 ($136.05)
Seat 3: tuosevink ($52.35)
Seat 4: ThePHC ($48.40)
Seat 5: grahamwhite ($71.65)
Seat 6: GamblingBrother ($37.65)
grahamwhite posts the small blind of $0.25
GamblingBrother posts the big blind of $0.50
The button is in seat #4
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to grahamwhite [8h 8s]
schemr calls $0.50
YankeeRomeo7 calls $0.50
tuosevink folds
ThePHC raises to $2.75
grahamwhite has 15 seconds left to act
grahamwhite raises to $8.50
GamblingBrother folds
schemr folds
YankeeRomeo7 folds
ThePHC calls $5.75
*** FLOP *** [2d Td 9c]
grahamwhite bets $14
ThePHC calls $14
*** TURN *** [2d Td 9c] [4h]
grahamwhite checks
ThePHC bets $25.90, and is all in
grahamwhite folds
Uncalled bet of $25.90 returned to ThePHC
ThePHC mucks
ThePHC wins the pot ($44.20)

Hand 3 Now this guys figures were definitely ok to re raise He was about 17 / 14
The thing is should I have made the cbet into this flop . What else could I do
I hate it when there is a rag flop like this and you know that if you check the turn he is going to fire on the river

Seat 1: Samoyed111 ($70.10)
Seat 2: YankeeRomeo7 ($140.85)
Seat 3: grahamwhite ($58.55)
Seat 4: bluemonstr22 ($44.50)
Seat 5: agpoker96 ($50)
Seat 6: zerosum79 ($91)
YankeeRomeo7 posts the small blind of $0.25
grahamwhite posts the big blind of $0.50
The button is in seat #1
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to grahamwhite [Ks Ah]
bluemonstr22 folds
zerosum79 folds
Samoyed111 raises to $1.75
YankeeRomeo7 folds
grahamwhite has 15 seconds left to act
grahamwhite raises to $5.50
Samoyed111 calls $3.75
*** FLOP *** [5h 9d 3s]
grahamwhite bets $9.50
Samoyed111 calls $9.50
*** TURN *** [5h 9d 3s] [9c]
grahamwhite checks
Samoyed111 bets $30.25
grahamwhite folds
Uncalled bet of $30.25 returned to Samoyed111
Samoyed111 mucks
Samoyed111 wins the pot ($28.75)

Hand 4 - thiis guy had been like play 50/14 and had a massive stack
Probably should have not double barreled

Seat 1: schemr ($27.05)
Seat 2: YankeeRomeo7 ($145.05)
Seat 3: Vieille Peau ($10.40)
Seat 4: ThePHC ($66.90)
Seat 5: grahamwhite ($47.90)
Seat 6: GamblingBrother ($31.05)
grahamwhite posts the small blind of $0.25
GamblingBrother posts the big blind of $0.50
5 seconds left to act
The button is in seat #4
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to grahamwhite [Ts Td]
schemr folds
YankeeRomeo7 calls $0.50
ThePHC folds
grahamwhite raises to $2
GamblingBrother folds
YankeeRomeo7 calls $1.50
*** FLOP *** [2s 7d Jd]
grahamwhite bets $4.50
YankeeRomeo7 calls $4.50
*** TURN *** [2s 7d Jd] [Js]
grahamwhite has 15 seconds left to act
grahamwhite bets $8.50
YankeeRomeo7 raises to $138.55, and is all in
grahamwhite folds
Uncalled bet of $130.05 returned to YankeeRomeo7
YankeeRomeo7 mucks
YankeeRomeo7 wins the pot ($29)

Hand 5 - here we go again another 3 bet with a small pp , Although im sure that when it comes to 3 betting its more to do with the player and position and not so much the cards . I think that I am overbetting my cbets on the 3 bets

Atlas King posts the small blind of $0.25
WhetSpot posts the big blind of $0.50
the button is in seat #2
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to grahamwhite [7s 7c]
jselling calls $0.50
grahamwhite raises to $2.25
TheNutters calls $2.25
dentalfrank calls $2.25
Atlas King folds
WhetSpot calls $1.75
jselling calls $1.75
*** FLOP *** [3s 5s Jd]
WhetSpot checks
jselling checks
grahamwhite checks
TheNutters checks
dentalfrank bets $2.50
WhetSpot has 15 seconds left to act
WhetSpot folds
jselling folds
grahamwhite raises to $11.50
TheNutters folds
dentalfrank calls $9
*** TURN *** [3s 5s Jd] [6h]
grahamwhite checks
dentalfrank bets $9
grahamwhite adds $20.30
grahamwhite folds
Uncalled bet of $9 returned to dentalfrank
dentalfrank mucks
dentalfrank wins the pot ($32.80)

Hand 6 – I played this pretty weakly I think tried to play a raise and a cbet against this player looks like I should have double barrelled and folded to his river bet

Seat 1: grahamwhite ($54.70)
Seat 2: DuggleBogey ($41.20)
Seat 3: ab1x ($102.50)
Seat 4: Heartachee ($50)
Seat 5: tash78 ($22)
Seat 6: zerosum79 ($59.05)
DuggleBogey posts the small blind of $0.25
ab1x posts the big blind of $0.50
The button is in seat #1
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to grahamwhite [Jd Th]
tash78 folds
zerosum79 folds
grahamwhite raises to $1.75
DuggleBogey calls $1.50
ab1x has 15 seconds left to act
ab1x folds
*** FLOP *** [9d Qc Ts]
DuggleBogey checks
grahamwhite has 15 seconds left to act
grahamwhite bets $4
DuggleBogey calls $4
*** TURN *** [9d Qc Ts] [Jh]
DuggleBogey checks
grahamwhite checks
*** RIVER *** [9d Qc Ts Jh] [Ah]
DuggleBogey has 15 seconds left to act
DuggleBogey bets $7
grahamwhite has 15 seconds left to act
grahamwhite calls $7
*** SHOW DOWN ***
DuggleBogey shows [9c Ac] two pair, Aces and Nines
grahamwhite mucks
DuggleBogey wins the pot ($24.70) with two pair, Aces and Nines

Hand 7 - yipes another 3 bet - I don’t think there was anything wrong with this 3 bet . I should have spotted this guys stack here though . I mean he only has one bet So that maybe where th problems was
All in

Seat 1: INGELTROD ($41)
Seat 2: kauch12 ($50.85)
Seat 3: MelloAceCV ($12.65)
Seat 4: Colonel Mustard ($50)
Seat 5: grahamwhite ($50.55)
Seat 6: schemr ($161.45)
grahamwhite posts the small blind of $0.25
schemr posts the big blind of $0.50
The button is in seat #3
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to grahamwhite [Kh Qc]
INGELTROD folds
kauch12 folds
MelloAceCV raises to $1.75
grahamwhite has 15 seconds left to act
grahamwhite raises to $5.75
schemr folds
MelloAceCV raises to $12.65, and is all in
grahamwhite calls $6.90
MelloAceCV shows [7d 7c]
grahamwhite shows [Kh Qc]
*** FLOP *** [8s 5h Jc]
*** TURN *** [8s 5h Jc] [7h]
*** RIVER *** [8s 5h Jc 7h] [Tc]
MelloAceCV shows three of a kind, Sevens
grahamwhite shows King Queen high
MelloAceCV wins the pot ($24.55) with three of a kind, Sevens

2007-08-02T17:33:00.000-07:00

Well my night seems to have been pretty much like this all night
Although i did tilt for a short while

www.pokerhand.org/?1327891

i had to laugh he was 50 / 8 / 1 and posted the coment " that was lucky

So after this depressing session i decided to blog my goals for August

2500 hands per week 10000 for the month of August

Play in position more frequently

Reduce my $vpip to less than 20% with an increased pfr if possible
I am currently 24 / 16

Make more notes on players . I didnt realize that once you have made them on FT
you just have to hover over the villains icon and they show up F Me thats thick

Finally im gonna stop donking off chips to large turn or river bets when i have not got the goods

Oh and a few more Sweat sessions

Tonights results 607 hands -$113

My First Sweat Session

2007-08-01T14:47:00.000-07:00

Wow , just had my first sweat session with Dodgyken . Man he was running hot so there
were not too many sticky points to talk about as a result

However what i want to stress is how easy it was . On the voip and away .
I was sort of worried a little about it . But once you get the logmein downloaded and sorted

It is easy . Believe me its easier than writing the blogs !!

Learning The Hard Way

2007-08-01T06:43:00.000-07:00

Did nt manage to play on Sunday night , I got back late from my chip shop and was just feeling really tired , so i managed to get away from the screen for a proper sleep

Monday night I lost a buyin early on when i got all in with 89s on the button on a 8 7 10 J 5 board only for the cut off to show Q9 the thing is he called my raise and then he called my c bet and then i just had to go all in. After that its hard work getting back to where you started .

Still i experimented a little with the 3 betting and i think i got the hang of it well just a little anyway . The guy on my right raised 3 times in a row when i was on the button the first time i had nothing but then JJ and AA what else could i do but re raise , he then proceeded to warn me about it lol . I did not feel i could justify doing it again too soon .

Tuesday night again i struggled early on and lost a buyin when i raised with K10o on the button the utg+1 called he then called my flop bet my turn bet and my river bet on a KJ847 I couldn't seem to get him to fold and was all in on the river only for him to show K7. Cold have saved some money here . Still again worked on the 3 betting with a little more success beginning to understand it .

Spent most of this morning reading the blogs in particular noledges blog
I need to get to this level ! no i will get to this level !!

Whilst i am not always posting on the blog i am most certainly reading others and trying to comment . Once i find a Hot spot for my laptop ill do my comments at lunchtimes giving me more time to play in the evenings

The blogs are a great way of learning , they really are , i have already got articles on 3 betting , table selectin and table aggression . Whats also pretty cool is you can also add to other blogs who probably dont know you exist and they respond

So although July has not been very productive on the $ side . In fact pretty unproductive .It most certainly has been on the learning / understanding side

So see you at the tables

Solid Session

2007-07-29T00:53:00.000-07:00

Ok first here are a few hands , now that i finally have worked out how to get these posted correctly

Hand 1 I was wondering should i have called this ? or fold ? I know I'm on the button so i should be using my position , but how ? or do i just pitch this hand and wait ?
www.pokerhand.org/?1311348

Hand 2 I seem to want to call the flush draws . Is there any +EV in this play , should i just fold ?
www.pokerhand.org/?1311360

Hand 3 This was my first attempt at 3 betting on this table , Not sure if my play makes sense though ?
www.pokerhand.org/?1311362

Hand 4 This guy minraised me , I just felt that it was a weak play that he continued , I was aso the big stack and easily had him covered . Those were my thoughts , but were they correct
www.pokerhand.org/?1311386

So anyway last nights session was ok , had to change tables a couple of times , must be some sort of delay with the hud , My 47 , 20 table somehow turned into a 20 / 16 by the time i got there...lol i hate it when that happens !!!

Ended up 2 buyinsup , so i was quite pleased , it beats losing a big pot early on and then having to grind my way back to the starting position .

It just goes to show how important confidence is in this game and you also
need a little momentum . Yep momentum , and i came up with a cunning
plan for when i go back to 4 tabling .

I will start of patiently with the 2 tables , feel my way into the session , and then once i feel i am playing my a game , i will add another table and then another
,
this also gives me the opportunity to pick a decent table , so often i
just get to choosing any table , the first and just load them up . A
little preparation should is necessary

See you at the tables

oh , i just read an article by corny on 12 tabling . I wonder if Mr Warrior has read it ?

Momentum !!

2007-07-28T01:39:00.000-07:00

More hands
Hand 1
www.pokerhand.org/?1308569

I was wondering if i should have called this bet
Vilain was 40/8 I knew he didnt have 2 pair but was wondering if i should have bet the turn card

Hand 2
www.pokerhand.org/?1308574

Was i correct to lay down this hand villain was 46 / 18 he had been very aggro against me in particular calling all my pfr an cbets to be honest i lost most of my pots to this guy . I had played an earlier hand with jj c bet it and got min raised and then it was checked down to the river he was holding A5 and there was an ace on the flop
so i was sure he had an ace here . But still did not like laying this down

Sadly i lost just over a buyin last night mostlu due to the 7 on the river that the guy in the first hand won . Overall i was happy with my play should have got away from the one table though where th guy was really aggro against me . But playing 2
tables for the minute is very helpful

Going to grind my way back to the july starting position .Hopefully i canget some comments here , although i have lacking on the posting side of this blog .

But that will change , Oh by the way the momentum thing is about my blogging
3 in 3 days cool !!

See you at the tables

Recovering

2007-07-27T01:23:00.000-07:00

first some hands as i never seem to post any
http://www.pokerhand.org/?1305376
http://www.pokerhand.org/?1305379
http://www.pokerhand.org/?1305381
http://www.pokerhand.org/?1305383

any comments much appreciated

Anyway back to the recovery . I have been reading loads of blogs , brian townsends in particular , as he seems to be on a downswing , losing 3 million is pretty big .

Then i got to reading some of the comments , Some of it good , some of it bad and i started to compare it to my downswing and thought that there must be similarities in the feelings . Obviously not the levels , but the feelings , dissapointment , anger , etc etc .

So some more thinking about how to recover , i read and re read some of the posts on more blogs . I put it down to confidence or lack of it , also lack of preparation and lack of concentration .These were the problems i had to solve !

So the last few days i have done the following . Reduced the tables i play from 4 to 2 . Watched some vids , I think trevrob of cr said he waches a vid before he plays
so i watched a brystmar vid . I spent more time selecting my tables . All in all i just slowed down a little , calmed down a little .

Once i get to my july starting position im going to have a break . Someone suggested a 4 day on 4 day off scenario to help . I think this may be a good idea . Maybe a 3 and 3 or even a 2 and 2 . I think fruity pro mentioned about the balance being right and for sure i know for many part timers it just isnt there .

Well more paragraphs than normal . see you at the tables

Downward Spirals

2007-07-26T06:08:00.000-07:00

Since my last post its has been a downward spiral . I have experienced a huge amount of downswing on my bankroll . The explanations are clear to see . I have been playing tired . I have been playing at my chip shop (that is pure madness) . I have been playing on tilt . I have been playing Badly .

As well as all of this if you are unaware of the floods in the uk . I work in worcester and live in gloucester so to be honest life has been a bit of a nightmare .

However these are just excuses or as someone once told me (probably myself) just a story i have been telling myself .

To be honest i think i had been tilting pretty badly over the weekend of the 13th and 14th of july , and then as i usually do , i go up to the higher limits . I got sucked out with AA vs 10 10 , when the villain hit trips for $245 on stars , then managed to enter a limit holdem sng for $50 which i just could not play and that was the end of my stars BR for the moment

I have done similar things on fulltilt losing nearly 30% of my roll through playing above my limits and poor play .

Then as i have been doing frequently , i started studying some of the blogs . I noiced that brian was on a huge downswing and made a post there , this got me to thinking about my own poker situation .

wanting to post and not wishing to make the post sound too negative , i had a long think about the lack of discipline that is sometimes in my life and therefore my game . When its quiet in the chip shop i play poker . What an absurd thing to do . At home when i am really tired i play 4 tables , again that just no good . These things i have too change .

The worst thing about it al though was having to deal with the loss of my bankroll , that is depressing or was !! Yep i have managed to overcome the sense of loss by reminding myself that i am still winning !! After building my roll up from $350 to nearly %1900 over the last few months , well mid april actually . I still am around the $1100 mark . So i am still winning.
I have used the last week as a lesson in how to recover from downswings and from tilting .

Some of the things i did are as followed , I reviewed my play . I had a rest . I dropped down a level to 10 / 25 for a few days to regain my confidence . I watched a few vids . I didnt have a break though but that will come when i get back to $1500 so i feel like i can start again !!

So were ready to rock and roll . This weekend i will play a little but concentrate on a timetable to bring the discipline back into my game .

Well thats it for now . See you at the tables .

Swings and Tilt

2007-07-13T06:55:00.000-07:00

Well this week has not been so successful so far. On Monday i had about a 3 buyin loss and then he same again on Tuesday. On both occasions i was playing 4 tables and seemingly going through the motions . I had got back late from work and went straight to the tables . On both occasions i had a 100 nl table open where most of my losses seemed to occur . On reviewing my hands i found that i was as lose there as i was on the 25 / 50 which seems to be wrong . Everyone seems to be so much tighter at 100 nl is this the case ? . So last night i decided to play just two tables. One on stars and one on Full Tilt ended even on the stars but up 2 buy ins on the FT table. Part of my problem is getting back late from my fish and chip shop (chippy)and wanting to play as currently im am really excited about the poker .So basically im playing when im really tired but also really keen so i blow hot an cold throughout the session sometimes nodding off and sometimes ultra alert.This is not good.Although i have not posted many hands i have been checking out all the bogs and working on my blogsite too . Read some 2+2 threads last night regarding mental states and i know this applies to me .When im 4 tabling i pretty much just play the cards up to a point like raise and c bet then if im called i consider db and then check the pahud stats to try and put them on a range all in all whilst i have not played much poker i have certainly been learning , and hopefully over the weekend i can put a few theories to the test . For example open up my button and cutoff range as per tiens post . Tighten up my utg and mp positions hopefully i can subconsciously learn them to make it easier on the 4 tabling . Much happier with the content of my blog as well which was distracting me . One final topic regarding posting of hands . Does anyone find that when they have made a huge mistake they just either know at the time its wrong or afterwards they can see how obvious it was . I do and then i just cant post the hand as i already know the answer ? still i will get some out there tonight or tomorrow. Anyway good luck at the tables

2007-07-09T09:36:00.000-07:00

Well the first week in July has fininshed and i am pretty sure i have spent more time blogging or at least trying to blog than playing poker....But im sure it will be worth it in the long run
I have not managed to post that many hands yet as im still coming to grips with the http stuff but i will get there....This week i have played nearly 3000 hands about 7 and a half hours play 4 tabling....I have just started to add a 50 / 100 nl table to
be included in my 4 but i am finding it tricky....It just doesnt seem like the 25 / 50 where pretty much when i c bet people fold or if i double barrel they fold
i have to play much tighter but still ill get there
won about $170 stats are about 23/16/4 but if any one can tell me how to get poker grapher and how to post the charts ill post the tricky 100 nl ones

Sweet Session....And no Maniac bets....I think

2007-07-05T16:42:00.000-07:00

Well i have just had a really good session.... 276 hands 52 mins $171.45
Very Sweet.... however i am going to design a spreadsheet that will check to see
how many of my top starting hands i was dealt in relation to how much i
win....I am thinking if the cards are dry it will be about losing less as opposed to winning more so i will actually be wining....strange concept i know
Still having trouble with the hand history posting
Here are a couple
hand 1 i was just wondering if i bet too much here and was lucky to get the call
www.pokerhand.org/?1237556 Hand 2 im on a flush draw but should i have called is this +ev in the long run
http://www.pokerhand.org/?1237550
i actuall think ive got the link !!! wow at last
and heres a couple of nice ones

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1237555

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1237522