Riverrun over me!

Had a great night playing last night where I am starting to get a feel of the types of tables that I can run over alot easier. Playing against a table of rocks sure isn't the place for me because when they reraise you really have to give them respect. Of course it would have been nice to catch a real hand once in a while to pop them right back.

Riverrun shows up at my table yesterday and I get dealt QQ and we end up all in. Of course he has AA but a sweet Q shows on the flop. The K landing on the river to give him the nut straight wasn't so sweet but something that doesn't impact my results as much as in the past. Almost at 10k hands of CR style playing of 6 max at the NL25 and NL50 level. So hopefully after another 5k hands at NL50 will give me enough of a bankroll to start putting NL100 into the mix.

Finished my PPA bonus yesterday as well so that was an additional $100 into the account. Sweet! Now I know that Fuel put out a little challenge on why we all aren't playing the higher stakes games... my answer is that I am planning on it but want to have the right tools available so I can stay there. Like investing this is just a slow and steady progression to becoming the best at something I choose to do.

Not much poker last week

Went to the hockey game tuesday and watched the Leafs beat Tampa... on Wed went to the Raptors game which they won over the Knicks. Hopefully the Leafs get into the playoffs and go against my Penguins.

Started back at NL25 tonight since I am rusty and ended up about $60 tonight.... nice since that is in addition to the $120 in rakeback from last month. Now when I get comfortable and get to NL100 then the rakeback should pick up and add to the stack.

I did watch a CR video tonight where GP had trouble dealing with a shortstack with a premium pair. For sure this has been one of the toughest things for me to learn how to deal with at tables where I am trying to play a LAG style. But experience is what we are looking for and I am starting to get a few hands in to improve my play. Also still very committed to making myself a better player by using the CR videos.

Bad Beats (but it could be worse!)

Any of the three readers on this blog know that I don't whine usually about bad beats.... only thing that bugs me is if they happen to the same opponent who should realize that they are behind if I am calling or reraising them.

Full Tilt Poker
No Limit Holdem Ring game
Blinds: $0.25/$0.50
5 players
Converter


Pre-flop: (5 players) Mungo36 is Button with :ac :qh
UTG folds, CO calls $0.5 (pot was $0.75), Mungo36 raises to $2.75, 2 folds, CO raises to $7, Mungo36 raises to $23, CO calls $13.75 (pot was $27.5).

Flop: :ts :qd :9c ($46.75, 2 players)
CO is all-in $1, Mungo36 calls $1 (pot was $47.75).

Turn: :3s ($48.75, 1 player + 1 all-in - Main pot: $48.75)

River: :kh ($48.75, 1 player + 1 all-in - Main pot: $48.75)

Results:
Final pot: $48.75
Mungo36 showed Ac Qh
CO showed Tc Kc

Full Tilt Poker
No Limit Holdem Ring game
Blinds: $0.25/$0.50
5 players
Converter


Pre-flop: (5 players) Mungo36 is BB with :5s :5d
UTG raises to $1, CO calls $1 (pot was $1.75), Button folds, SB raises to $2, Mungo36 calls $1.5 (pot was $4.25), UTG raises to $7.5, CO folds, SB calls $4.5 (pot was $11.25), Mungo36 calls $4.5 (pot was $15.75).

Flop: :3c :6h :5h ($23.5, 3 players)
SB bets $15.5, Mungo36 calls $15.5 (pot was $39), UTG calls all-in $12.35.

Turn: :2h ($66.85, 2 players + 1 all-in - Main pot: $60.55, Sidepot 1: $6.3)
SB is all-in $14.85, Mungo36 calls $14.85 (pot was $81.7).

River: :4c ($96.55, 1 player + 2 all-in - Main pot: $60.55, Sidepot 1: $36)

Results:
Final pot: $96.55
Mungo36 showed 5s 5d
UTG showed Qd Qh
SB showed 7h 7d

Flop TPTK after re-reraising him in the first hand (he was a bad player and I had seen him reraise with K high before) so I put him to the test. Of course he hits his two pair on river.

4 mins later I flop a set and manage to get both all in only to see him river his straight. The good thing is that I played solid tonight for a couple hours and the videos are starting to hit brain! I sort of had what could only be called a negative rush for five mins where I lost every big hand I was involved in. AK where I reraise a shortstack and he calls to see A88 flop. He has AA and I doubled him up.... set over set in another hand... so in 2 hours I make $200 to only lose $150 in 10 mins. Such is the game of poker and I will be back at it tomorrow evening.

A few 3 bets light working out when I notice guys multi tabling and taking advantage of position to raise... those guys are great for this move since it looks more genuine. Mining while watching a CR video does set me up nicely to join into a table with tons of confidence of what I am against.

Hand of the evening

Not sure when the last time I played at a table with so many calling stations. In the hand prior to this one the superstar managed to call a river bluff with his 3 high 4-flush calling 3/4 pot bet. So that is why I only have $40 because I couldn't reload in between hands fast enough while multi tabling.

So please take a look at this fantastic fun hand!

http://www.pokerhand.org/?894931

Made back most of the cost of the CR extension this evening while still working on a few things such as 3 betting and more focus on reads and taking good notes on players. Still don't have enough donkeys in the mix but working on it.... still finding the games sort of soft but not running super hot like before. Must be time to watch more videos and think more away from the game instead of hammering through another thousand hands.

No AC Vegas for me

Damn gov't didn't get me my passport in time so going to the US is out of the question. Don't want to be confused with the other terrorists and detained for a few days on no charges!

Well the good thing about blogger events is that there is always another one... I still haven't ever been to Vegas but this has to be the year. Of course to get to one of these events I better start winning some real cash online!

Today is the deadline to get your extension payment into cardrunners at the $20 / mth price. I did another 12 months and looking forward to seeing my progress over this next few months. So far I can see a change in my ability to read certain situations but I have to watch out in getting overaggressive at times. Learning to turn it down for a couple orbits and then ramping back up is something that GP is great at but I am still learning.

Have fun in AC guys.... wish I could have been there.

Been quiet lately

Not much poker going on these days.... ran into Astin and didn't make it back home in time for the Mookie. Instead ended up at Turf where I bet on the ponies for a while and had a good steak before heading home. Watched a couple episodes of Rome which is one of my favorite shows. I am looking forward to Regenesis having a 3rd season as they deal with some cool situations that can come our way.

Take a look at this bill (luckily I wasn't responsible for it!).... now that is a party. Of course I would have been drinking Krug and not Cristal (cuz I ain't no rapper).

Fun at the Mookie

Played like a donk in the Mookie last night and built up a huge amount of chips and then pissed it away. Got into a blind war with K2 and rereraised pushed against an unknown player (found out it was the winner of last weeks cc's thursday event) on a 882 flop. Of course he had A8 and I was a shortstack... at least he took the rest of my chips right after that.

Good thing was that the cash game was crusing along at NL50 6 max with me up $95 on the night after getting stacked early. Played tricky by calling a tight players pfr with JJ from the SB instead of raising. Flop comes all low hearts so I check (no Jh), MP player who limp/called preflop checked and the button raiser bets 3/4 pot. So to isolate I reraise him a pot sized bet thinking he has Ah and might be drawing / cbetting. The problem is that he had $35 to start and that meant that if he pushed I have to call. He pushes and I call a few more bucks and see he has A4h... shit. Reload and remember to reraise with JJ preflop to find out the strength of the opponents hands. So by the end of the night I had almost $200 in front of me at a table where I never got AA or KK even once.

I did have better success with the 3 betting light by improving my table image and making it tighter and more aggro post flop. Still having a hard time getting to a 5+ AF on the flop, 4+ on turn, and 3+ on the river. I enjoy floating people too often I guess!

Mac poker online

A bit of variance

One thing about learning this 3 betting light... it can be painful when you run into big hands. So lost about 4 buyins last night with some super aggro play and not hitting a single draw. Gnome also linked up an article on being super aggro with 4 bet bluffs which I tried once and lost a buyin.

I will say that I got a ton of action but only from shortstacks that ran into my big hands. I did also tilt off half of a buyin but then realized the error of my ways and went to bed.

Back to the CR style until I dominate for a few more weeks and I will for sure take another run at building this into my game.

High VPIP

The Superstar Poker Gnome (nice 10k winning day) asked me how I could possibly get my vpip over 30% and I said I would show one of the ways I was doing it.... raising from EP with hands that hit gold or are easy folds. I do cbet often but usually with position or when against weak/tight players that are likely to fold unless I am beat. Against tricky players I cbet less but just often enough that they play back at me when I have a big hand later on. Think of it as a way to induce bluffs later on in the session... lose a few small pots but stack them later on.

The Gnome just wrote a masterpiece on 3 betting that everyone should read and it will be a focus for me over the next week. To do this I will probably pull the vpip back to the mid 20% range so I appear to be a little less of a LAG type player.

Beware the Penguins! Gotta love the moves the team made at the trade deadline.

Getting money out of poker sites or neteller

Umm all those folks with money stuck in FT or PS (not sure about ability to send cash to someone else in neteller) I think I can help you out. For a small fee (still haven't looked through the financial costs yet) I can get you to fire me the cash on the site and I can put it in my bank account and mail you a cheque.

Not sure if anyone reads this or has an interest in getting cash out of poker sites but this probably works for a few of you who are currently stuck.

More Realistic Results

Managed to focus on getting in lots of hands this weekend... that meant less sleep so tomorrow night I might not play much. My problem hands right now are TPTK and overpairs vs. shortstacks with sets. I really don't see how you can get away from paying them off but then outplaying them when they have a larger stack. The ones I hate the most are the little hit and run experts!


The second leg down was from losing two big hands one of which pissed me off. I was running my now usual 34/23/3+ style and of course people play back at that after a while. I noticed that when I raised from MP and one person called he would use a squeeze play from the button. So a couple orbits later with KK in MP I do the same raise and get the same caller. He insta reraises again and I fire another reraise at him so he knows I am not folding to his push. He pushes with AKs and I have him dominated. We were both large stacks at the time so losing $80 at a NL50 table to a rivered flush was a bit annoying. The other was an overpair of 9's where I correct read that the guy was pushing the flop with a flush draw. He hits it and another large stack gone.

Oh well at least I was getting paid off when I flop trips because I bet almost every hand. The tough part is to not keep firing when they have a hand. Glad I pushed the number of hands I could get into a weekend just to see what it must be like to do this for a living... only fun when you want to play.

Sleep = good results

I came home last night and crashed at 9 pm! My body wasn't up for a couple hours of poker before my head hit that pillow so I played a few hands this morning and early afternoon.

Take a look at the graph:



Now most of the upswing is at the NL25 level. When I might have to get up for baby Guin I didn't want to play my regular stakes. Good to see that I was crushing the game today at 52 ptbb/100. Watching Cocktail (horrible Tom Cruise flick - I do like Elizabeth Shue though) and made $100 so the wife and me were happy!

Thanks Riverrun for seeing the same situation happening... sometimes with poker you think you are just running hot and it isn't due to you playing well. This is until others are going through the same transformation... the 2nd Sbrugby video told me that I wasn't aggressive enough! So a bit more folding on the flop and a few more cbets did increase the win rate. Gotta love it when the recipe works so well because it makes you look fearless.

So tonight back to the NL50 tables and hopefully I can continue to run at this torrid pace for a while longer.... I do need $240 to extend my cardrunners member for another year at the 20/mth price point.

Also for those talking about how it is a small sample size remember that 5k hands is about 2 months of playing for me. I am trying to pick that up but hard with my limited time in front of the computer.

CR style working

Got in a few hands after donking out of the blogger events last night. Managed to win back my buyins and another $100 to finish the night on a happy note. Played a bit on the PS2 and relaxed before going to bed for only 5 hours sleep... that is about 2-3 more than I got in either of the prior two nights.

So for next week the goal is to get some sleep and watch a few more CR videos and continue to dominate the NL50 games on FT. I did donate $40 to the PPA so that I can get that $100 bonus on FT which will get me to focus on playing enough hands to earn that bonus on top of my rakeback.

I also want to earn enough FT points to earn a Garmin GPS thing for the car. I get lost all the time and my wife luckily is not employed in map reading. So that is 69m points and currently I am only at 7.4m. Long way to go but at least it is another goal for the year.

Even More Rigged Live Poker

The Leafs put in a horrific effort last night which I watched from the bar at Hy's while putting down a nice New York steak and a good bottle of Malbec.

After that I was feeling like a little poker and headed over to the club for some live play. First hand get dealt 66 in the CO. EP raises to $12, one caller, Hero calls, BB calls. Flop is 9c8x6c so I have to think I am ahead here so when the EP bets $25 and one caller so I reraise all in for $146 to price out any draws of which there are many.

Now this is what I don't understand... if you have only a straight draw with no chance to backdoor a good flush then you are insane to chase in this situation.


Board: 9c 8d 6c
Dead:
equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 26.869% 25.76% 01.11% 255 11.00 { Ac7h }
Hand 1: 73.131% 72.02% 01.11% 713 11.00 { 6d6s }

Of course the chase is on and the 5d falls on the turn and no pair on river so good bye $200 with a flopped set (first one of the night).

Managed to get back most of my loss and watched that donk lose all of his chips. Got home way too late and feeling tired today and the wife isn't happy that I didn't go right home... she has a point as this stuff should be reserved for weekends.

Solid Night

Rikidee (watch out as he is buying gay video games which are no longer cool according to some sports figures!) made a whole post out of a couple sentences from a CR video on overbetting that I missed when I watched it the first time. I heard something about it but certainly didn't take as much notice of it as he did.... so I watched it again and it looks like an interesting idea when you find a calling station. When watching these guys play 10/20 NL I am amazed at some of the crazy ass calls you see so it is a good tool to use on a rare occasion.

The one point that was nailed home for me was that for the majority of our time at the tables we should be playing ABC poker. I think for some reason that we often try to outplay everyone on each hand and that isn't the goal. In the end we want more cash than we started with and if we are patient and aggressive our opponents will give us their cash.

So last night refocused on playing solid poker I attacked a couple NL100 tables. Then I run into a guy who overbet every hand he was in and he did it twice against me. First hand I am dealt QQ in the BB. Villian raises to $3 and I reraise him to $12. Flop is K24r and I lead out for $20 and he insta reraises it to $65. I let it go.... but I like my bet with that type of flop because the texture was good and I think that I take that down way more often than I am reraised. It is a hand that I will post this evening on CR to see if I played it in a manner that is optimal vs. other ways to play it to take the hand down. A few hands later against the same Villian I call his raise with 22 and flop is Q high. He bets 1/2 pot and I reraise it and he insta pushes. Again I liked how I used position to take an aggressive stance on the hand when I thought he could be cbetting with Ax. About an orbit later after winning a couple small hands against him when I cbet he left the table.

What I like best about the CR style is that you piss off everyone at the table with the constant pressure. There is no way to play a LAG style when not playing your A game without bleeding chips everywhere. People by the end of the night were letting me walk because to complete from the SB meant you would probably face a raise. If you raised with trash could it stand up to a very possible reraise?!! Limping from EP's wasn't possible without facing a 5x bb raise. Now I wasn't just raising with junk but was using position to my advantage to take down lots of small pots and when someone fought back I usually had a hand.

Overall I only ended up about a buyin but the feeling of running over a table and getting guys to do what I wanted was a welcome change. The few suckouts by a shortstack who was playing 90/8 over 100 hands hurt a bit since he lost it all to another solid player at the table. But those are the types of players that I want at my table anytime.

I did donk out of the Hoy last night but I was trying to read what Hoy and Iak had when I called them. They of course were pushing with the goods again and my hands were dominated both times. The good part of the evening was coming back from 250 chips to 1200 before donating to Iak. Get em next week.

Playing like crap

I was playing like crap last night because I couldn't get motivated to play my A game at NL25 6 max. The hardest part of going back down a few levels to work on the game is that the results aren't worth anything to the bankroll.

So after donking away a couple buyins I decided to go up to NL100 and play a better game. At the lower limits you really just nut peddle and steal small pots to earn cash... sort of boring. At NL100 6 max I managed to come away up almost a buyin so overall I was flat on the night. Also got myself another token so hopefully that can be turned into something that builds the bankroll.

Starting to get used to the CR method of playing but I think I am still a bit too tight at a 6 max game. Playing a 29%/22% and my AF is running in the 3 range. I think I can open it up a bit more which can find me getting played back at when I have big hands. Play on site does seem to have improved with only one or two really bad donks per table instead of one or two good players.

Also it is time for me to get to bed before 11 pm at least twice a week. That alone should get me into the right frame of mind. Hard to think straight when you have two-three glasses of wine with dinner and the wife wants to buy a new house....

Can't play the FTOP #9

Hopefully I can find a blogger who likes to play some pot limit Omaha and HE to play the event for me.

First person who can guarantee me that they can play it will get a shot at a nice event. I only want 10% of what you win...

So Far Behind....

Been a while since my last post partially because I am still recovering from the Eh-Vegas crowd... two nights in a row of live poker till 5 am and getting up the next day to spend time with the family will do that to you.

Kat did a fantastic job of making it a great event that should only grow over time. Overall I think I was down about 500 over the weekend but it was well worth it. Our wine tasting on Friday was fun with Jules giving me some info on wine... hopefully she will send me a few rec's that our LCBO actually stocks.

Iak thanks again for the drive to Oakville as that was a good chance to chat and get to meet you. Now I have to focus a bit more on my game and try to bring the A game to the blogger events. Always interesting to hear people tell you to your face that they think you play like a donkey! Respect that he said it using $5 words that it took me a few days to truly understand the level of donkishness that he considers my current game to be in.

Cash games have been going well for me and I have also had some recent success in the token events. Used 1 to attempt a tier II but was crap in that so I sign up for a FTOP event 9 sat. Looked like a pot limit holdem event but was I ever surprised after 10 mins when the level went up and we switched to Omaha Hi. Ack! I suck at Omaha only having played it in blogger events and just for fun. Well I managed to play super tight and very aggro but an early suckout had me crippled down to 350 chips. Built the stack back up and got to the final table in 8th place. Finally another hour later I managed to win it so this Saturday lets hope my pot limit run continues.

Vegas-Eh Style!

Well the event that hopefully will grow over the years starts tonight with dinner and a few drinks. I am sure to spend a bit of cash to make sure that the out of towners enjoy themselves. It is cold out in Toronto these days and the nights get really cold... so not sure how many of the bloggers will want some live action post drinks this evening. I know I always enjoy donking away a few chips!

Tomorrow I will have to miss the tournament associated with the event because of the 'Guins coming to town to play the Leafs. But after the game I will be so pumped to come out and play some live pokah against those cash game players that stick around. Never been to the club on a weekend to interested to see if the quality of players is better or worse than the mid week crowd.

Kat has done a great job getting people to show up in our town during the coldest time of the year. Just to offset my excitement I went and renewed my passport, drivers license, and health card.

Now to go to Atlantic City for HighonPoker's gathering in a month I will need that passport to show up. The increase in the rules to cross the border into the US is a bit of a pain but the hard work for me is now done for another five years.

Reviewme - Cardroom Supply - Poker Tables

This is a sponsored post.

Cardroom Supply has a great assortment of poker tables available for purchase. Many of us would love to setup the ultimate poker room for our home games and here is a great place to get your main piece of equipment. If you want a games room they also have tables that are available that can be converted to poker tables. It is also possible to purchase a table and chair sets which I haven't seen anywhere else. Now if many of you guys are like me you are looking for good folding tables so lucky for me they have an assortment of tables than I can put away easily.

Now I did notice that the site has a good promotion where any purchase over $100 results in free shipping. The ability to use the 1-800 number for ordering will be good for those with some further questions about the products.

Don't forget to check out the rest of the site for lots of other items to give you the Ultimate Home Poker room.

Cab Fare

Went to the Raptors game last night and took the 5th row seats instead of the courtsides. That way some young guy got a chance to sit in the nice seats.... not that my seats were bad at all. Easy Raptors win and then off to Ki for some post game drinks. Now after a couple beers I didn't want to take a train home so I decided to go to the cash game for some cab money!

One hour later I am walking out with an extra $150 in my pocket... amazing how easy it is to win with an ABC style of poker... so $65 for the cab home and then gave the wife $100 to go spend on anything she wants. That way she doesn't give me as much grief when I stay out late (gotta do something to keep the heat down!)

Today got a good bonus so I will be happy for another year. This is the year that I really have to push my portfolio to new levels. I might have just found a new potential 10 bagger that I will have to buy in my PA in a large way.

That being said I will go and buy a good bottle of wine for my dinner tonight... gotta celebrate.

Keeping the Focus

Staying true to not playing when not focused is working. Normally I would have fired up a few games last night and donked away some cash. But not anymore! I was looking to get a Wii but instead settled for a PS2... yes the cost was cheap enough that it didn't matter and I wanted to play God of War... and II when it launches soon.

So a bit of video game time later and some actual sleep has me in a good mood for poker today. That would normally mean some live action tonight at the club and beating up those tournament donks that bust early. Instead, I got offered steak and a raptors game at courtside.... so maybe some poker if the beer flow is slow enough. Otherwise head home and get ready for tomorrow when I get my annual review and bonus number.... the wait is agonizing for the number that is a very large percentage of our earnings for the year.

I do have to say that I am very pissed off with the workers for the Go Transit system. These lazy shits keep cancelling my train that I use in the morning due to a labor dispute. Now I am someone who really hates unions in this day and age so these childish ways of denying your customers service is a disgrace. You guys want a raise so you call in sick for a few extra days? All of these people should be fired instead of caving into demands from those who don't realize how good they have things with their current CN based pay package. Oh and if you idiots are going to cancel a train please send out an email using your service to notify the passengers at least... that way I can forward it to my boss who is wondering what the hell is slowing me down in the morning. So enough of my tilted rant about using a gov't run service that just doesn't give value for the cost. Let it go public and we can strip all this crap out and make these people really work for a living and to generate a return on my money.

POY Event 1 & Live Last Week

So last week I decided to take the CR style and put it to good use at the live tables and see how it fares against the calling stations at my local club. All I can say is that it sure tightens a table up a bunch when they are scared of getting reraised and have sizable bets coming their way all night.

Focusing on position also allows me to steal a bunch of unwanted pots that I enter so my stack is much larger than it would normally be when the bad beats arrive. So overall the first week of CR style while playing live was +$400 and I still don't know what the hell I am doing yet!

On the online side I had to get back to NL25 after donking away 3 buyins at NL50 while drinking and playing... it was fun but have to earn that back (and continue to work on playing the CR style at 6 max tables) before I can jump up to higher levels.

So all this rambling gets me to discuss my play last night in the WPBT event 1. Played a bit tighter with Lucko on my right keeping me in line with his fantastic style. I still don't know why everyone tries to pick him off since he likes to call bets that are larger than value bets with middle pair! Nothing worse than a solid LAG on your right and with a ton of chips. The good thing is that these guys recognize the guys who play a TAG style and adapt. Had a phone call where I folded a BB where I should call and would have won a monster pot... damn mother in laws! Then the laptop decided to make it a tough night and folded my QQ on the BB with StatiKing with a shortstack raise. Reboot and try to play some poker... still over 2k chips no time to worry.

Finally get doubled up when I flop a set vs. AA and got all in on the turn. From there on I only had one really bad play that that was against Change100. *She* raised the SB when it folded to her and I took that to be a steal so I pushed with KQo and after thinking it was a steal only to see the call with AJo so still a race but 60/40 and I won. Sorry Change100 it was my worst play but the karma would come back to bite me on the butt later on.

Not enough bloggers know that Raveen is my poker nemesis... my poker goal is to stack him so often he drops out of medical school due to the shame! Actually he seems like a cool guy who kicks ass at poker but he was a luckbox last night. I announced to him that I would bring swift justice to the one who drops quads on my TPnoK hand for a stack at 1/2 NL (also known as the worst hand I have played in about a year)! Well I managed to reraise him 3 times and that drove him over the edge!

Raveen raises from MP which is his standard way to enter a pot. I know that I have been pushing back at him a lot so I decide to let him know that folding isn't an option for me in this hand with AQs and 15 people remaining. Blinds are 300/600 with 100 ante if I remember correctly. So his raise to 1,800 looked weak and from the CO I reraised to 6,666 and I only had 5,400 approx. behind. Why not push? Because I didn't want it to look like a desperate move with a small pair. And he knows that I have pot committed myself to my hand so no way can he feel that he has any fold equity in this hand. He pushes and I am hoping to be against a smaller Ax... instead he turns of 65o.... hmm that is interesting considering he is one of the chip leaders and I wasn't too far behind and only 7 get paid this evening. He hits the straight and I am done for the night.... ugg... at least he went on to win the whole tournament.

Now the concept of people just playing blogger events for fun making such moves normal just doesn't make sense to me. After investing 2+ hours of time the buyin for the event shouldn't dictate play anymore.... now we are down to the few guys who are actually trying to win this evening. With my KQ hand I actually thought I was ahead of steals (according to Pokerstove it is a top 9.2% hand) vs. doing the same with 56o (71.6% hand)... heck Hoy complains about calling reraises with AQo (6.5%) so I know where he stands on this hand.

In the end I got my money in good. Win that hand and then running towards the cash with a good stack and lots of people sitting with low M's getting ready to push. Good to know that my prior raises can get people to do silly stuff because they get tired of someone playing back at them. Still focused and working hard to be that pest who can get you to put your tourney life on the line preflop with a non paired 6 high. Either that or I am running into a lot of guys who would rather go to bed than win an event... who then go on to win the event.

Won the 2nd Chance!

PL Omaha Hi is a game that I still have no clue how to play. I asked slb and he just told me to be aggro and I used that technique postflop by reraising him and pushing him off a hand.... I wasn't sure what I had but it looked alright so I went with it!

Hit a couple good hands when needed and built up a good bunch of chips. I was also playing two cash tables where the suckouts have continued. I even joined a NL100 table and found a donk who thought bottom pair on the flop with no kicker was good enough to go all in on the turn. I held TPTK which is good against a short stack so an easy call of that small push only to watch that 3 kicker give the donk 2 pair. Ugly. Just make a note and hope to find this fish again.

So it was good to win a blogger event and also to play well and not get tilted in the cash games. KK < Q4 when my 5x bb raise was called and they hit top two pair! Ugly! At least I am not paying off these guys too much in those situations but it is still a bit annoying. My bankroll could use a couple positive hits to give me some room to take some shots at bigger games.

More Rigged Live Game Play

Well I was out meeting with a few friends last night and when a couple of the said they play poker "once in a while" I got a little excited. Luckily I am not endowed like Bobby or they would have noticed! So we go hit the ATM and 15 mins later sitting at the underground club slinging some chips. Two orbits in I get AA at a six handed table so I raise to the standard $10 from UTG+1. Now both of my buddies sat to my right so I wouldn't have to steal their blinds which they wouldn't imagine folding to me. Lets just say that they were a little drunk while I was slightly tipsy but ready to rock the table.

So an Asian dude who wore "cool" glasses and a fancy dress shirt calls (very loose table overall) from the SB and my buddies both call. Flop is KdQx4d so with the flush draw I reraise buddy in the BB (he bet $10) to $70 to isolate. Everyone calls but I see the nice Ax on the turn. No flush so all is good in the world as I can't put them on J10 but the flush draw looks real. SB bets $25 and both buddies call, so I reraise to $125 and everyone calls again. Of course SB has the flush draw with A3d and hits on the river. My buddies both had a K mid kicker which showed their inexperience to play that for their stack especially after the A on the turn.

So the SB says for sure he was willing to go to the felt with that draw because of how strong it was. He wasn't even worried when I showed the set of A's .... little shits like that seem to draw out far too often. Only played for another 1/2 hour and won back that buyin and also a bit of extra cash. Then one tight player left the game and that was my cue to get out of there.

Losing a $700+ pot to an idiot really hurt but I played well and I know those opportunities will come up again.

Lacking Focus for Timeframes

I need to setup a couple new rules so that I can focus properly and not start off down 1/2 - 1 buyin before I start playing well.

1. No big pots without the nuts against anyone you have less than 60 hands against. Too often I end up backing down from a crazy reraise with TPTK only to find out that was the maniac that had 2nd pair.

2. Leave tables when they aren't worth the time. Found myself at a table with 4 TAG players and here I am trying to play a looser game against those sharks... find waters that are safer.

3. Watch a full Cardrunners video prior to playing as listening to the constant consistent play of Taylor is a good way to focus.

4. Get some damn sleep... last night 3.5 hours the night before 2 hours. Not close to the 6 hours I am trying to average this year. Tonight I might just watch a couple videos and then go to bed early.

So down a couple buyins last night with some positive points. One I used the play of reraising pot against a person who led out at a pot with a small probe bet. I had nothing but took down a good pot instead of just calling which is my typical play. Keep control of the hand and punish people for calling my raises. I wasn't good at letting hands go or keeping pot size small when I had okay (TPTK) hands but that is something that will be the goal over the next week.

The good thing is that I am committed to making me a better player but hopefully my mistakes plus the bad beats don't kill my bankroll. Pissing away a buyin last night was probably the dumbest thing I have done in a while. 3 bullet bluffs into a TAG who has a high aggro rating but is calling tells me I am beat.... check it down .... I do not have to win every hand I raise.

Now the work begins

Well finally finished that damn 3k raked hands on the B2B network... crazy f'n site where I lost a couple buyins on silly plays but a handful more on crazy bad beats... I am not one to whine too much about that stuff as variance has been good to me in the past... just hurry up and get done with kicking my ass!

So now to rebuild my game I am starting at NL25 6 max on FT. Overplayed JJ last night but other than that the first 500 hands went well. slb watched me playing against a super donk (other than him!) and I finally had to bust the guy by going all in with KJs vs. K9. Next hand A9s vs. QJ. Luckily he wanted to continue to pay off my big hands and he scared the hell out of the rest of the table... most folded to his cbets. Going to look for that guy tonight to double up on that fun.

Time to get the most out of this Card Runners subscription.... the easy part was signing up... the hard part is working on my game.

Getting back on track

After blowing a bunch of my bankroll on FT with silly plays I decided to get back into the grind. Played in the D2S tonight and you know that you are playing well when they are complaining about my steals early in an event. Also, the guy who looked up my PS results in sharkscope was just funny. He got stacked by me a little while later so I guess it goes around.

Here is the screenshot of my results.


So I started the night out focused and the results were good with a good suckout to give me the big stack with 5 left. It is always nice when you win a couple races and then can just roll into the cash. Got all in HU with K8 on a 5s6x7s board vs. AJs. So we both had lots of outs to win the hand and we both whiffed! A high takes it down.... but I was happy with my play.

I then went back to B2B to work off a bit of the bonus while trying to avoid situations like this from the other night!

http://www.pokerhand.org/?732688 The friendly people at the site mentioned that I couldn't take down the Bad Beat Jackpot but they would look into giving me something... that was great customer service from these guys.

Found that if I was patient with a super LAG that I could find a spot to take him down instead of trying to play back at him. Poker is so much more fun when you are patient and have a solid game plan.

So after attempting to follow through with the few things I have picked up from Cardrunners I was up 80 euros this evening (plus . Not sure how many people are aware of how solid the CR guys did at the PCA 4 of the top 6! Glad I am working with this crew to improve my game. Wes also did a good job of making the cash in this event which is great to see bloggers represented!

Ending the evening tonight by watching a 10/20 cash game video... these videos are great for taking the game to the next level.

Late Live Play

Got out for a couple quick drinks last night with a buddy of mine who is just an action junkie at the poker tables. He also was way ahead of me in the drinking department when I showed up at 8 pm to grab a drink... well next thing I know we are having food and having a night cap at the SoHo hotel and then on to the poker club.

Amazed that an almost full table is already slinging chips with no scary players around at all. I build up my $200 stack to $350 when the wheels come off. In the BB with 67o I call a raise to $6 due to good pot odds. Flop is a golden 589r so I check knowing that one of the five other people in this pot will attempt to take it down. UTG raises to $6, the next guy reraises to $21, a tight player at the end of the table calls the $21... so I shove it all in figuring that some guy with an overpair or a set will call me and hopefully my hand can hold. It folds to the tight player who calls with top two pair as he said he could lay it down for the other $200 in front of him.

Turn is a blank and then the river is a 8.... live poker is so f'n rigged.

Posted my hand from the last post onto the cardrunners site and they said I am a chip spewer... oh okay but I doubt I will tighten it up too much but I will attempt to implement a more conservative stance and play back at people with the goods when they continually raise into me. Have to stop looking for places to beat a player and instead focus on winning cash.

Learning is always painful

Donked out of the Hoy last night due to my over excitement to get back into the big blogger 1/2 cash table. Call that mistake number 1. I have to focus and enter each event in order to at least end up in the money. If that isn't what I am feeling at the time I should just rail the event because the chat is a good part of the fun.

Got to the cash table sitting to the left of a guy who plays a very similar game to what Cardrunners tells people to play. Everytime he was on the button he raised any unraised pot ... usually a pot sized raise if a couple limpers or to $7 if no one else was in the pot. So I watched him to this for 6 orbits and finally decided to take a stand. He raises to $7.... I reraise to $23 and he is the only caller to a 10 high flop with two spades.

Flop couldn't have helped him so I lead out for a $40 bet into a $48 pot because I can't put him on a super strong hand just yet. He calls. Turn is another 10. Here is where I think I made the mistake by not going all in as I instead bet $66 which was about half of what he had left (also 1/2 pot). If he pushes I know I am beat and can fold and save some bucks.... he thinks for a long time before going all in. I fold. At least I am attempting a few things that I wouldn't have tried before but maybe learning should be done at a lower level than normal! That just wouldn't be my style.

Now on the turn I could have checked to see if he would bet and maybe get a free card or pushed... now anyone reading this far.... what am I holding and what is my opponent holding? Up to this point I am playing a TAG style of 22/11/3 and he was SLAGing it with a 35/17/4.5 with all his raises from the button or two to the left of it. So I know he is a strong positional player and I know I have them worried about my hand but couldn't get them to lay it down.

Positives: 1. Picked the player and figured out his game plan. 2. Built a plan to exploit that style. 3. Waited for my opportunity to execute and then took action. 4. Followed through and attempted something new. 5. Reviewed the situation to learn as much as I can from it.

Negatives: Played this hand about 2 mins later. Got sort of tilted and then I donked off my stack at the 1/2 game with TPnoK. Ugly. Back to NL25 6 max to learn how to play shorthanded and work up from there.

I did go to the B2B network and won back $60 and worked off 200 hands towards my 200 euro bonus so only 800 more hands to go. Will also get an additional PSO bonus with 1,300 more hands so I will definately play to get to that level. We will review where I should play at that point as the table selection on the B2B network isn't great as the Europeans are all sleeping. The guys I do get to play against are some of the most passive players around.... but I want to get back after those guys at Booyah where I had good success in the past.

Until then I will be Full Tilted until I win back some of my cash!

Cardrunner.com

Joined Cardrunner.com after taking note of the Gnome's success at cash games on his blog. If anyone else is interested in joining you can list guin36 as a referral. So far watched about 3 hours of video and tried out a few new moves last night at the blogger 1/2 table... of course after waffles got cracked by weak player it turned into a regular cash table.

Lost $85 in trying out being even more aggro with position but still think I am not raising enough preflop to drive out some limpers. Gotta punish them more and post the trouble hands onto the forum...

Which gets me on to the goals for the year... I know I am slow to post this stuff but time to catch up.

1. Focus on my game such that I am trying to actually win money instead of treating it like "play" money currently. My brother wants to buy a license for a taxi cab (over 100k CAD) and it would be cool to fund it from playing poker. Not to mention buying a bunch of great wine to enjoy over the next few years... need some quality for Fuel's visits to town as eating out will get too expensive.

2. Sit out when the wife is talking to me.... currently she is the only person who puts me on tilt... one outer... oh well that is poker... wife telling me to empty dishwasher while someone just reraised my AA on an 8 high board throws me for a loop!

3. Have more family nights where the closest I get to poker is through reading. This way I can put a book down easier mid sentence and still spend plenty of time with the wife and little Guin. Utilizing the forums at Cardrunner and 2+2 should improve my play more than just grinding it out. The family is super important to me and I don't want them to feel left out of my schedule.

4. Play when I am ready to play my best game and not because there is a game to play.

5. When I play live it is to win money and not just to play. Anyone noticing a trend of me f'n around with poker too much in the past year. Hitting my 10k goal would have been easy if I just worked on the game and didn't mess around.

Looking back at last year I think I only moved up to NL100 but I really should have tried to get to NL200. I go through stretches at NL100 where I dominate for days on end over 16 ptbb / 100. Just have to build the bankroll to play the 2/4 game.

6. That leads me to my big goal for the year which is to play 3/6 and even take a small shot at 5/10. Can't wait till I can bet in 36, 66 and 136 increments at a cash table.

7. In general I need to get more sleep (avg 4 hours now - try for 6 at least), eat better, drink less (keep binge drinking to minimum), and work harder (at work and at poker) to make this year as successful as it should be. Throw in a bit more exercise and sex (sex counts as exercise right?!) and it could be my best year ever.

Before I forget I did post my one pixel at 36 x 36.

Villian / Superhero

Thought I would follow the trend (interesting results!):

Your results:
You are Lex Luthor

Lex Luthor 80% Dr. Doom 72% Riddler 61% The Joker 57% Apocalypse 57% Magneto 55% Kingpin 48% Juggernaut 42% Green Goblin 42% Venom 41% Mr. Freeze 40% Two-Face 38% Dark Phoenix 36% Catwoman 31% Mystique 26% Poison Ivy 21%

A brilliant businessman on a quest for world domination and the self-proclaimed greatest criminal mind of our time!

Click here to take the "Which Super Villain am I?" quiz...

Your results:
You are Iron Man

Iron Man 80% Green Lantern 75% The Flash 60% Catwoman 60% Superman 50% Spider-Man 50% Supergirl 43% Batman 40% Hulk 40% Robin 33% Wonder Woman 28%

Inventor. Businessman. Genius.

Click here to take the "Which Superhero are you?" quiz...

UFC & Live Event

It is always cool to get together with some friends to watch UFC and engage in some poker fun. Just played it sort of tight and then raised huge when I got a hand and stole some blinds to get to the cash. Finished 2nd in the first event when I pushed into AA when they doubled blinds to get the game over with.... I never complain when they do this stuff because I know I will cash in the next event (or at least that is the plan!).

By the time of the 2nd event we have the UFC event running which allows a couple well timed steals while the big fights are on! Guys are busy drinking and almost don't want to play anything but premium hands if they can help it. No problem I will put in a nice large raise and sit back and watch the fight and chip up. So that led to me winning the big event of the evening with the larger buyin.

To keep my invite to the next UFC-fish homegame I stuck around and donated to the drunkfeast post game so it doesn't look like I was trying to run away with their cash. By now it is so loose the only move is an all in because most raises are being reraised by a push. Lose a race and my evening was over around 2:30 am.

So +$240 for the night was a good way for me to end the year.

Over one year of rambling... so make this one long!

Hard to believe that I have made 140 posts over the last year about poker and other crap... mostly poker anyways.

Overall not a bad year but it could have been so much better.... going to take a good look at many aspects of my life over the next couple weeks to come up with some solid goals for next year.

That being said I decided yesterday to humble myself to the poker gods and not demand that I win every pot. With that small adjustment to my game and a couple coin flips going my way I am working to turn around an 8 buyin setback. Have to like some of the situations that have been thrown my way over the last week.

Here is the one where I knew I was due to turn things around.

First hand at the table and JsTx in the CO (post from late position a la Doubleas suggestion). Just called a 2.5x bb raise from MP and both blinds call as well. Flop is AxKsQs so nut straight but a flush draw is out there. SB checks, BB leads out with 1/2 pot bet, MP folds, I reraise to new pot amount but willing to let it go if board pairs or flush lands on turn. SB and BB both call. Question is what do they have? I put one on the flush draw and the other on two pair as that is the only reasonable thing they could hold that called the raise preflop. AA, KK and QQ all should have reraised preflop so discounting the fact that anyone has those hands.

Turn is a 3x so good no flush. SB checks, BB bets 1/4 pot, Hero reraises by more than pot and almost enough to put BB all in. SB folds and the river brings a 3x. SB pushes last $5 in the pot and I call.

What does the SB hold? Take a look at where all of us stood on the turn. The bugger had the A3s which is interesting that 3 handed it is even with the set due to the flush draw.


Board: Qs Ah Ks 3c
Dead:
equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 19.0589 % 19.06% 00.00% { As3s }
Hand 2: 61.8988 % 61.91% 00.00% { JsTh }
Hand 3: 19.0423 % 19.05% 00.00% { AcAd }

Once the BB folds I am a solid 3:1 favorite to win....


Board: Qs Ah Ks 3c
Dead: Ac Ad
equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 23.8215 % 23.85% 00.00% { As3s }
Hand 2: 76.1785 % 76.26% 00.00% { JsTh }

At least one of the two villians could figure out that my big bets meant that I had the straight. I bet slb would have about 5 pictures of a donkey with this post... for me it is just the start of an evening of poker. Reload put in a note that buddy will chase a draw for his stack and overbet pots against him to get my cash back!

Amazing how another year of getting kicked in the junk is starting to make me somewhat immune to other players bad decisions. Sometimes I throw out a bit of a jab at them for the bad play to piss them off but I am able to keep playing well. None of this of course applys to those situations against a super LAG who is hitting every hand against me. A big part of my downswing was a 3x buyin at one table where AA < KK (all in preflop), KK < AA (all in preflop), KK < AA (all in on a 6 high flop)... all in a matter of minutes. The only thought that goes through a simple minded brain like mine at a moment like that is "Shit that guy has my number!"

Last night I was clearing a bunch of hands for a big bonus I am working on with the Poker Savvy guys when slb mentioned that bloggers were playing NL200. Wow the stakes are getting bigger over time... bigger buyin tournaments and now bigger cash tables. Tried to join the table but had to wait 30 mins to get a seat. ScottMc had one interesting hand against me where I think he put me on AK or AQ and thought I just cbet a whiffed flop. He of course called my preflop raise with position with a one gapper and the post flop situation was like this:


Board: Td 6h 4h
Dead:
equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 44.6763 % 44.72% 00.00% { 9c9d }
Hand 2: 55.3237 % 55.38% 00.00% { 7h5h }

Now some might say I was weak/tight by cbetting $15 at a $19 pot and then folding when raised to $45. Now I actually bet to get info and got enough of an answer that I was probably behind (good read this time). Now I could have called and then pushed if no flush hits on the turn but the $260 I had in front of me was a good chunk of my FT balance that I removed due to the shitshow with DuggleBogey. Now if we assume that it doesn't give him a hidden straight that is the only way I regain the lead in this hand. He just has too many outs and being a penguin I don't dodge well on land... something about the center of gravity being too low!


Board: Td 6h 4h 2c
Dead:
equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 65.9091 % 65.91% 00.00% { 9c9d }
Hand 2: 34.0909 % 34.09% 00.00% { 7h5h }

Made about $45 at the blogger table and another $50 at a non blogger NL100 to run my month's cash winnings at FT to approx. $750. Gotta love that but I really have to play another 2,500 raked hands (0.31+ euros) on the B2B network to get a $400 US bonus plus $200 Euros. The players are bad but I have to play mostly 6 max tables which I am not used to yet. If you want to see weak/tight you should play against europeans as they love to see flops and fold to cbets. I think if I did just that I could end up with a positive win rate of 2 bb / 100 over time.

Well if I don't get the chance to post again this year, I hope everyone has a happy new year, close to the people they care about the most. Some of you might find me online mashing buttons and trying to win some cash or at least clearing that bonus.

Wild Night Playing Live

Headed to the live club for some poker goodness last night because Kat said she was going. Managed to move a meeting to a future date so I could be on time and sober for the $40 tournament.

In these tournaments you really need to catch some cards around the 30-45 min mark because there will be a few races to get to the final table. Instead my AQs < A10o and that crippled me. Very next hand QJs < 97o but at least I was short in that one.

The funny thing about playing a tournament and then going right into playing 1/2 NL is that some people don't adjust. Actually the play at the live table was the most action I had ever seen at a table (including online). To fully explain I will have to label a few players:
(Seat number, label, read)
1. Bay St. Buddy (BSB) - slightly loose, ABCish, a little tough to push off of a pot
2. Tough Guy (TG) - likes to raise with position and willing to go to felt to show his manhood
3. Scared Lady (SL)- tight / super weak (does she blog?) who says has been running bad
4. Scared Guy (SG) - tight / super weak (does he blog?) trying to play ABC at a wild table
5. Tournament champ (TC) - loose but had to play tight - won large live event
6. Super Maniac (SM) - Asian super loose, super aggressive ATM looking for action
7. & 8a. Maniac Tricky Guy (MTG) - very loose passive preflop , aggro push monkey post flop who likes to call with low cards
7a. Tight Asian (TA) - smart tight player with the worst seat in the house
8. Calling Station (CS) - dumb calling station who feels lucky sometimes
9. Fearless Guy (FG) - loose player who will float and catches cards
10. Hero (Hero) - all round excellent player who will play super-TAG this evening
11. TAG (TAG) - solid player who respects Hero's raises and is forced to make some tough calls

So we have a very full table with loose guys in the early and mid seats with tight/weak people in between and tight / aggro people at the end of the table. Super maniac decided he was going to give all of us as much action as we could handle!

For the first 3 orbits I don't even play a hand as I was watching raises and reraises all over the table. I finally get to see what SM was raising with and he was going to pay me off. MTG had just busted and bought in short for $50 and raises from MP to $10 and CS calls with his $65 stack. In the BB Hero raises to $50 with AKs to isolate the tilting MTG and get him into a race. He calls and so does CS so when he checks to me on the J high flop I bet $15 to put his ass all in as well. He says he is feeling lucky with his QJo and the turn and river are blanks so he wins a nice pot. That is the hand that proved to me that CS was indeed a calling station and he said he felt lucky. In the end I was lucky to be at a table full of so many losers.

So being a shorter stack I continued to play tight (didn't have cash on me to rebuy fully). SM had just lost a monster pot when his Q high hand got cracked by two pair that he tried to bluff on the turn! Everytime that happened he raised bigger on the next hand especially if he just rebought for more chips. On the BB when he raised to $22 (only a standard 11x bb raise) which was called by MTG as expected. Now with AQo I could just call but that would be weak and my starting hand selection is much tighter so I push while ahead. SM calls with 55 and I win the race with a Q high flop. Now the stack is starting to get back to normal.

Then the rush starts with a flush vs. TC that hit on the river where I flopped bottom pair and nut flush draw and he bet much less than pot and then check called my value bet.

Get pocket 10's UTG and just limp and call the raise to $6. Flop is 883r and the BB leads out for $15. I call along with one other to see the turn. Turn is a beautiful 10 and I try to not look all excited. BB leads out for $30 and I take a bit of time to see if he has an $8. FG is known to bet all streets when he thinks he is ahead and senses weakness. So I just call to see the river which is a blank and he bets out $65. Unlucky for me he folds to my push so I don't get his last 80 or so but still a nice hand.

Overall, just another wild night of playing live poker and winning $260. Darn shame that Kat missed it as Lee sat down at the other table and donked off a couple buy ins.

Poker IQ?!

Did this poker IQ test which was interesting and here were the results:



Poker IQ Score

Your Poker IQ Score of 115 shows how able your mind is in general. Anyone with a Poker IQ Score this high is considered to be of above average intelligence. This score is better than 76.83% of all persons taking this test. Most occupations can be comprehended with a Poker IQ this high. You should be able to handle almost all academic challenges.
You scored higher than your average percentile score in 7 individual ability categories. 3 of these better scores could be called statistically significant and may indicate special abilities, or that you were distracted on those parts of the IQ Test that counted more heavily in the other ability categories.

I must have clicked on the wrong boxes a few times to be considered smart. Sort of like when I was in grade school and I started making a design and next thing I know they are calling me "enhanced".... Bobby would say "Hear that ladies?"

Another Fuel Personality Test

Sweet

Prick- ENTP73% Extraversion, 80% Intuition, 73% Thinking, 40% Judging

People love to hate you, because you love to argue. The strange thing is you probably took that as a compliment. Why, I bet you've already got a witty comeback all lined up ready to throw right back at me.

What you don't realise is that your inane obsession with debating pisses everyone off. Whatever happened to us all trying to get alone? I mean, you're so annoying people disagree with you for the damn sake of it! NOBODY cares about your abundant opinions. Trust me.

Believe it or not, but there's more to life than your expansive knowledge and sharp repertoire. When was the last time you showered? Brushed your teeth?
While you're up in Nevernever land, getting excited over future possibilities and your crazy theories, WE have to put up with your awful stench. I can smell you from here.
Your personality is ideal for that of a future lawyer and because everyone already hates you, you have nothing to lose.

Booyah Swag!

Received a nice parcel in the mail today from Booyah Poker. They sent me a couple hats and a tshirt with their logo on it. Very cool and so far I have to say that they are awesome for building their brand with the players who join. So Canadian's looking for a place to play for some NHL tickets or entry to CPT events join by clicking my banner above.

Tried playing the FT Bad Beat on Cancer event... was kicking ass but couldn't win a race if my life depended on it. Hopefully Garth goes on to place well and cancer gets beat worse than I did this evening.

Final table hammer drop

Got some sleep and wanted to post my final table hammer drop... wish a few bloggers were around to witness... only got a couple screenshots of it that don't do the hand justice. Wait I guess I could post the entire hand history here.





I thought he min bet the flop but it looks like he checked it and I bet out and he folded.

Well time to go cash out of the site since I don't have time to go earn anymore bonus before it expires for me tonight.

Your Player ID: Mungo36
Date and Time: 2006-12-16 20:09:32
Transfer Number: XXXXXXXX
Amount: $3000.00

DuggleBogey they responded to my email to them telling them that the screwed up in how to deal with players. There response was that I sent in my email but not from the email address registered with my account. What a bunch of BS and they should focus on the problem and not on the email address the complaints come from.

Pain into Pleasure?!! 2nd in 3k Guarantee

I am feeling quite good about myself with a solid placing in the 3k Guarantee event on Full Tilt that started last night at 3 am... so with almost no sleep I just wanted to post my results. I really played well at the final table where I started very short and managed to make every hand I play pay off until I took the chip lead.



Just so you get an idea of what the final table was like for me take a look at how the table looked.



The hand that should have ended it... of course a nice K on the turn and buddy is freerolling for 1st!



So I am tired and the baby Guin wants me to read her a book... going to do so feeling a bit better about my game. Funny thing was that this is a pot limit event and I really haven't played much pot limit in the past.

MTT's = PAIN

I have been trying to use my tokens since we can't trust Full Tilt to protect our funds. So signed up for the 11k guaranteed.... convinced the table that I am so loose and crazy when I get called by a guy with an overpair and I had a sooted hammer.

That ends up leading me to another hand with a board of AKK36 and I am holding 67s from MP and bet the flop, checked the turn and 1/2 pot the river hoping it looked like a value bet. The guy to my left calls with Q high and I win the hand.

The crazy painful hand is with me holding AJo in CO-1 with only one limper thus far so I raise it up to 3x bb (didn't want to mind letting it go if reraised). BB and the limper both call. Flop is J34r and it is checked to me and I bet half the pot which is a good %age of their remaining chips. BB calls and I start to worry about an overpair but the limper folds. Turn is an A and since he doesn't have more than a pot sized bet I know we are going to get all in. If he has a set I will be paying it off. He pushes and I insta call to see he has KK and a solid 5% chance to win the hand.... river K and I go from being a top 30 out of 300 left to a short stack. That hand would have put me in the top 10 overall for a good run to the money. Instead I go out 240th after playing some of my best poker (stop laughing now!).

I don't know how you MTT guys handle situations like that day in and day out... at least at the cash tables I can just rebuy and stake out my idiot all day long if I want. Sites like Booyah poker (see banner above) actually allow me to track my players so I can find the fishys so much easier.

Time to call it a week and take the little one to see Santa tonight and get her pic taken. She is excited unlike prior years where the old dude scared her. Tonight you might see me at the cash tables and the 10 pm 25k or whatever just trying to find a big enough donk to out donk me.

Interesting hand...

Talk about someone being able to laydown a hand when they know they are beat. Not even a crying call with a set.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?671391

And I managed to get a double Lemieux (66)but they didn't under the DQB comment afterwards. I liked the hand because I was against a loose aggro player so felt that by betting out I could get him to raise. Then when I got reraised I knew I had him so pushing was the only option.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?671395

Super night at the tables where I ended up approx. $350 plus some bonus money. Probably playing against people that hacked the Full Tilt site and it is such a shame that the site hasn't done something to take care of DuggleBogey yet.

Your Money is NOT SAFE at Full Tilt Poker

Just read DuggleBogey's situation with Full Tilt and it is f'n horrible. Happy to say that I won $75 there last night donking around after my company year end bash. I also cleared another $20 of my bonus but leaving lots of it on the table.

One thing I can say is that I will be taking a good majority of my cash out of that site so if it does get hacked then I won't loose much. Note that I will be updating my Full Tilt holdings from approx. 1,400 to 200 to play the Mookie. For the non-US players looking for a place to park your cash you should try out Booyah Poker. I think I will also be leaning towards changing my password at all the sites I play at and have a new password for sites to post and chat about poker.

How can sites ignore players that actually will give them bad publicity when we are all going to band together to bash them.

Full Tilt is acting so shitty over a few hundred dollars that they could have spent and received nothing but praise from the blogging community. The growth from the US players is starting to go to their heads and next thing they are acting like they are Party Poker.

NL100 Dominance

I haven't focused enough this year on building the bankroll. Updating the figure to the left sure gets me thinking about why you want to play the "A" game when you are at the tables. All I know is that when I sit down with the right frame of mind and a bit of time that I rock the NL100 tables. The problem is I often sit down just to put in the time and not totally into winning some cash.

Last night I didn't have any problem with the game at all. First of all started off the evening by going and watching the Leafs beat Tampa. Then caught the train home right after the game and managed to win about $160 despite losing $90 when my AA < KK all in preflop. I also lost a big hand when a guy hit his 5 outer after pushing all in (shortstack) with 2nd pair after I potted the flop with TPTK. My ability to just roll with the bad beats and continue to play solid poker is one of the keys to my game. People expect you to tilt and are shocked when you just move on to the next hand.

Over the next while I will get a good computer in the house (using my laptop now) where I can 4 table and that should help out a lot. Getting good at using my info from PT to figure out hand ranges, along with being able to mix things up to create an image. I usually like to be considered a guy who is loose enough to float people with any two cards as I get more calls of my big bets on the river.

Thanks to Fuel for his informative posts on overbetting for value which have improved my win rate. Now all I would like is the time to get in a few thousand hands a month... running about 1k hands / month with a 10+ BB / 100 win rate.... not sustainable. Of course if you check my sharkscope numbers you will see were some of the winnings are going! Add to that the -EV blogger events and you have a bit of a leak but well worth the cash.

Backgammon @ Gammon Empire - ReviewMe

This is a sponsored post by ReviewMe.

Backgammon is a game that has been played by many poker greats including Erik Seidel, Gus Hansen, and Stu Ungar. So why don't more of us arm ourselves with similar skill sets to these players?

Probably because we haven't found a site yet that offers us all the tables, guaranteed tournaments that we have grown accustomed to from our poker sites. Now is the time to try out Gammon Empire. Setting up an account is simple and you get $2 for using a valid email address. For those people who don't want to install yet another program on your computer you can always use the lite Java version.

One of the nice features is that players are all ranked so you can really pick a suitable opponent to play against. As a new player I have a grey icon next to my name but watch out for those guys labelled red! I do like the idea that the poker concept of rake is reduced for the top quality players. This site really focuses on making the costs of the game reduce for the high stakes players and the top quality players. Sort of like a built in rakeback program to keep the frequent players playing. Try it now vs. the other 10,000+ players currently on the site.

I did see that the site is currently giving away backgammon boards and you might want to try to get one of those to play live against your friends.

Slump Breaker

Had a great time playing poker with the SNG superstar RikkiDee live at our local club. He of course played great and ended up finishing 2nd while his very sweet young lady managed to get to the final table. The club has a good mix of donks like myself all the way to some solid players so it was cool to see a blogger in the cash. My hopes are usually dashed by the time the third beer goes down too quickly!

Played the 1/2 200 max NL cash game and had a couple really tough laydowns. I did start off nice and strong when the SB rasies to 10 (call him wild Asian guy!) and since there was already 6 limpers (including me on the button) they all called! Flop is Ah Kh 9x and it checks around and my J10d isn't looking that good and since these guys call raises on flop bets I check as well. Turn is a lovely Q and it checks to me again so I bet a bit more than 1/2 pot. The SB beats me to the middle with the check raise push on the turn and I am expecting a set. Instead I see he had AK and a nice brick river gets me to $300 quickly.

Now to the tougher hands... 24o in the SB and I limp because 8 limpers already in the pot. Flop is 2x 2h 3h and I figure that from the SB one of these guys is going to bet to take down the uncontested pot. LP guy bets $15 and I raise it to $60 figuring he is on a flush draw or a better 2. Turn is the Ah and he now could have a flush, a better 2 (hard to not fold that 4 kicker), or a full house... ack! He pushes for another $74which really gets me down to a baby flush or a better 2.... I go in the tank wondering about how the Benicio Del Toro looking dude could call my reraise. Was my bet size to small? I think I should have put him all in on the flop because these guys don't mind to pay for a draw.

About an orbit later I see a tight EP player raise to $10. A slightly loose but thinking player calls the raise and I look down at JJ. I decide to call with the hooks and see how many to the flop... sort of play it like 88 and look for a set and a huge pot or an easy flop fold that is inexpensive. A guy to my right calls and then my wild Asian friend from the AK hand raises to $106! The two EP guys fold and it is back to me. I figure this could be a crazy steal or he has AA-QQ and all of them have me so dominated. That is where I think I made the mistake. I know he is wild and I should have been willing to race there against him. Instead I fold and the guy to my left pushes his $150 in the middle with QQ. Wild man calls with 44 and they race.... to make it worse a J hit on the turn in what could have been the biggest pot of the evening! I was a little perturbed by both of these hands and ended up down a bit on the night.

Fun time and glad to see RikkiDee show up and show us how to play poker.... no more downbeat posts from him.

Pacific + fun FT token

Most bloggers know that I love to raise almost any hand preflop. Sometimes with position and sometimes without it which goes against conventional poker thinking. It really pays off when you flop a monster and no one believes your cbets! Well I notice 4 hands into a turbo token event that one guy has been super aggressive. I like guys who like to LAG it up early... so I raise with QJo and he calls. Flop is A J 4 with flush draw. I bet out 1/2 pot and he raises to 500... I put him on the flush draw and push and he calls with K4s. He hits and the stack is crippled to 150. Came back from that and busted the guy and went on to get my token. Very satisfying to know that even with few chips I can come back. Thanks again for Smokkee reminding me that in a token event a few weeks back that got me thinking things through.

Been a while since I updated my numbers on the left so I did that this evening... pathetic that I haven't really improved the bankroll since about March but I think my play is much better. Confidence at the cash tables and just as important is my increased patience. Recently the goal has been to try to play post flop against bloggers and see if I can confuse them. Wil told me he hates me so I must be doing something right! Hopefully he doesn't call customer service when I steal his BB 36 times in a row again!

Pacific NL100 was the place where I was working on clearing a bonus and ended up $160 or so which made for a good weekend.

The River and slb are ONE!

Got home late last night as I met up with a buddy to look at a couple stock ideas and a couple beers to open up the discussion. Almost forgot that the Mookie is now a FT event but eventually got registered for the 2nd chance.

slb was good enough to girlie chat with me and tell me how stud h/l works. Seems like a cool game and I will spend some time trying it out again in the near future. Managed to scoop a nice pot with a 6 high straight against MiamiDon in the 2nd chance with my new knowledge!

Of course slb managed to knock me out of the tournament during the holdem round and me being shortstacked with AA hoping to get all in. I did but by the river slb had already hit the straight. One way to defend your blinds from UTG raises!

Overall, I was happy with my play which didn't donk away like the night before when I got to the final table. Upon sober reflection it was sort of pathetic to donk away a chip lead like that so close to the money... that foolishness will have to be avenged.

On a good note I did manage to win some cash at my favorite Booyah tables...


30.11.2006 02:33:27 Leave Table $124.83

30.11.2006 02:31:25 Leave Table $185.00

30.11.2006 02:30:26 Leave Table $102.00

30.11.2006 02:20:47 Buy chips $80.00 <---- give me a full buyin

30.11.2006 02:20:08 Sit down at table $20.00

30.11.2006 02:02:24 Sit down at table $100.00

30.11.2006 02:01:16 Sit down at table $100.00

Not much time but a good reward.

PNIC + WWdN 2nd Chance

Played alright in two events tonight but managed to blow up soon after getting to the final table.

Luckily the cash game was good on Booyah again and now I have turned 700 into 1,500 on that site ($310 bonus dollars). Only playing NL100 so that is a nice run of cards where guys are willing to go all in with junk. There have been hands that I get sucked out on but I have managed to get my money in good against big stacks often enough to make up for the bad beats.

The Full Tilt bonus that I have is something that I probably should try to earn more of while it is available. As we approach the end of the year it would sure be nice to actually take a couple steps forward to my 10k goal.

Cardschat - ReviewMe

This is a sponsored post about Cardschat. The site is focused on being a new forum to discuss poker and also a site with valuable advice on strategy. In addition they review a bunch of the sites and have bonus codes if you are looking to setup through them. They are not offering rakeback or other promotions like some other sites but I would be more interested in the site's offerings if they did that. Hopefully, we see them step in that direction soon as it would generate more income from forum posters in the long term.

The guide section is very interesting and I will spend some time reading most of these articles. First off I don't know how to play Omaha at all which makes it tough to play HORSE .... actually I need a guide for all the games involved! Bankroll management issues? Well they have that covered along with poker books and a section on studying your game.

In the forums you will find a great community of players who have a bunch of tournaments that they use to get people to post more often. You need 15 quality posts in order to get the passwords to those events so join now and start posting. It should be interesting to get a few of the bloggers into these events to watch us clean up!

Booyah, even when drunk

Well managed to get home around 1 am last night feeling a little tipsy from 6-7 pints of beer, 4 shots of tequila, 1 jagermeister to round it all out. Played in a poker event that the dealer had to be the worst person to ever to hold that position. Turning over flops before people called bets and taking forever to catch up to the play. In the end I lost my chips to the guy who invited me which worked out for me so to the bar I go!

Like I said I was feeling tipsy but I fire up the Booyah!.... two table NL100 while watching Dexter (good show) and finish up $100 in about an hour. It was getting late and next thing I know it is morning and I am sleeping on the couch! Feeling good today and got some work done while catching up on the 60+ blogs that I read.

Going to keep playing this rush that I am on and hopefully I can start working up from my current low bankroll situation. The bar on the left needs to be updated... will get to that soon... I think.

9th Place LAG...

Managed to squeak into the money last night in the WWdN which was good. Made a couple mistakes late after building an alright stack and then way way overplaying TPTK against an overpair. So silly of me to do things that I wouldn't do any other time. Blaming that bad play on how tired I was playing last night.

Used the 2nd chance to work on my LAG skillz (sorely lacking) and managed to build up a nice stack. The good part of raising every other hand and then cbetting is that you win lots of small pots but you get to stack people when you hit really hard. Flopped a flush and bet out only to get raised! It rocks to convince people that you will bet with nothing and are willing to do it with your whole stack. Calling raises cold also gave me a chance to play post flop which is an area where I need more work. Spent time trying to figure out what hands a person could be holding to make plays against me. It was making poker fun again... have to try it again in a few more events. Of course it all ended badly when I put CJ on a pocket pair or missed draw and he was firing with air.... instead he had AA. Such a good read!

Had to turn down flying to Buffalo to watch the Leafs game and flying back because I am going out tomorrow night as well. Don't get me wrong I will be out for a bit this evening but just not for long. Tomorrow night is the NHL Alumni poker night money raiser for scholarships for kids.... damn thing sucks for structure so I will be pushing one of my first three hands to get to an early chiplead or bust.

Got out monday night and drank some Cakebread Cellars 2003 Cab which was good but way too young to be opening now. That still didn't stop 3 of us from downing 3 bottles plus a bottle of Caymus Zin. Paid for my drinks by taking the guys on at that point to HU poker for $50 / game. Smoked both of the guys and ended up with a few extra dollars in my pocket. Not a bad night overall but it will keep me in check over the next couple nights.

Another night saying Booyah!

Played well in the Mookie last night where ScottMc decided to limp reraise all in with 7's vs my Q's. River is the case 7 and he jumps to the early chiplead instead of me. Always nice when you get a big hand on the button and raise to 6x BB to punish limpers (but it appears to just be a steal). I guess my image is such that it wouldn't shock someone to see me pull that move with worse than normal cards. In ScottMc's defense he did see me laydown a couple hands to pushes by DuggleBogey who must fear my post flop play to either push or fold against me!

Moved over to Booyah poker for some fun playing some 1/2 NL online. Having played a few hours live at this level makes handling the larger bet sizes less of an adjustment. Played TAG for a couple orbits when I get into a blind battle against a LAG. He completes and I check with K2s. Flop is 10d, 9d, 2x and when he checks it is open betting season. Pot it and he calls so I put him on a draw. Another 10x on the turn and he leads out for $8 and I smooth call to control pot size. A harmless 5x falls on the river and he leads out again for $32 or just larger than the pot. This play looked very weird to me because someone with a 10 would not lead out with a bet on the turn. So in the end it appears that he had a draw that didn't make it so I called. Great read and he mocks me for being a calling station but I ignore him. 10 mins later looking at AQs gets me to raise to 5x bb (my standard TAG raise) and a short stack of $65 pushes from the BB. I call and it is against A10o. Love the push and my hand holds up... sweet. Table breaks so I move to another one. Get AA 3 hands in and do a standard raise. Short stack with $75 pushes all in and I call and racing against JJ. My hand holds and the night is getting better! This site is full of guys who like to gamble. Won a total of $170 before calling it a night. Going to spend a bit more time playing that site and building on my buddy list. Also earning a bonus that clears quickly at the 1/2 level.

Review ME!

ScurvyDog mentioned this site so I joined up because cash is cash... so this is a paid advertisment! All 3 million readers of this blog are going to love the stuff that I pimp on the site.

Signing up as a blogger is free and you get a rate that you're paid for each review, based your blog's Alexa and Technocrati rankings, as well as an estimate of your RSS feed subscriptions. You can make up to $250 per review (50% of the price is what you actually earn) depending on the page rank and traffic of your blog. Having more posts should increase your pageviews and increase your earnings. You can receive payment via PayPal/check.

Why not make some cash?! Everyone gets to review the ReviewMe site when they sign up. Now lets hope that they have a few poker related items for me to review. Everyone should note that all bloggers can be / should be truthful in your reviews, no need for fake positive reviews. So setup your new ReviewMe account and choose some key words where you want to be placed. Many of the poker bloggers are using: poker, casino, bonus, gambling to put them in the correct category. I am still a little unsure about how advertisers pick which blogs to use but these keywords could be the key to getting more jobs.

Now if we were also able to adjust our price lower to get some more business that would also be a nice addition to the features on the site. If there is a weakness on the site it would be the lack of current other offers for us to go about reviewing while our excitement for the product is the highest.

Victory in the Hoy!

Managed to not lose my composure at the final table like normal.... also only made one lousy call with Q10o when I called a re-re-raise of my steal attempt. Lucky for me that I ran into Q9s and my hand held up.

The tournament started well with me catching some cards vs. Mowenumdown who kept flopping sets that couldn't hold up against 53s (I hit a flush) and the fateful hand of 82o vs. 87 in a blinds battle where I flopped two pair and turned the boat. GG Mow and that chip lead really helped out.

After that Shadowtwin was nice enough to not crack my 5's in a coinflip and I was off to the final table! He said that without his chips there was no way I was going to win it.

Fuel had some bad luck at the final table to bubble but played his usual aggro game to put a run at winning the tournament. In the end it was CJ standing toe to toe with me and luckily I held a good chip lead. He did manage to chip into it a bit but then I started to get more aggro and it paid off. Won with AJ vs. 99 with the J on the turn all in preflop.




The funny thing about the results is that I am usually finishing where Hoy finished, and he usually finishes where I finished... if that makes any sense!



Edit: Forgot to mention that I also managed to not totally tilt when my warm up $10 SNG ended poorly for me. One of the things I seem to do when I am playing my A game (stop laughing!) is that people get tilted by my plays. LAG player to my right raises from the button and I repop it to about 40% of my stack with Q high. He folds and I don't show. No comments but I could tell that he wasn't enjoying my TAG play pushing him around the couple times we tangled. Down to 5 handed when the hand happened that should have ruined my play in the Hoy. KK in the SB and the superstar LAG raises again which is what I expect everytime it folds around to him. I reraise for 50% of my stack to make it appear that this move is a steal. He pushes and I call.... villians hand A3o! A on the turn and I get to focus on the Hoy. Damn the effect of playing back at someone hard gets people to do silly things. Win that hand and cashing is certain and 1st is a good possibility. In the end you wonder what hand range the villian put me on prior to the push since fold equity really wasn't there.

Playing with DeezNutz!

Sorry for the poor hand history... it is a Booyah poker thing.


$10 - NL - 9 Seats
13245401-2
Holdem No Limit
20/40
[Nov 10 21:59:15] : Seat 1 : joinus has $2,000
[Nov 10 21:59:15] : Seat 2 : bodder has $1,960
[Nov 10 21:59:15] : Seat 3 : queen99 has $2,000
[Nov 10 21:59:15] : Seat 4 : bigredbadge has $2,000
[Nov 10 21:59:15] : Seat 5 : Wolverine630 has $2,140
[Nov 10 21:59:15] : Seat 6 : TIMBO26 has $1,980
[Nov 10 21:59:15] : Seat 7 : Mungo36 has $1,960
[Nov 10 21:59:15] : Seat 8 : thevicker has $1,960
[Nov 10 21:59:15] : Seat 9 : DeezNutz! has $2,000
[Nov 10 21:59:15] : TIMBO26 is the dealer.
[Nov 10 21:59:15] : Mungo36 posted small blind.
[Nov 10 21:59:15] : thevicker posted big blind.
[Nov 10 21:59:15] : Game [2] started with 9 players.
[Nov 10 21:59:15] : Dealing Hole Cards.
[Nov 10 21:59:15] : Seat 7 : Mungo36 has Ks 5h
[Nov 10 21:59:23] : DeezNutz! called 40 <---- EP call looks funny - be careful!
[Nov 10 21:59:24] : joinus folded.
[Nov 10 21:59:25] : bodder folded.
[Nov 10 21:59:25] : queen99 folded.
[Nov 10 21:59:26] : bigredbadge folded.
[Nov 10 21:59:35] : Mungo36 : well played wolverine
[Nov 10 21:59:36] : Wolverine630 called 40
[Nov 10 21:59:39] : TIMBO26 folded.
[Nov 10 21:59:41] : Mungo36 called 20 <--- complete
[Nov 10 21:59:41] : Stakes: 20/40 Current level: 1 Next level in: 7 min.
[Nov 10 21:59:43] : thevicker checked.
[Nov 10 21:59:45] : Dealing flop.
[Nov 10 21:59:45] : Board cards [3s 9s 2h]
[Nov 10 21:59:47] : Mungo36 checked.
[Nov 10 21:59:48] : thevicker checked.
[Nov 10 21:59:55] : DeezNutz! bet 160 <----- looked like a cbet from EP or weak overpair
[Nov 10 22:00:00] : Wolverine630 folded.
[Nov 10 22:00:01] : Stakes: 20/40 Current level: 1 Next level in: 7 min.
[Nov 10 22:00:11] : Mungo36 called 160
[Nov 10 22:00:14] : thevicker called 160
[Nov 10 22:00:14] : Dealing turn.
[Nov 10 22:00:14] : Board cards [3s 9s 2h 6s] <---- bet the scare card and try to take it down
[Nov 10 22:00:21] : Stakes: 20/40 Current level: 1 Next level in: 7 min.
[Nov 10 22:00:22] : Mungo36 bet 166
[Nov 10 22:00:25] : thevicker called 166 <--- don't like the call
[Nov 10 22:00:26] : DeezNutz! folded.
[Nov 10 22:00:27] : Dealing river.
[Nov 10 22:00:27] : Board cards [3s 9s 2h 6s 4c] <---- miracle card!!!
[Nov 10 22:00:39] : Mungo36 bet 666 <---- bet like I have the K high flush
[Nov 10 22:00:41] : Stakes: 20/40 Current level: 1 Next level in: 6 min.
[Nov 10 22:00:42] : thevicker called 666 <---- call felt better than a raise!
[Nov 10 22:00:44] : Showdown!
[Nov 10 22:00:44] : Seat 7 : Mungo36 has Ks 5h
[Nov 10 22:00:45] : Seat 7 : Mungo36 has Ks 5h
[Nov 10 22:00:45] : Mungo36 has Straight 65432
[Nov 10 22:00:48] : Seat 8 : thevicker has 3h As
[Nov 10 22:00:48] : thevicker has Pair: 3s <---- why I love this site.
[Nov 10 22:00:48] : Mungo36 wins 2,304 with Straight 65432
[Nov 10 22:00:56] : Hand is over.
[Nov 10 22:00:56] : Stakes: 20/40 Current level: 1 Next level in: 6 min.