Should I throw in the towel ??

Well, I have had a week off work and planned to play tons of hands in my bid for supernova, however it just hasn't happened. The week has turned out having a few more drinking sessions than I originally planned, which although was great fun, was not good for the grind or the bankroll. I started off the week with the best intentions, getting a 5k hand day in for the first time, but I didn't play well and it affected my confidence quite a bit, I think after that I was looking for excuses not to play just in case I played or ran bad again.

I reckon I might only pull in about 8k vpps this month, which will put me on around 42k for the year in total, with 4 months to go this would mean I would need to get 58k vpps at an average of approx 14.5k vpps a month to get it. Considering the most I have ever gotten is about 8k, that would obv mean playing a lot more than I am now.

So sometime in September I am going to have to make a decision what to do. If i don't carry on and get to supernova, all my plans for next year will have to change, if this is the case, I might as well try something else for the remainder of the year as at the moment as it stands the year is going to be a complete washout and almost certainly the lowest yearly profit since I have been playing poker, which considering it is by far the most I have ever played, is pretty piss poor.

I still think my health and fitness is causing me issues as my concentration level is appalling, even when I am 15 tabling, I still tend to drift off and mooch around on the net. I know for a fact that the days when I can keep my mind on the game, my decisions are much better (not always the results, variance is a beeetch)

If I do knock the supenova bid on the head, I think i will spend more time on my fitness, I have been trying to lose a few pounds, well stones to be fair, for quite a while. I have posted before many times how if you feel better about yourself, your confidence level increases and if your confidence increases, so does your profit at the tables, so I think this is a must starting in September.

But for now, it was my buffday on Wednesday, so tonight is yet another night out on the piss, which will inevitably end up with 9 tabling drunk later on, I know I shouldn't but sometimes I can hold it together and play ok, other times the drunken risks pay off !!! but mostly, I play like a twat and lose a buyin or two lol......c'est la vie.

Todays song is from a little known band called 22 pisterpirkko I came across them by accident when at a festival in the 90s, it started pissing down and I dived in the nearest tent and this band happened to be playing and they were amazing live.

22 pisterpirkko - This Time

Struggling for time

Been a busy old month, unfortunately busy, as in, out on the piss a lot !!! So obv, the poker hours I planned to put in have suffered. I have only played about 22k hands so far this month and I am slightly down at the tables. This is mainly due to one drunken tilty session where, to be honest, I just did not care about the money at all and just piled in with uber aggression. Of course when you are pissed your reads and timing are, well to be blunt, fooking miles off !! With the big drop in profits that comes with it. This along with an AA vs KK all in pre for 110 bb where the board finished 8, 9, 10, J, Q !!! Did not help either.

I have got an all day wedding tomorrow as well, then sunday the mighty Villa are on telly at 13.30, with Man U the next game on at 16:00, which means another all day super cider sunday....Just hope I can keep off the tables when I get home.

The good news is that I am off work all of next week, so should be able to catch up on the old hours.

I decided to cash in 50k fpps for a $650 bonus which I should be completing early next week, so hopefully the doom switch won't get turned on and lose the lot getting the bonus, which I have heard a few people say its rigged to do *tuts at conspiracy theorists.

I have also accepted an STT challenge from BurnleyMik on the krackedkings forum. Only a $20 wager over who can post the most profit over 25 $5 stts on stars. I haven't played stts for yonks, they used to be my bread an butter back in the day, but I got bored, although at times when playing bad at cash I have thought about going back to them, especially now that I am used to mass tabling a bit more, I only used to play two at a time when I did them a while ago, I feel I could comfortably 18 table them, hopefully not getting heads up in all 18 at once !! Will be starting them next week, Mik has already done 10 and got 4 3rds and 2 2nds, so might have me work cut out.

Will be having a night in tonight (well thats the plan, until Winona calls !!) so hopefully can get a couple of thousand hands in and catch the friday drunken fish on later, although that could end up being me !! Got to die me hair tonight at some stage, so having a shed load of beer prob not be a good idea, otherwise I might end up looking like a morris dancer !!

Thats it for now, feeling pretty good at mo, mainly cos I know I got a weekend on the piss and partying coming up and a week off work straight after. So as we are in a happy mood......


Siouxsie and the Banshees - Happy House

Whores Draws

The title exactly shows what my July was like and as you can see in the graph, up until the last two sessions of the month it was looking quite rosy, but as we all know, a good kick in the balls is only a few hands away.

To be fair, I actually ran quite well, which is even more annoying cos I would of expected to of won a lot more considering how +ev I was, but I guess we can't have anything.

The main downside of the month poker wise was the amount hands I played. I was determined to get over 12k VPPS but personal circumstances dictated otherwise, I did manage to get over 7.5k though so at least I have got back to platinum level, but I still am now only on about 31k VPP, so to get to 100K by the end of the year to get to supernova is starting to feel like a tall order. As stated in my previous post, I have got some leave in August so want to try and get a lot of play in. I feel realistically I need to be over 50K VPP by the end of August to stick a chance, but this would involve probably moving up to 18 tables from the 13-15 I am currently doing. I am already find it difficult to post any sort of decent profit mass tabling as it is. Maybe I should have at least two days a week where I drop to 4-6 and play proper poker instead of just mindlessly play nitty abc poker to get the volume of hands in. If i am going well, its def any idea to be looked at.

On a personal note July was a truly awful month for me. There are only 4 things I truly love in this world namely my wife, my mother, my grandmother and my dog. July incredibly took two of these away from me. My Grandmother sadly passed away at the grand old age of 84 and the funeral took place at the beginning of July. Then when things looked like they couldn't get any worse by beautiful staffie Fern went off her legs at the age of 13 and we had to make the awful decision to have her put to sleep. Now I have had a couple of dogs before who have passed away, but this was the first time I have been in the vets when we have had to do it and it is truly the most heartbreaking thing I have ever had to do, I am even shedding a tear while writing this just even thinking about it. She was one of the most precious little things you could ever meet and the house now seems completely soul less without her running around causing mayhem. We will eventually get another staffie, almost certainly from a rescue centre again, but it won't be for a while as the pain of losing Fern is still to hard at the moment.

Any, enough of cheering you all up, this is supposed to be a poker blog !! So at least you can see the reasons why I didn't hit my goal of 12k VPP.

Gonna go out for a walk today around a local park then have some dinner then start back on the grind. Still not sure what to do about the FPPs. I have about 62k of um at the moment, so could cash 50k in for $650 and then do the same again in September. Would def help the roll I suppose, but tempted to keep them for the $4k 250k fpps if I get to Supernova. I don't need to cash them in just yet as my roll is quite healthy, so will prob leave them for now. If any of you our there that read this are stars players, let me know what you do with them and the best value ?

Thats it for now, hopefully it won't be a month before my next post, should be able to slip in a few updates in between the grind, if I haven't gone completely insane.

Something softer today to calm the mood.

Bauhaus - All We Ever Wanted Was Everything

A Tough Month

Well the ship didn't stay steady for long, in fact the day after my last post, I put in a 3000+ hand session and managed to donk off almost 8 buyins, I should know better than to mention how things are turning around for the better, cos inevitably it goes tits up almost straight away.

The month didn't turn out a total disaster, approx 40k hands played and only $15 down, with some fpps in the bank to cash in at a later date, so technically was in profit, but could of been so much better, I still reckon I tilted off at least 4 buyins and lost another 4 buyins with stupid calls, its the same old story.

One bad thing about the month was that due to the world cup, I didn't play no where near as much as I should of as I was out on the piss, or watching games at home so I didn't manage to maintain platinum, so have dropped back to gold. I really need to get at least 12k vpp next month, or I will have no change of getting to supernova by the end of the year. If I can get approx 12k in July, I have got some holiday booked in August and intend to have a full week of 8 hours at least a day to try and get some serious grind in, I really need to get at least 20k vpp that month to get me back on track, I may be able to do the same again in october.

As long as I don't hit a big downswing and start monkey tilting again, I should be ok.

Lets hope July can be the first profitable month at the tables in the last 3.

GL me and bring on the grind.

The Jam - Down in the Tube Station at Midnight

Steadying the ship

The complete and utter disaster that was called "May" is over. I hope I never have another month like it. I really had to step back and evaluate my game completely. In doing so, I believe I managed to identify a few major leaks and worked on them. I still have many more leaks to look at but I think at least I have stemmed the downward spiral that I thought I was never going to be able to get out of. I am not saying I have turned it around completely yet, but I now, for the short term at least seem to be heading in the right direction.

I finished May 19 buyins down, but at one stage was over 25 buyins, so the re-evaluation of my game has paid off already. I only managed to get 50K hands in at the end, mainly due to the fact that I was running/playing so bad, I ended up cutting down the amount I played. I guess this is only natural, although I it did cross my mind to start chasing my losses, but this is just a recipe to disaster.

The one good thing that did come out of May was that I did actually make platinum, but only on the last day and if I am going to hit Supernova by the end of the year, I now know it is going to take 100k hands per month from now on in, or something close to that figure, I really don't want to end up in a situation where I need to get about 25k vpp in December and end up doing stupid mass tabling sessions for long hours, although to be fair, this may even be good practice for 2011 when that is exactly what I will be doing.

If I can sustain my play at the moment and keep on the winning track, I might even invest in some coaching in September, I have a couple of people in mind from Cardrunners who I think will be able to improve my game.

So, lets just hope the ship has stopped sinking for now and we can stay afloat and have a profitable month without rakeback for a change and you never know, in two months time, I might even get a comeback king icon on PTR ;-)

Madness - Night Boat to Cairo

June has started off a little better, continuing on the winning streak, only about 4 buyins up at the moment in about 14k hands.

Nightmare on every street

Well the wheels have really fell off the wagon, its been a really bad 10 days or so. In this short space of time, I have virtually lost my whole years profit. I have tried to put my finger on what the problem is and have come to the conclusion that it is just variance, I have had a few inevitable bad beats, but most of the big pots I have lost have just been coolers with at least 6 sets losing to oversets. I am about 16 buyins down this month in the 33k hands that I have played so far, which is very bad considering my quite nittish style at full ring.

I am considering changing the style of play that I use and I am definitely going to have to experiment with different lines as the style of play on stars does seem to be a lot different to what I am used to on other sites. When I was sponsored with Bad Beat on ipoker. In the first 3 months I was up over 1k playing only two tables of 50NL Full Ring and was obv playing a lot less hands than I am now as I am currently 9-13 tabling normally a min of 3-5 hours a day. So I must be doing something drastically wrong.

The other thing I may need to consider is the the variance seemed to have kicked in since Stars changed the min buyin structure so the 20bb guys can't now sit at the 40bb-100bb tables that I am choosing to play on. I am beginning to wonder if a lot of my profit when I first started to play on stars was from playing against these short stacks in a +ev fashion. I am not sure how I could filter this out in HEM to see if this indeed the case, although I really don't want to go an play at the 20bb-50bb tables as I have read a few studies that the short stackers do have a real advantage long term.

The good news I guess is that I have already retained Gold Star status and should move up to platinum by the end of next week. Should also be able to purchase a $650 VIP Bonus at the end of the month, which should bring some welcome $$ back into the bankroll which as I said above is taking a bit of a hit at the moment.

I reckon its gonna be a long struggle to get to supernova and I need to develop an effective strategy to at least break even very quick, or it will be back to MTTs and Snooze and Gos again.

Prob won't play too much today as its FA Cup final day here in Englands green and pleasant land, which means a compulsory all day out on the piss.

Also need to start to increase the frequency of my blogging to help with my enthusiasm through these bad times. Hopefully the good times will be back again very soon.

Time to get the blood rushing round the body ready for the day out, crank up the sound to full and give it some thrash.....

Pendulum - Watercolour

Back and ready to grind

Hello Peeps....

Back from a tour of my new fave place in the world, namely Canada. Was out there on a West to East fully guided tour, which included a 3000 mile train journey from Vancouver through the Rockies, stopping eventually in Toronto. the tour also included stop offs in Jasper, Ottawa and a short period in Montreal. Without a shadow of a doubt, it was the most wonderful holiday I have ever experienced.

As we were going in mid April, we spent a fortune on Winter clothes, ready for the cold onslaught that was about to be thrust upon us, which of course, never came. The weather was outstanding, with only 3 hours of rain during the whole time we were over there and that was when were on the train, so no coats were needed.

Its really difficult to pick out what I loved most, we just did so much while we were out there. I guess if I had to choose one thing that stood out, it would possibly be the helicopter ride of Niagara Falls. All of my life I have said that if I was gonna die tomorrow, the one thing I would have to do before I popped it would be to see the falls in the flesh. When the opportunity to fly over it in a helicopter came up, it just had to be done. I took so many photos while up there, but I think this is one of the best ones that came out ok.



I could talk forever about the holiday, but as this is a poker blog, I know you will only get bored. I do however intend to return to Canada again in the near future, hopefully to tour move of the West coast in the next 3 years or so.

The bad thing about holidays is that they eventually end and you have to go back to work. This strangely enough was short lived for me, as after two days back at work I got the dreaded Man Flu and had to come home sick. I always get really fooked off when I have to have time off sick as I do like to take the piss out of the girly puffs who have a sniffle and don't turn up. I don't tend to get ill very often (touch wood) but when I do, I seem to get it bad. Luckily it only lasted for about 4 days, so I now feel ok again and have been back on the poker tables.

I did manage to play enough hands in April to retain my Gold status on stars. But as May has now started, the grind is now on to get to SuperNova by the end of the year.

I currently have about 12k VPPS and seem to be holding my own 9 tabling, but due to stupid and I mean STUPID calls I am not winning very much at the tables. I have got to the stage where I have played a lot of hands and my hand reading skils have improved immensely. However, what hasn't improved is my abilty to put my reads into practice. There still seems to be a little man on my shoulder saying "Call you fool, he hasn't got it" even when if you follow the hand through to its logical conclusion, it is bleeding obvious that he has it and the fold is the only option.

Still, I am in profit with the bonuses and building up some nice FPPs ready to cash in later in the year. As stated, this year is all about getting used to mass mulitabling on stars and hopefully developing a strategy that at worst is break even, but hopefully bring in at least 0.5bb/100 which is my aim considering the amount of tables that I will be playing.

On target to hit platinum this month, so as the title says, Let the grind begin.

New Order - Perfect Kiss

March Round Up

The best month by far this year, finishing approx $880 up, which has helped put my year back on track. It was fairly rock on the cash fron, but managed to finish approx 3 buyins up and played by far the most hands in a month I have done, I estimate I played approx 42k hands, not the greatest win rate by far I know, but at least it was a winning month over a significant amount of hands. Didn't reach Platinum on stars in the end due to a few nights out on the piss over the last week or so.

I have one day left at work tomorow, then I am off work for 25 days, yep, TWENTY FIVE FOOKING GLORIUS DAYS.........YEE HAAAA. Have got a great trip touring across Canada planned for the wifeys 40th and just can't wait, I have always wanted to go there so at last will be fulfilling one of my lifetime ambitions, which I feel I haven't done to many of lately, def time to get a wish list going and start crossing them before I start getting toooooo old.

Anyway, back to the poker. Last months profit mainly came from a decent tourney finished (see below) Dunno why, but last Friday, I just fancied playing a decent MTT, so went for the $30 Deep Stack on Lucky Ace Poker (on the 888/Pacific Network) I actually spent the first 4 hours of it playing it on the my 2nd monitor while 9 tabling cash on stars, did nothing special, just played solid. To be fair, the tourney sort of played itself as most of my big hands held and I got paid off to boot. No real special hands, no beats to shout out about, I didn't get lucky, just a plain ole boring mtt which just happened to go on for 7 hours. I eventually went out 6th when I was the short stack, I decided to call a min utg raise on my bb with QJ with the intention to shove any non dangerous flop. I think the flop came down 24 8 or summat like that, so I shoved, I was quite stunned when he snap called with his mighty AT for a 1/4 of his stack, a good call I know, but not a single thought went into it, but hey how, $637 for 6th has helped me no end and I have a little tourney roll on LAP to play with now.



Won't be able to play for about 16 days in April, so the plan will be to just keep Gold Status on Stars ready for the big push in May where I hope to play 100k hands in a month for the first time, although a back log of work may get in the way, but will give it a go.

Lets hope the rest of the months of the year can yield a similar amount of profit.

I guess we should have a Canadian Theme for todays song, thought about Monty Pythons I'm a lumberjack, but settled for this.

Alannis Morisette - Ironic.

Ready to Rock

My Pc was starting to really piss me off, so I took the plunge and rebuilt it from scratch. Installed windows 7 and then put all me poker software back on. Took the drastic decision to start off a whole new database from scratch and not import any of my old hands. I guess its a nice clean start all round. All back up and running, decided to buy table Ninja as I am def gonna stay on stars for my little supernova challenge.

I have upped to 9 tables and will probably stick at this until May, possibly go to 12 in April depending on how it goes.

I have reached Gold status as expected quite easily and possibly may even get to Platinum by the end of the month depending on what I get up to next weekend.

Things have been going ok at the tables for a change and I am a few buyins up, although I have been running quite a bit above ev to be fair, but I ain't gonna complain whend I do. Not sure exactly how many hands I have played this month as I have started a new database, but have managed to clock up 18k hands in the last 9 days, so I am pretty sure that this month will be the most I have ever played. This is gonna be nothing compared to the 100k hands+ a month I will need to be doing shortly, not sure how much I am looking forward to it, but gonna give it a good bash.

So the suns out, just come back from a lovely walk in the park with my wife, i'm winning at poker and I am about to go down the pub to watch the footy and sink a few winonas with me mates. Its what life was meant for.

Rock on...............

The Cardigans - My Favourite Game

Shoot for the stars

Been playing on Stars almost exclusively at 50NL Full Ring, only 6 tabling just to get a feel for the site and also only playing when I feel like playing. I don't know why, but there is def something about Stars that makes me tilt less, I am sure I will prob regret that statement later on the year.

Only played about 6k hands this month, but I am over 3 buyins up, so can't complain had a couple of beats too, but overall, nowt to send me on a spunk monkey tilt fest.

In preparation for upping the amount of tables, I downloaded a trial of Table Ninja. It really is one impressive piece of software and I would not play without it any more on stars when multi-tabling, it is worth the $$ alone, just so the active table is under the mouse so you don't have to click twice, which was driving me fooking nuts !!!

The only pain in arse I have is that I can't upgrade to the latest version of HEM, due to an issue I have with .net framework on me Vista PC, its gonna take a rebuild to cure it and frankly I can't be arsed. If I am gonna rebuild it, I will prob go straight to windows 7, but its coming up to 3 years old anyway, do thinking about buying a new one, will prob leave this till I come back from me hols, will def save a lot of hassle being able to build the new one and get it all set up while still being able to use the old one.

Been having a mooch on pokertableratings as well, not sure what to think yet, I am not sure how accurate it is, as I have noticed it has already missed one of the days off when I was two buyins up, which over a sample less than 10k hands, makes a big diff to how you potentially would view a player, so might use it as a very rough guide, but prob not make any stacking off decisions based on the info on there.

Overall enjoying poker again, although this may be due to the fact that I am playing only when I want to at the moment. This will obv change in may when I have to start grinding out prob at least 500vpp a day to get to supernova by the end of the year. I will post my progress weekly on this little challenge from the beginning of May, but as of now, the plan is just to tick over, slowly transfer $$ over to build the roll up on stars ready for the big plunge next year. Made Silver Star this month and should easily get Gold. Hopefully keep Gold during April when I won't be able to play many days, will just have to make sure I get a fair few points in on the few days I can play.

I also think I may of misjudged my calcs for next year, on my last post initially I said my aim would be for SuperNova 500k, looking at the VPP/Hand I am getting at the moment, I think realistically this may have to drop to 300k target unless I can get some big sessions in at 100NL, I guess time will tell.

After seeing Rammstein the other week, it def got me thinking I don't go to enough gigs anymore, used to go to loads. Next on this list is the Foo Fighters, I saw them at the Reading Festival in about 1996, even crowd surfed to them (was a bit lighter in those days !!)

Wish my hair would fooking stay like his instead of looking like some ink dipped hippy !!!

Foo Fighters - Best of of you (Live)

Been Thinking

Brain hurts cos of it. But at last I have come to a decision on what I want to do with poker..........

First of all, nothing is gonna start in anger till May 1st. I am going to spend the next two months sorting out my health and fitness in preparation for what I want to do in the future. Everything I do is now geared around planning for next year.

In short, I have decided to give Stars a real bash, beginning with getting to SuperNova by the end of the year. Gonna build up some VPPs over the next two months, just so I can start May prob at Gold, Get Platinum in May and then go for SuperNova by the end of the year.

I have done some calcs ready for next year and I really believe SuperNova Elite will be beyond me, even if I play 100NL, working full time as well, will just be a bit too much. So my aim for 2011 will be to hit 500,000 VPP, then review from there.

Obviously all of the above depends on my state of mind, as it from what I have seen it can be truly soul destroying when you hit a bad run of variance, and when you are playing that many hands a week, it is gonna hit hard. I def have the bankroll to do it and I have already started moving the funds around, I expect I may even make a loss this year if I don't do anything else, but if I don't cash in any of my FPP's it could be a good year next year if I can stay close to breaking even. Of course the plan is to win at the table as well, but this will be a bonus as no one can play there A game when 20+ tabling.

All may change in the future, but for now this is my plan.

Still well up on the month, found I have lost my patience for MTTs so started to drift back to cash again, lets hope the gods can let my hands hold up for a bit, cos I know then I can crush the levels I play........cough.

Went to see the greatest live band on the planet a couple of weeks ago at the LG arena, 3rd time I have seen them and they were better than ever. If you ever get a change to go and see them, you just have to check them out.

Rammstein.

Short trailer from set



No real decent live footage that has good sound on, so here is just one of there many cool vids.

Part Time Poker

Not played much since my last post, played a fair few MTT's with limited success. Made a few $$ on the Laddies Weekly 2010 Leaderboard race, could of done a lot better in it, but picked a bad week. I was actually leading it by over 100 points after 2 days, but had already got tickets to see Rammstein on the weds night, co couldn't play. Thursdays as you all know is my piss up night (not missing that) but missing two whole days out of the the whole week, was never gonna be good. Also picked up about $280 rakeback from last months play on VC, so overall about $400 up this month, so back in profit for the year....JUST !!!

I have decided I am not going to play much poker at all now until May when I return from my hols. I need to concentrate on my fitness levels and to get my weight down, I really have let meself go lately, I think I need to set some goals to get meself back on track.

On the subject of goals, my enthusiasm does seem to have wained a bit for poker, but my desire to get some serious wonga out the game is still there. Again I think I need to set myself some challenges to keep my interest up. I have seriously been thinking about going for Supernova on stars from May -> December. That would give me approx 8 months to get 100k VPP, I think that this could be pretty achievable and would definitely give me some focus as it would require some proper planning and discipline time wise to get there. I would probably look to do this at 50NL Full Ring, if anyone has any experience of this sort of grind, please feel free to leave some comments or drop me an email.

If all goes well and my game improves to cope with the massive swings the above will take, then I may even consider giving SuperNova Elite a bash, I know I would have to play a minimum of 100NL to get there as it is gonna need an average of 2740 VPP a day, which is some serious grind. I'm really not sure I could dedicate myself for a whole year to get there, but if you could do it and break even at the tables, it could pay a serious wedge of your mortgage, which is something, to me, would make it all worthwhile. Although the wife would prob have a hissy fit at me playing poker for 6-7 hours everyday !!!

But at least it gives me food for thought on where to head.........

Joan Osborne - One of us

All Change

Jan the 1st came and the plans for the year were all laid out. Bankroll aims, table selection, amounts to withdraw on a regular basis etc etc etc......

Jan the 26th and the toys truly went out the pram, a few mad tilt sessions and I had had enough of playing cash. If you are 15 tabling and you start tilting, it can be very expensive very quick.

I ended up withdrawing all of my money out of all sites, except for £200 in laddies and about $75 on stars. I also decided to take out about £1800 out of my bankroll to pay for the spending for the up coming Canada trip in April and pay of the odd other bits of stuff.

So its back basics, back to playing MTTs with maybe the odd 6 seater cash table when there is not much else about.

Yesterday was me first day back at the tables and went ok, played about 8 tournies and made 2 FT's coming 2nd in one and 4th in the other, although the 4th was in a Razz tourney with not that many runners. Also bubbled the FT on an omaha tourney, which was a bit frustrating as I got it all in with AAxx on the flop with the nut flush draw, the fish who called by all in with K6xx for the 2nd nut flush draw hit K and 6 on the turn/river for runner runner two pair, now that is foooking annoying, but c'est la vie. Hopefully tilt will be behind me soon (yes, I have said that before lol) but really gonna try not to let it get to me anymore.

Still not sure where to play me tournies yet, currently mainly playing on lads, but I know the pacific/littlewoods network has some good tournies on there, my m8 Ian took one down for a $12k payday in the last week or so, so they must be shite !!!

The one thing I did do after I had me little tanty snot rage was go back through all the hands etc and to be honest, I really didn't get shafted that much. I only ended 10 buyins down at the tables over about 27k hands, which is not the end of the world really and I have got a fair chunk or rakeback to come back which will cover most of that. I think the main reason for giving it a break is that I really don't want to go a whole year again being a slight losing player and making small change on rakeback, hence the reason to go back to MTTs. I will def be looking to sat into a few of the bigger tourneys and once I have got my roll back up again, start to look at buying in to €20 euro tourneys directly. I have left £3k in my poker savings account which is how I keep my bankroll seperate from my day to day money, and have about £300 online with about another £250 to come back in rakeback this month. Hopefully this will be enough to move forward.

Hopefully as they say on KrackedKings.....Big one coming !!!

New Order - Dreams Never End

Slow Start to the Year

Hellooooooo, the year hasn't started off to great, the days I can be arsed to play I have managed to get a bit of a grind on, played about 14k hands so far this year, but running -ev at the mo, so I am about 2 buyins down, although I am happy with the majority of my play at the moment, so can't really complain.

Not played as many tournies as I would of liked, as I haven't really had the time to sit put aside 6 hours or so to go deep in anything decent, so no news on that really, gotta tidy the house up a bit today, getting a bit lazy on that front, then hopefully try and get 3k hands in over the day and maybe a couple of tournies on the evening.

Speaking of tournies, the Stars World Blogger thingy is up at the end of the month, I have cashed in this a couple of times, so looking forward to playing this again. I would love to play on stars full time, might have to see what it would take to make supernova elite playing 25/50c tables lol, if its possible, might have a bash next year, now that would be a challenge.

Option 1

I have registered to play in the PokerStars World Blogger Championship of Online Poker! The WBCOOP is a free online Poker tournament open to all Bloggers, so register on WBCOOP to play.

Registration code: 141319

So the first tune of the year is has to be one of my fave artists of all time, he is the godfather of grunge and just probably one of the best live artists out there.

Neil Young - Cortez the Killer

Thats it for 2009

Well, its the final post of 2009 and it was all set to be how bad a year its been at the tables and y worst year since 2005, however December turned all that around. Luckily a few good results on MTT's meant I finished the year $5328.03 in profit, $2600 of this being in December Alone.

I guess on reflection it was a poor year, I finished about 13 buyins down overall on the cash tables in a year where I really thought would be my first +ve. However I can look back over the year and those 13 buyins can be put down to a few sessions where I tilted badly, in fact I did have one day where I lost 13 buyins in one session alone. It just goes to show how over the long term a few bad sessions can really add up and turn you from a losing player to a winning player, every pot and decision really does count at cash, so if like me, you tend to be playing cash in the background while fucking around reading forums and playing Farmville, your $ per hour is really going to suffer. Hopefully this can be addressed in the new year.

I had another small tournament win on laddies, not a big win, but it did take over 5 hours and I believe I played very well and didn't make any mistakes during the whole tourney, sometimes this is more satisfying than winning big $$$, well almost lol.



Tried a few different things on the cash tables this month, even tried a couple of sessions shortstacking on 9 tables. I sat with $10 on $50 10 seater tables playing push poker and some blind stealing at the end of the session I had played 3000 hands and was $135 down looool. It was unreal, variance at its worst. Out of the 20 all in pots I got called on I only one 4 !!! losing 16 of them, worse of all I only got it in bad on about 3 of them, with most being an 80/20 fave getting called by lower pocket pairs which spiked there 2 outers.......So that idea got dropped quite quickly.

I finished the month going back to play 6 max and trying to play an optimum style, I managed to pull back all of the shortstacking losses doing this and finished off the month about a buy in up.

The original plan for next year was for volume, I have been practicing 9 tabling full ring on iPoker for a couple of days, sitting with $30 and seem to be doing ok, but it is still a problem with the shortstackers. Although, looking at the forums, there seems to be quite a few rumours that they will be changing the rakeback method from dealt the contributed, which will change a lot of peoples strategy I guess, but hopefully will make for better tables. The other big change on iPoker is winning players getting banned from playing. Victor Chandler, where I am playing the moment have blocked quite a few of the big winners from playing cash because of a new fine system being imposed by iPoker, which is a complete and utter farce. This even includes losing players who make money by rakeback alone, which in essence is me at the moment, so when I do start to win, it might be shortlived and I will have to start all over again on another skin if I want to play on iPoker, I guess I will see how it goes.

So the new plan is now a mix of volume and quality, alternating from multitabling full ring and playing 2-3 tables of 6 max. I also intend to play a lot more tourneys next year and also trying to sat into the bigger events, especially things like wcoop and ecoop etc. I can't go to vegas this year as where I work we are opening a new hospital in June and it will be chaos, we have even had a 2 week leave ban in the middle of the world cup ffs !!!! that could prove interesting when they try and drag me out the pub. lol

So, my goals for next year are basically to have my first winning year on the cash tables. Hopefully this will make the year my most profitable yet, $10k would be an ideal target overall, but that is what I said last year, but you never know.

Thats if for now, I hate new years eve, so will be staying in with the wife, but I love New Years Day, its like a big broom sweeping all the bad behind and everything ahead is positive. I intend to make it the best year of my life so far, lets hope it is yours too.

Goth

Joy Division - New Dawn Fades

A nice XMAS Bonus

A bit over due, but as you can see by last months graph, I now consider myself a professional rakeback monkey, playing crappy break even poker. Starting the month off well, then just getting in to the old calling station rut, I don't know how many times I have mentioned this leak while blogging, but it is still there, I'm prob losing at least 4 buyins a month just not believing big value bets on the river and paying these people off., this month is almost exactly the same. I do however believe that if I fix this leak, I can be a good winning player at the level I am currently playing at, that along with the rakeback should make for a good year next year. So for the time being the crossroads is straight ahead and carrying on playing the cash tables, I will review this after the first couple of months of next year.


It was a tricky decision, as you see by laddies pic, I have also had my biggest win ever playing MTT's shipping €1500 when I took down the monthly Rake the Rake laddies 5k freeroll. I normally would of been running around the room like a chimp on acid, but I was feeling really ill, so when my AA stood up post flop all when heads up, I thought, oh a win, thats nice !!!!!

To be fair, I did get a bit lucky, as when we were down to the last 5, I shoved from the cut off on a steal while fairly short stacked with 10 7 os and got called by QQ, the flop was a total miss leaving almost drawing dead, then the miracle 7 on the turn and the 7 on the river kept me alive, I think once after that suckout my name was on it.

The win saved my year to be fair, taking my winnings to over $5k for the year, which I thought I had no chance of achieving, I guess it just shows that I still need to keep playing the odd MTT to keep my eye in and have a chance for the big wins to give the bankroll a boost.

Saying that, I have decided to take £1000 out of my bankroll to pay for xmas and also put some towards the canada holiday next year.

Hope to get at least one more blog in before xmas, so keep on muffing and gl at the tables.

The Ting Tings - Great DJ

A Dilemma

Well, I think I have come to a crossroads in my poker life, after two years playing 90% cash, I am really starting to think if it really is for me. If I actually compare the profit from my early years which was all sng and mtt I think the figures tell there own story. Taking into account I played a lot less in those days and got NO rakeback and NO bonuses at all. At the moment, I am still a small loser on the cash tables overall, but making all my money in rakeback and bonuses.

So the dilemma is, do I go back to playing sngs and MTTs ? or to I still stick to cash and work hard on my game, so that when I do eventually become a winning player at the tables, this along with a good rakeback deal and 30k hands a month should then bring some decent $$$.

I have been looking hard at my figures to try and find out why I lose at the cash tables and it comes down to a plain and simple fact that I pay people off too lightly, I just don't believe them and I always thing they are "at it" and look them up light. I am also sad to say, I still tilt off a couple of buyins a month at least, this really does add up over the course of a year.

The month started off very well on my new site, but as you will see at the end of the month on my graph, the steep climb of profit for the first half of the month is far outwayed by the dramatic fall from grace as the decent is steeper coming down. I actually had another tit attack on friday morning and withdrew most of me money from the site, which I now regret, as it hasn't cleared and I only have 3 buyins left in there at the moment, so I can only play two tables max at the moment (which probably is a good thing)

Maybe only being able to play two cash tables, will give me the opportunity to play more MTTs as well. I have played a couple recently and done well, I should of made a decent score the other day when I was sitting 3/21 in the laddies 2.5k guarenteed out of 698 runners, I got dealt QQ and raised, 1 caller. Flop Q95 all clubs and he insta shoved, I called and he showed 55 and the lucky fish hit his 1 outer for quads on the river, was unreal, I wudda been a massive chippy at that stage as he was quite big stack as well, but eventually went out 15th....sigh. Also managed to make the FT of the 1111Poker Kracked Kings special, which I was really pleased with as there were a lot of good players to get through.

So, until the money clears back into my bank account, so I can then put it back into the poker site I took it out of, I guess its just gonna be 1 or 2 cash tables and mtts on laddies, so watch ya back on the tourney tables, Goth is back ;-))

Lush - Hypocrite

All Change

Well the old saying goes "a change is good as a rest" So a change it is. Giving laddies and the 6 seaters a break for a bit and for my sins, I am going back to iPoker and also back to 10 seaters full ring.

So its a new site and a new nickname, keeping it stum at the moment, but its prob not that difficult to work out who is me if your trawel the 50NL tables, i'm very much a creature of habit !!!

Managed to get a good deal with an afiliate, hopefully it will work out, if not, I guess theres a lot of iPoker skins to have a pop at, but will stick with it for a couple of months at least just to see how the rakeback comes in.

Played a few hands at the end of last month on the new skin just so I can get my hud etc set up. Its been a while since I played full ring, especially on iPoker and I can't believe how many short stacking mother foookers there is, there abs everywhere, at least 5 on each table. The good news is that, as far as I can see, they are all shite lol. Just wait for the right time and value town them and never ever fold top pair post flop vs them.

So started in anger on 1st november and so far, touch wood, things are going ok, a couple of buyins up, just playing quite nitty and getting it in good where I can. One thing I had forgot about was you can't resize the tables and the mini ones are a bag of wank. Also the play is sooooo slow, after playing 6 seaters mainly for the last 18 months, it seems to take forever for the fish to think about folding there 72 off suit under the gun !!! I guess I might have to play 8 tables to counteract the hands per hour rate, been doing 4-6 for that first week, will up this if it continues to go ok.

Other good news, managed to get my first live cash at Broadway Casino in Brum on Friday in the £20 rebuy, was only 64 runners, but there was a 4.5k prizepool up for grabs. I did manage a couple of pieces of luck to get there. At 15 left I was down to 800 chips after the utg limped, I shoved with TT in mid pos and he insta called with his QJ !!! WTF !!! two hands later, there was a raise in early position. i shoved me 35 os in for value with me lat 800 chips. He turned over AK. I had a big smile when the flop came down 345, big sigh on the turn bought the 2 for his straight, then a big fook off grin when another 5 dropped on the river to boat me up looooool.

A few hands later, there was a couple of limpers and I shoved me AK, got called by one of the sneaky fookers with QQ. The flop came down 2QK and I was on me way to the bar but the poker gods were with me, with the turn coming an Ace and the monster K on the river to give me the bigger boat lool. Live poker is soooooo rigged.

After that, managed to get to final table, kept me head down while still short stacked watching them knock each other out. With 6 left I was guaranteed £220, with 5th paying £280, I only had 3 BB left and I did a deal for £300 with all of the others who were pretty even taking a bigger cut, but all playing for the remaining 1.6k. I was happy with that and eventually went out shoving with KJ and walking into AK right behind me. But overall very pleased and really enjoyed the banter. It def gave the confidence a bit of a boost.

So all is rosy again, apart from the fact that I can't seem to sleep at the moment, hence writing this at 2.45am (oh and homes5 was whinging I don't update it enough *blush)

So thats it for now, hopefully will get a shed load of hands in tomorrow, although if I pop down the pub at 14:00 to watch the rugby, it may get a bit messy as they normally turn into an all dayer....c'est la vie, its a hard life.......

Todays song is just a plain and simple happy song, seen the band live twice, always make me smile.

The Wannadies - You and Me Song

Dummy, Pram.....Out

Right, thats it.

Had a great holiday, came back soooo relaxed was untrue. Played some pokes, played well and got back into the grind, has a few outdraws yesterday, but nay bother, I'm relaxed.....

Tonight, 5 buyins down, on such setup hands its untrue, set over set. full house, vs higher full house. In BB with Q3 sooooted, flop A65 all my suit giving me the flush, but the utg fish has limped with KT sooooooooooted to flooop the nut flush....FML

Ladbrokes can go kiss my arse I would of withdrawn all my money if I foooking could, everytime I try to withdraw or even transfer, it says I'm not logged in and gives me a login box, so I login, try again, noooo but i'm not logged in !!!! I'd phone them up, but I would end up smashing me fooking phone if I talked to any prick on the end of it !!!!

Time for another site..........................Can't believe my fave site to play on is the only site that I can't win on 6 max...........

Sigh !!!!!

So the irony of todays song, is that next week I am back at work and it will not be........

Happy Mondays - Kinky Afro

Late night update

Not updated for a while, its seems my apathy for poker at the moment has crossed over into other areas of my life, just can't seem to get going with anything at the moment, plodding along halfheartedly. Def need a break from it all, luckily, got a holiday coming up soon and will be getting away from the rat race for 10 days or so, time to reflect on where I want to be with it all.

On the poker front, last month didn't turn out too bad in the end, I never did quite recover from the experiment at the start of the month, but pulled it back enough that after rakeback etc was almost $90 up on the month. Could of been a lot worse.

This month, I have stuck to me guns and only played a small amount of poker, only about 1.7k hands so far and I am a couple of buyins up. I am sure I will get back into the groove in the near future, hopefully put 20k+ hands in November and get ready for the push for 2010, where I def wanna get back to playing 50NL at least, with the aim of being able to play fully 100NL by the end of 2012

Not really much else to say, will be looking to remap me life out during the break, set new goals and lifestyle changes, using the time for positive thoughts, rather than the current negativity that I seem to be shrouded in at the moment. Also gonna look at changing my writing style, mix the blog up abit, seems to have gone a bit stale lately. Would love to get into a situation where I have the enthusiasm to be able to update it 2-3 times a week, I find looking back over the older posts sometimes quite surprising in what my thoughts were at the time, its quite amazing on how over the years your views and goals in life change and you forget what you used to strive for.

I guess I am just going through me mid life crisis. I have earned it and boy am I gonna have it !!!

Tata for now........

Fallen Angel