My hourly rate playing poker online sucks

It's not exactly a huge surprise that my hourly rate playing poker online sucks, but at least I can measure it and try and improve it as I work through my next two challenges, and that's a start I guess.

In this post I'll start delving into some of the statistics relating to my 1st Bankroll Boosting challenge on Party Poker, watch out for a few more postings on stats coming in the next few days too.

The eagle eyed among you may spot some slight discrepancies in my stats, this is due to a difference of 5 games between my two information sources, poker tracker and my Excel bankroll spreadsheet. This has been caused by playing the odd game on my laptop and not capturing the hand historys results for poker traker. The difference equates to 5 games and a profit variation of just $10, so the stats are close enough for me not to worry about trying to correct them.

I've been using an excel spreadsheet to track my results more or less since I started playing poker online and I continue to use it even though I now use Poker Tracker to record everything and am reasonably comfortable finding my way around it. I log every game in my spreadsheet and it gives me a really nice snapshot of where I am at. I start a new page in the spreadsheet each month, or with each new challenge and have a summary page at the front that errr... summarises everything. If you don't alreaqdy use a spreadsheet or Poker Tracker to track your game, you should. Feel free to download a copy of my poker spreadsheet and use it yourself. I'll post a video tutorial on Poker Tracker sometime soon as it is a bit daunting at first, but the data it can give you is just awesome.

The challenge took approximately 2.6 months, during which I played for 163 hours. That equates to approximately 1 month's work in a 9-5 job. After all that effort my hourly rate equates to $2.48. To put that in perspective the national minimum wage in the UK, expressed in dollars is $11.38. To feel comfortable enough to become a professional poker player I would want to be earning £75,000 a year which would equate to an hourly rate of approximately $75. For my next two challenges I need to be looking to increase my hourly rate rather dramatically, lets set a target of say $4.00 per hour on my Full Tilt Challenge and $7.50 on phase 2 of my Party challenge. In short I need to play more hours, with more simultaneous tables, at higher levels and achieve better results. Should be easy then!!!!!

That's it for this quick post but I'll post some more statistics on phase 1 of my challenge soon, so we can drill into the profitability of different game types and start looking at hand ranges, positional play etc..

Till next time..

Poker Bankroll Building - New Challenge Commences

Now that I have completed stage 1 of my bankroll building challenge and boosted my bankroll on Part Poker from $200 to $600 I am ready to progress to my next challenge. However for the next stage I am going to run two seperate challenges.

My initial challenge was inspired by Alex Martin's excellent "Bankroll Boosters" article in the September 2007 edition of Inside Poker magazine. The first half of my new challenges is to move onto the second phase of this and boost my Party Poker bankroll from $600 to $1,200. The second half of my challenge is to repeat phase one on another poker site.

The rules are as follows...

Full Tilt Challenge 1
I have deposited $200 on Full Tilt Poker and am going to work it up to $600 playing $5 and $10, 9 man Sit and Go tables. There are various reasons why I've decided to do this on Full Tilt including.

• Great 100% deposit bonus (could be worth $200 to me as that's what I initially deposited)
• Site is always busy
• The software is really nice
• The games I've tried so far seem reasonably good, the players are more preictable and passive than the loonies I keep encountering on Party
• The blind structure is a bit slower than Party which will favour skillfull play more then luck

I have already started playing a few $5 games on Full Tilt and my bankroll is already up to about $240 with an ROI of around 40%, when I get it to $250 I'll start testing out the $10 tables.

My goal is to maintain a better ROI than my initial Party Challenge and reach my profit target in significantly fewer games than the 316 it took me on Party.

Party Challenge 2
My target on Party Poker is to boost my $600 bankroll there up to $1200 by playing $20, 10 man Sit and Go tables. The target timescale is 2 months and 300 games with an ROI of 10% (which will be tough if I'm running two challenges concurrently)

I will provide a little more detail on both challeges as I start posting about my progress in them. I will also be posting a review of Full Tilt and some detailed stats, analysis and strategy articles over the coming days and weeks.

In the meantime if you have any questions, suggestions, comments or abuse... just leave a comment below. If anyone wants to join me in my challenge and try it too I would be delighted to accept the challenge, although I won't be going for a Tank vs Dale mental endurance marathon. If you haven't tried Full Tilt or want to Join me click the Full Tilt banner at the top right of my Blog and claim your 100% deposit bonus.

Wish me luck, Here goes....

Poker Bankroll Building - Phase 1 Completed

Woohoo...

I've just got time for a really quick posting before I head off to bed. As you can see from the title I've just completed phase 1 of my bankroll building challenge. I haven't had a chance to play online much over the last week but tonight I managed to squeeze in 6 x $6 SNG's and finished in the money in 4 of them with 2 x 1st and 2 x 2nd.

Running Total: Played 316 / ITM 41% / ROI 15% / Profit $415.40

That concludes phase 1 of my challenge, tomorrow I will start two new challenges.

Check back over the next few days for a flurry of postings containing statistics, analysis, strategy, advice and the low down on my next two poker challenges. If there is anything you particularly want me to post about leave me a comment.

Holla

High Stakes Poker - Sammy Farha vs Jamie Gold

Oh my god, this show is just so awesome, each new episode sets a new standard in TV poker. This episode should be re-named the Sammy Farha show as we see lots of action between Sammy and 2006 World Series of Poker winner, Jamie Gold.

Both these players love to gamble and like to talk a lot during the hand to get reads on their opponents, well you'll see a mastercalass in this episode. Raisy Daisy...

If the video panel below doesn't show up properly use the links below to watch the videos on PokerTube.



High Stakes Poker Season 4 - Episode 13 - Part 1/4
High Stakes Poker Season 4 - Episode 13 - Part 2/4
High Stakes Poker Season 4 - Episode 13 - Part 3/4
High Stakes Poker Season 4 - Episode 13 - Part 4/4

High Stakes Poker - Jamie Gold gets it All in

The latest episode of High Stakes Poker certainly lives up to its name with an all in confrontation between WSOP (World Series of Poker) 2006 winner Jamie Gold and regular Big Game player Patrick Antonius.

The buy in for this series of High Stakes is $500,000 per player so these guys are playing with seriously life changing sums of money, yet Patrick looks as cool as cucumber as he casually calls Jamie's All In creating the largest pot in televised poker history.

This episode also sees the tensions rise as Sammy Farha starts to needle the other players a bit. One thing is for sure, this show is just going from strength to strength. I can't wait to see next week's episode. The sparks are surely going to fly...




High Stakes Poker Season 4 - Episode 12 - Part 1/4
High Stakes Poker Season 4 - Episode 12 - Part 2/4
High Stakes Poker Season 4 - Episode 12 - Part 3/4
High Stakes Poker Season 4 - Episode 12 - Part 4/4

Pub Poker League - Weblomaniac takes it down

No online poker yesterday as it was local pub tournament night. I was sitting in second place in the Bishopton Poker League, just one point behind the leader so I went into last night's game determined to play well and try as hard as I could to win the game and move up to the top spot in the leaderboard. I would have to play a good game against the current leader though as he's a good player.
We had 11 players last night, so both our beautiful home made tables were in use and the standard of play was great. It's been getting stronger every week to be honest and you can see changes in individual players games as they introduce new moves into their repetoir.

Early on I played tight and tried not to get into too many dangerous pots. I picked up pocket kings quite early on and upgraded them to a set when a third one came down on the flop so that boosted my stack a bit.

Gradually the players got whittled down and we merged onto one table. With a couple of players quite short stacked I was sitting slightly below average with 4,500 chips when the average stack was 5,500. I luckily picked up pocket kings again, raised it pre-flop, hit another king on the flop to make a set and bet it. I checked the turn hoping my opponent would read that as wekenss and bet in to me on the river, which he obligingly did, only for me to re-raise him. Bingo, I sent a player to the rail, took down a nice big pot and nearly doubled my stack. With a bit of monetum and some chips behind me I took down the next two pots with marginal hands that came good and was now sitting on a perfectly respectable stack, enough to take me deep into the final table.

The field thinned and I took out the bubble player and went into the heads up battle with a significant chip lead against a strong player with lots of casino and poker club experience. I was reasonably confident because my heads up play isn't usually too shabby and I had a great chip advantage. But my opponent played really well he seemed to always manage to get out of the way of my genuine raises or significantly re-raise my opportunistic raises. He made a great comeback, took the chip lead and had me starting to wonder if I had a tell that he had spotted. I then lucked out on him re-raising all in on a flop that he had bet at. I was pretty sure his bet no the flop was a bluff so it was sickening when he flipped over middle pair to my unpaired A-x. But like the donkey that I am, I rivered an Ace and inflicted a rather sickening bad beat on him.

A little while later I limped into a pot from the big blind with 7-4 off suit only for a 7 to come down on the flop, which I bet, then another 7 on the turn. I get some more chips in and am reluctantly called. I now have a massive chip lead and I know my opponent is going to be shoving at every opportunity so I need to be careful not to double him up, but the blinds are big enough that I can't let him steal the blinds with impunity either.

The final hand was a toughy, I can't remember the exact hands but the flop was something like 4-5-J. I had paired my 5 and was last to act. My opponent shoved and I went into the tank. I knew he could be shoving with pretty much anything but he had actually had the goods on some of the earlier shoves that I had stood up to. I finally decided there was a chance my 5 might be good, I had a King as well so I had a strong kicker and an overcard. If I win the hand I take down the game, If I lose the hand I double him up but still have the chip advantage. I call and he reveals his cards, he's paired the 4 and doesn't improve his hand on the turn or river.

I took first place in the game, moved up to first position in the league table and took home a few quid into the bargain, Happy Days...

I need to be careful next week though, only two more league games to play and my main opponent, The Silver Fox is within easy striking distance.

Party Poker - Bankroll Building Update

It seems that everytime I post an update on my Party Poker bankroll building challenge the poker gods decide to pull the rug from under me. Last time I posted I had just worked my way back up from a bit of a bad run and no sooner had I posted than it happened again!

To be fair, it wasn't all luck or variance, I don't think I was playing my "A" game. So a bit of adjustment to my agression levels and a bit more grinding and I'm nearly back to where I was last time.

It feels like the challenge is taking forever, but I keep telling myself I'm nearly there. I can't wait to hit the $400 profit as I want to move onto stage 2 of the challenge and I also have a new challenge that I want to get started on. I'll reveal more about the new challenge once I get this one cracked.

Stay on target....nearly there.

Running Total: Played 300 / ITM 40% / ROI 12% / Profit $331.40

$500,000 Buy In on High Stakes Poker

The stakes have risen to a staggering $500,000 buy in on my favourite Poker TV show, High Stakes Poker. This show has always been entertaining and exciting to watch because of the high stakes and the atmosphere at the table. The atmosphere and chat at the table is usually pretty friendly, often amusing and always insightful, some of the moments I enjoy the most are when Phil Hellmuth or MIke Matasou lose it at the table.

In this particular episode the buy in has been increased to $500,000 so we are promised pots in excess of $1 Million dollars getting contested by the familiar faces including Doyle Brunson, Barry Greenstein, Sammy Farha, Jamie Gold, Patrick Antonius, David Benyamine, Antonio Esfandiari and Guy La Lauberte founder of Cirque de Soliel.

Fascinating viewing, watch episode 11 from series 4 of High Stakes poker below. I'll post links to the next episode the minute it comes online as it alledgedly contains an all-in confrontation between Jamie Gold and an insta call from Patrick Antonius.



High Stakes Poker Season 4 - Episode 11 - Part 1/4
High Stakes Poker Season 4 - Episode 11 - Part 2/4
High Stakes Poker Season 4 - Episode 11 - Part 3/4
High Stakes Poker Season 4 - Episode 11 - Part 4/4

Getting Closer

It's about 3 weeks since I last posted and despite my silence I've still been grinding away at the $10 Sit & Go tables on Party Poker, it's just that I haven't really had anything terribly exciting to blog about.

When I last posted I was quite upbeat because I felt I had finally broken free of the $200 profit plateaux that I seemed to be stuck at. Well it turns out that my optimism was to be short lived as I slid back down to the $200 barrier and then went slightly through it in the games that followed my last post.

Since then it's been up and down a couple of times so I decided to just keep my head down. 75 games further on and I feel I better update the blog or it will look like I've given up!

The profits are now up to $356 so I think I've finally shaken off the curse of the $200 barrier and I'm getting tantalisingly close to my $400 profit target. If my next session or two go well I will hopefully be able to cruise up to and through the $400 mark and then I can start dipping my toe into the $20 SNGs

Most of my play over the last few weeks has been on two tables simultaneously and I now feel pretty cmofortable playing two at once. I've even tried running 4 x $5.00 tables at once to get a feel for that.

I have also opened up an account on Full Tilt and deposited $200 in there. I'll post a bit more info on my decision to open a Full Tilt account and a little review and comparisson with Party Poker in the coming days. Suffice to say though, my main reason for opening an account there was so I could start enjoying the benefits of a bit of rakeback. More on that next time though.

Running Total: Played 254 / ITM 41% / ROI 15% / Profit $356.90

Multi Table Novice

Since my last posting I have been cautiously multi tabling. I had previously felt reasonably comfortable playing a couple of tables simultaneously but my results had not been good. Whether that was down to variance or because I wasn't able to focus on the other player's styles and betting patterns, I'm not sure.

When things are running smoothly at the $10 games I can cash in about 50% of the games I play so I set myself some rules, a stop loss if you will. I would play 2 tables at once and if I didn't cash in one of the games I would revert to single tabling until I had recovered the two lost buy ins. If I cashed in at least one of the games I would continue playing 2 tables.

I also mentioned last time that I seemed to be stuck on a plateau at around $200 profit and was going to try and be even more patient at the tables as I felt I had perhaps been a little impatient.

Well the batch of games I've played over the last few days have seen me consistently cashing whilst multi tabling and I've broken away from my £200 plateau, so I'm a happy boy. Of the 2 x 2 table sessions I played last night I picked up 2 x 1st out of the 4 games. So I'm delighted, that's another little mental hurdle cleared.

Running Total: Played 170 / ITM 45% / ROI 18% / Profit $287.40

Life is Good

It's now 2 weeks since I left the grind of the rat race and I have to say I'm thoroughly enjoying it. Today is an excellent case in point. I had an excellent sleep last night, got up felling refreshed then walked my youngest daughter to nursery. I then sauntered at a leisurely pace towards the train station and hopped on the first available train into Glasgow.

Arriving in the city my first priority was to find a nice comfy couch at Starbucks and read some more of this month's particularly interesting Poker Pro Europe magazine, whilst enjoying a coffee and a muffin. Bliss, no dashing to an office or endless meetings for me today.

Then it was off to Borders where I picked up a my highly anticipated copy of Des Wilson's new book Ghosts at the Table and a few other interesting looking new poker titles. A few more errands and it was back home in time for lunch.

This week I have been working on a website for a wedding photographer, the site looks great and the effort I put into the Search Engine Optimisation is already starting to pay off with the site ranking 26th out of 1.3 million.

I have also found some time to work on my secret poker site this week and am gettign a good feeling of acomplishment and satisfaction as it starts coming together. I can't wait to share more info with you and start enrolling some beta testers.

Next week I have another website to build for a new client. It's quite a simple one and should only take a couple of days but it's going to look good, the design concept I've got is really sweet.

At the moment life is good and I'm really enjoying the freedom of being at home and in control of my own destiny. I guess the honeymoon period is nearly over though. I'm feeling reasonably chilled and refreshed and I need to start focusing building some revenue streams over the coming weeks.

$200 Barrier

It's been all quiet on the blog for a few days but I've still been plodding away. As always not getting through as many games as I would like to. It's difficult to find the time with a family, young kids and the pre-occupation of trying to make a living.

I've played another 12 games since my last post and seem to have found myself stuck at around the $200 profit mark. I arrived at this point with great momentum and hoped to power through it onto $300 and beyond. But I seem to be stuck, one step forward, two steps back. From the last 12 games I've picked up 3 x 3rd, 1 x 1st, 1 x 2nd.

Running Total: Played 152 / ITM 42% / ROI 15% / Profit $205.40

I think a little lack of patience has crept into my game. I'm going to tighten up a bit over the next few games and see if that improves things again.

Humorous Disconnections

I played 5 games on Tuesday and even had a bash at multi tabling again. The multitable experience was a bit frantic as I am currently focusing hard on making really good notes on all the players, capturing all cards that get shown along with level, position, hand result and how it was played. I guess a lot of better players can just watch the game and remember all these details for each player but I find the act of making the note and the fact I have all the players notes open simultaneously while I play helps me get a great read on my opponents. The multi-tabling was frantic because I was struggling to keep up to speed with my note taking. I managed a 3rd and a 5th playing two tables simultaneously so not bad.

The most notable thing about yesterdays games though was the last Sit and Go of the night. The first player to bust out did so on the second hand. I picked up a nice hand a few hands later and won a few chips boosting my stack to 2640 chips, about a 32% gain on my stack. Then my connection went down. This didn't worry me at first as we were only about half way through level one and I now had an above average stack. My connection has been going down intermittantly recently but usually for never more than a minute or two, but last night it went down and didn't show any signs of coming back. I settled back and started reading a magazine whilst waiting for it to come back.

After an hour my connection came back and I logged in to see what had happened, fully expecting to have been blinded away in 5th or 6th place. I requested a hand history email of the last 12 hands and started to read it. Wow four players left, but I only had 140 chips and am all in on the Small Blind for 140 chips the blinds were 200/400. So I was going to get blinded out in 4th, hang on, Dealing Hole Cards [6d,6c] and they held up, now up to 280 chips. The next interesting hand happened when the Big Blind got back to me, I'm all in for 280 chips and get 2 callers. Dealing Hole Cards [5d, 7d], Flop [3c, Jh, 5c], Turn [5s] River [2c] and I triple up to 840 with a set of 5's.

Compared with the other stacks (7400, 8260, 3500) I'm hideously short and the other players, particularly the guy with 3,500 chips, must surely have the sense to just wait until I get blinded out as the blinds are just about to go to 400/800, but no, a fight ensues, the 3,500 chip dude busts and I pick up 3rd in a game that I was only present in for the first 5 hands. You gotta laugh.

I was going to try and post a nice pretty hand history but none of the hand history viewers would do what I wanted them to and the format of the e-mail histories from Party aren't compatible with a lot of them, so you've had to put up with my narrative description. This has however got the cogs in the entrepreneurial corner of my brain twirling a bit and I've just gone and purchased 3 new domains that would be ideal for a rather special new kind of hand history viewer. I feel some rampant scribbling and thinking coming on :-)

Back to the challenge, Tuesday was OK but not great. Played 5 got 3 x 3rd.

Running Total: Played 140 / ITM 42% / ROI 16% / Profit 197.40

Longest Sit & Go yet

I only played two games on Monday night and one of them turned into a bit of a marathon. The game went to 163 hands, that's the longest $10 Sit & Go I've played, I had to take a little break after it as it left me a bit frazzled. Unluckily I went card dead heads up and only managed to take second.

Running Total: Played 135 / ITM 41% / ROI 16% / Profit $192.40

September Challenge Results

I've reached the end of September and it's not a huge surprise that I haven't managed to hit the targets I set myself for my challenge. It's been pretty obvious for the last week or so that I was struggling to get enough games in and the bad run early in the challenge certainly didn't help things. I did finsh on a high though, check out the nice upward direction on the graph below.

Final Results: Played 133 Games / ITM 41% / ROI 16% / Profit $184.40

I am not disheartened though, the challenge has been good for me. I feel my game is a lot more disciplined now and because I am sticking predominantly to one game type and level on just one site I have been able to get into a consistant playing style and therefore get more of a feel for my own style, strategy and that of my opponenets. Happy Days.

I have learnt that it's difficult to grind out a high volume of games if only single tabling and only playing after a day at work which means I can't get started until the kids are in bed, usually about 9:30pm. I'm rearing to try multi-tabling again and I'll definatley give it a tentative shot again in the next few days, but if I'm not achieving > 30% ITM & > 10% ROI I will revert to single tabling again.

I certainly finished the challenge with a great run at the $11 x 10 player games on Party Poker and go forward feeling really comfortable at this level. I achieved 62% ITM / 93% ROI / $164 Profit in that last run of 16 games and am delighted, it certainly makes up for the frustration earlier in the month.

At the start of my challenge I said I was going to get stuck into the books and training videos but in truth I've found myself only really doing that when things haven't been going so well. I think they help to restore my confidence when it takes a dent and re-affirm things I already know. When things are going well the pressure to get more games in means I fire up another SNG rather than taking some time to study. I am aware that there are books I still want to read, books I want to go back over and a ton of great videos I want to watch so I need to try and put aside a bit more time to study even when things are going well.

I mentioned in an earlier post that there could be an argument for playing on until the 6th October as I didn't start my challenge right at the beginning of September. I am going to freeze my results there in my bankroll spreadsheet for September and start a new page to record October to keep my records consistent with previous months, however I am going to take a copy of the sheet and continue to update it, so I guess the challenge isn't strictly over. My challenge was inspired by an article by Alex Martin in Inside Poker magazine which suggested two months to grow to $600 bankroll in $10 games, so I'm going to keep going and follow the goals in the magazine. To be honest I was pushing it a bit by trying to do the whole challenge in one month, but you know what they say, shoot for the stars and all that.

So, onwards an upwards. How long will it take me to reach $400 profit? Can I do it by the 6th?

Time's Running Out

Today is the last day of September, the time to complete my challenge is running out.

I played 7 games on Friday and Saturday, cashed in 4 of them. One of them was just a $3 game on PokerStars though for light relief.

Running Total: Played 130 / ITM 41% / ROI 13% / Profit $147.40

Not Playing Enough!

Wednesday was my last day at work and Bishopton Poker League night so I didn't play any online Poker. I placed third in the poker league game tonight, and should have finished higher but I made a bad call, knowing I was almost certainly behind to bust out in 3rd. I did win a cheeky little cash game after the league game though.

I had hoped to get a good number of games in on Thursday and Friday but there is some work I need to get through first. I spent most of Thursday working away inside Second Life and only managed to play one online game in the evening. I did win it though so that's helped the ROI a bit more.

Running Total : Played 123 / ITM 40% / ROI 10% / Profit $107.80

It's unlikely I will get any games in on Friday until the evening so my 200 game / 20% / $400 profit target is looking in grave jeoperdy. There are a couple of things that could help.

1) My strike rate in the $11 games since I started playing them again is excellent, if I can maintain that kind of rate I may reach my $400 target without needing to play 200 games. I've played 7 games since I started back at the $11's and have picked up 2 x 3rd, 1 x 2nd, 2x 1st. That's 5 out 7 cashes which is an ITM of 71% and an ROI of 120%. That's a pretty exceptional rate, but it is a tiny sample size and I don't expect it to continue. Maybe it's things just balancing out after the terrible run I had a few weeks ago.

2) When an entrepreneur is challenged they will usually look to ways to bend or re-write the rules to their advantage in order to succeed. Well, although I called my challenge my "September Challenge" I didn't technically start until the 6th September so it could be argued that I can keep running until midnight on the 5th October.

NH - GG - GL - GFY

What a slacker, I only managed two games tonight but I'm really pleased with my play. Everything felt totally in control and I took first place in one of the games, so another positive step forward for my ROI.

Running Total: Played 122 / ITM 39% / ROI 7%
/ Profit $68.80

No update tomorrow as it's Bishopton Poker League night and my last day at work so I might have a light libation to celebrate. I should manage to get a more respectable number of games in on Thursday, the first day of my new life, even though I've got a few things I need to do.

Onwards and Upwards...

New Beginnings

I've hinted a few times on my blog that there is something going on in my life that may change things a bit, well it's finally time to spill the beans.

Tomorrow is my last day in the corporate rat race. I decided back in January that I would make some pretty big changes in my life this year. I have been in the same job as Development Director for an Internet Entertainment company for the last twelve years and it's time to move on. In fact, more than move on, it's time for a whole new chapter in my life.

I have been offered a few jobs in London but to be honest I'm looking for a complete change, so three months ago I handed in my notice and started tentatively planning the my future.

Most normal people would make sure they had a new job all lined up before leaving a perfectly good, highly paid position. Well, I've never been one for doing things the conventional way so I don't have another job lined up and I don't have an absolutely concrete plan for what comes next. But somewhere between my dreams and my tentative plans lies my future. It's going to be fun seeing what it holds.

The dream...

Well I love the Internet/Technology and Poker. I'm very good at one of them and still a struggling student of the other, see if you can figure out which is which :-). If I could find a way to make a living on my own from one of these passions it would be great. If I could find something that combined both, then that would be the dream.

From now until Christmas I am going to chill out and let all the stress and hassle of my previous existence fade away whilst I try to figure out exactly what's next. If by Christmas I am getting signals that I can make my own way as an Internet Developer / Entrepreneur or start earning a reasonable amount from Poker (not necessarily just by playing) then I will be able to go into 2008 a happy man with some clear plans and targets. If on the other hand I can't, then I'll be starting to search for a new job in the New Year. Before anybody flames me, and before you ask, I am under no illusion that I could replace my previous salary with earnings from playing poker. I've a very long way to go before I could even consider that, and I suspect I may never be good enough.

With a family, kids and a pretty chunky motgage to support I know a lot of my friends have views of me that range from mild bemusment to thinking I'm being pretty irresponsible, but I have to do this. If I had continued as I was I would have gone completely round the bend sooner or later. If by Christmas I'm starting to pull in a the beginnings of an income from my own ventures then great, if not, I still have options, even if it means going back to the rat race again.

The Tentative Plan...

The logic behind the plan initially is to build up multiple revenue streams. In other words I'm going to try a few things that in isolation might not make a massive amount but combined could be enough. The broad areas I'll be covering are Internet Development / Second Life Development / Poker

As a developer I have some projects of my own that I will be pursuing but I will also be seeking to sell my services in order to pay the bills until I can get some of my own projects running.

The first of my personal projects is a very groovy new poker website that offers something pretty unique. It's already about half built and I will divulge more soon as I'll be needing some poker enthusiasts to give me feedback and help me shakeout any bugs. Watch this space.

I also plan to spend some time improving my poker game and learning more about the poker industry as I am sure there must be openings in this burgeoning industry that somebody with my business, technical and ahem.... playing skills could extract some +EV from.

The Reality...

It's been a while since I've really looked forward to something but I have to say I'm really looking forward to waking up on Thursday morning knowing it is the first day of my new life. Yes, it's scary. I have no job, no income and a family to support, but I've got everything covered for about 6 months so I can afford to spend the next 3 months experimenting and laying the foundations for the next chapter. I feel liberated...

Finally, it goes without saying, that if you need the assistance of a shit hot web developer and poker nut then gimme a yell. Or should that read a nutty web developer and shit poker player. I guess time will tell.

To be Continued...

Monday Night

I only managed 4 games tonight but I was back at the $11 x 10 man SNGs and the results were pretty respectable. I picked up 3 cashes out of 4 games with 1 x 2nd and 2 x 3rd.

Running Total: Played 120 / ITM 39% / ROI 4% / Profit $40.80

I know I'm not getting through anywhere near enough games at the moment but my results have been more akin to normal over the last week so I'm reasonably happy to keep plodding away. I would like to crank up the number of games but my multi-tabling expereinces earlier in the challenge weren't good. At the time I didn't feel like I was giving away too much of an edge but the results would suggest different.

I know for a fact that my new note taking and player categorisation is working as I now have a far better feel for all the players at a table and can put them on tighter range of hands but that is taking a lot of concentration, and is leaving me a bit frazzled. I doubt I could focus that much multi-tabling. Pehaps after another few hundred games this level of focus on other player's habits will become more natural and will allow me to achieve the same results on multiple tables at once.

Table Construction

No online poker on Sunday. I had a lazy Sunday morning, bliss! In the afternoon I got a text from poker buddy Andy and went round to help him finish off the first Bishopton Poker League poker table.

Andy had already cut out the pieces of wood but it only took us a couple of hours to finsh assembling the pieces and put on the foam, cloth and vinyl. We were following free plans from Home Poker Tourney and they worked a treat. We are delighted with the table which seats 6 very comfortably and should be fine for 8 too. It cost about £80 to build which is pretty reasonable and I can confirm that it's very plush and comfortable to play at as we christened it with a little home game on Sunday night.

Back in the Black

I'm finally back in the black after playing 5 games on Saturday and finishing 1 x 1st and 2 x 2nd. It's taken a while and been frustrating at times but I'm relieved.





Running Total: Played 116 / ITM 38% / ROI 2% / Profit $14.80

Now let's just hope I can keep it in the black and start moving forward with larger wins, more acceptable rake percentage and and less completely mental play from my opponents. I'm so looking forward to getting back into the $10 games again, but the bummer is that I don't know how much of a chance I'm going to get to play online today! Family stuff during the day and a home game with my poker buddies tonight.

The long haul

I managed 6 games today, all $6 x 10 player and picked up 1 x 1st and 2 x 2nd so it was another profitable day on my long slow slog back to positive ROI.

Running Total: Played 111 / ITM 37% / ROI -1% / Profit -$10.20

It is looking increasingly unlikely that I will be able to hit any of my targets by the end of the month:

• 200 games - Multi tabling was -EV for me the few times I tried it earlier in the challenge so I need to be careful there, lets see what happens in the next few days and I might give it another bash.
• 20% ROI - Err... yea, my bad run at the start of the challenge is going to make that tricky now, but not completely impossible!
• $400 - That's going to be hard too. If I step back up to the $10 games tomorrow, and I manage to play about 90 and I manage an ROI of about 50% I can still do it, that's a lot of ifs.

Am I going to give up? ...Hell No, I keep going. I still have one secret card up my sleeve that I haven't revealed yet. I've almost blogged about it a few times now, I'll spill the beans in the next few days. It may help me in the last few days of the month.

A few more games

It was after 10pm before I got the computer powered up last night, and I almost fell asleep during the first game. I had a couple of coffees and managed to get 4 x $6 10 player games in but the best I could manage was 2 x 3rd places.

Running Total: Played 105 / ITM 36% / ROI -3% / Profit -$29.20

Day off on Friday and I have the house to myself for a few hours so I should be able to get a more respectable number of games in and hopefully get myself back into positive ROI territory.

Satisfaction

Tuesday night was the most satisfying night of poker I've had in a couple of weeks. I only played 3 games and felt mentally quite exhausted after them but the results were good. I cashed in all three, 2 x 1st and 1 x 3rd, all in $6 x 10 player games.

Running Total: Played 101 / ITM 36% / ROI -3% / Profit -$25.20

So, 101 games and many hours into my challenge and… I’m almost back where I started. My performance over the next 100 games is going to have to be pretty exceptional, but I'm feeling good.

Yesterday I referenced an article on Pocket Fives by Jennifear, well I re-read it last night and that lead me on to reading an excellent article on Standard Tight Aggressive play and another article on a slightly looser style. I’ve been thinking quite a lot about my game and what I have been experiencing recently, so these articles definitely helped.

I went into Tuesday night’s session with a renewed determination and a refined gameplan:

1) Loosen up slightly during level 1 & 2 playing suited connectors, semi connectors and suited aces, basically anything that can make a good flush or straight, with the view of hitting a monster cheaply.
2) I have been arriving at the bubble with a relatively short stack compared to the chip leaders too often, so I need to be stealing more during level 3 & 4. So when it gets down to 5-6 players or about halfway through level 3 start stealing with any Ace, Two court cards or Kx greater than K-6, but be very aware of position and the opponents current behaviour.

3) Keep stealing as the blinds get bigger and move into ICM bubble mode at 4 players but rather than shoving when the opportunity arises be more inclined to go for a 2.5 – 3 times the blind raise. This is because the players at this level seem to recognise the shove as a stealing tactic but are more likely to take a coin flip gamble and call. If I keep the ICM raises to a standard 2.5 – 3 (or sometimes a bit more) then I can still get away from them if donkey boy calls with his 7-2 offsuit and proceeds to flop the nuts.

4) Heads Up. Just be patient and play my usual aggressive heads up game, chip away at them, wear them down and then trap them when they finally get sick of it. Just remember, patience.

Well it seemed to work a treat. I don’t know if it was my refined gameplan, lucky table selection or something else as the sample size is entirely inconsequential, but something went right so I’m happy. Now all I’ve got to do is hold that moment, and try and continue playing in this style to see if holds over a longer run.

One other thing I did was to concentrate far more on the other players’ hands during the game using the Hand History window and Poker Tracker to note every hand shown down (or mucked at showdown). I did this before but not as diligently and last night I started noting them down in a slightly different way that turned out much easier to read in the player notes window. I felt I really got into a groove last night and my focus on the game and the players surpassed my normal level, I think that’s why I felt a bit mentally drained by the end of it but I’m sure it made a big difference when I was choosing my spots to make a steal from.

Finally after I was finished playing I spent half an hour in Poker Tracker and spotted a few interesting things.

The hands I lose with are when I have just a high card or a single pair, everything else is +EV and the position I lose from most often is the Big Blind. So there are a couple more pointers for me to follow as I tweak my game a little more.

One thing is for sure, playing so many games, at the same level, on the same site and opening myself up to public scrutiny is bringing me a focus and level of self analysis that I don’t think I have achieved before. Long my it continue and hopefully my results will improve accordingly.

Onwards and Upwards….

No report tomorrow, Wednesday night is Bishopton Poker League night.

The 7-2 Game on High Stakes Poker

The best poker show on TV is back.

Series four of High Stakes Poker has just started airing again in the States and can be viewed on PokerTube. The first episode gets off to a bang with Antonio Esfandiari suggesting that a side bet should be placed on the game with each player agreeing to pay $500 each to the first player who wins a hand with 7-2 off suit.

Well it doesn't take long before the fireworks kick off between Phil Hellmuth and Mike Matasou in hand where one player has the all conquering 7-2 offsuit.

Check out the link, this is one of the funniest pieces of Poker TV you'll see.

I'm going to see if I can introduce a 7-2 sidebet into the one of the side games at the pub tomorrow night, as if that game really needs loosened up any more!

Frustration!

Oh boy, sometimes poker can be such a frustrating game, one step forward and three steps back. So can you guess how I got on last night? Yup, you got it. The gradual rebuild back to profit suffered a set back last night and my ROI is down a few more %. ARSE!

I started off last night by playing 5 x $6 - 10 player and only managed 1 x 2nd and 1 x 3rd. Then I switched to $6 - 6 Max games and started multi tabling and didn't cash in any of the 5 of them that I played.

I did make a couple of bad plays on the 6 max games whilst multi-tabling, partially because I perhaps didn't have as good a read on my opponents as I would if single tabling and partially because I made a couple of decisions too quickly. Having said that I was on the receiveing end of some pretty sick behaviour.

I've been playing tight in the early stages of these SnG's only getting involved if I have a big hand, but have been finding I can cruise up to the bubble OK but am often relatively short stacked by the time I get there. Normally, that's OK. I'm more comfortable playing when it gets down to three or four players and big blinds as I can get a better read on my opponents, I can start bullying a bit and I can start bringing in some ICM bubble play, but in these $6 games they will call an all in a lot looser than at higher levels so I need to be more cautious and that dillutes any bubble play advantage I may have had.

I'm toying with the idea of playing a bit looser in the early levels, keeping the pot small pre-flop and playing more of a post flop game. These guys at the $6 level seem to call just about anything pre flop but will often laydown hands to a relatively small bet on the river. I'll maybe try loosening up and playing more of a post flop game tonight in a couple of games. There was an article on Pocket 5's by JenniFear that I must dig out and re-read as I seem to remember it advocating this style.

Running Total: Played 98 / ITM 34% / ROI -8% / Profit -$67.20

Revision on yesterday's weekly mini target:
1) Be careful multi tabling, don't make decisions too quickly, try to take the time to study the hand and opponent to help me make a better decision.
2) Profit is more important than number of games played, don't rush to Multi table if it's going to have a negative effect on my ROI. I would rather get to 150 games with 15% ROI than 200 games with -5% ROI.

nuff sed

Another small step

I had quite a quiet Sunday, spending time with the family, so I only played 5 games today but managed a small profit for the day so musn't grumble.

Sun 16th Sep: Played 5 / 1 x 1st (10 handed) / 1 x 2nd (6 Max)

Running Total: Played 88 / ITM 35% / ROI -4% / Profit -$32.20

I'm slowly working my back to breakeven ROI for the month and the bankroll on Party is back up to $215 so I 'm nearly ready to step back up to the $10 games. If I have a good night on Monday and can get my bankroll back to $250 I should be able to move back up again on Tuesday.

I've still got a long way to go to get to 200 games and 20% ROI, but at least I'm in a better frame of mind than I was a week ago. If my first couple of games go well tonight I will start multi-tabling again. I really need to be playing more games but I also need to be really careful in case multi-tabling was the cause of some of the pain last week.

This week's mini targets:

1) Increase the number of games per day - Aim for 10 per day
2) Get back into the $10 games and maintain +ROI in them whilst multi-tabling

Little Baby Steps

Saturday was a more enjoyable day, didn't play much due to the cinema outing but the results were good, played 5 cashed in 4. The Bourne Ultimatum was brilliant, and all the better for watching the Supremacy the previous night as the Ultimatum is a continuation of the storyline set up in the Bourne Supremacy.

Back to the poker...

Playing a lot of games at the same level on the same site is giving me a focus I don't think I've managed to achieve before. I now feel I know my game better and can see the effect of small changes much more easily. I used to skip around from site to site so it was never as clear how small changes effected things as all the other variable in the equation were changing too.

Sat 15th Sep: Played 5 / 1 x 1st / 3 x 2nd / EV +$27 (4 x 6-Max , 1 x 10 Player)

Need to spend a little time brushing up on my Heads Up play today, too many seconds yesterday.

Running Total: Played 83 / ITM 35% / ROI -5% / Profit $-37.20

Little baby steps, but at least they are in the right direction.

Double Update

Saturday morning is double update morning.

On Thursay night I did indeed drop back down to the $6 level for bankroll preservation reasons as discussed in an earlier posting. I was dog tired when I started playing but managed 8 x 6-Max games before calling it a night.

Thu 13th Sep: Played 8 / 1 x 2nd / 1 x 1st

Only played three games on Friday night, watched the Bourne Supremacy on DVD in preparation for a trip to the cinema to see the Bourne Ultimatum tonight.

Fri 14th Sep: Played 3 / 1 x 1st / 1 x 2nd

Running Total: Played 78 / ITM 32% / ROI -9% / Profit -$64.20

A small step in the right direction, but I won't be able to play much today so it's going to be a long slog back to +EV

Bishopton Poker Leage - Final

No update on my September challenge today as I was playing live last night in the final game of The Bishopton Poker League, a local league run by me and a few of my buddies. I went into the final in joint 3rd place in the league, needing a strong finish with lots of points and for the first and second positioned players to bust out early, oh, and I also needed a busy night so there would be lots of points for a strong finish.

Alas, it was a quiet night, probably due to the Scotland vs France match, and we only managed 9 players. Even though I won the game it didn’t yield enough points for me to leapfrog either of the two league leaders who finished 3rd and 4th positions. I played well though and am pleased with my 3rd place finish in the league. If I hadn’t missed one of the games due to work commitments it could have been a different story.

My win has boosted my confidence a bit and I’m looking forward to getting back to my challenge on Thursday night even though I’ll be dropping down to the $6 tables.

It can't rain all the time

When I went to bed on Monday night I was sure that I had put my losing streak behind me, so when I sat down at about 9pm on Tuesday night I was looking forward to seeing my bankroll and ROI starting to climb again. Alas this wasn’t to be. Tuesday night was another horrible session.

I started playing 10 player SNGs and only cashed in one of them for 3rd place. I then moved back to the 6 Max tables and played 7 of them only managing to cash once in 2nd. This has to be the worst streak I’ve had in SNGs in well over a year, if not ever and I have to say it’s got me feeling pretty frustrated. I’m sure it’s just variance but I’ll be spending a little while in Poker Tracker reviewing some of my critical hands before I play any more of my challenge.

I also have a bankroll related decision to make before I play any more. The last 3 sessions have been sufficiently bad that my bankroll has taken a hit. I should probably have stepped down a level after Monday night but I was pretty sure that Tuesday’s session would reverse the trend, I was wrong. I still have $170 in my Party Account, I think I have 3 options:

1) Try and ride out the variance, continuing to play the $11’s. I’m tempted but logic tells me not to. I’ve always been quite good at bankroll management, just because this is a challenge doesn’t mean I need to throw my normal bankroll rules out the window.

2) I’m having a particularly bad run on Party but have decent funds on quite a few other sites, why not switch my challenge to another site. I could but it seems like a bit of a cop out. Normally if I was selecting an SNG or a cash table I will go where I feel I am most likely to win. Poker tracker shows me which sites / levels / structures I have historically done best at so I normally wouldn’t think twice about staying on a site where I was having a tough time. However, I have historically done well on Party and I don’t feel I have played badly or that my opponents have outplayed me, I certainly know the latter isn’t true, I’ve got the Hand Histories to prove it.

3) Manage my bankroll sensibly and step down to the $6 SNGs on Party. The number of Donktastic muppets I’m going to encounter will be frustrating but if I’m going to take heed of all the wise words I’ve read, then I need to choose this option.

I’m tending towards option 3, just knuckle down, ride it out and don’t let it get me down.

Having said that, I won’t be able to play online tonight because it’s the final in the local poker league that I run with a couple of my poker buddies. I will defer my bankroll decision until just before my Thursday session. Until then, here’s the sorry stats.

11th Sep : Played 10 / 8 x DNC / 1 x 3rd ($11 10 player) / 1 x 2nd ($11 6-Max)

Running Total: Played 67 / ITM 30% / ROI -10% / Profit -$70.20

I don't like Mondays

Sunday was a bad day, perhaps the worst I’ve had. It left me frustrated and I spent the night and most of Monday contemplating my play but although my results on Sunday were definitely getting me down I was pretty convinced it was just bad luck / variance.

I wasn’t able to get started on Monday until 9:30 pm but I sat down at the screen with a renewed determination. “I won’t let these Donks get me down”. Trying to be sensible I decided, no multi-tabling until I get a few wins back under my belt, just incase that was having a detrimental effect, though I’m pretty sure it wasn’t. I also decided to play 6 max tables rather then 10 max. Whilst my ROI to date on 10 player tables is positive, my ROI on 6 player games is higher, and I’ve played a shed load more of them.

Despite my best efforts, Monday was completely horrible too. I felt I was playing really well but it just wasn’t going my way. To say the Poker Gods were frowning on me is an understatement, they were standing in the heavens on their little clouds with their trousers round their ankles, pissing all over me. My nut full house gets cracked by Quads, I hit a set and get beaten by a higher set, and on and on it goes. What does a guy have to do? However I’m not going to let it get me down.

I played 7 games on Monday and finally cashed in my last game of the night. In fact I did better than cash, I completely decimated the game, took 1st place and was able to go to bed with a feeling of satisfaction rather than despair. Hopefully that’s the losing streak over and I can return to my winning ways tonight. If I don’t, I fear I may need to drop down a level if I have another bad night, and I really don’t want to have to do that. God knows what level of donktastic muppetry I'll encounter if I have to move down to the $6's, hell it's daft enough in the $11's.

10th Sep : Played 7 / 6 x DNC / 1 x 1st (all $11 6-Max)

Running Total: Played 57 / ITM 32% / ROI -1% / Profit -$4.20

Sunday Bloody Sunday

Yeuch! I've had a pretty horrible Sunday.

I've played 13 games today, 10 online and 3 live games at a friendly local home game. I did OK at the home game but my results online have been dire. I know I busted out from one of the online games because I made a bad play but I think my plays were correct in the others. One thing is for sure, you need be very carefull with ICM bubble play at $10 on Party as you are far more likely to get called. Lesson learned, assimilated and ready for a better session tomorrow.

I'm working tomorrow so I probably won't be logging in until about 9pm so not sure how many games I'll get in.

9th Sep Online : Played 10 / 8 x DNC (did not Cash) / 1 x 3rd / 1x 2nd
9th Sep Live : Played 3 / 2 x DNC / 1 x 1st (winner takes all)

Running Total : Played 50 / ITM 34% / ROI 7% / Profit $36.80

1st Challenge Update

I actually starterd playing towards my challenge a few days ago but only mentioned it on my blog yesterday, so technically this is the first update even though it's the 9th September.

Only played 5 games yesterday, a couple in the morning and three in the evening after I got the kids to bed...but before the coverage of qualifying for the Italian Grand Prix. By the time the qualifying finished it was after midnight and I was feeling pretty tired so I decided to get some sleep rather than play tired.

Running Total to 9th Sep : Played 37 / ITM 38% / ROI 20% / Profit $71.80

ROI on target but I need to step up the number of games I'm playing else I won't hit my 200 games until about the 40th of Sepetmeber!

September Challenge

I mentioned in my posting last week that recently my discipline had deteriorated a bit. Well it's time to step up my level of studying and set myself a challenge for the month.

For the studying, I'm going to watch at least one training video per day from Poker X Factor. I always find my game improves imediately when I watch these videos, it just tends to drift again if I don't continue to watch them and play a sufficient amount to keep everything at the forefront of my mind.

I'm also going to devour some more books and spend time reading articles online. I've just started reading a new book from Two plus Two publishing called Sit'n'Go strategy by Colin Moshman. I've already read about one third of it and it seems pretty good. I'm also plannig to go back and skim through Harrington Vol2 again and spend some time working on my poker maths, Pot Odds and ICM theory.

What about the challenge. Well I'm going to try and play 200 $10 Sit and Gos on Party Poker by the end of September. The logic behind this is that I will be playing sufficiently frequently that it will help me get some consistency back into my game. With my renewed appetite for learing and a focus on my discipline I am hoping this should also help my bankroll too. I am striving for a 20% ROI. I will be multi-tabling, probably only two at a time but by the end of the month I want to be running 3 or 4 tables without getting overwhelmed. If all goes well this should give me the confidence and bankroll to start dipping my toe into the $20's next month.

It may not be the most extreme challenge, but at least it gives me a goal to work towards. I've already made a start on it in the last couple of days and I think I'm up to about 30 SNGs already.

I'll try and post a little mini update every day, wish me luck.

Live at the Stanley

This week I got my first chance to visit the Stanley "Mint" casino in Glasgow and take part in one of their tournaments. I've wanted to go to the Stanley for simply ages, but never seemed to get around to it. That all changed this week when i tagged along with a few of my local poker buddies to the Thursday night £25 Freezeout.

A couple of the lads I was with play there reasonably regularly and are pretty good players. I wasn't sure how I would fair. I guess I was reasonably confident that I would hold my own and not look like a complete donk, but more than that... I wasn't sure.

I'm delighted to say the evening was a great successs with me taking down 4th place for £110 from a field of 43 players. I picked up a couple of small pots early on but concentrated on playing tight and trying to get a feel for the game and style of my opponents. For the first hour of the game I hardly saw a single face card. When I finally did, I lost a a chunk of chips in two different hands, just before the break. So I went into the break a little unsure if I would last until the next break.

The second session started and my chips continued to dwindle as the blinds increased. Every time I picked up a hand or was going to target a players blind it would be raised before me and I'd have to abandon the hand. I picked up Jacks in late position but there was a raise and a re-raise before it got to me, so into the muck they went. It turns out I was up against pocket Kings and Ace-Queen on a board showing a second Ace, sigh of relief. The blinds were now starting to catch me and it was time to start moving. Luckily I picked up a couple of hands, shoved, got called both times and won both races. So I was back out of the danger zone and back to average stack level.

Then the defining hand came along. I was sitting in the big blind and I picked up 9-5 offsuit. One player limped in from mid position and the Small Blind limped too. I was wathcing the Small Blind as the flop came down, he was a relatively new arrival at the table, had just lost a couple of pots, and was now a bit below average in chips. I knew he was getting ready to make a move and sure enough, shove. I turned to look at the flop and couldn't believe my luck when I spotted a 9-5-X. Could my opponent have trips? Hang on a moment... look at the flop more closely 9-5-9, I've flopped a full house, the high side of it no less. Rock'n'Roll. I pretend to deliberate for another moment then calmly call the Small Blinds 9,100 all-in fully expecting the reamining player to fold.

The reamining player takes another glance at his cards then looks at his below average chipstack, counts off his chips and sticks them in the middle too, leaving himself with just one $100 chip. The turn comes down, it's inconsequential. I hold a single $100 chip, smile at the boy and chuck it in, he smiles back and chucks in his $100 chip. Card on there backs and he has A-J suited and the small blind had a 5 in his hand and had made two pair on the flop. Both were drawing dead and I was now in possession of a very respectable ~30,000 chips. Happy Days.

I've got to rush out now, errands to do, so I need to try and wrap this up.. Suffice to say. I made the final table, lasted longer than my buddies. Made some awesome laydowns and dodged some potentially terminal encounters. Got reads on a couple of guys and managed to use one of them to take a lad out.

I took out a couple of folk at the final table and was marginal chip leader. But as we got short-handed I started playing like a pussy and didn't use my stack to take control the way I normally would in that position. My buddies had left and I would have to get a taxi home, so I REALLY didn't want to buuble. So I played like a complete woos and made it through the bubble. By that time the blinds were getting enormous and it was time to hussle. A guy I recognised from CinCin's, who it turns out posts ion Blonde as BobaFett was sitting to my right he made a pre flop raise on my blind. I was pretty sure he probably had a bit of something but decided to shove my A-5 anyway. He flipped over A-10 and proceeded to crush my already dominated hand by hitting a 10.

OK, I know I played like a pussy when we got short-handed, and it's my own fault, but none the less I am quite pleased with the result.

I've now played 5 proper live games, I don't count the pub league and home games as I treat them more socially, but more on that another time. Anyway, Played at the Gutshot, cashed. Visited CinCin's three times, cashed once. Visited the Stanley and cashed first time. I 'm shocked and stunned 3 out of 5 cashes is very respectable. Maybe there's hope for me yet :-)

Missing in Action

I can't believe it's 3 months sicnce I last posted here! I've still been playing poker, and am just as passionate about it as ever. I guess I just lacked the drive and discipline to update my blog. Therefore, it's not entirely suprising that my poker has followed a similair pattern. I have still been doing pretty good most of the time but I haven't been playing with quite the same drive and discipline that I was at the end of 2006, beginning of 2007. My results haven't been as consistent and a few leaks have definately crept into my game.

Over the last couple of weeks I've had my head back in the poker books and have been playing better so it's time to get the discipline back on track, start posting here again and get on with working my poker up to the next level.

Quite a lot has been going on both in my poker life and my real life but I'll not swamp this post with everything. I'll break it up into bite sized chunks and post it over the coming days / weeks.

So here's to a new chapter,
Shuffle up and deal...

I BET YOU

"The following is what happens when you give two degenerate gamblers their own TV Show"

Antionio Esfandiari & Phil Laak have a crazy new TV Show. Check it out and you'll see what happens when a cameraman follows the guys around LA while they challenge each other to a pile of crazy proposition bets.

Great TV..

RaiNKhAN Top Starcraft Broodwar Player Playing 26+ SNG at Pokerstars

Sometimes I like to Multi Table but this is just mental.......

Poker pro and sit and go' master plays more than 26 sit and gos´ at once. Very entertaining.

Part 1 - Introduction
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4637718411371050080&q=pokerstars

Part 2 - MTT Insanity
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8902770502910175629&q=pokerstars

Am I ready to go Pro??

My god, surely I'm not ready to turn Poker Pro yet, I've not even been playing for a year!!! but then again I have got a 50% ITM / 50% ROI in the $10 - 6 player turbo SNG's on iPoker network but the sample size is only 50 games!

So what makes me think I'm ready to go professional, well, I've just discovered a very interesting secret...

All the Pro's are rubbish, they are only paid huge sponsored deals, then featured in tourneys, magazines and TV shows to keep the whole poker gravy train rolling for the poker rooms and media companies. The Pros are in fact just ordinary people, and they are rubbish at poker.

Far fetched you might think, but whooaa, hold on there. I have proof. Infact more than proof, hard statistical evidence from a very credible source. Take a look at the image below, it's a readout from Sharkscope showing 10 players, nine of them are sponsored Pokerstars professionals and the other one is me!

OK so my ROI / Profit on stars isn't huge, but I am in profit, which is better than seven of the nine stars professionals listed.

It can only be a matter of time before Pokerstars realise the error in their ways and call to offer me a sponsorship deal.

Seriously though..... I was rather gobsmacked that some of the pros had negative ROI's. OK I understand that these are their public professional accounts and they are marked with a huge target when they play using them, so they probably have alternate private accounts that they use for making money, but none the less.... I was surprised.

What a Tosser!

That's what I shouted at myself a couple of times this weekend.

Occurrence 1: Whilst playing in the Titan Poker $3,000 Gtd Freezeout Multi Table Tournament. 215 players had started the game, 26 were left, I was in 2nd place. Two hands later I busted out... what a tosser!

Occurrence 2: After a great run on Friday and Saturday I decided it was time to try a $20 SNG. In the heat of the moment though I didn't notice that I'd registered for a $20 Olmaha H/L SNG. I have purposely never looked at Olmaha or any other of the poker variants as I want to make sure I've got NL Hold'em cracked before I confuse myself with other variants. Therefore when the cards were dealt and everybody started betting I was at a distinct disadvantage. I didn't know if my hand was good or bad never mind working out the appropriate bets, hell, I didn't even know the rules... what a tosser!

I shall be trying hard not to have any more "What a Tosser!" moments this month.