New job? And new personal HU record

Well I got an e-mail from Absolute today with $10 free from them. Usually I do something stupid like PLO or blackjack trying to run it up or lose it and I lose it and I don't play there again until I get more free money. Today I decided to play HU SNGs with it. Lowest they had was $5.25s so I could only afford to lose once before I'd have to short stack some NL cash games. Anyway I won and was able to play another and I ran up 8 wins in a row. I won 4 $5s and 4 $10s to turn the $10 into $67. Not a huge accomplishment in itself but I won my last game last night and 8 in a row today so my new record is now 9 games.

I also received an e-mail from a local company about my resume. I had meant to send it in over the weekend and forgot and I thought about it just before I went to bed this morning so I got back up and sent it in and unfortunately the reply was in mu junkbox so I didn't see it until late tonight but I sent a reply back and they want to interview me so maybe early next week I'll get that taken care of. I'm kinda nervous. It looks like they want a web guy and it used to be my specialty. I've done some web stuff in college and enjoyed it but I'm rusty as I haven't done any of it in a couple years and would need a quick refresher. But I think I'd be good at the job.

Would be nice to get back to work and come home and play a few hours of poker each night and be able to build my bankroll and maybe do some MTTs or something else on the side. Not sure if my old backer would want to pick me back up but I'd be willing to do the Sunday majors probably if he'd be up for it. I don't see me grinding the nightly MTTs with having to be at work the next morning. I'd prefer to play SNGs or cash so I could stop when I wanted to.

Anyway I didn't get to play any at Tilt today like I had planned. Lil bro just got a new car so I spent some time checking it out. Its a Pontiac G5. About the same as the Chevy Cobalt. Not a bad looking lil car. Has a aux input for Ipods or whatever. I used the last of my FPPs last week to get him a new Ipod for it cause I thought it had the connector but maybe its the newer models or the upgraded ones or something cause his didn't have just an Ipod cable built in like we had read about on the web but its no big deal.

I watched the season premiere of Lost tonight and I'll probably watch either some HU cash or HU SNG vids on cardrunners tonight. I may try to quickly run up that Absolute mini roll I have there but most of my time will be spent at the Tilt games. I'm not worried about trying to get money off Absolute until I have a couple hundred or something worth working with.

moved to Full Tilt same results

Well I just run bad everywhere lately. Last SNg of the night I get all in with 75 on 975 flop he had K9 rivers a 9 and talks trash to me cause I'm a donk obv. I dropped 7 BIs at the 34s and made 4.5 at the 23s so I still lost just over $100 tonight. I played some more this morning at Stars I had like $30 in the account and ran it up to about $120 playing micros and did pretty well. Got my confidence back somewhat. Pretty disappointed with how I ran tonight but I played well. The donks at Tilt may be worse than Stars if thats possible. The games are much faster since you only start with 50BBs.

I guess I'll play some more of the 23s tomorrow and keep taking shots at the 34s whenever I get 10 BIs. Hopefully I can get my mojo back soon. This week is going to be a loss for sure as there is no way I can get back to even currently. But if I could grind some games at Tilt and cashing in my rakeback on Saturday night if I have enough to have 20 BIs at the 57s I'll be satisfied. Also hopefully I'll be close to get my FullTilt jersey soon. I didn't get any offers to buy it so I'll probably take the Hockey jersey. It or the Soccer one but probably the hockey cause I like my Stars PCA hockey jersey the best out of all my poker swag.

downswing continues

This is just sick. I played a few 57s today and went like 3 for 8 and decided to move down both because I wasn't feeling too confident in my game and I really didn't want to redeposit. I though I'd move down and play the 34s tonight. Well I ran like crap there too and lost most of what I had remaining on Stars. Its just non stop beats or coolers when we get it all in. I'm sure I've developed a couple leaks too but this is getting wild. I moved down to the 11s and eventually played a couple 6.25s with what was left. Example at the 11s lvl 1 I get QQ all in v/s Q8 on 87x flop and he turns trips on me. I just can't do much when I run like this.

I'm playing a 5400FPP sat right now trying to squeak into the money here so I have some bankroll without having to redeposit what I just withdrew. I have some funds on Tilt and I'm planning on going there next week anyway but I wanted to finish out the week at Stars and get my 10K VPPs so I could get 2 more months of VIP status and freerolls. Also taking some cash from Stars to Tilt was part of my plan as well. 6 remaining I lose 66 to Q4s and my run continues. And I bubble it.

I doubt I blog for a few days. I'll prolly grind what little I have at the lowest stakes on Stars and just try to get my VPP goal then maybe ship it all over to Tilt and see how I do there. I was really confident up to 2 days ago I could crush these and somehow variance has taken all that away. :-(

Learning from a downswing

Well last night's run was unfortunate but not really as crushing as I thought it was last night. I only dropped 11.5 BIs I think. I may set a stop loss of 10 in the future but I've lost 6 games in a row several times before so I'm not sure. I've seen lots of other players say they've had 15 BI downswings. I've played 600-700 games now HU so I was due to have a bad night sooner or later. After I got offline last night I realized it wasn't that bad. Just bad timing cause I had just cashed out so much. I may go ahead and take a shot at the 57s again tonight cause I have some funds on Tilt or that I can upload on Stars if I need to but hopefully I won't. But I think I will start taking a break if I drop 5 BIs in a row and clear my head then if I drop another 5 I'll call it a night.

Also I know last night I just wasn't catching any cards and I was playing a lot of stations. But I've known that stations seem to be my biggest problem in HU games. I tend to continue betting out of habit and get myself short and then tend to play push/fold and get myself back in it. But I need to change gears v/s them and tighten my preflop range and possibly make my bets larger. Most stations don't notice that you've tightened up and will continue to call down big bets regardless. And since I try to table select v/s the better players I'm probably going to be playing a lot of weaker players.

Here are a few hands from last night in the early part where I wasn't getting crushed that I had selected to post.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?2017626

This is something I've wanted to work on and think it was a good play. I tend to think this is always a bluff but its probably not. I think I have the best hand here often.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?2017631

http://www.pokerhand.org/?2017633

This summed up my night. He claims this was a misclick but I'm not sure. He shot back right after the hand a line about how I pwn souls or something. It might have been a compliment idk but it sounded like he was being a smartass.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?2017644

worst run ever at HU

This is going to be short cause i've got a big drinking session upcoming. I played 48 games tonight and dropped $670. I couldn't win anything. People were misclick calling me 6 hi and catching runner runner straights, getting all in on flops in level 1 weak FD v/s my overpairs, top pairs, 2 pairs and everyone hit them. I got my big pairs snapped off left and right. This was truly the sickest run I've ever had. I lost like 9 in a row at one point. I won 4 of my last 20 games tonight. Mostly against losing players. They would call down and catch almost anything and I never could get much going. I had several interesting hands from early in the session where I won 6 in a row and like 8 of 9 I may post tomorrow. This crushed my ROI and win %s somewhat.

The worst part is I just cashed out 1/2 of my roll leaving myself 20 BIs for the 57s and now I'm down to about 7 BIs so I'm going to have to move down now and not sure if I can even get to the 10K VPPs since I'll have to run at least 1 day of 37s to get to 10BIs for the 57s which is about the least I would want to try them again.

Anyway I've got a bottle calling my name that needs to be emptied...

back from the dead

Man it seems this was the theme all night. I'd get crippled early in a lot of games down to 500 chips in level 2 and then make a huge comeback and win. My night could have really been bad with as many suckouts as everyone was getting. Almost everyone who chased got there whether it was flushes or top pair v/s my overpairs on the flop. But I thought I played very well trying to take advantage of knowing how to play a short stack. Up and down night as well which doesn't help. I had a streak of 5 in a row that put me up almost 300 on the night then lost 6 of the next 7 and it didn't get much better. I finally won 3 in a row to end the night up 1 BI. I got in 39 games which is good. I was ready to call it a night at 22 games when I was so far up and might have had I won a few more games. But I needed to put in the grind tonight. Think I need 125 more games to hit the 10K VPP mark.

Not sure why I'm pressing so hard for it b/c I really think I'm going to try out FullTilt soon. The forums say the Tilt higher stakes games are softer than Stars and you get more games in per hour but prolly a slightly less ROI due to the turbo format and 3 minute blinds. But most players seem to average 12 games an hour 2 tabling Stars and since I've started raising less my games are taking longer and I'm lucky to get 10 per hour. Plus I'd be getting rakeback at Tilt.

If I could make it to the 115s on Tilt and got Ironman I'd be getting about 75K points as well if I traded in medals for points each month. I know it comes out of rakeback buying stuff but I'd be able to get like an Ipod a month or something close to that. I mean what else are you going to do with points there? The store really sucks. I'll prolly buy a hockey jersey cause I'm very close to 1 right now from playing cash games last month and I've wanted one for a couple of years. But I'm not buying 3 jerseys a month LOL! I know WTF would I do with an Ipod a month but I'm sure I could sell them on ebay and still profit a couple hundred. IDK I hate just letting the points build up there cause there just isn't anything else to do with them. I could see for 3-4 months I would have a new camera which I don't really need, a GPS which would be nice but I'd only get it cause there isn't much else, and I'd get a new Ipod. I just spent all my Stars FPPs to get my lil bro a new 160GB Ipod for his new car which hopefully he's getting this week and its supposed to have an Ipod hook up.

I'd get one of the Ipod Touch but living in TN we don't have many WiFi spots so the internet features won't do me much good. The storage is small and I'd really just assume have a 160GB Ipod with all my music and/or videos on there cause I can't see me watching movie or anything on either. So maybe I'd get a camcorder one month as well. I really wish the store was more like Stars but Stars is still the best site IMO and I'm going to miss it if I do leave there. But if I can get 15 games/hour 2 tabling on Tilt I think its a much better deal.

OK enough rambling about the store here were a couple hands from tonight.
Preflop here is loose but he min raised me. I really hate his shove here but we were getting it in either way. http://www.pokerhand.org/?2008952
Same player. http://www.pokerhand.org/?2008958
And this is why you don't play Ax
http://www.pokerhand.org/?2008965

Saturdays are fun

Nothing like the weekend players to make you feel good. At least when you run good and I did tonight. Well I can't say I ran too good I just played 2 guys with winning sharkscopes all night and they were pretty good players who must have been drunk or the upper levels are really soft cause I outplayed them pretty bad. Lots of bluffers tonight and I had 1 guy thats pretty much all he did. I just called him down with almost any pair every hand. He did hit me once when I called down top pair from the BB and he had raised 72o and was betting bottom pair and rivered trips and overshoved me where I thought I should fold but didn't and I was right he had trips. But he 3 bet bluffed so often I went ahead and looked him up. Took him about 5 minutes to bluff his stack back off to me. I only played a little over 20 games tonight and was up almost $400 so I stopped early cause I need to get some stuff done around the house and I wanted to keep watching some of the HU cash vids on Card Runners.

Pretty good week overall. I only played 215 games and was break even though 130 of those games and still made $840 this week. Running 17% over my last 85 games helps out LOL! Overall I'm at 488 games 6.6% ROI and 55.7% win rate. I think I could move up if I wanted to but I just don't seem to find enough games to play continuously at the 115s and there seems to be more grinders hanging out there so I figure I'll stay here for now and maybe in a couple weeks I'll think about making a move up or to cash. I'm really wanting to maybe start splitting sessions of SNGs and Cash to see how I do.

I'm about $800 away from the leaderboard on Sharkscope. I know I should have played more tonight but if I can get there by the end of the month I'd be hapy. I have to buckle down the rest of the month and get my games in or I won't get to the 10K VPP mark. I need 170 more games I think to get there. I may be forced to do a few 115s if I'm not close by the 30th. But I think I'll be ok. I tend to want to stop on a high note when I play. This is probably a -$EV move but its a +EV move for my attitude and moral. I'm not putting any hands up tonight but I may come back and add a HH tomorrow v/s the bluff station cause I thought it was a good one. Kind of entertaining I think.

fri night

Well I took last night off to watch videos and catch up on posts at the 2+2 HU forums. Did ok tonight. 37 games and up almost $200. Nothing really interesting tonight. I did get 1 player down to 20 chips at 25/50 and he came back to 1K chips and we got all in TT v/s Q5cc and he flopped 2 clubs and I was scared he was going to make the comeback but I held. I have a few other hands from tonight posted below. I'm thinking of trying to play some HU cash. I would think it would have to be more profitable but also higher variance. The problem is Tilt/Stars has HU cash but it starts at 50NL and I'd like to start off a little lower if I could. There seems to be a lot of HU cash going and if I datamined it would be easy to stay away from winning players as well. But I'm not looking to make the move right away. I'm hoping to keep grinding the 57Ts for a while. There are still lots of losing players at this level and I'd like to get my ROI up some before I try moving up and I'm still tweaking my game. Currently I have 466 games 5.5% ROI, and 55.2% win rate. That includes a 125 game break even stretch this week and I went about 80 games break even to start out at this level.

I need 2500 VPPs before the end of the month which is just under 200 games I believe and shouldn't be a problem. Going to try to get up in time to play the VIP freerolls. I missed it last week I think. Here are a few hands from tonight.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1998258 I have no idea what his thinking is at any point in this hand.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1998283 This was marginal but I really thought I was ahead on the flop and couldn't believe his play. This guy has great stats at the lower levels but he played pretty bad both times I played him tonight.

Here is another from him. Obv he gives me no respect.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?1998290

Back in black

OK I get bored and try to find witty titles. But I did have a good session finally. But 1st I'll tell a quick story. I got my new RAM in today and went to install it in my computer. I take the side off to get inside and there is a mouse inside my computer. I have a few open slots in the back where I used to have PCI cards that have been removed and I never capped the slots in the back. Somehow he climbed in there I guess just before I opened the case. I'm lucky he didn't chew threw any wires or on the boards at all.

Started off scary. 1st 2 games were 2 huge donks. I got down to 700 chips early in the 1st one and my opponent was super agro. He raises 3x I shove KQ and he insta calls Q9o and gg me. 2nd one I get the guy down to 750 or 800 and he calls over 10% of his stack 85s and flops 2 pair v/s my QQ in lvl 2. I did somehow come back to win that one. I ran pretty well overall. Lots of suck outs and resuck outs. The worst of the night was I had an opponent down to 2BBs at 25/50 and he won. I got my money in behind every single time it was pretty amazing. The guy was a rack after he got crippled. I think he had me dominated 4 times in a row.

I only played 26 games tonight and went 16/10 for a good night. Overall I got my ROI back over 5% and 55% win rate. I got my new RAM in and upgraded my PC tonight. Up to 2.5GBs of RAM and I can tell some difference but there is still some lag I can't get rid of. Cardrunners is hiring for their Chicago office. I sent en e-mail and my resume as it would be an awesome job working with GreenPlastic and MuddyWater. I don't figure to have a shot at it but why not. I probably would hate living in Chicago as I hate the cold weather.

Anyway I've thought about maybe posting a complete HH here every now and then I'm not sure how many people are even reading this so it may not be worthwhile to bother. But I thought I could post some funny/interesting/bad beat hands rather than just my ranting.

This was a good one. I got called by bottom pair. Such respect.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?1987314

I'd played this guy in 1 other game and he was wild. I hate getting in pre this early with AK but I think I hate his play even worse. Luckily these situations very rarely come up v.s decent players. http://www.pokerhand.org/?1987325

This shows how well a lot of there guys play. http://www.pokerhand.org/?1987378

And finally 1 more time no respect. http://www.pokerhand.org/?1987415

rollercoaster continues

Well i went break even tonight in about 43 games I think. I started off winning 5 of 18. I made a couple of bad plays and just got coolered several times over pairs v/s larger pairs. I slowly grinded my way back and I quit when I got to even. This is about 125 games break even which is probably

Nothing really exciting today. I'm still tweaking my game and working on some mid stage plays. I'm also working on betting with under 15BBs where used to I would shove a lot. V/s some opponents its still easy to limp or min raise the btn and take the pot on the flop with a small bet. I may get the leaderboard this week if I can ever remember how to have winning sessions again. I seem to be struggling early in my sessions the last few days so I may either watch a HU video just 1 table a few games to get my mindset right before grinding it out.

Please get me off this rollercoaster

This is really crazy. I played 6 115s today and broke even. I know I said I wasn't going to play them but I saw several bad players and couldn't help myself. I went 3-3 but should have been 5-1 in them. I took a break and came back to the 57s tonight. I went 1-8 to start my session off. For the last 2 days I've had trouble winning 60/40s, coinflips and rarely win a 40/60. I had several players hit perfect runner runner, call all in on 3rd pair and a 3 hi FD on the turn, they were rivering their kicker for 2 pair when we would get all in on the flop top pair v/s top pair, etc etc. I've gone 100 games break even or close to it.

I did stage a big comeback tonight. I was down almost 400 at my lowest point and and 26
games later I was up almost 250. I'm at 360 games now and 5% ROI. Its taken a big plunge after the 100 game even stretch obv. Last 300 games though I'm still at 7.5% ROI.

I'm hoping to make the 2008 leaderboard for this level by the end of the month. I can probably make it this week if I put in the hours. I'm going to try for at least 200 games this week and 40 games a day. I'm 1/2 way there already since I played 52 last night and 40 today but I plan to play most of the week and maybe take 1 day off this weekend but I'm not sure. Also I'm trying to get to the 10K VPP level this month. I'm on pace for it but I don't have much room to miss either. If I miss a day or two I'll have to make up some more games.

worst night yet

This was unreal. I lost 8 of 9 to start the night. I was down over $500 early on and never could get back to even. I played 52 games tonight just trying to get to even and I'm finally stopping down $250. 3 times I got within 2 wins of being .500 on the night and I'd get 3 outted or something stupid and go back to 5 wins under .500. Like 1 idiot tells me on hand 1 he's going to shove. I had JJ just waiting of course he limp/folds. Hand 2 I had AT and raise and he insta shoves so I decide to gamble cause I'm sure he had nothing. He had J8s and gg me. :-(

I think I may stay at the 57s for a while and try to get caught up on my bills and grind up a roll. I think 10 buy ins is fine if you are taking a shot up and don't mind moving down but the last few days I've seen some brutal streaks and I'm playing mostly losing players. So I'd like to get up to 50BIs maybe so I can take a hit and not have to think about moving down. Also since the 115s on Stars don't go off that often I can pick and choose some to play when I feel like it.

Anyway my arm is fixing to fall off cause I just did 52 straight HU games and I think I need a drink LOL!

rollercoaster ride again tonight

Wow what a night. Pretty horrible session late last night/early this morning. Today I started off great. Lost my 1st game then won 6 in a row, lost 1, won 5 in a row. Then I went on the worst stretch I've had yet. I lost 7 in a row and 9 of 10 games. I finished up the session winning 10 of 13 I think. I still had a 60%+ win rate so I can't complain but man I was near suicide levels there in the middle. I had a good night overall though.

I didn't make my goals for the week and I can't complain too much about it. Between the PXF stuff on Monday, internet problems a couple times this week, and I haven't felt well a few days this week. I took off early a few nights when I made my $300 a night goal as well and took a shot last night and lost 5 buy ins at the 115s. For the week at the 57Ts though I played 213 games, +$1282, 10.5% ROI and 57.7% win rate. I'm pretty happy with that and if I can get some more volume in and hold those rates or close to it I'd be happy.

I think they are sustainable as well. Maybe my win rate and ROI come down a point or two but I don't think it would be much. And I'd make it up with more volume as well. I need to take some more shots at the 115s but I'm not sure when/where. I may start sharkscoping them in the afternoon before my sessions of the 57s or closer to midnight after my sessions. That way I could keep my volume up at the 57s and as I took shots and built up at the 115s I could think about playing those more. There seems to be more winning players and they don't go off near as often so I might have to split time between the 57s and 115s even when I do get a roll to play them. Have to see what happens. I could also add some FullTilt games I guess but if possible I'd like to keep just playing stars and building up FPPs. But if I can get enough games to run the 115s and 230s full time between both sites I'd do that instead as its worth more than the FPP bonuses.

worst day yet

Most of the evening my internet was out. I did get a few games in but not many and tried moving up tot he 115s and table selecting but the games were bad and I won 2/5 before just going to the 57s for the night. Did ok think I broke even. Had a headache and went to bed. Got up a few hours later and talking to stevie while he was pwning the higher HU SNGs I started playing again. Took several shots v/s really bad players at the 115s and just continued to lose. Then I found some even worse guys sitting in the 230s so I took a shot at them even though it was out of my roll. I went 3 for 5 in then for a slight profit. I'm 4 for 13 in the 115s and its sickening. I've had top paired rivered by trips from guys calling down bottom pair or just the classic 3 outters. I went even in 24 of the 57s so overall I dropped a little over 400 today. Which was a decent % of my roll. But my plan was to take shots at the 115s when I had over 1K in my account and thats what I did. I was taking shots at the 230s just cause the players were so bad and I was up at the time. But I had a stretch where I went 1/8 and had to go back down.

Not sure what I'll do tonight. Probably keep playing the 57s and maybe late in the night if I'm up and can sharkscope the players ahead of time take another shot at the 115s. I was hoping I could just grind them like I do the 57s but I'm not sure thats possible. I saw in the afternoon the games were really soft but tonight they had more winning players than losing players in them. And on top of that they just didn't run that often compared to the 57s. I waited 5 minutes at one point and the 115s just weren't getting any action. 5 minutes isn't a huge amnt of time but when your used to games starting in under a minute or two it gets frustrating.

At the 57s my ROI is holding at 5% and my win % is 55%. I still think there is room for improvement but its ok for now. I'm hoping I'm wrong about the 115s and that I can just grind them and just avoid the top players. There are players at the 57s that are winning players that I feel have huge leaks in their game so if the 115s are the same I think I'd be in good shape.

f'ing charter internet

OK I didn't update last night. I was running really bad and on top of that I wasn't playing my A game. I got back to close to even and stopped about 35 games in last night. Tonight my internet has dropped out at least 5 times so I stopped early. I played 27 games and was up about $200 so I got tired of getting dropped.

After talking with stevie tonight I may start min raising preflop more. I'm not sure how well I like the idea. It makes hand reading more important and its going to be more effort multi tabling but the upside may be worth it. I'll have to keep trying it out to see how it works.

Overall 212 games 5.6% ROI and 55.2% win %. Last 150 games is 10.8% ROI and 57.9% win %.

Tuesday update

Well I somehow calmed down from last night and didn't slit my wrist or anything although I wanted to. I really think I'm just not meant to play in the WSOP after all LOL! I also need to do 600 more 57Ts to get to my 10K VPP mark for Jan to continue my Nova status. I can miss 1 month before they end it but I still have to hit 100K by June 30th to keep it. Which kind of sucks. Looks like if you were still on pace to keep it they'd let you have it until you fell off the pace. If you made 10K a month you are going to get Nova status a few months after they take it away from you so its not a huge deal but it does kind of suck.

But anyway did pretty well tonight I only played 39 games. Finished up 400 which is good cause I think I went 5/5 over the last 10 games and was pretty bummed out. Stupid stuff like lvl 2 I 4 bet all in AJo and get instacalled by KQs. AT gets rivered by A9 AIPF. I lost 3 of 3 to 1 guy who had his sharkscope blocked but he was such a station and he just kept hitting flops and not folding anything. Nothing you can do when a guy calls down 3rd pair and you miss your overs and FD every time. I wanted to start doing 60 games a day but idk if I will get there or not. I need to maybe do an afternoon session of 20 games and then 2 night sessions of 20 games. My goal was to run Sunday to Sunday making 300 a night. I obv didn't get there last night cause I played like 10 games and had all those PXF games but I did profit from winning the 1 HU tourny and the 4th place in the PXF invitational. I was ahead of my goal Sunday and tonight so I think I'm pretty close overall and have played less games than I thought I would need to so I'm not stressing about not getting all my games in.

Well I've got to go put in my 30+ minutes on the bike now. I've started eating more because I'm exercising more so I'm actually putting weight back on so I'm going to have to increase my workouts some. I may try to either do an extra 30 minutes in the early afternoon on the bike or try to just up my nightly riding to 45 minutes.

*Edit:

Thought I'd post my stats for the 57Ts I'm at 150 games and my ROI is 5.9% and Win % is 55.3%. Sample is still way too small to know where I am considering I was break even at 110 games. Games are up to 1 min on average but the last couple of days games seem to be taking longer. Not sure if its something I'm doing differently or my opponents but I'm running much better so I hope its me playing better.

Just missed a WSOP 2.5K seat

Got invited to play in the PXF invitation MTT tonight. Make the final table in 1st place. 1st prize is a 2.5K WSOP seat. I run AQ into KK 4 handed and get crippled. Then I dbl up next hand then my A6 < 98s and I'm out 4th. 1-3 also got a PXF chip set so I really do run bad LOL!

Sunday update

Well I took some brutal beats today. Lots of AJ v/s Ax hands that I lost. My fav was guy min raises I reraise AA he calls and shoves the flop with a gutshot (about 2.5x the pot) and runner runners trips. I had a few suck outs mainly spots you can't avoid. Both of us below 15BBs and I run JJ into QQ and turn a J but you can't fault anyone on plays like that. I guess cause it was Sunday but the play was as bad as I've seen at the 57s. Players constantly overshoving pots. Guys shoving 1500 stacks over a 3x raise at level 1. Its been a roller coaster. No one wanted to fold their BB and usually floated flops with just 1 over card. And just as I am playing my last game idiot min raises me again from the btn with with 20BBs I call 95s and flop a flush and he hit his set and the river pairs him. And he comes back to beat me obv.

I played 40 games tonight and won 24 of them. Games took longer than usual. Normally I have an average time under 10 minutes but tonight all of them were over 12 minutes. That gets me to the 100 game mark here and I'm slightly ahead. About 1.5% I believe with a win rate of 53%. Lots of room for improvement. I think I can beat them for at least 10% ROI which would take about a 57.5% win rate. I don't see why I can't win at that rate especially as I work on my game more and quit running bad. I don't think I've yet to see more than 2-3 players I thought were even decent players at this level.

sick sick nite

Well I only played 20 games tonight. Haven't felt well and I wasn't on top of my game either so I quit after getting another cold deck. I lost AK to AT all in pre at the 15/30 level, build back up and lose AT to A8o all in pre at 25/50 to exit 1 game, very next game 1st hand in I flop trips A kicker only to see my opponent flopped the boat. Then I lose another 99 to 66 all in pre and then get berated for me being a luckbox which really confused me as I didn't know WTF he was even talking about. Seriously the play is so bad. I've thought about moving my play to Full Tilt cause the turbos are faster and you get more games in but I'm not sure the player pools are as high for HU games. If they aren't I'm fine playing at Stars and not getting rakeback but keeping my Nova status. So far I'm 29/31 at the 57s. So I'm down about 3 or 4 BIs which doesn't bother me as I easily should have won 15 of the 20 games I played tonight.

I'm planning on playing a full day tomorrow hopefully at least 50 games. If I start off slow at the 57s I'll prolly drop down to the 34s for a lil while and get myself back above 10 BIs and then keep plugging away at the 57s. I think I'm averaging about 10 minutes a game so 2 tabling thats about 12 an hour. If that holds up I'll probably start trying to play 60 games a day and 300 a week minimum. Thats only 25 hours a week but I think it would keep me from burning out too much and easily allows me to put in an extra hour a night or 1 extra night during the week to get to 30 or more hours if I need to. I think I can run close to 10% ROI especially if I can get more play in on the weekends. All these holidays and my Bday this weekend really have gotten me used to not playing poker much on the weekend so I got to get back in the habit.

Moving on up...

So I went into the 57.50 turbo HUs tonight. I thought the play was just as bad as usual. Actually saw more gamble out of people early than I had at the last couple of levels. I went 20 and 20 tonight so I lost about 1.5 BIs due to rake but I stopped at 40 games. After 11pm tonight games started drying up and I had just got back to .500 and decided to stop. I went on a bad downswing late where I just couldn't win a showdown. I rarely 3 bet light. I just don't see a point when most players play so bad I don't have to. Well lvl 1 I 3 bet a guy with AK. He's already lost 500 chips to me I believe. He makes his standard min raise and I shove him and he insta calls JTo and gg me. I had several of these tonight it was pretty bad. I had 6 games under 5 minutes and 14 of them under 10 minutes. So they were looking to gamble tonight. One thing I need to work on is I'm usually aggressive early and either I'm at the 2K mark by level 2 or they are. I don't mind being down to 1K early as I can usually play my way back but I seem to be giving up my lead a lot by the time we get into 25/50 we're back to even. I may need to cut my aggression back some after getting some chips. Although my sample is pretty small and I didn't really get any hands tonight so I'm not going to make any big changes in my play but if I see the trend continue I'll make some adjustments.

For some reason I was actually nervous playing the 57s tonight. I don't think I played any different and after a couple quick beats I got over it. I don't see a reason for me to not keep playing at this level though. If I run really bad tomorrow I might step down but otherwise I think I'm going to stay here and build my roll and sample size up. But its very tempting to try and make a move to the 100s to see if the games are just as bad. Also I'm really wanting to get my 10K VPPs for the month. I can miss 1 month before June and keep Nova status. I'd like to hit Nova again before it runs out and I think I can if I'm playing the 100s and above but I may just try to put in some more hours next week and get my VPP totals up there.

WOW what a night

1st of all congrats to Stevie444 who won the $1K event at the PCA this week. Nice $70K score there for him. Must be nice to run good at life. Too bad his money isn't lucky or I'd be crushing some high limit SNG or MTTs right now. :-(

OK started off tonight in the 34.5Ts. Didn't start off well. Lost a ton of key races and big show downs. Through 14 games I was only down 5 BIs but I had lost 7 out of 8 games before taking a break to eat dinner. I came back and just ran hot and played well which is a great combo. In my last 21 games I lost 3. I did suck out a few times pretty big. Not really bad plays just getting in spots where we had to get all in pre and I happened to be behind but I caught several kickers to get some big wins. Starting off after dinner I won 6 in a row and ended the night winning 8 in a row. Pretty sick run and I probably should have kept playing but I was happy with my results so I went ahead and quit early. I think I will start playing later in the night rather than starting at 6 or 7pm and ending around 11. Maybe start about 8 or 9 and play until the earlier mornings. The play was definitely worse the later the night went.

Also I need to get on a schedule for exercising and getting myself back in shape. I was up to 150 which is heavier than I've ever been and I have nothing that fits anymore. So its either lose some weight or go shopping. I've been riding the nordic track bike about 6 miles a day 4 days a week. I want to up that to 6 or 7 days but over the holidays and with my bday this week I'll have to try that next week. I'm hopefully going to continue doing some crunches and push ups and just some small stuff to get myself back in shape. I'd really rather not join the gym but I may try to get some free weights or something in the near future.

It really depends on whether I go back to work or not. Makes it hard to make plans cause I don't know what I'm going to be doing in 2 weeks. Honestly I'd hoping that this HU SNG thing works out for me. But until I'm beating the 55s for a decent sample at 10% or better I'm not stopping my job search. I really think I can do it though and I'm going to move up to the 55s tomorrow. I've been jumping up very quick but most of the threads I've read on bankroll management have said 10-20 BIs if you move down if you run bad. So I took my small roll I had on Stars from all the VIP freeroll cashes last month and started at the 6s and just worked my way up every day. I did have 1 losing day at the 11s and slight winning days at the other levels so I don't think I've played enough to even really know how I'm doing. Obv tonight really throws off my stats as well. But hopefully I can play the 55s and stay there for a little while. I probably won't be moving up to the 100s until I have 2K in my bankroll for them and I've got some expenses I need to pay so its going to take a couple weeks of running decent to get my bankroll there. Which I think is a good thing. It will force me to stay at the 55s, get a sample size that will let me know how I'm doing and if I think I can continue beating the level at a win rate I'm happy with.

Wow this thing is kinda long. I meant to type a quick update and I'm sure everyone wanted to know about my losing weight as well LOL! I'll try to update tomorrow's results and I'm taking off Friday for my b'day. I'll hopefully wake up in time to play the VIP freerolls on Stars.

another cold deck HU

This is getting crazy. I moved up to the 23Ts HU SNGs today and was up about 2 BIs through 50 games. Small sample I know. I think I played very well. Induced a lot of bluffs and made some big calls on the river. The problem was most of the bluffs I induced got there on the river drawing to 4 outs or less. My fav was this hand. Btn raises i 3 bet my AA he calls. Flop is K22 and he shoves me with 55 and turns his 5. Plays like this just worked out for everyone all day long. I did manage to suck out a couple times myself short stacked but nothing like the guys who were 2 and 3 outting me deep stacked at level 2.

I'm still enjoying the HU SNGs though. Just playing 2 at a time unless I can get the same person in 2 games then I'll add a 3rd. That doesn't happen often. Overall the play is horrible. I found one guy at the 23 HUs that was down 8K in the last year only playing HU SNGs. I'm sure he's got to be at the far end of the donk spectrum but still there aren't many solid players to be found here. I think I'll try the 33s tomorrow and if I can at least run break even stay there until I can grind enough to move up to the 50s. I'd like to get to 10% ROI at the 50s as I think I could make a living grinding those games and hopefully move up to the 100s and 200s and use some game selection and shark scope to avoid the better players.

HU downswing

Played about 70 HU games yesterday at the 6.25 level and finished up a few buy ins nothing great but the play was horrible overall. Decided to step up to the 11s today and try my luck. Played 50 games and won 21 of them I think. Pretty horrible run. I lost KK to Ax 3 times all in pre with low blinds. I lost AK to J4o all in pre at 15/30. Just one of those days. I think the games are very beatable here and I'll probably try to put in another 50 or so games tomorrow to see how I do. I want to play some more 6 max SNGs as well but working on HU right now since the games seem so soft overall. Players get pretty pissed and talk a lot of trash too it seems. I've gotten where I'm complaining more than usual and I need to turn the chat off and just ignore them. I really wish Stars had that rematch button. Might be worth it to berate the players and try to get them to play you HU again and tilted.

6 Max SNGs are easy but why do I run so bad?

This is sickening. I play 43 6 max SNGs yesterday and the play is so bad. I ran even worse though. Went 5/17 HU and bubbled 9 more. Today has started off even worse as I just lost HU when I had the guy down to 3BBs and he 3 outted me 3 times the last was him calling all in K9o v/s my QQ. In 22 games so far my 1-3 distribution is 2/6/8. Thats so horrible I almost can't believe it. I'm winning 30% of my HU battles and bubbling almost 25% of them. Part of it is I have to adjust for the horrible players at the level and the other part is I can't win unless they ar drawing to 2 outs or less. Time for the 1st VIP freeroll. I'm sure the idiots in it won't be much better than I'm seeing in the SNGs.

I just barely cashed in the 50K freeroll for $60 today. weeeeeeeee