January 2009 results.

I played about 107,000 ring game hands, 170 S&Gs, and 40 MTTs/ freerolls/satellites this month. Everything considered I made over ~$3400 from poker this month. I am going to try to make more money next month by not playing so much micro limits and get back to big winnings of 2007!

PLO($11) MTT victory!

Ship first place for $647. My stats at the final table were an amusing 65/35/6. I am happy with the win and my play in the final 2 tables.

I played 20 MTTs in the last 7 hours. 3 freerolls - all bust. 8 satellites for 1020 FPPs - got T$18.6. And 9 regular tourneys, 8 busts and 1 win sounds good to me. The two disappointing tourneys were the Stud MTT where I was 2 out of the money, and one of the NLO8+ tourneys were I had an awesome stack and then lost 2 flips and a bad beat and my $30.50 was gone.

Vengeance is mine!

Since a picture is worth 1000 words ...

Notables:

• I did not think I was playing so tight at NL($2)(6-max).
• I did not think I was playing so loose at PL($0.25), but there was some short-handed.
• I never recovered $85 of lost allin EV, it doesn't work like that.
• The only way I won at NL($2) was that the 6 allins that I won were bigger than the 4 allins that I lost. I am not sure why that data mining site shows a loss of $60 for me, when I won $70. Seems like they are missing the important stuff.
• At PL($0.25) a poor guy, umuckinme, suffered a lot of the wrath, when I beat his AA, AA, KK via flopped sets: 22, 99, 33.
• I was real excited about posting this vengeance post until right as I was closing my tables: 66vKJ a massive spazz 3-bet allin on a 6Q7 flop **DOOM** 53
• I am not sure why I have no interest in reviewing my winning hands. Maybe there is less to learn from them.
• I will post the monthly update tomorrow. I hit over 100k hands for the month, and as a personal challenge I profitably hit over 10k hands at 7 different levels.

Doomswitch?

I played about 30 minutes (575 hands) of PL($0.25). I had a suspicious session which reminds me of my session on January 1st where I lost 14 buyins at NL($0.25). Check it ...

96v77 allin on 587 flop *DOOM* 82. -$30

AAvQQ AIPF *DOOM* 923Q6. -$23

TTv98 allin on turn 8T6 *DOOM* 75. -$15

44v99 cold deck allin T94T7. -$13

Q8vAA allin on 828 flop *DOOM* A3. -$12

T9vAT cold deck allin on JKQ flop. -$12

Awesome 30 minutes of my life, it did not feel random. Lost $101 and was $102 below allin EV at micro limits in a short period. Those are low dollar amounts, but that is 4 buyins of EV in 30 minutes.

FTP is softer than PS.

Here are a couple representative hands from FTP today.
AAvKTo AIPF http://www.cardschat.com/hand/6457
AAvJTo AIPF http://www.cardschat.com/hand/6458

On another note, can I fold this river after the turn check-minraise and the river shove? Opponent's stats are 40/12/2 over 50 hands.
99 on 3T986 board http://www.cardschat.com/hand/6459
Will say the results later, wanted some unbiased comments.

FTOPS XI stake received.

I got staked by Shakunimama8 (a mid-high stakes solid winning regular) for $1073 with a 70%/30% split(no make-up) for the following events:
Event #3,. $216 Stud,. Thurs. 2/5. 6pm
Event #14, $535 HORSE, Tues.. 2/10 6pm
Event #21, $322 Razz,. Friday 2/13 6pm

Will give an update after each event. I have no idea why they don't have a Stud H/L event, which is my favorite.

Staking for the FTOPS XI?

I am looking for staking for the FTOPS XI. Specifically for Event #14, the $535 HORSE event on 2/10/09 at 6pm PST. Last time I got staked for the $215 HORSE on PS it worked out well.

Other stats and records are in various posts on my blog, and all three previous staking results have been positive. I am open to be staked in other or multiple events. Let me know if you want to stake me fully or partially.

Hangover.

Today is my first hangover in about 8 years. It doesn't feel good. In poker news, I have been trying to get my VPIP under 20% for the first time in over a year and it is working out so far.

Think before going allin.

Stacks: UTG+1 with $16.50, MP1 with $93.20, MP2 with $110.90, CO with $84.15, BTN with $103.00, SB with $22.25, BB with $19.35, UTG with $100.00
Dealt to MP1:K♠ A♥
Preflop:
UTG raises $3 to $4
1 players fold.
Hero calls [$4]
1 players fold.
CO calls [$4]
3 players folded.
Total folds this street: 5
Potsize: $13.5
Flop: A♣ A♦ 10♥
UTG: checks
Hero bets [$6]
4 players fold.
UTG raises $19 to $25
Hero raises $64.20 to $89.20 [ all-in ]
UTG calls [$64.20]
Total folds this street: 1
Potsize: $191.9
Turn: J♦
River: 9♥
Results: UTG shows a full house, Tens full of Aces: 10♣ 10♠

Sometimes you just have to think a little more before going allin. One could argue that this is just a cold deck, but looking closer I commit an additional $83 into $25 pot on the flop. The original raiser is UTG with preflop stats of 10/8. His UTG raising range is probably TT+, AK ... possibly AQs/AQ. Against that range and the way the action went I think I should have folded (there are 3 combos of AK, 3 combos of TT, and 4 combos of AQ which may not be in his range).

Stop checking allin EV.

It is time to stop checking allin EV. I have been looking at how I ran after almost every session, and now I am thinking that I have just been wasting my time. After looking at the current month as a whole containing 67k+ hands, and 1500+ allins it seems right on.

Forgot full ring.

Somehow I forgot how to play full ring after playing almost only 6-max for the last 3 weeks. I am pretty sure this is not how to do it, looking at my stats below. 28/23/4 with a 70% ATS is just ridiculous.

I played pretty bad. After 9 hours of NL($0.50) the last 2 days to get 10,800 hands in, I honestly don't know how I won anything. I had a $450 downswing in the middle, losing KKvAA twice, QQvKK twice, KKvset, QQvset, not to mention did horribly at flips, timed out with AA, AK, JJ when my computer crashed, and I also ran $100 below EV. Here is the least fun hand: http://www.cardschat.com/hand/6249 (3% shot allin on flop for $80).

I wanted to note that there was a suspicious short stacker, pusha82, who won 14/14 showdowns with a 70% W$WSF. I also went to war with a regular, RSSmoot, who 3-bet me like 20 times. Here are the two suckout river flushes I made on him as revenge: http://www.cardschat.com/hand/6250 http://www.cardschat.com/hand/6251

16 tabling 6-max.

I tried to up my tables to 16 at NL($0.50)(6-max) to make more money since things have been so breakeven. As much fun as getting 1400 hands/hour is, it was not successful, and also left me extremely tired and had to take a nap. I am going back to 13-tabling instead of 16-tabling, and I will have to settle for 1150 hands/hour.

Grindin ...

Four hours(4800 hands) of NL($1)(6-max) for nothing. I feel like the games are getting tough to the point that it is difficult to beat the rake($319 MGR) ... or is it just me?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jN9nGsiCTQ

Heads-up rake is too high.

I have been mostly playing heads-up and 3-4 handed on FTP. Today I busted a guy who had $36 in NL($1)(heads-up), yet I still lost $2. So in 246 hands, for 57 minutes of play we payed $38 in rake. I think that is a bit ridiculous.

Here are my stats at FTP this month (only 2500 hands, also won ~$50 in 100 hands of heads-up PLO, and ~$30 in 100 S&Gs), the majority ~50k hands this month have been on PS. I don't know if I am playing too loose, even for heads-up.

Lack of updates.

I haven't been updating the blog because I have been busy and also not much to say. I have about $400 at FTP now after my rakeback came. I have a decent amount at PS and played about 20k hands (16 hours) of NL($0.50)(6-max) at 2.5 PTBB/100 since my last update.

I haven't been playing as much volume since I am back to the gym on a regular basis on a 5-day split. Work has also been a bit busy since the start of the new year.
1. Chest/Abs
2. Back/Traps/Abs
3. Legs/Calves
4. Shoulders/Triceps/Biceps/Forearms
5. Cardio - 5 miles
I overweighted Abs since I undertrained them for the last 17 years. I have been back on this for about a month now and it feels good.

Will give some poker related post later this month.

Cable/Phone out today.

I missed the SuperNova $50k freeroll.
I was probably going to win it this week too.

I went and rented some movies since I have been mostly getting caught up on chores all day that I had been putting off. Back to the grind this evening after some movies.

I will probably try to grind out some more FTP raffle tickets at the micro S&Gs in the S&G Madness promotion. I got 6 tickets and $20 so far from the promotion. I have small funds at FTP. After the staking I had $12 and 16,000 points. I entered nine 1,800 FTP satellites and won 6 tokens (more than the 3 expected), and then proceeded to lose all of those tokens, but still got $20 from knocking out 5 players. With that $20 I grinded up to $110 playing short-stacked and short-handed. Then after the first volley in the S&G Madness that left me at $150 after I went 6-7-7-26 in 46 tourneys.

Even at NL($0.25).

I decided I wasn't going to play another hand of anything at PS until I got even at NL($0.25)(6-max) this month. Finally it happened, and I am only 6 buyins below allin EV. I guess I will move up, because I paid $351 rake, $464 MGR, and got hardly any player points (rakeback). It was an awesome journey after losing 29 buyins in one day, being down as much as 16 full-stack buyins to finally get back to even.

Between the allin EV problems, and the fact I was dealt AA 67 times instead of the expected 87 times, I am hoping to run better as I start NL($0.50)(6-max). I am probably not going back to full ring this year, and I am not going to be playing more than 13 tables at a time, because I don't want to play stacked anymore.

More FPP fun.

Lost 5400 FPP in a hyper-turbo to $215, 77 can't beat A2s AIPF ...
river flush.
Did not win $215 in 5400 hyper-turno, when AK can't beat AJ AIPF ...
river straight, got 3rd for return of FPP.
Lost 2250 FPP in turbo to $215, when AA can't beat KQ on AJT flop...

Not too many more FPP to lose.

Happy New Year!

I will quit online poker over the next two months.

Here is my session today. I somehow lost 13 full stacks, and then 16 short stacks at NL($0.25)(6-max). The "players" are too tough. Besides the joke of a graph below where I am $350 below allin EV, that is not even counting the hundreds of times I had to fold when the miricle card got there and it is not on the graph.