Half a step forward

Well, one of the hardest things in poker is to get back after a big downswing. Your confidence is low and you want to tweak your game. This is probably easier for an established player, but for an up and comer who is tweaking their game every session anyway, the uncertainty makes overadjustment a little to easy of a trap to fall into.

Last night I fired up another session of 25NL and it didn't start off well. I ran a bluff catching line on someone, but they showed up with TT to my 88. In retrospect, I probably shouldn't have done that with 88 (although I think it would have been a great line with 99), although it was pretty close, so I don't regret it. A few hands later I defend with AJ, but wind up loosing another medium pot to runner runner flush. At this point I was down half a buy in. It's not much, but it gave me the feeling of running on a treadmill. I wound up hovering between down a half a buy in to a full buy in for most of the session. About half way through I ran my TPGK into a flush draw and it held, and I thought my session was about to turn around. But about 5 hands later my set ran into a 4 flush board, so I had to let it go. Then I ran my AA into a set, but I think I lost the minimum on the hand.

Then I hit a FH against a flush, and from that point forward I slowly increased my winnings. I wound up winning about $15. Not a great session (or even a good one really) but it definately helped my poker ego to have a couple of winners in a row. Oddly enough I had started playing a much more weak tight game, which seems to be working. People are just floating and trying to take pots away to much. I C-bet less than 60%, but still have a success rate of under 40%. I'm not sure how much I like playing the more passive trapping style, but a lot the time I am picking up an extra bet in situations where I wouldn't be getting any. The bet check call line and check call lead lines have become much more common.

An example of this was last night when I had AK. I isolated to limpers (I don't iso light anymore unless I know the villan is limping trash - to many players limping strong hands at rush) and the flop came down K84. It was a 3 way pot and I had position, so I decided to check it back. I think betting here gets to many folds and the flop was dry as hell. The plan worked, as the second player lead out for $2 on a turned 4. Not a bad card for me as it pretty much removes a set of 4's. I call and do a happy dance as the other player in the hand called. The river is another 8, so I called again. Sadly, the villan happened to have 78 in the hand, but you can't really get upset about someone hitting a 2 outer on you. On the other hand, it's hard to take a long term approach when you are trying to dig out of a whole.

9 steps forward. 1 step back

Friday and Saturday were the worst back to back poker days of my career. Let me first start by saying my play wasn't stellar by any means. I don't think there was any way I could have come out of those sessions as a winner, but I didn't have to lose as much as I did. Friday I dropped 4 buy ins, and Saturday I dropped 5. The problem is that both days I lost every big pot I played. Didn't matter if I was aheador behind, the villan got my money. At one point I 5 bet shoved on a LAG/AGGRO tard in a SB/BTN war with KK and said they have AA. Sure enough. Anyway, I have a 10 buy in stop loss (yeah, I know thats a HUGE stop loss, but I have the bankroll for it, and the extra rakeback/iron man points were worth the risk) and by Sunday I was actually afraid I might hit it. The last thing I want to have to do is grind out another 5010NL buy ins to take another shot. I had some problems with my desktop, so I had to play on my laptop, which litterally had 0 HH to work with, so I wound up playing pretty weak tight over all, but I wound up winning a little over a buy in. I pretty much avoided all marginal spots, played 1 table, and took really good notes. Honestly, at that point I really couldn't take another losing session without dropping down.

Overall, I am down 6 buy ins, so I still have 4 to work with. I'm hoping that I can get back to even this week. It's a pretty hard thing for my ego right now, but if I plan on moving up and being a pro, I am going to have to get used to these swings.

Tilt went down, so I started something new

So, by the time I got around to playing poker last night, Tilt was down. This left me with my Stars account which is pretty much empty. A few months ago I got into a pretty interesting debate with King Spew stating that I think 40BB's is a horrible stack size as it creates a lot of awkward stack to pot ratio's. He made a lot of points that made me reevaluate my opnions. I had largely forgotten about this until I saw Mpethy and Kurt talking about there win rates with various stack sizes and how their win rates with 40BB's is pretty much the same as their win rate with 100. This really intrigued me, as I hadn't got to actual win rates with King Spew.

Well, I decided that I would go ahead and work with 40BB stacks on my stars account. I had to make a few adjustments. First, I adjusted my bank roll requirements to 40. I think the variance will be about the same in terms over overall BB, but it should be much higher regarding actual buy ins. The second adjustment is to run tighter, close to nit stats. I also think that TN will be required as you will have to table hop constantly. I was able to run 13 tables without TN, but I don't have the patience or desire to spend overly long at 2NL - 10NL again.

Now, for the potential benefits. First, moving up will be faster. Instead of needing to win 2000BB to move up (per my usual win 20 buy ins), even with 40 buy ins you only 1600BB. Second, it creates a stack size that most players aren't comfortable with. Third, bonus money will have a MUCH bigger impact. With rake back I win a free buy in every 5K hands. Well, with this stack, it will be a free buy in every 2K hands. And finally, If I can make the same amount of money overall but risk less money to make it, well, why not give it a shot?

So, my plan is to use the MR a lot as it will keep a decent SPR and put villans in awkward situations. This won't really come into effect at 2NL as players are so bad, but that's fine. Just means I will move up faster. I only got to play for about 40 minutes last night (and man did I forget how much of a pain it is to sit in and out of tables) but I won 2 buy ins. In reality it probably won't make a difference, as between Iron Man/rakeback/developing a database for Mpethy to look at I won't ever actually get around to playing at stars for another couple of months, but it never hurts to explore new ideas.

Another milestone day!

Last night was an EPIC run good session. I decided to play 10NL rush as I just wanted to have some fun and not worry to much. The session started out well. I opened AQ in EP, and the board came down J89. It was a pretty dry board overall and I was OOP, so I decided I was going to double barrel as long as the turn wasn't a J, 9, or T, and bluff catch if I hit an A or Q. It came down as a 5 and I fired the second bullet. Another call and I was pretty much done with the hand, but the river was an A. At this point I decide to bluff catch the river, as what hand that I beat is really going to call 3 barrels? So I check and the villan fires pot. I tanked, but decided to go with the plan, and was rewarded when the villan showed K9.

Thats kind of how the session went. My plans worked out to either limit losses or maximize wins. There is only 1 fold I wasn't sure of, but when the PFA fired a bullet and I called with TPTK, and we were both check raised, I am OK folding TPTK. If they were bluffing, good game them. I wound up putting in a 1,400 hand session winning at 20pt/bb100 - yeah, you read that right! I finished the session up 6 buy ins, so I am now a winning 10NL rush player officially! For a total of up 3 buy ins and a win rate of just under 1ptbb/100. Considering the massive pile of crap I had in my first few sessions, I am OK with that.

Anyway, now that I am posotive in 10NL, I am going to stick to primarily 25NL, except when inebriated or holding Dom. It's time for me to put my big boy pants. I also decided that instead of following my standard win 20 buy ins before moving up, I am going to go with up 10 and take shots. Once I hit that mark, I will take shots with the loose a buy in, drop down and win 3 more. One of the things I just figured out about rush last night (yeah, I'm a bit slow at times) is that as long as you are willing to drop down, I really don't need to follow such strict bank roll requirements. It made sense playing 20 tables as you needed those buy ins to even be able to play the tables. But with rush you just don't need that much money to play.

The other milestone last night. My bank roll just hit 4 digits.

Weekend update

Well, it was a 3 day weekend, so I managed to get some poker in. Not as much as I hoped, but more than I expected. Overall it was a pretty good weekend. First, I got in about 3K hands of 25NL rush. I won half a buy in in my first session and just over a buy in in my second. That's the good news. The bad news is I was playing scared. Not scared money, but scared to make moves and plays. I was playing really nitty and passiing up spots because I didn't feel comfortable. The good news is that my last session was much better. I was playing a better game, but it wasn't a great session money wise. Wound up breaking even mostly due to 2 hands. One was basically a coin flip on the flop with my KJs on an 8 high flush flop. I check raised and felt I had to call it off with what I considered to be about 40% equity against this players range. Turns out I was wrong, as the player shoved 99. I hit my K on the turn, but they hit their 1 outer on the river. I'm not overly upset with the hand, as I had 51% equity at the time, but loosing a 130BB is difficult when you are getting comfortable at a new level.

The other hand I am actually VERY happy with how I played it, although 2P2 would say I played it horribly. I called a UTG open from someone playing 20/4 with QQ. It was a small sample size (just over 100 hands) but this player hadn't C-bet once. They C-bet and I was VERY happy. At this point I put them on AA/KK as I don't think AQ is in their UTG opening range. So I'm doing back flips when an A comes and this player bets again. At this point I go ahead and call down. The sample isn't big enough for me to fold the second nuts and they weren't betting overly large. I wound up loosing about half a stack by the river. I think that was the tipping point for the session, and after that I played a much better game. I wound up breaking even after the session, so I am somewhat happy. Over all I have played just under 5K hands and am up just over 2 buy ins without rakeback. So, in 5 sessions I am already 10% of the way to taking shots at 50NL. No matter what though, I am going to stick at 25NL for at least 50K hands. I have done some research, and I decided I want to get a stat review by Mpethy. A lot of the regs I respect said that 1 2 hour session added 1-2BB/100 to their game, and that would be HUGE. The down side is you need a decent sample and I just lost my database not to long ago. I actually think this is probably pretty good though considering just how much my game has changed, so it is probably better to get a new sample.

The other good news for me is that I now feel like I have 10NL rush figured out and can play there any time and in any condition and make a profit. This is good news as one of my goals this month was to make 10NL rush my new goof of spot/tired/inebriated playing ground. On the 4th I got home and put the kids to bed and fired up the game. I was a bit drunk and really wanting to goof around trying new lines and wierd situations. I got a little more drunk and played around 2K hands. I roller coastered all over the place, but around 1.5K hands in I was down 2 buy ins and decided to just go get the money. 500 hands later I am up about 2 bucks and head off to bed. This is pretty much my final test of being able to crush a level. If I can go in drunk and fooling around and still manage to pull a profit, then that level becomes my bitch.

On the bonus front, the Academy challeng points are suffering now that I don't have the Ferguson. The Ferguson was bad, but some of these others are just stupid. Seriously, how often do you have a flush draw and someone bets less than 20% of the pot? I mean I have it on, but I expect the points to slow down a TON. I am on pace for gold this month, which would be huge (3 free buy ins!). I can't wait to see how much I get in rake back Friday to. Gotta love that free money!

Oh, and the BEST part of the weekend? While doing my session review last night, I noticed that HEM has given me the ABC TAG! First time I have ever seen this tag. I never understood why people hate being called ABC. Uhm, apparently it is profitable up to and including 200NL (which is higher than my target level at the moment!) and can easily make you 6 digits a year. Call me a tag fish/nit tag/whatever the hell else you want - just call me paid!

A month in review

Well, this has been a very good month for me. I increased my Bankroll by almost 40% this month. I figured out how to steadily beat 10NL rush (HUGELY important as rush is all I can usually play due to family), got back into 25NL FR games, took my first shot at 25NL rush, got Iron Man for the first time ever AND qualified for the 1 a day free roll (which gives me 2 free tourneys in July!), and I started getting Academy points (a little over 20% of the way to a $100 bonus!)

A rough estimate:
Winnings: 210
Rakeback: $75
Iron man: $25 (not counting the medals cause I have no idea how much their worth)
Academy: $20

Total for the month: $330 - not bad considering I started at 5NL and 10NL!

I AM IRON MAN

Yeah, that's right biatches. I am an iron man now. I can smell the jealousy through my key board. You want it. You know you do!

Anyway, back to poker. I wound up playing 25NL last night even though I was way to tired. Or, more correctly, because I was tired and I wanted to get my points quickly.
The kids were with my finace at Grandma's house shooting of fire works when I got home, so I spent some extra time digging. Got a lot done, but damn was I exhasted last night. When I finally to playing after Dom (baby) played an hours worth of pace daddy pace, I really just didn't give a crap. I wound up winning ten bucks in 350 hands, but I really don't think I played well. The session started off like crap, as my first hand that went past the flop was a disaster. Someone donked into me, so I raised it up with overs. They flat and then check a turned A (of course I have AQ), so I check it back with my A to open up their range. They pot the river and I snap it off. Oops. Apparently this fool donks with their sets. Then I lost a couple of pots isoing limpers who hit the part of their hand I wasn't dominating. The session actually turned around on a hand I am not sure of. I opened JJ UTG and faced a 3 bet squeeze from the BB, who had just under 80BB. I decided to flat IP, and they poted a 9 high flop. So I tank and think about it, deciding to call. Then they shove the turn and looking at the size of the pot I just couldn't fold the overpair to an unknown. Showed up with AK and suddenly I was in the posotive. Now that I have the information I like the play, as their are 16 combinations I beat and 18 combinations I don't, so overall once I get to the flop I should be calling down. I really think I should have folded pre-flop though with so little info. But hey, I get the notes and the money, so I won't be regretting the decision.

The only down side was taking notes. I really think to really crush rush you need to take solid notes. So, I spent the next 2 hours drinking beer and taking notes. I saw a lot of exploitahbility, and one player in particular had some interesting lines. This player check raised twice that I saw as the PFA. One time they probably didn't win much more, but on another hand they got a pretty good amount without showing down. Going to keep an eye on that one as I am exploring new lines. A couple of my bigger pots were in situations that would make 2P2 cringe as I went into check call mode with pretty strong hands in some spots. Overall I think it will be good. People just aren't calling down for big pots with 1 pair anymore, so its time to think of ways to get that medium pot on a more consistent basis, and frankly betting isn't going to do that.