Thursday 31 March 2011
Looking Forward To April
The end of the month is upon us and I'm now starting to look forward to what April has in store. For the record, as I've rubber-stamped the month with an update, I'll be counting today's play as part of my April balance. (Not essential information but worth noting.) The great thing about April is that I'll only be at work for about a week and a half and the rest of the time I'll be a free man. That's gotta be the ball in the back of the net.
MARCH - UPDATE #3
Right, so it's a fairly dreary Thursday morning and I've decided I need the day off work; I'm really not feeling 100% with this damn cold and I need a break for the day so there. As such, I've decided that now would be a good time to get my March update in the bag.
Well, live-wise, there is nothing really mega to report on the profit and loss front. I started with small winning and losing sessions which had me up £70 by mid-March. However, my drunken session at the PKR social hit me for £300 and I've ended up £230 down for the month. The £300 dent includes the twenty odd quid for the SnGs, the £80 for the freezeout main event and the £200 for the cash game "fun" at the end.
Thankfully, online is a different story. I know I've banged on about it in my posts but by mid-March, I was up a cool £800. Since then the old balance has been yo-yoing somewhat and has panned out fairly evenly. The frustrating thing about this is that, although I've been very pleased with my table selection play, outers on the river being hit by suspect players cost me dear.
With a stop-loss sum enforced (and £500 banked for March) I allowed myself around $100 with which to play out the last few days of the month. After turning this into $200, yesterday a sudden spin up of $340, over just 15 hands, pushed me back in the right direction and I'm now feeling fine with how the month has ended.
As I mentioned before, for convenience sake, the following update is all in pounds (£) but, obviously, a bit of give-and-take is needed due to the fluctuating exchange rate.
Obviously, I have to feel ok about the yearly figures being in green and the recording of another winning month overall. I have mixed feelings about the monthly "live" figure being in red though. Let's be honest, playing the drunk donk at the PKR social may be fun at the time and may be a relatively small price to pay for a good time - but if I were sober and played my "A" game rather than my "D" game I may have had some chance of actually winning some monies.
Well, live-wise, there is nothing really mega to report on the profit and loss front. I started with small winning and losing sessions which had me up £70 by mid-March. However, my drunken session at the PKR social hit me for £300 and I've ended up £230 down for the month. The £300 dent includes the twenty odd quid for the SnGs, the £80 for the freezeout main event and the £200 for the cash game "fun" at the end.
Thankfully, online is a different story. I know I've banged on about it in my posts but by mid-March, I was up a cool £800. Since then the old balance has been yo-yoing somewhat and has panned out fairly evenly. The frustrating thing about this is that, although I've been very pleased with my table selection play, outers on the river being hit by suspect players cost me dear.
With a stop-loss sum enforced (and £500 banked for March) I allowed myself around $100 with which to play out the last few days of the month. After turning this into $200, yesterday a sudden spin up of $340, over just 15 hands, pushed me back in the right direction and I'm now feeling fine with how the month has ended.
As I mentioned before, for convenience sake, the following update is all in pounds (£) but, obviously, a bit of give-and-take is needed due to the fluctuating exchange rate.
__________________________________________________________________________
ONLINE: MARCH +£810 / YEAR: +£350
LIVE: MARCH -£230 / YEAR: +£1470
TOTAL: MARCH +£580 / YEAR: +£1820
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Obviously, I have to feel ok about the yearly figures being in green and the recording of another winning month overall. I have mixed feelings about the monthly "live" figure being in red though. Let's be honest, playing the drunk donk at the PKR social may be fun at the time and may be a relatively small price to pay for a good time - but if I were sober and played my "A" game rather than my "D" game I may have had some chance of actually winning some monies.
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Still, to make calculations easier, I'll be making a small deposit into my PKR account later today so that I've got a nice round figure in there for the start of April.---------------
TWADDLE ON AND CRACK ON!!
Wednesday 30 March 2011
Table Captain
In my last post I was writing about how frustrating the game can be when I work my way up the wobbly way, only to be knocked right back down again by players who cheekily nab their outers on the river. Well, it doesn't happen very often but this evening I managed to reverse my fortune and was sitting at the table with over $500 in front of me - not a massive achievement for the pros out there but a satisfying, albeit rare, occurence indeed for me at the online game nevertheless. The interesting thing is how quickly this sort of thing can happen. I plonked down my $200 and then 15 hands later I had spun it up to this:
One for the album, for sure.
One for the album, for sure.
A Frustrating Second Half Of The Month
First off, I'm WELL under the weather at the moment with the most shockingly bad cold I've had in years. I'm thinking of heading for a day off work tomorrow but I'm not sure. I'll see how I am in the morning.
No doubt about it, the second part to March has just been very frustrating. I'm at about break-even since the middle of the month at the online game and a lot of this, once again, has been down to opponents hitting their bleedin' outers on the river. In the last hand on Sunday, for instance, I held an ace with a 44AA board only for my opponent to spike his 1-outer (the 4) on the river! Big ouch!! Big loss of monies!!!
Then yesterday, I end up with this little beauty:
Flush draw, under the gun, now let me see...
No doubt about it, the second part to March has just been very frustrating. I'm at about break-even since the middle of the month at the online game and a lot of this, once again, has been down to opponents hitting their bleedin' outers on the river. In the last hand on Sunday, for instance, I held an ace with a 44AA board only for my opponent to spike his 1-outer (the 4) on the river! Big ouch!! Big loss of monies!!!
Then yesterday, I end up with this little beauty:
Flush draw, under the gun, now let me see...
Yep, there was a touch of desperation in the call on the flop but I felt it was worth a pop at the time. As it was, the hand meant a loss of just $25 as I collected from Mr Big Stack. Still, I could have done without seeing that full house on the river as it woulda given me a good boost. Anyway...
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KEEP ON CHUGGING EH?
Tuesday 29 March 2011
Pay Attention!
As I'm winding down this month, I'm not always entering tables with a full stack. But not entering with a full-stack shouldn't mean that I should do needlessly nitty thngs like fold A6 in mid-position on a 6-max table! I think I deserved to get punished for this one:
You know what's coming next. In the words of Jim Bowen from the quiz show, Bullseye: just take a look at what you woulda won:
Bosh. I think I coulda won a few bob there.
You know what's coming next. In the words of Jim Bowen from the quiz show, Bullseye: just take a look at what you woulda won:
Bosh. I think I coulda won a few bob there.
Sunday 27 March 2011
Did I Leave My Chips At The Table!?
Ok, now I'm wondering if I actually cashed out my chips from The Fox when I left on Saturday night. I've been thinking about this. I know I'd had a few but I really can't understand how I was down £200 when I'd hardly played any hands! I really think I just left without cashing out whatever chips I left on the table. I've messaged a few of the PKR players who were sitting at the table and I'll see what they say. Funny.
P.S. It's now the next day and I'm at work. It was too late to phone The Fox yesterday when I started doubting that I had actually lost £200 and I'm at work now. I really don't fancy phoning a poker club from the staff room or English Office and asking if I left chips on the table. I think I'll give the club a ring tonight and find out. I wonder what the ruling would be if I had actually left them there after all?
P.S. It's now the next day and I'm at work. It was too late to phone The Fox yesterday when I started doubting that I had actually lost £200 and I'm at work now. I really don't fancy phoning a poker club from the staff room or English Office and asking if I left chips on the table. I think I'll give the club a ring tonight and find out. I wonder what the ruling would be if I had actually left them there after all?
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P.S. Mystery solved: Ok, a few of the PKR players got back to me: I definitely did cashout around £100 in chips on Saturday night which means I definitely was down £200. Drunk poker - don't do it kids!
Let's Have A Round-Up
I know I've resolved to do an update at the end of each month but I'm feeling a bit bored so I'm just going to do a quick review of how my month has gone so far:
Online Poker Round-Up
With just 2.5K hands being played so far this month, it's not exactly been a heavy time on the online poker front. However, as readers of my blog will know, March is generally going very well for me and at the time of writing I'm looking at a £715 profit in my PKR account. I know I was on this when I was blowing my trumpet 10 days ago but that's because I've just been breaking even since then. When April arrives I want to be at least £500 up for March so I've given myself a stop-loss figure where I will stop playing for the month should I lose £215 from now until 31st March. At the moment I am £255 up in the online game for the year - not really that good when you think about it.
Live Poker Round-Up
Thanks largely to a £300 drop during the PKR Social (although I'm questioning why the hell I'm down £200 when I hardly played any hands - damn beer!), I'm down £230 this month at the live game and as I'm not likely to play any more live sessions over the coming days this will be the total for the month. This means it'll be my first losing month at the live game this year. Thankfully, as I stormed the live tables over January and February, I'm still up to the tune of £1470 for the year. The grand total then is £1725 which, I suppose, is not bad at all.
Online Poker Round-Up
With just 2.5K hands being played so far this month, it's not exactly been a heavy time on the online poker front. However, as readers of my blog will know, March is generally going very well for me and at the time of writing I'm looking at a £715 profit in my PKR account. I know I was on this when I was blowing my trumpet 10 days ago but that's because I've just been breaking even since then. When April arrives I want to be at least £500 up for March so I've given myself a stop-loss figure where I will stop playing for the month should I lose £215 from now until 31st March. At the moment I am £255 up in the online game for the year - not really that good when you think about it.
Live Poker Round-Up
Thanks largely to a £300 drop during the PKR Social (although I'm questioning why the hell I'm down £200 when I hardly played any hands - damn beer!), I'm down £230 this month at the live game and as I'm not likely to play any more live sessions over the coming days this will be the total for the month. This means it'll be my first losing month at the live game this year. Thankfully, as I stormed the live tables over January and February, I'm still up to the tune of £1470 for the year. The grand total then is £1725 which, I suppose, is not bad at all.
Live Session #14: PKR Social - Part 2
Today was the £80 freezeout event but proceedings did not get off to a great start when the beginning was delayed for 30 minutes due to the big march in town. Still, no worries, with the grand entrance of four PKR players dressed as the teletubbies (they were the bounty players) we were up and running. The whole table was good-natured and I think everyone got into the spirit of things; the only known players to me were Elz442, jimmyfizzels and also a regular Fox Club player who was sitting to my left and who had to put up with most of my twaddle - but it was also nice to be joined by James666 who came bounding to the table with his sumo outfit on.
As things went, I was 99.9% card-dead for the whole tourny. I got very few opportunities to get creative and when I did I was given resistance, mainly by a young fella called apdavies01 who just seemed to like tangling with me for some reason. The best hand I had all tourny was 88 and although I got a double up with this from James666 (when he flipped over the 33), from then on my cards were dead dead dead. I can't actually remember my exit hand clearly but I think it was when I held something like K 10 (my second best hand of the tourny) when I had something like 5 or 6 BBs left.
After this it was onto the cash game tables to get given the same crummy cards that I had been given through the tourny. What do you do when you continually get shovelled the shit for hours on end!? Anyway, I met up with the chap called UwillLose at the cash tables; this was the fella who I met at the Arsenal v Sunderland game. He was quite a character it has to be said but when I went to shake him by the hand I got a real telling off from the women sitting between us who said I shouldn't be waving my hand around near her chips! I kind of took exception to this and tried to reason with her but I was the one who was taken aside with a warning from the floor manager! To be fair, other players were telling me to just drop it as well and I know I probably carried on for longer than was necessary but... there ya go.
After this I sat on kickofff's table with the likes of KKowboy, mrj1210, lugfest369, LockeLamora et al. Again, the cards were dire and so after a while I decided it was best to take my leave. For some reason, I stupidly decided to give The Empire a go and ended up sitting down with £300 at a newly formed £1/£3 table. Needless to say I ended up face down with my head on my stack of chips, half asleep, and was politely asked to leave by the floor manager who said that due to the state I was in he was actually saving me money - which was probably true I suppose.
As always, it was good to meet some of the PKR players and staff in the flesh and it's nice that most of the players tolerate my twaddle at the table. There were just a few cold-shoulders, it has to be said, but these were a very very small minority.
Unfortunately (keeping the negativity going) if you count the £80 for the freezout along with all cash game shenanigens AND the sit 'n' go losses then I have ended up down £300 over the two days. It also means that I am down £230 at the live game for the month of March. Boo. Thankfully despite a little dip recently my online game has generally come on in leaps and bounds this month and have tipped the scales in my favour and into the green for March so far.
P.S. I'm really starting to question whether I just forgot to cash out my chips and left them on the table. I hardly played any hands yet I'm down £200! It doesn't make any sense.
As things went, I was 99.9% card-dead for the whole tourny. I got very few opportunities to get creative and when I did I was given resistance, mainly by a young fella called apdavies01 who just seemed to like tangling with me for some reason. The best hand I had all tourny was 88 and although I got a double up with this from James666 (when he flipped over the 33), from then on my cards were dead dead dead. I can't actually remember my exit hand clearly but I think it was when I held something like K 10 (my second best hand of the tourny) when I had something like 5 or 6 BBs left.
After this it was onto the cash game tables to get given the same crummy cards that I had been given through the tourny. What do you do when you continually get shovelled the shit for hours on end!? Anyway, I met up with the chap called UwillLose at the cash tables; this was the fella who I met at the Arsenal v Sunderland game. He was quite a character it has to be said but when I went to shake him by the hand I got a real telling off from the women sitting between us who said I shouldn't be waving my hand around near her chips! I kind of took exception to this and tried to reason with her but I was the one who was taken aside with a warning from the floor manager! To be fair, other players were telling me to just drop it as well and I know I probably carried on for longer than was necessary but... there ya go.
After this I sat on kickofff's table with the likes of KKowboy, mrj1210, lugfest369, LockeLamora et al. Again, the cards were dire and so after a while I decided it was best to take my leave. For some reason, I stupidly decided to give The Empire a go and ended up sitting down with £300 at a newly formed £1/£3 table. Needless to say I ended up face down with my head on my stack of chips, half asleep, and was politely asked to leave by the floor manager who said that due to the state I was in he was actually saving me money - which was probably true I suppose.
As always, it was good to meet some of the PKR players and staff in the flesh and it's nice that most of the players tolerate my twaddle at the table. There were just a few cold-shoulders, it has to be said, but these were a very very small minority.
Unfortunately (keeping the negativity going) if you count the £80 for the freezout along with all cash game shenanigens AND the sit 'n' go losses then I have ended up down £300 over the two days. It also means that I am down £230 at the live game for the month of March. Boo. Thankfully despite a little dip recently my online game has generally come on in leaps and bounds this month and have tipped the scales in my favour and into the green for March so far.
P.S. I'm really starting to question whether I just forgot to cash out my chips and left them on the table. I hardly played any hands yet I'm down £200! It doesn't make any sense.
Live Session #13: PKR Social - Part 1
It's now Sunday afternoon and I'm sitting up in bed with my laptop. I've got one of those horrible colds where the throat is sore and it hurts to swallow. I've got a slight headache and a queezy stomach from over-drinking and my legs are very achey and tired from having walked a long way last night when I fell asleep on the bus and ended up in Bromley - about 6 miles from where I live! I wasn't even quite sure exactly where I was as I slept on the bus the whole way - and the bus stopped in the middle of suburbia somewhere when we got kicked off! (I think it may have been Grove Park.) There were no other buses or taxis in sight and it was bloody freezing so I just had to let my instincts guide me in the right direction. NOT nice.
Anyway, the PKR Social event has come and gone and I think I may have made a bit of a fool of myself yet again. I definitely remember shouting obnoxiously at people from my table on the Saturday and I remember upsetting a certain player who took exception to me reaching across her space to shake someone by the hand. I knew she was very annoyed at me for doing this and I think I provoked her a little bit but at least she didn't end up slapping me in the face - which she certainly looked like she wanted to do.
Things started on the Friday evening with a few mad sit 'n' go formats. I arrived a little early and was told it wasn't opening until 8 o'clock so I popped into a nearby pub with a fella called ZenPagan, who was also outside, and we also got chatting to a guy called ShortfinMako. Back in The Fox, there were four sit 'n' go tables; three-card holdem; a round of each; pairings and some other version where you got extra cards or something (but I didn't play that one). It really was all about having a laugh and meeting new people so it was all good. Results-wise, out of the three I played, I just cashed in the pairings while teamed up with a fella called mrj1210 and so won the £10 back meaning overall I ended up £23 down (counting the £1 fees).
To be honest, Friday night was all a bit of a blur as I drunk quite heavily both on the Friday and the Saturday. There were also just far too many names to recall here on the blog as well - I just don't have the energy to remember every detail so I'll just say there were a lorra lorra laughs. Oh, I ended up having to walk home about two or three miles on the Friday night as well.
Anyway, the PKR Social event has come and gone and I think I may have made a bit of a fool of myself yet again. I definitely remember shouting obnoxiously at people from my table on the Saturday and I remember upsetting a certain player who took exception to me reaching across her space to shake someone by the hand. I knew she was very annoyed at me for doing this and I think I provoked her a little bit but at least she didn't end up slapping me in the face - which she certainly looked like she wanted to do.
Things started on the Friday evening with a few mad sit 'n' go formats. I arrived a little early and was told it wasn't opening until 8 o'clock so I popped into a nearby pub with a fella called ZenPagan, who was also outside, and we also got chatting to a guy called ShortfinMako. Back in The Fox, there were four sit 'n' go tables; three-card holdem; a round of each; pairings and some other version where you got extra cards or something (but I didn't play that one). It really was all about having a laugh and meeting new people so it was all good. Results-wise, out of the three I played, I just cashed in the pairings while teamed up with a fella called mrj1210 and so won the £10 back meaning overall I ended up £23 down (counting the £1 fees).
To be honest, Friday night was all a bit of a blur as I drunk quite heavily both on the Friday and the Saturday. There were also just far too many names to recall here on the blog as well - I just don't have the energy to remember every detail so I'll just say there were a lorra lorra laughs. Oh, I ended up having to walk home about two or three miles on the Friday night as well.
Friday 25 March 2011
PKR Social Tonight
Tonight, I'm going to head on down to The Fox Poker Club to play some crazy Sit & Go stuff with the PKR faithful. Tomorrow it's the £80 freezeout. As I said in earlier posts, the result of the freezeout on Saturday will go towards the profit and loss of my live balance.
When it comes to tonight's events, I really don't know because it's a one-off and unlike the live sessions that I've encountered before. Therefore, as it stands, I'm undecided as to whether to count it as a proper live game session or just to treat it as a social event without thinking about the money or recording the actual results.
My gut-feeling tells me that as it's a "social" and it really is all about the fun, then recording how much I win or lose just seems a bit daft. There again, I always treat the Fox MTTs as "just a bit of fun" but I always count those results towards my balance. I just don't really know.
When it comes to tonight's events, I really don't know because it's a one-off and unlike the live sessions that I've encountered before. Therefore, as it stands, I'm undecided as to whether to count it as a proper live game session or just to treat it as a social event without thinking about the money or recording the actual results.
My gut-feeling tells me that as it's a "social" and it really is all about the fun, then recording how much I win or lose just seems a bit daft. There again, I always treat the Fox MTTs as "just a bit of fun" but I always count those results towards my balance. I just don't really know.
Tuesday 22 March 2011
And The Spew Goes On
Jesus, it's just carrying on. I've decided to put a stop-loss limit on for the month and will call a halt to online poker playing proceedings, for the month of March, should I fall to a monthly profit of £500. Thanks to a great start to the month, I guess I should really be happy that I'm in this position in the first place but I still could have done without these recent spewing sessions. This gives me around just £50 ($80) to donk around with for the rest of the month - but I do just feel I need to put the breaks on a little at the moment.
This way, I can, at least, say that my online profit for the year will be in the green come 1st April and that, psychologically speaking, I can start April in a happier place than if I started in the red. To be honest, I'm having a tough time at work at the moment and I think this is affecting my game and just making me play badly. I've actually cashed-out the £500; again, psycholigically, banking this to make me feel that I've actually accomplished something at the online game.
On a more cheerful note, the PKR social event is fast approaching. On Friday 25th, I'll be making my way to The Fox to play some Sit n Goes and then on Saturday it'll be the main £80 event. I will need to knock £80 off my live poker balance for the Saturday event but I'm still undecided whether to include cash won or lost at the Friday night shenanigens in my overall live balance or whether to just keep this separate as normal outgoing expenses for entertainment. I just dunno yet.
For reasons not really appropriate for this blog, there are issues happening at work at the moment which might mean that I'm not coming across as my cheerful self - but I certainly won't let this dampen my spirits come the weekend. Hopefully, all will be well in the long run.
This way, I can, at least, say that my online profit for the year will be in the green come 1st April and that, psychologically speaking, I can start April in a happier place than if I started in the red. To be honest, I'm having a tough time at work at the moment and I think this is affecting my game and just making me play badly. I've actually cashed-out the £500; again, psycholigically, banking this to make me feel that I've actually accomplished something at the online game.
On a more cheerful note, the PKR social event is fast approaching. On Friday 25th, I'll be making my way to The Fox to play some Sit n Goes and then on Saturday it'll be the main £80 event. I will need to knock £80 off my live poker balance for the Saturday event but I'm still undecided whether to include cash won or lost at the Friday night shenanigens in my overall live balance or whether to just keep this separate as normal outgoing expenses for entertainment. I just dunno yet.
For reasons not really appropriate for this blog, there are issues happening at work at the moment which might mean that I'm not coming across as my cheerful self - but I certainly won't let this dampen my spirits come the weekend. Hopefully, all will be well in the long run.
Sunday 20 March 2011
Spew! Spew! Barney Mcgrew...
...Cuthbert! Dibble! Grub!
That was Captain Flack's roll-call at the beginning of every episode to Trumpton which was a TV programme for kids way back in the good ol' 70s. (Well, he actually said "Pugh! Pugh! Barney Mcgrew..." but you get the idea.) Check out the way the fire engine tears dangerously down the streets of Trumpton on the way to an emergency in the opening clip. That roll-call has been indelibly stamped on my memory from when I used to watch it meself on my days off from school - great stuff.
Rubbish.
That was Captain Flack's roll-call at the beginning of every episode to Trumpton which was a TV programme for kids way back in the good ol' 70s. (Well, he actually said "Pugh! Pugh! Barney Mcgrew..." but you get the idea.) Check out the way the fire engine tears dangerously down the streets of Trumpton on the way to an emergency in the opening clip. That roll-call has been indelibly stamped on my memory from when I used to watch it meself on my days off from school - great stuff.
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Anyway, it had to happen I suppose and I guess today had to be the day. I still think I must be on some sort of "winning tilt" because after a very good start to the month and waking up to around a $1350 profit in my PKR account this morning, I managed to spew a cool $300 today and I'm now looking at a $1050 profit instead.Rubbish.
Live Session #12: Breaking Even
Yesterday, I was off into town for the live pokers. First stop, at 5PM, was The Fox to lay down money for their £38 freezeout. There was a cash game kicking off but with only 3 or 4 players at the table I decided against it and headed off to The Empire. Buying in for £300 at a table with just one bigger stack I got given some tasty cards, which I played quite aggressively, and spun my stack up for a £63 profit. That was the MTT paid for and a few pennies for beers.
After a pint it was back to The Fox for the freezeout. Here I managed to min cash for a £45 return and a £7 profit. Yep, during this I proceeded to get merrily drunk and then misbehaved at a private table with James Sudworth, Ashley Hames and PKR's Danski. The reason this occured was because I saw them playing at a table across the way and wormed my way into their game for a tenner. I looked down at 44 first hand, went all-in and was promptly called by the aforementioned villain (Sudworth). He flipped over the jacks and I duly donated. I don't know what came over me but I just had to plant a big kiss on his cheeks - why must I always behave like a fool?
Oh well, after this it was a case of heading back to the freezeout for that min cash. After that I made another attempt to get back on Sudworth's table but I don't think they really appreciated some nutter gatecrashing their table and they were ready for me this time with a rule that I can't really remember but it sounded VERY -ev. It was a polite way of seeing me off and I really don't blame them for this - a lot of peeps would have just told me to fuck off!
Anyway, to round off the evening I plonked myself down at a £1/£1 cash table with my £45 winnings and duly donked it all off by going all-in on a board which gave me top pair good kicker. I even improved my hand to two pair on the turn - but when the villain spiked his flush on the river it was goodbye to the £45. With £10 going to James Sudworth it was a modest £15 profit for the evening. Hardly worth shouting about and I must have paid at least double that for the beers but at least I got to kiss a PKR pro!
After a pint it was back to The Fox for the freezeout. Here I managed to min cash for a £45 return and a £7 profit. Yep, during this I proceeded to get merrily drunk and then misbehaved at a private table with James Sudworth, Ashley Hames and PKR's Danski. The reason this occured was because I saw them playing at a table across the way and wormed my way into their game for a tenner. I looked down at 44 first hand, went all-in and was promptly called by the aforementioned villain (Sudworth). He flipped over the jacks and I duly donated. I don't know what came over me but I just had to plant a big kiss on his cheeks - why must I always behave like a fool?
Oh well, after this it was a case of heading back to the freezeout for that min cash. After that I made another attempt to get back on Sudworth's table but I don't think they really appreciated some nutter gatecrashing their table and they were ready for me this time with a rule that I can't really remember but it sounded VERY -ev. It was a polite way of seeing me off and I really don't blame them for this - a lot of peeps would have just told me to fuck off!
Anyway, to round off the evening I plonked myself down at a £1/£1 cash table with my £45 winnings and duly donked it all off by going all-in on a board which gave me top pair good kicker. I even improved my hand to two pair on the turn - but when the villain spiked his flush on the river it was goodbye to the £45. With £10 going to James Sudworth it was a modest £15 profit for the evening. Hardly worth shouting about and I must have paid at least double that for the beers but at least I got to kiss a PKR pro!
Saturday 19 March 2011
Table Selection: Most Overlooked Tool In The Box
(Note: In this post I refer to some principles laid out by MyPokerLab.com. This was due to the fact that I was reminded of an article in Bluff Magazine contributed by a player who runs that site. This is NOT an advert for MyPokerLab. I have never subscribed to it nor intend to.)
To my mind, table selection is one of the most neglected aspects of online poker and just like yours truly is the most overlooked tool in the box. In MTTs you do not get this privilege but if you entered a room full of players playing a game for money and there was a spare seat at each table, you'd have a little think where to sit, right?
Your "micro-game", according to MyPokerLab, refers to the ability to tackle hand to hand combat at the table. This includes many things such as:
1. Hand-reading skills.
2. Understanding position.
3. Bet-sizing considerations.
4. Which action to take according to the table dynamics.
5. Figuring out opponents' skill-level.
etc etc etc
Your "macro-game" consists of the considerations you make away from the table. Again, taking MyPokerLab as a source, this includes things such as:
1. Bankroll Management.
2. Tilt Control.
3. Looking at stats from the tracking software.
4. Studying the game.
5. Table Selection.
etc etc etc
The article that appeared in Bluff Magazine talked about how the quality of tools from your "micro-game toolbox" can mean diddly-squat if you don't use and apply the tools from your "macro-game toolbox" in the right way. To get a better angle on this you can click here.
The point that I'd like to make is that online, judging by the way that people seem to dive head-first onto the first table that becomes available, a large majority of players just don't use the "Table Selection Tool" at all and, hence, they damage their bottom line. Or, to put it bluntly, loads of players just don't care who they play! True, in order to apply the "Table Selection Tool" you do need to possess a certain degree of humilty; a little thing inside that says you just might get outplayed were you to sit down at Table X, but methinks if it were used properly and more often it would save many players a lot of money in the long run.
If more players tapped into their meek and humble side, took the time to work out who the decent players are, avoided sitting at the table with too many of them (you can't avoid them completely) then certain players would save a ton of money. There again, my darkside says, fine, let the dunderheads dive head first into their demise - sod 'em.
To my mind, table selection is one of the most neglected aspects of online poker and just like yours truly is the most overlooked tool in the box. In MTTs you do not get this privilege but if you entered a room full of players playing a game for money and there was a spare seat at each table, you'd have a little think where to sit, right?
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Forgive the cliche but the long-term poker player knows that he has to bring all sorts of tools with him from the toolbox to do the job. Some might bring better quality tools than others but it's also how those tools are used that define the player. At MyPokerLab.com these "tools" can be divided under two headings: the "micro-game" and the "macro-game." Your "micro-game", according to MyPokerLab, refers to the ability to tackle hand to hand combat at the table. This includes many things such as:
1. Hand-reading skills.
2. Understanding position.
3. Bet-sizing considerations.
4. Which action to take according to the table dynamics.
5. Figuring out opponents' skill-level.
etc etc etc
Your "macro-game" consists of the considerations you make away from the table. Again, taking MyPokerLab as a source, this includes things such as:
1. Bankroll Management.
2. Tilt Control.
3. Looking at stats from the tracking software.
4. Studying the game.
5. Table Selection.
etc etc etc
The article that appeared in Bluff Magazine talked about how the quality of tools from your "micro-game toolbox" can mean diddly-squat if you don't use and apply the tools from your "macro-game toolbox" in the right way. To get a better angle on this you can click here.
The point that I'd like to make is that online, judging by the way that people seem to dive head-first onto the first table that becomes available, a large majority of players just don't use the "Table Selection Tool" at all and, hence, they damage their bottom line. Or, to put it bluntly, loads of players just don't care who they play! True, in order to apply the "Table Selection Tool" you do need to possess a certain degree of humilty; a little thing inside that says you just might get outplayed were you to sit down at Table X, but methinks if it were used properly and more often it would save many players a lot of money in the long run.
If more players tapped into their meek and humble side, took the time to work out who the decent players are, avoided sitting at the table with too many of them (you can't avoid them completely) then certain players would save a ton of money. There again, my darkside says, fine, let the dunderheads dive head first into their demise - sod 'em.
Winning Tilt
Just as every cloud has a silver lining so does every rose have a thorn and after being showered with gifts at the online game this month, I'm at that point where I'm experiencing just a little bit of frustration at the tables. Now, of course, getting frustrated is all part of the general scheme of things but when "winning tilt" rears its head we have to be as wary as ever and be especially on our guard. Protecting ourselves from the onset of tilt is crucial.
To clarify my thoughts on this, "Winning tilt", as far as I know, is the feeling you get when you've been so used to getting rewarded, that when the pipes suddenly get blocked and things don't quite flow as they have - a tiny feeling of resentment sets in. Thoughts like; "Where have my pocket kings and aces gone?"; "Why aren't I hitting any goddam flops anymore?" and "Why the hell am I calling so much?" come creeping into the consciousness.
I suppose, in a way, it's like being spoilt.
Now as these thoughts have taken me over a bit in the last few days I've decided it's best to have a short break from the online game today. It's Saturday morning and the sun is shining down gloriously so I'm heading off into town. Later, I'll be popping into The Fox to play their £38 freezeout which starts at 7PM and then, maybe, I'll hit The Empire or stay at The Fox for a little £1/£1; I don't know, it all depends where the mood takes me.
To clarify my thoughts on this, "Winning tilt", as far as I know, is the feeling you get when you've been so used to getting rewarded, that when the pipes suddenly get blocked and things don't quite flow as they have - a tiny feeling of resentment sets in. Thoughts like; "Where have my pocket kings and aces gone?"; "Why aren't I hitting any goddam flops anymore?" and "Why the hell am I calling so much?" come creeping into the consciousness.
I suppose, in a way, it's like being spoilt.
Now as these thoughts have taken me over a bit in the last few days I've decided it's best to have a short break from the online game today. It's Saturday morning and the sun is shining down gloriously so I'm heading off into town. Later, I'll be popping into The Fox to play their £38 freezeout which starts at 7PM and then, maybe, I'll hit The Empire or stay at The Fox for a little £1/£1; I don't know, it all depends where the mood takes me.
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SO LET'S DO THIS!!
Thursday 17 March 2011
Full House V. Nut Flush
A flopped full house versus a turned nut flush happens rarely but when it happens in your favour, it's marvellous. So when you get this:
Which is this:
And then get this:
That's the ball in the back of the net.
Wednesday 16 March 2011
A Loud Blow On The Trumpet
As my march through March continues to gallop on apace and with a certain milestone being reached (see below) - I have to say that my blog is ripe for a good old brag post. We're about half-way through March now and with just 1.5K hands being played this month, I'm still delighted to inform y'all that I've managed to hit a $1160 (~£715) profit at the online game for the month so far. Unfortunately, with all my hand-histories going AWOL, I'm going to have to split my graphs up a bit. The first one shows my progress from the 1st to the 10th March:
Between taking an image of this and my next chart (below) I had a bit of an accident when my entire bank of PKR hand-histories disappeared. I must have played a good few hundred hands on the laptop and the PC in the interim (including my flippin heck hand) but any record of these have also now been lost. This chart shows my progress since Sunday 13th March up until now:
Between taking an image of this and my next chart (below) I had a bit of an accident when my entire bank of PKR hand-histories disappeared. I must have played a good few hundred hands on the laptop and the PC in the interim (including my flippin heck hand) but any record of these have also now been lost. This chart shows my progress since Sunday 13th March up until now:
As you can see by the total hands played, I've not exactly been having heavy sessions over the last few weeks but I've sure been running pretty damn good. Due to mild distractions around me and simply because I've just wanted to play the game at a more leisurely pace I've mainly just been single-tabling - and this suits me just fine.I know I've said it before but Jesus H Christ I'll say it again - bringing the A game to the table is priority number 1.
Now this brings me to my little milestone: thanks largely to a live game profit of £1750 for the year, along with a modest £250 annual profit at the online game, I'm happy to say that I've just topped an overall profit of £2000 for the year 2011! Now in one respect it's good to see that we're looking at a profit here but, in another respect, with more hands that could have been played and a first month from hell it could be (should be?) so much more!! Of course, let's not lose sight of the fact that this figure could easily go down as well as up. But we'll see...we'll see.
Anyway, with another bleedin' parents' evening approaching tomorrow (God I hate them) I'm going to take it easy for the rest of the night, logout from the poker and just bask smugly in the glory of it all for now. Still, with all that self-congratulatory twaddle going on, I sense the self-fulfilling doomswitch being clicked resoundly in the background. Why the hell do I bring this upon myself? Jesus.
---------------
FOR THE GLORY OF THE TWADDLE!!
Tuesday 15 March 2011
The Freedom Of "No Bankroll" Poker
Before taking my first steps on this journey, I made a big deal about my bankroll and my bankroll management strategy. I wanted to make sure I was doing the "right" thing in the "right" way and as such drew up a bankroll chart and put strict rules in place as to which stakes to play at and on how many tables to play on according to how much I held in my PKR account.
Come February, just as everything fell apart, I concluded that sticking to these rules so rigidly was just too restrictive as it meant being far too preoccupied with keeping score rather than just playing "A" game poker. I put these observations up on the PKR forum (I know, what's wrong with 2+2 eh?) and it was a fella calling himself Dunbar who really struck the right chord when he wrote that a bankroll is actually "the money you have to play poker." This really hit home to me the fact that a "bankroll" is really spare money you have from any source that can be used and accessed to play poker and NOT "however much you currently have in your online poker account(s)."
As a semi-serious player who plays just 5-6K hands on average per month this idea really liberated me and now, as long as I have a reasonable amount of buy-ins ready to hand, I just don't consider myself as having a proper bankroll in the traditional sense anymore. To me, I now just have an unfixed amount of money which I can use to play poker with. Of course it's still important to keep track of profit and losses but THE most important thing, as ever and always, remains that I sit at the table with my "A" game firmly in place. As long as I do this I think I am doing the "right" thing.
Come February, just as everything fell apart, I concluded that sticking to these rules so rigidly was just too restrictive as it meant being far too preoccupied with keeping score rather than just playing "A" game poker. I put these observations up on the PKR forum (I know, what's wrong with 2+2 eh?) and it was a fella calling himself Dunbar who really struck the right chord when he wrote that a bankroll is actually "the money you have to play poker." This really hit home to me the fact that a "bankroll" is really spare money you have from any source that can be used and accessed to play poker and NOT "however much you currently have in your online poker account(s)."
As a semi-serious player who plays just 5-6K hands on average per month this idea really liberated me and now, as long as I have a reasonable amount of buy-ins ready to hand, I just don't consider myself as having a proper bankroll in the traditional sense anymore. To me, I now just have an unfixed amount of money which I can use to play poker with. Of course it's still important to keep track of profit and losses but THE most important thing, as ever and always, remains that I sit at the table with my "A" game firmly in place. As long as I do this I think I am doing the "right" thing.
Monday 14 March 2011
Re-reading "Elements Of Poker"
Back in December of last year, I posted my "Top 10 Poker Books (Plus 2 More)" and wrote short reviews next to each to explain why I liked them. One book that I left out was Caro's "Most Profitable Hold 'Em Advice" which I think I could have put into the "General Strategy" section of that post. Another one I left out is called "The Elements Of Poker" by Tommy Angelo which I'm rereading now after hearing it being mentioned a few times recently in a favourable light. After finishing the first section on "Universal Elements" today, and even picking it up for the second time, I'm still undecided about this book:
As an old student of philosophy (and trying hard not to disappear up my own arse) the style of writing reminds me of good old Ludwig Wittgenstein's "Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus" where little nuggets of information are sprinkled around and where the occasional bright lights really do make you stop and ponder at length on the depth of what has been said. The book is not so much about strategy but more on the mindset you need to have when sitting at the table - well, the first sections cover this quite comprehensively anyway.
What I like about it is that the writer has a strong live, bricks & mortar, background rather than having stronger links with the internet game. The section following "Universal Elements" is called "Table Poker" and focuses exclusively on live poker. Looking at the second half of the book, it appears to get a little too maths/stats heavy for my liking which is possibly why it didn't make my Top 10. Nevertheless, I'll delve into the "Table Poker" section over the next few days and see how the book pans out.
Sunday 13 March 2011
PKR Hand Histories - Gone!
Way back in January, I bought myself the full version of Holdem Manager for around £60. From the off it just didn't import my PKR hand histories properly and I never got to see an accurate graph of my progress or got to mess around with stats and stuff. Today, in an effort to get this bloody thing working I started importing hands into HEM from all sorts of sources but still no up-to-date accurate graph appeared.
At one point I downloaded and installed the updated version of HEM but think I might have left the PKR client open while doing so. It may have been as a result of this but somehow ALL of my PKR hand-history files have been wiped!! This means that neither Holdem Manager or PokerOfficer can find any files now before 12th March 2011.
With everything back to zilch, and my 5-year old laptop only having its operating system re-installed the once, AND with a lot of things just "chugging" at the moment on this computer, I think that a complete re-install of the operating system is now in order. Of course, this means that any graph I post from now, from the laptop, will not show any results prior to March 12th 2011.
Jesus.
At one point I downloaded and installed the updated version of HEM but think I might have left the PKR client open while doing so. It may have been as a result of this but somehow ALL of my PKR hand-history files have been wiped!! This means that neither Holdem Manager or PokerOfficer can find any files now before 12th March 2011.
With everything back to zilch, and my 5-year old laptop only having its operating system re-installed the once, AND with a lot of things just "chugging" at the moment on this computer, I think that a complete re-install of the operating system is now in order. Of course, this means that any graph I post from now, from the laptop, will not show any results prior to March 12th 2011.
Jesus.
Saturday 12 March 2011
Flippin Heck
It's always nice to win a coinflip when it's a full buy-in versus another full buy-in and as I continue to run quite well at the ol' online poker game I just feel like posting this hand cos it doesn't happen THAT often and I actually won the bleedin' flip for a change!
This next one is a lot closer but still has the pocket pairs ahead:
I didn't expect an all-in call to be honest cos waffle was playing super-loose and it looked like a light 3bet move on the button from smudgie. By the way, just to make it more interesting, note the flush draw that the RNG decided to throw in on the turn.
Actually, this sort of thing is less of a coinflip than one might think according to poker stove:
This next one is a lot closer but still has the pocket pairs ahead:
Clear evidence, perhaps, that AK may be nice but not all it's cracked up to be?
Recovery Complete
Yes, I know we still have over nine and a half months to go but I'm happy to report that I've managed to steer things back on course after our little "detour" at the start of the year. Last night I managed a small winning session on the PC - which means I have managed to reach... break-even point for the year - HURRAH!
Below is an image of my PokerOfficer chart for the year. It only shows my laptop results (I've played around 3K hands on my PC) but gives a clear indication of the way things have generally gone for the year so far:
For psychological reasons, I guess it's better to have the trough in the middle at the bottom of the graph rather than a peak in the middle at the top. Of course, anything can happen now. I could go and plummet all the way down again, continue heading into the stratosphere or just trundle along in mediocrity. Who knows what the rest of the month will bring?
Below is an image of my PokerOfficer chart for the year. It only shows my laptop results (I've played around 3K hands on my PC) but gives a clear indication of the way things have generally gone for the year so far:
For psychological reasons, I guess it's better to have the trough in the middle at the bottom of the graph rather than a peak in the middle at the top. Of course, anything can happen now. I could go and plummet all the way down again, continue heading into the stratosphere or just trundle along in mediocrity. Who knows what the rest of the month will bring?
Thursday 10 March 2011
A March Through March: Nearly There
Ok, with my rakeback payment finally going in, I can say that I'm now just £40 in the red at the online game for the year which means I am just a few reaches away from climbing out of this nasty hole that I dug myself into earlier in the year. I know, I shouldn't even be thinking about where I stand as far as the balance goes and I should be studying the game rather than looking at stupid graphs but...well...you know how it is.
I know this is gonna sound like bragging and, hell, maybe it is but what's wrong with giving it a big cheer on the old blog eh? I've not even played me 1K hands yet this month but slowly and steady wins the day. Here is my graph for March so far:
I know this is gonna sound like bragging and, hell, maybe it is but what's wrong with giving it a big cheer on the old blog eh? I've not even played me 1K hands yet this month but slowly and steady wins the day. Here is my graph for March so far:
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STEADY STEADY STEADY.
NOW FOR THE LOVE OF GOD LET'S JUST DO THIS!!!
NOW FOR THE LOVE OF GOD LET'S JUST DO THIS!!!
Why Join The Table Of Death?
As a player who plays regularly on PKR, practically everyday, I like to think that I get to know who the good players are, particularly among the regulars. Also, as someone who likes to think he knows his own limitations, I like to look out for myself when I go hunting in the jungle. I don't mind saying that I will avoid a place where too many large and dangerous predators prowl and will generally roam where the less wild creatures are. I don't mind mixing it if I have to and I'll have chunks taken out of me from time to time, for sure, but I do manage to survive.
Now although I may be describing an evil and treacherous place where only the survival of the fittest win through - this is exactly what online cash game poker is all about. When you go out hunting you have to make sure you limit the dangers you face but for God's sake why throw yourself into the lion's den!? A while back I touched upon this in my brother's "whirlpool theory" where I expressed bewilderment at why really good, decent players put themselves in danger by matching themselves up with other obviously good players. (Is it really just for the practice!?)
Well, as I was surveying the battlefield today I came across a couple of "tables of death" where, surely, no one in their right mind would sit down at. Maybe I shouldn't but I'm just going to go right on ahead and post them anyway:
Table 1
Table 2
Now unless I'm well wide of the mark, these are all good players. (On Table #2 Muzone was up to his "Muzowning" antics and was just leaving after bagging $603 for himself.) But why would all these players sit down to play each other in the first place!?
I'm still puzzled.
Now although I may be describing an evil and treacherous place where only the survival of the fittest win through - this is exactly what online cash game poker is all about. When you go out hunting you have to make sure you limit the dangers you face but for God's sake why throw yourself into the lion's den!? A while back I touched upon this in my brother's "whirlpool theory" where I expressed bewilderment at why really good, decent players put themselves in danger by matching themselves up with other obviously good players. (Is it really just for the practice!?)
Well, as I was surveying the battlefield today I came across a couple of "tables of death" where, surely, no one in their right mind would sit down at. Maybe I shouldn't but I'm just going to go right on ahead and post them anyway:
Table 1
Table 2
Now unless I'm well wide of the mark, these are all good players. (On Table #2 Muzone was up to his "Muzowning" antics and was just leaving after bagging $603 for himself.) But why would all these players sit down to play each other in the first place!?
I'm still puzzled.
Tools Of The Trade: I Wish
Actually, the tools of my real trade would be items like board markers and exercise books but here are some images of the chippy chips I use to donk around with on various weekends. This first image is of The Fox cash game chips. These are quite light and have a light "plastic" feel to them. The front and backs are exactly the same. With lower stakes games mainly in operation and much more players buying in for smaller amounts it's actually quite rare to see a pink chip in action at the tables.
CHIPS AT THE FOX
These next chips are those used at The Empire. They are heavier and just have a more "comfortable" feel to them although I don't like the inconsistancy in design with the £1 chip.
CHIPS AT THE EMPIRE
CHIPS AT THE FOX
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CHIPS AT THE EMPIRE
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Finally, here's an image of the other chips I've picked up along the way. The first is a £1 chip from The Gala Casino in Bournemouth, the second is from The Grosvenor in Brighton and the third is a $1 chip which I picked up from Foxwoods, Connecticut in the good old US of A. The last one, by the way, is a Paulson chip which are the most expensive type. I'm not actually that keen on the sharp edges of the paulson chip but there ya go. If you decide to order this type over the net, by the way, you're looking at around £1.15 per chip!! 
---------------
I'm pretty annoyed with myself for not making sure I had £1 chips from The Vic or The International to show but, still, as I'm going into town later on today I might just swing by and pick them up. I also have five varieties of my own poker chips which I bought from various sources but those will have to be shown in a later post, as will details of my wonderful playing card collection - a real treat, top notch!
Wednesday 9 March 2011
Live Session #11: Gambling With A Shortstack
I've really got to stop doing this. Only recently have I been on the PKR forum going on about how rubbish the shortstack strategy is and there I was, at The Empire this evening sitting there with a piddly stack, doing exactly what I said was no good!
Anyway, as I mentioned in my last post, I was a bit cross with the online poker thing tonight as I STILL have yet to receive a rakeback payment. As such, I trundled off into town on the bus to visit my old haunts. I popped into The Fox first but with the list at 4 players long for a cash game, no one budging from their seat, no sign of a new table opening AND with the temperature of the room being quite warm, I left for The Empire. Straight away I got a seat and plonked down a scared looking £135; rubbish. I donked off around £50 fairly quickly and it was clear I'd picked up a loose passive table image early doors. Shortly after I got dealt QQ and used my image well to get paid an ok amount and to get my stack back up to £140. Shortly after this came the key hand:
Key Hand
Mr Confident Loosie Goosie Man raises £16 from early position. (He's done this a fair few times so...whatever.) Mr Tightpants in middle-position who's never played a single hand flat calls. In the cut-off I look down at 10 10. Ok, this has to be a classic raise or fold situation right? With Mr CLGM raising a very high percentage of the time and Mr Tightpants ONLY calling, and not raising, I figure my 10 10 is strong against their AJ-AK or their 22-99 range and I DEFINITELY aint calling to set-mine or for them to go and outdraw me. I really don't wanna fold my 10 10 either while on a shortstack so with £35 in the pot and surely some fold equity flying around I chucked in my entire £140!
Get this! Mr Big Blind Shortstack puts in his entire £60 (that's ok but might make a call more likely from the other villains), Mr CLGM thinks for a bit before calling my £140 (not good), and Mr Tightpants, after thinking for an age, decides to make the call as well (wtf)! Hmm, heads-up would have been all right but a 4-way pot was really not what I wanted. The flop comes A x x and I'm pretty sure that's gonna send me home. They check. The turn comes a seven. They check. The river comes a seven. They check. Mr BBS shows 66, Mr CLGM announces two pair but doesn't show, Mr Tightpants flips over AK for the winning hand (two pair; aces and sevens ) and scoops in a large pot in the region of £500. I calmly put my cards face down in the muck and take my leave. £135 down.
In retrospect, I have mixed feelings about how I played the hand. A £50 or £60 raise (instead of an all-in) may have been the better move as it may have signified a stronger hand and may even have got people to fold. (Although this is unlikely as I was playing many hands - and it is The Empire after all.) In this case, if I still had the three callers I would have been able to get away from the hand when the ace fell and saved myself 80 or 90 quid. (A daft concilation is that I would still have lost even if I held JJ, QQ or KK.) Still, whatever the correct play, I think that playing with this type of stack just puts me in a reckless gambling mood which is really not a state I want to be in. But at least it is has taught me a few lessons:
Lesson 1: Avoid playing live poker with a stack less than 50% of the maximum and aim to go for as close to a 100% stack as possible. Never gamble because of shortstack restrictions ever again.
Lesson 2: Think carefully before playing live poker in mid-week. Players tend to be stronger and plenty of sleep to be fresh for work the next day is absolutely vital.
Anyway, as I mentioned in my last post, I was a bit cross with the online poker thing tonight as I STILL have yet to receive a rakeback payment. As such, I trundled off into town on the bus to visit my old haunts. I popped into The Fox first but with the list at 4 players long for a cash game, no one budging from their seat, no sign of a new table opening AND with the temperature of the room being quite warm, I left for The Empire. Straight away I got a seat and plonked down a scared looking £135; rubbish. I donked off around £50 fairly quickly and it was clear I'd picked up a loose passive table image early doors. Shortly after I got dealt QQ and used my image well to get paid an ok amount and to get my stack back up to £140. Shortly after this came the key hand:
Key Hand
Mr Confident Loosie Goosie Man raises £16 from early position. (He's done this a fair few times so...whatever.) Mr Tightpants in middle-position who's never played a single hand flat calls. In the cut-off I look down at 10 10. Ok, this has to be a classic raise or fold situation right? With Mr CLGM raising a very high percentage of the time and Mr Tightpants ONLY calling, and not raising, I figure my 10 10 is strong against their AJ-AK or their 22-99 range and I DEFINITELY aint calling to set-mine or for them to go and outdraw me. I really don't wanna fold my 10 10 either while on a shortstack so with £35 in the pot and surely some fold equity flying around I chucked in my entire £140!
Get this! Mr Big Blind Shortstack puts in his entire £60 (that's ok but might make a call more likely from the other villains), Mr CLGM thinks for a bit before calling my £140 (not good), and Mr Tightpants, after thinking for an age, decides to make the call as well (wtf)! Hmm, heads-up would have been all right but a 4-way pot was really not what I wanted. The flop comes A x x and I'm pretty sure that's gonna send me home. They check. The turn comes a seven. They check. The river comes a seven. They check. Mr BBS shows 66, Mr CLGM announces two pair but doesn't show, Mr Tightpants flips over AK for the winning hand (two pair; aces and sevens ) and scoops in a large pot in the region of £500. I calmly put my cards face down in the muck and take my leave. £135 down.
In retrospect, I have mixed feelings about how I played the hand. A £50 or £60 raise (instead of an all-in) may have been the better move as it may have signified a stronger hand and may even have got people to fold. (Although this is unlikely as I was playing many hands - and it is The Empire after all.) In this case, if I still had the three callers I would have been able to get away from the hand when the ace fell and saved myself 80 or 90 quid. (A daft concilation is that I would still have lost even if I held JJ, QQ or KK.) Still, whatever the correct play, I think that playing with this type of stack just puts me in a reckless gambling mood which is really not a state I want to be in. But at least it is has taught me a few lessons:
Lesson 1: Avoid playing live poker with a stack less than 50% of the maximum and aim to go for as close to a 100% stack as possible. Never gamble because of shortstack restrictions ever again.
Lesson 2: Think carefully before playing live poker in mid-week. Players tend to be stronger and plenty of sleep to be fresh for work the next day is absolutely vital.
Tilted - Where's My F***ing Rakeback!?
This is going to have me sounding like a spoilt git but I tell ya, one thing that kinda pisses me off about online poker is a delayed rakeback payment. I know, maybe I'm lucky to even get it - many players only hear of it after they have registered on the site, by which time it's too late to apply for - but when it gets to the 9th of the month and you still haven't had that little boost at the beginning of the month, it can be a little vexing.
Actually, you know what? I'm not even gonna play online tonight! I'm gonna jump on the bus and head on into town. Fuck 'em. If they wanna delay my rakeback, I won't play on their site, that'll teach 'em. I'm off for a shower to freshen up, then I'm off into town baby!!
Actually, you know what? I'm not even gonna play online tonight! I'm gonna jump on the bus and head on into town. Fuck 'em. If they wanna delay my rakeback, I won't play on their site, that'll teach 'em. I'm off for a shower to freshen up, then I'm off into town baby!!
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NOW COME ON!!
Tuesday 8 March 2011
Lots Of Graphs (Online Play In The Spotlight)
After investing $89 in the full version of the poker tracking software known as Holdem Manager, I'm feeling a little put-out that it's just not collecting my hand-histories from the PKR folder at the moment - and so currently it's completely useless. I'm sure that a little fiddle will put it right but, at present, I'm just relying on PokerOfficer.
Now that the dust has settled and my online game is almost getting back to break-even for the year (it'll go down now that I've mentioned this), I feel that, as promised, it's only right to throw up my graphs for the year. Now I know that I said I'd do this on a monthly basis but, to be honest, I was so deflated after the January debacle that I kind of put this idea on the back-burner.
Those who have been following my load of old twaddle will know that merging files through my PokerOfficer software only corrupts the data so I'm afraid I have to put up my laptop results and PC results up separately. I'm not going to show how I've got on at each level because that's just too long-winded and boring but, rest assured, most of these hands are at nl100 or nl200. I'll still preface each graph with a little introduction to explain the figures. First let's look at the month of death:
Graphs 1 & 2 - JANUARY
Hands Played at nl2 - nl25 = 51
Hands Played at nl50 = 395
Hands Played at nl100 = 3675
Hands Played at nl200 = 1198
Total Hands Played = 5319
Graphed Profit/Loss = -$430
Actual Profit/Loss = -$860
Explanation
Although the graphs have me down at just $430, I know I was down twice this much for the month. I know, for sure, that I exited the table immediately on seeing my AA lose to AK in a hand at a $200nl game which caused me to lose a buy-in. In this case PokerOfficer would not have captured the hand; you need to let the PKR software run its course between hands for the hand-history to be fully recorded. I must have done this on more than one occasion as the data just does not quite match reality. The laptop graph should, therefore, definitely have me down at least an extra $200.
LAPTOP GRAPH
Graphs 3 & 4 - FEBRUARY
Hands Played at nl2 - nl25 = 89
Hands Played at nl50 =372
Hands Played at nl100 =1664
Hands Played at nl200 = 962
Hands Played at nl400 = 40
Total Hands Played =3127
Graphed Profit/Loss = $336
Actual Profit/Loss = +$100
Explanation
This was my "steadying of the ship" month. Not many hands played, for sure, but a lack of confidence at the beginning of February would be the reason for this. A poor performance at MTTs would probably account for the difference between "graphed profits" and "actual profits" and the $170 rakeback payment would be a contributory factor as well. Oh, I may have dabbled with a few blackjack hands also.
LAPTOP GRAPH
PC GRAPH
Graph 5 - MARCH (SO FAR)
Hands Played at nl2 - nl25 = 17
Hands Played at nl50 = 98
Hands Played at nl100 = 290
Hands Played at nl200 =317
Total Hands Played = 718
Graphed Profit/Loss = $554
Actual Profit/Loss = $670
Explanation
I've not yet played any online poker on the PC yet this month so no graph for that obviously. This month has been fandabidozie thus far and it's a gradual climb out of the mire but let's not get complacent. I've taken the liberty of including an anticipated rakeback payment of ~$130 to my "Actual Profit" figure here because with the date now at 8th March, this really should have been paid in by now. I also grabbed just over $100 in the $5K ADDED on Sunday. Still, it's been fairly even Steven on the MTT front overall.
LAPTOP GRAPH
There you have it. With my online losses presently standing at just £60 for the year, I guess I have to be positive about completing my repair job to the "month of death" but let's just wait and see eh?
Now that the dust has settled and my online game is almost getting back to break-even for the year (it'll go down now that I've mentioned this), I feel that, as promised, it's only right to throw up my graphs for the year. Now I know that I said I'd do this on a monthly basis but, to be honest, I was so deflated after the January debacle that I kind of put this idea on the back-burner.
Those who have been following my load of old twaddle will know that merging files through my PokerOfficer software only corrupts the data so I'm afraid I have to put up my laptop results and PC results up separately. I'm not going to show how I've got on at each level because that's just too long-winded and boring but, rest assured, most of these hands are at nl100 or nl200. I'll still preface each graph with a little introduction to explain the figures. First let's look at the month of death:
Graphs 1 & 2 - JANUARY
Hands Played at nl2 - nl25 = 51
Hands Played at nl50 = 395
Hands Played at nl100 = 3675
Hands Played at nl200 = 1198
Total Hands Played = 5319
Graphed Profit/Loss = -$430
Actual Profit/Loss = -$860
Explanation
Although the graphs have me down at just $430, I know I was down twice this much for the month. I know, for sure, that I exited the table immediately on seeing my AA lose to AK in a hand at a $200nl game which caused me to lose a buy-in. In this case PokerOfficer would not have captured the hand; you need to let the PKR software run its course between hands for the hand-history to be fully recorded. I must have done this on more than one occasion as the data just does not quite match reality. The laptop graph should, therefore, definitely have me down at least an extra $200.
LAPTOP GRAPH
PC GRAPH
Graphs 3 & 4 - FEBRUARY
Hands Played at nl2 - nl25 = 89
Hands Played at nl50 =372
Hands Played at nl100 =1664
Hands Played at nl200 = 962
Hands Played at nl400 = 40
Total Hands Played =3127
Graphed Profit/Loss = $336
Actual Profit/Loss = +$100
Explanation
This was my "steadying of the ship" month. Not many hands played, for sure, but a lack of confidence at the beginning of February would be the reason for this. A poor performance at MTTs would probably account for the difference between "graphed profits" and "actual profits" and the $170 rakeback payment would be a contributory factor as well. Oh, I may have dabbled with a few blackjack hands also.
LAPTOP GRAPH
PC GRAPH
Graph 5 - MARCH (SO FAR)
Hands Played at nl2 - nl25 = 17
Hands Played at nl50 = 98
Hands Played at nl100 = 290
Hands Played at nl200 =317
Total Hands Played = 718
Graphed Profit/Loss = $554
Actual Profit/Loss = $670
Explanation
I've not yet played any online poker on the PC yet this month so no graph for that obviously. This month has been fandabidozie thus far and it's a gradual climb out of the mire but let's not get complacent. I've taken the liberty of including an anticipated rakeback payment of ~$130 to my "Actual Profit" figure here because with the date now at 8th March, this really should have been paid in by now. I also grabbed just over $100 in the $5K ADDED on Sunday. Still, it's been fairly even Steven on the MTT front overall.
LAPTOP GRAPH
There you have it. With my online losses presently standing at just £60 for the year, I guess I have to be positive about completing my repair job to the "month of death" but let's just wait and see eh?
Monday 7 March 2011
£80 Direct Buy-In To The PKR Social
I've just deposited £80 ($130) into my PKR account to use as a direct buy in to their social event which is taking place on 26th March. They have ongoing satellites running on their site but, to be honest, it's not easy to qualify this way and I just can't be arsed with them. For this, I'm going to pay the price of admission and have done with it. Hopefully I'll get to see some of the villains who have been taking the money off me at the online cash tables and get my revenge!
Effectively, this will be a live £80 freezeout so I'll be treating this, precisely, as a live session as far as keeping track of my profits and losses are concerned; I'll be taking £80 away from my current "live tally" balance. On the evening before (Friday 25th March) it seems there are going to be some sit and go tables with bizarre variations that I'll not have heard of. That'll be -ev for me then but, still, it's for the craic innit?
Although the event will probably be about the fun just as much as the poker, it would still be pleasant to come away with a bit of cash this time. What I quite like about this is that we do actually get the Sunday to recover so no Monday morning blues - which is nice.
Effectively, this will be a live £80 freezeout so I'll be treating this, precisely, as a live session as far as keeping track of my profits and losses are concerned; I'll be taking £80 away from my current "live tally" balance. On the evening before (Friday 25th March) it seems there are going to be some sit and go tables with bizarre variations that I'll not have heard of. That'll be -ev for me then but, still, it's for the craic innit?
Although the event will probably be about the fun just as much as the poker, it would still be pleasant to come away with a bit of cash this time. What I quite like about this is that we do actually get the Sunday to recover so no Monday morning blues - which is nice.
Sunday 6 March 2011
Big Ouch In The $33, $5K ADDED MTT
We're around the bubble in the above mentioned MTT. Don'tcha just love it when you go all-in and have your villain call with a poor and dominated hand, only to see them hit their 3-outer on the river!?
Lovely.
Poker Stove said this:
And then this on the turn:
But still, it's not all bad:
Just scraping in once again.
And The Next One Please:
Oh, but here I am being seen off in the $35, 2-day, main event when I went all-in preflop against a villain who was playing far too many hands and getting far too frisky for this structure. Needless to say, he called and I dominated with AQ v. KQ.
Poker stove said:
But...at this table its... bosh.. and look what hits the flop!:
Lovely.
Poker Stove said this:
And then this on the turn:
But still, it's not all bad:
Just scraping in once again.
And The Next One Please:
Oh, but here I am being seen off in the $35, 2-day, main event when I went all-in preflop against a villain who was playing far too many hands and getting far too frisky for this structure. Needless to say, he called and I dominated with AQ v. KQ.
Poker stove said:
But...at this table its... bosh.. and look what hits the flop!:
Of course if it held up, I woulda been back in the game with something resembling a competitive stack. Poker eh?
NOT My Weekly Update
This spot is usually devoted to my weekly update but as I resolved last week to make my updates "monthly" instead, I'll honour my own decision and not go back on the deal. However, as I mentioned before, we poker players are hugely egotistical - and I'm no exception so after a pleasing week, I'll just twaddle on about how my week has gone...
First off, I've had two contrasting live sessions this month. My Friday night session at The Fox was dead dead dead and I endead up £50 down. (Did you see what I did there, with the words? Good eh?) Anyway, after that bollocks, I managed to turn it all around the following night thanks mostly to a £400 pot at The Empire while holding AA which contributed to my overall (£240) winning evening and which puts my live game profits at £190 for the month and £1900 for the year which really can't be bad.
Online, I am pleased to say that after a ropey start, things have started the same way as they did in January and February. i.e. I'm off to a flying start! With an anticipated rakeback payment of ~$130 expected to come my way very soon, my account balance has moved $400 in the right direction this March. Of course, I hope my fortunes don't follow the same course as those two months; where January had me down to the tune of $860 - and me questioning whether to carry on with the blog - and where February had me yo-yoing to an ultimately uneventful break-even month.
First off, I've had two contrasting live sessions this month. My Friday night session at The Fox was dead dead dead and I endead up £50 down. (Did you see what I did there, with the words? Good eh?) Anyway, after that bollocks, I managed to turn it all around the following night thanks mostly to a £400 pot at The Empire while holding AA which contributed to my overall (£240) winning evening and which puts my live game profits at £190 for the month and £1900 for the year which really can't be bad.
Online, I am pleased to say that after a ropey start, things have started the same way as they did in January and February. i.e. I'm off to a flying start! With an anticipated rakeback payment of ~$130 expected to come my way very soon, my account balance has moved $400 in the right direction this March. Of course, I hope my fortunes don't follow the same course as those two months; where January had me down to the tune of $860 - and me questioning whether to carry on with the blog - and where February had me yo-yoing to an ultimately uneventful break-even month.
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All told, although I am down ~£300 this year at the online game, it's thanks to the live arena that I'm actually feeling very content with how my poker journey has gone so far. To a large extent, with so many live game players unable to fold, it seems as if the "sitting tight until you get AA or KK and then chucking it all-in" strategy is actually alive and well and is a thoroughly effective tactic! Still, I'll end with a pointless message to show off my skills in the art of alliteration:
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ROCK ON BABY - DO THE BLOODY BUSINESS BOYS!!
Live Session #10: Empire To The Rescue Again
(Written in the present tense for effect.)
Sitting down at a cash game table after 5 or 6 pints of lager is not the greatest preparation in the world but, hey, you gotta mix it up a bit innit? I arrive at The Fox at around 6:20PM, pay the £38 for the freezeout (when will I ever learn?) and head for the cash game tables for a "warm-up". To my surprise, standing right there is flesicher123 - PKR badboy and online trash-talker extraordinaire, who is on a break from the main event. He's here with a few of his pals, known as weplayany2 and beanman4 on PKR.
Flesicher is having a fair crack at the £300 main event but weplayany2 and beanman4 are out and they are at a £1/£2 cash table. After a quick chat with flesicher et al I get my £200 in chips, avoid the aforementioned table, and take my place at a £1/£1 game. In spite of the fact that I've had a few, I get nice cards and spin up a profit of £75. Getting dealt AA, after playing fast and loose previously, always helps and I was happy to get in £50 on a harmless looking flop and see a caller chuck in the £50 - who then folds the turn when I throw it all in.
As I take my seat for the £38 freezeout I decide that it might be funny to "accidently" trip over while holding my cash game chips - just for a laugh. I time my trip to perfection, fall on the floor at just the right angle and all my chips tumble out of my hands with a perfect splash. But no one else seems to think it's very funny. Anyway, with a couple more Peronis ordered, the £38 freezeout was fun and the atmosphere was good but I crash out stupidly. Mid-way through I'm on a playable stack and it's folded to me in mid-position. For some reason I like the look of my 10 5o and put in a fair raise only for the BB to call. The flop comes 5 2 2 and I chuck it all-in only for the villain to insta-call with 77. I feel a bit annoyed because I was feeling very comfortable up to that point and it was such a stupid way to go out - Jesus! Anyway, I bump into flesicher, once again, and he has made the final table with an average stack and he will resume play the following day.
With the time at around 11PM I decide that a change of scene is in order and, while £35 up on the night thus far, I head on over to The Empire. This turns out to be a GOOD move. I pay for £200 in chips (for some reason I kept £200 of Fox chips in my pocket) and I get a seat straight away. With only six players at the table I get dealt the beautful AA, once again, very early in the session. Preflop, there are two limpers so I decide to chuck in £15. Bingo! The villain to my left thinks for a while before throwing in £75 - these are the moments that make it all worthwhile! With the shrug of the shoulders, I throw in my £200. He's kind of priced himself in and so he calls fairly quickly. The board comes something like 5 5 J 5 2 and with my villain showing no reaction I know he hasn't improved and I know my aces are good. He flips over 10 10 and I double-up swiftly.
The table is not particularly strong and I just chug along nicely. However, as the time approaches 1:30AM the effects of the earlier consumption of alcohol really starts to kick in and I feel shattered and I'm almost falling asleep. This is most definitely NOT the time to carry on playing. Apart from the AA hand, there are no other key hands to speak of and I take my leave with £407 in chips and a profit of £207. This makes a ~£240 profit on the night.
Once again, then, it's a visit to The Empire that makes it all come good. Even though I collected £70 at the cash game table at The Fox, it doesn't take a genius to work out that perhaps I should be spending far less time at The Fox, with their £1/£1 games along with their low buy-in MTTs, and much more at The Empire.
Today, it's my beloved $33, $5K ADDED MTT for gold+ members at PKR plus a very interesting 2-day main event for $35 which has a 30 minute clock! I think I'll be giving both of these a pop come this evening.
Sitting down at a cash game table after 5 or 6 pints of lager is not the greatest preparation in the world but, hey, you gotta mix it up a bit innit? I arrive at The Fox at around 6:20PM, pay the £38 for the freezeout (when will I ever learn?) and head for the cash game tables for a "warm-up". To my surprise, standing right there is flesicher123 - PKR badboy and online trash-talker extraordinaire, who is on a break from the main event. He's here with a few of his pals, known as weplayany2 and beanman4 on PKR.
Flesicher is having a fair crack at the £300 main event but weplayany2 and beanman4 are out and they are at a £1/£2 cash table. After a quick chat with flesicher et al I get my £200 in chips, avoid the aforementioned table, and take my place at a £1/£1 game. In spite of the fact that I've had a few, I get nice cards and spin up a profit of £75. Getting dealt AA, after playing fast and loose previously, always helps and I was happy to get in £50 on a harmless looking flop and see a caller chuck in the £50 - who then folds the turn when I throw it all in.
As I take my seat for the £38 freezeout I decide that it might be funny to "accidently" trip over while holding my cash game chips - just for a laugh. I time my trip to perfection, fall on the floor at just the right angle and all my chips tumble out of my hands with a perfect splash. But no one else seems to think it's very funny. Anyway, with a couple more Peronis ordered, the £38 freezeout was fun and the atmosphere was good but I crash out stupidly. Mid-way through I'm on a playable stack and it's folded to me in mid-position. For some reason I like the look of my 10 5o and put in a fair raise only for the BB to call. The flop comes 5 2 2 and I chuck it all-in only for the villain to insta-call with 77. I feel a bit annoyed because I was feeling very comfortable up to that point and it was such a stupid way to go out - Jesus! Anyway, I bump into flesicher, once again, and he has made the final table with an average stack and he will resume play the following day.
With the time at around 11PM I decide that a change of scene is in order and, while £35 up on the night thus far, I head on over to The Empire. This turns out to be a GOOD move. I pay for £200 in chips (for some reason I kept £200 of Fox chips in my pocket) and I get a seat straight away. With only six players at the table I get dealt the beautful AA, once again, very early in the session. Preflop, there are two limpers so I decide to chuck in £15. Bingo! The villain to my left thinks for a while before throwing in £75 - these are the moments that make it all worthwhile! With the shrug of the shoulders, I throw in my £200. He's kind of priced himself in and so he calls fairly quickly. The board comes something like 5 5 J 5 2 and with my villain showing no reaction I know he hasn't improved and I know my aces are good. He flips over 10 10 and I double-up swiftly.
The table is not particularly strong and I just chug along nicely. However, as the time approaches 1:30AM the effects of the earlier consumption of alcohol really starts to kick in and I feel shattered and I'm almost falling asleep. This is most definitely NOT the time to carry on playing. Apart from the AA hand, there are no other key hands to speak of and I take my leave with £407 in chips and a profit of £207. This makes a ~£240 profit on the night.
Once again, then, it's a visit to The Empire that makes it all come good. Even though I collected £70 at the cash game table at The Fox, it doesn't take a genius to work out that perhaps I should be spending far less time at The Fox, with their £1/£1 games along with their low buy-in MTTs, and much more at The Empire.
Today, it's my beloved $33, $5K ADDED MTT for gold+ members at PKR plus a very interesting 2-day main event for $35 which has a 30 minute clock! I think I'll be giving both of these a pop come this evening.
Arsenal v Sunderland
I've lived in London for about 23 years now and have only been to a couple of matches. Yesterday I headed up to north London to The Emirates to watch Arsenal v Sunderland courtesy of an invite from PKR who have six season tickets and who invite VIP members to the games.
Jake O'Leary, the guy in charge of it all, met us outside the South Entrance which leads to the area for box and club members. A short ride up the escalator led us to the plush, carpeted area and after a swift pint we took our place for the match. First off - the view and and whole atmosphere was pretty stunning to say the least. The pitch seemed really close and the whole structure of the stadium was fantastic. It actually seemed really compact and I was surprised to see that the attendance was over 60000!
At half-time it was time to take advantage of the free beer - these are left on the table and are free to take as you wish - so I grabbed a couple and chatted away, mainly to a player who goes by the name of kanapes. She was here with her daughter and there was also another PKR member of staff along with a player called UwillLose (or something like that). As the area cleared for the second half, I stayed for about 5 or 10 minutes and continued to chat away with kanapes. Then, as I returned to my seat I saw the PKR guys coming back out for more drinks! Well, not to pass up on the opportunity, I joined them for another pint - and there we were, the four of us propping up the bar and chatting away while the game played on!
I have to say, Jake O'Leary was a fine host and, "invigorated" by the drinks and with the UwillLose fella chatting away like a good'un, we took our place for the final 25 minutes or so. Much excitement ensued and the guys were going crazy with a few near misses but it all ended 0-0.
A quick walk to the waiting taxi later, and a story from Jake about his "exploits" (which I won't go into), we arrived at his local in Camden and it was more beers and chat. Again, Jake talked of the night that Scott Shelley (a PKR member of staff) won his bracelet at the WSOPE; just a few pennies were won and spent that night shall we say.
As 6 o'clock approached I had to take my leave. It was a really enjoyable afternoon - the facilities at the ground for the box and club members are superb and the convenience of the easy access to free drinks, the taxi ride to Camden - and more free beers on the PKR tab at the pub afterwards meant a great time was had by all.
Anyway, after this it was a case of jumping on the tube for a visit to The Fox and The Empire which I will twaddle on about in my next post...
Jake O'Leary, the guy in charge of it all, met us outside the South Entrance which leads to the area for box and club members. A short ride up the escalator led us to the plush, carpeted area and after a swift pint we took our place for the match. First off - the view and and whole atmosphere was pretty stunning to say the least. The pitch seemed really close and the whole structure of the stadium was fantastic. It actually seemed really compact and I was surprised to see that the attendance was over 60000!
At half-time it was time to take advantage of the free beer - these are left on the table and are free to take as you wish - so I grabbed a couple and chatted away, mainly to a player who goes by the name of kanapes. She was here with her daughter and there was also another PKR member of staff along with a player called UwillLose (or something like that). As the area cleared for the second half, I stayed for about 5 or 10 minutes and continued to chat away with kanapes. Then, as I returned to my seat I saw the PKR guys coming back out for more drinks! Well, not to pass up on the opportunity, I joined them for another pint - and there we were, the four of us propping up the bar and chatting away while the game played on!
I have to say, Jake O'Leary was a fine host and, "invigorated" by the drinks and with the UwillLose fella chatting away like a good'un, we took our place for the final 25 minutes or so. Much excitement ensued and the guys were going crazy with a few near misses but it all ended 0-0.
A quick walk to the waiting taxi later, and a story from Jake about his "exploits" (which I won't go into), we arrived at his local in Camden and it was more beers and chat. Again, Jake talked of the night that Scott Shelley (a PKR member of staff) won his bracelet at the WSOPE; just a few pennies were won and spent that night shall we say.
As 6 o'clock approached I had to take my leave. It was a really enjoyable afternoon - the facilities at the ground for the box and club members are superb and the convenience of the easy access to free drinks, the taxi ride to Camden - and more free beers on the PKR tab at the pub afterwards meant a great time was had by all.
Anyway, after this it was a case of jumping on the tube for a visit to The Fox and The Empire which I will twaddle on about in my next post...
Saturday 5 March 2011
Live Session #9: Nothing Doing At The Fox
Last night it was a late trip to The Fox and a session on their £1/£1 tables. I arrived there at 10PM, put £200 down at the table and stayed till about 1:45AM. It was one of those painfully slow tables where players would take ages to make decisions, would have to be constantly reminded that it was their turn and regularly reminded what the bet was - even though it was obvious if they just LOOKED AT THE FUCKING CHIPS THE PLAYER JUST PUT IN!
Still, the pain was compounded by going card-dead for the entire session ( I got AKs once, a 77, 66 and a 55 - where only the AK won me any money - but apart from that zilch else to speak of) and getting zero opportunities to get involved in any action with the table maniac who arrived later at the table. I got up from the table £50 down (my 2nd losing live session of the year) and then headed to The Empire which was full and bustling as usual. Unfortunately, after putting my name down on the list and a 15 minute wait, I started getting tired and decided to get the bus back home.
This afternoon, it's a trip to The Emirates, courtesy of PKR, where I'll be enjoying the Arsenal v Sunderland match and then heading for another poker session at either The Fox or The Empire. Let the games begin! A trip report will follow.
Still, the pain was compounded by going card-dead for the entire session ( I got AKs once, a 77, 66 and a 55 - where only the AK won me any money - but apart from that zilch else to speak of) and getting zero opportunities to get involved in any action with the table maniac who arrived later at the table. I got up from the table £50 down (my 2nd losing live session of the year) and then headed to The Empire which was full and bustling as usual. Unfortunately, after putting my name down on the list and a 15 minute wait, I started getting tired and decided to get the bus back home.
This afternoon, it's a trip to The Emirates, courtesy of PKR, where I'll be enjoying the Arsenal v Sunderland match and then heading for another poker session at either The Fox or The Empire. Let the games begin! A trip report will follow.
Friday 4 March 2011
A Fun Weekend Awaits
It's now Friday morning and I'm in the school library while I have a free lesson. Work is getting a bit stressful (well, everyday is stressful) and I have a mountain of work to do so I thought I'd do a quick blog entry for therapeutic reasons.
Even though the weather remains bloody freezing, I think I might take myself off into town tonight for a session at either The Fox or The Empire. I still haven't been to The Vic in ages but the general feeling is that the games are tougher there and I reckon my edge at The Empire, these days, is far too big to ignore. It depends how I feel but at the moment I'd say there's about a 60% chance that I'll be heading into town.
Being a VIP member at PKR (diamond or platinum membership) does have its perks and the good people at PKR have invited me to watch the Arsenal v. Sunderland game at The Emirates on Saturday afternoon. Now I'm not the huge football nut that I used to be and I don't particularly have a big interest in the result but I think it'll be an interesting experience. Afterwards, again, as the journey home will involve travelling through the heart of London, I think I may just pop into either The Fox or The Empire again for an evening session. Again, though, this will depend on my mood.
Finally, on Sunday (and I will need to check this when I get home today) PKR are holding a $35 MTT with a mega-slow structure. It's actually the slowest structure I have ever seen in an online tourney and certainly for that buy-in. As far as I recall, you get 10000 chips, 30 minutes for each level on the clock and it runs over two days!! i.e. an evening session on Sunday night followed by an evening session on the Monday.
Anyway, roll on 3 o'clock for chrissake, for chrissake roll on 3 o'clock!!
Even though the weather remains bloody freezing, I think I might take myself off into town tonight for a session at either The Fox or The Empire. I still haven't been to The Vic in ages but the general feeling is that the games are tougher there and I reckon my edge at The Empire, these days, is far too big to ignore. It depends how I feel but at the moment I'd say there's about a 60% chance that I'll be heading into town.
Being a VIP member at PKR (diamond or platinum membership) does have its perks and the good people at PKR have invited me to watch the Arsenal v. Sunderland game at The Emirates on Saturday afternoon. Now I'm not the huge football nut that I used to be and I don't particularly have a big interest in the result but I think it'll be an interesting experience. Afterwards, again, as the journey home will involve travelling through the heart of London, I think I may just pop into either The Fox or The Empire again for an evening session. Again, though, this will depend on my mood.
Finally, on Sunday (and I will need to check this when I get home today) PKR are holding a $35 MTT with a mega-slow structure. It's actually the slowest structure I have ever seen in an online tourney and certainly for that buy-in. As far as I recall, you get 10000 chips, 30 minutes for each level on the clock and it runs over two days!! i.e. an evening session on Sunday night followed by an evening session on the Monday.
Anyway, roll on 3 o'clock for chrissake, for chrissake roll on 3 o'clock!!
Wednesday 2 March 2011
Bubbling The PKR Social Satellite
Bubble bubble toil and trouble:
This satellite was for the PKR Social event which is to be held at The Fox Poker Club on the 26th March. I was quite far behind chip-wise but felt good taking this opponent on heads-up. I got it all-in on the flop with a set and got called with two-pair. Funny, he hit runner runner flush. Funny...
This satellite was for the PKR Social event which is to be held at The Fox Poker Club on the 26th March. I was quite far behind chip-wise but felt good taking this opponent on heads-up. I got it all-in on the flop with a set and got called with two-pair. Funny, he hit runner runner flush. Funny...
Tuesday 1 March 2011
Cold Cold Cold
11:30PM and really not much to report about this first day of the month apart from the fact that it's still so god damn cold! I may have mentioned it before but the British winter can be so bleedin' depressing and waking up to a cold, gloomy morning, day in/day out, just before going to work, over 4 months can be a real drag. It's like December is happening all over again. Just one warm, sunny day. Please.
Oh, and to add more insult to injury - I got a parents' evening to do on Thursday night as well. That's another day tied to work until 7PM where I won't get home till eight in the evening.
Woe is me!
Oh, and to add more insult to injury - I got a parents' evening to do on Thursday night as well. That's another day tied to work until 7PM where I won't get home till eight in the evening.
Woe is me!
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