So I got the money moved

So there we go. As of tonight I have all my active money at Full Tilt. (Well, almost). I have $797.50 there, and $280 in Big Felter. But lets just say that honestly I am not too sure of when I might get that back...so I am leaving it out of the bank roll right now (I mean I could not play with it, so I guess I should not count it).

So there we go. I am all ready to start. I played around last night and was able to double up one table quite quickly. But I did figure out another hole in my game. When I am ready to shut things down for the night I have to be quicker in closing the tables. I say that because I suddenly turn into an action/bluff junkie as I try to squeeze out the last of the money from the tables. I must have given back almost 60 percent of my winnings last night in the last 5 minutes, and I know I have done that before. It is one thing to take a bad beat as things are winding down, it is another to just give it away.

Actually making the change right now

I was thinking. What is the point to having my bank roll (a good chunk of it) sitting at a sight like Hollywood Poker that had so few things going for it. Mainly the lack of player and the inability to have player to player transfers were the 2 biggest ones. So I just went and sucked the last of my money out of there and I am going to move it to Full Tilt where the other part of my bank roll is.

This will be much better when it comes to wanting to move money back and forth to Poker stars and I can just use other players to move the money.

I also feel this is my last "push" to try and prove to myself that I can actually play this game. I am not even sure anymore if I can or not, but I figure it is time to find out. I know the fundamentals but I think there are soo many other players out there that do as well that I must admit I have little or no edge to them. Especially when I look at other players who are doing well and the plays they make that I am just no where near there yet. But I am going to try.

So later I will update and restart the bank roll tracker at the bottom of the page so that I can really make a run. I guess I should also go after Felter at some point to get the 250 that is midding from there that I leant him. Does not look like that is ever going to come back from poker anyhow.

So here comes the fresh start. I hope to be able to grind out a profit at the full ring .25 cent games for a while and gradually work my way back up to the .50-$1 games that were profitable for me. And I figure the best place to do that is where there are a lot of player. When I can not even find 3 full tables at Hollywood I gotta start asking myself really who am I playing against. And how many of them might be fish.

So here goes.......

Well that sucked

Wow. Just finishing up here but did I ever play some impotent poker, especially in the cash games. In the sit-goes did not do well either, but that at least had some bad luck (Lost a couple of kicker races).

What pisses me off though is that way I was playing in the cash games, especially when I wanted to go in patient. What i was doing was playing the second tier of hands (ok) but playing them BAD. I am talking about suited connectors and the K-10s of the world. I was limping late a couple of times, and that let junk hit paired boards and take hands away from me.

In addition I think all my continuation bets were called when I did not have position, so I think there is something there.

Anyhow, so finished this down something close to a full buyin over the 2 tables, but 11 dollars in sitngos. So not a great night. Also am thinking that there we soo few players on that it may be time to move on to another site with more fish. If I get anywhere near $400 I am going to do the big move.

Later

Ok. Here we go

Played a little bit this afternoon, and not much happened (Down a couple of dollars) Lets try a couple of cash tables (.25) with a $5 sitngo going for an hour or so.

I believe this was a good fold....

TEXAS_HOLDEM, NO_LIMIT, P4-56105748-627
played at "Boston" for USD RM from 2007-12-16 15:49 until 2007-12-16 15:50
Seat 1: x gigi1952 ($10.80 in chips)
Seat 2: ilovetft ($8.30 in chips)
Seat 3: stonemann1 ($18.80 in chips)
Seat 4: soundb0y ($5 in chips)
Seat 5: fiskehans ($23.10 in chips)
Seat 6: J_a_c_e_k ($24.75 in chips)
Seat 7: sascha.s ($25 in chips)
Seat 8: zarbel ($21.75 in chips)
Seat 9: Grinding Up ($24.60 in chips)
Seat 10: roma93 ($21.45 in chips)

ANTES/BLINDS
roma93 posts blind ($0.15), x gigi1952 posts blind ($0.25), soundb0y posts blind ($0.25).

PRE-FLOP
ilovetft folds, stonemann1 folds, soundb0y checks, fiskehans bets $1, J_a_c_e_k folds, sascha.s folds, zarbel folds, Grinding Up bets $1.75, roma93 folds, x gigi1952 folds, soundb0y folds, fiskehans calls $0.75.
FLOP [board cards: 3H,5D,QH ]fiskehans bets $4, Grinding Up bets $8, fiskehans calls $4.
TURN [board cards: 3H,5D,QH,JS ]fiskehans bets $4, Grinding Up folds.
RIVER [board cards: 3H,5D,QH,JS ]fiskehans wins $23.15.

Finished some staking challenges

So I have been concentrating a lot on Groovy-T's staking challenges, and used them to work on my game. What Trav was doing was giving us first 10, and then 20 dollars and asking us to do what we could over the next month.

I was happy as I was able to more than double my stake the last time with some good disciplined play. I am hoping that the patience I had to exhibit will come to fruition as I go back to Full Tilt and Hollywood. Although I do have to say that the idea of moving my money over to Stars does not hurt as they were SOOO many games there. But I do want to see if at least ONCE at could get the free money from Rake the Rake. We shall see.

Anyhow, hope to have some more things to post here

Taking some more small steps

I took some time and played a little on the hollywood account. I am still determined to slowly grow this account with really tight bank roll management. I think that I am too good to not have it grow over time.

Managed to make 60 dollars today playing .15-.25 cents (My home for the next 6 months I am sure) and it could have been even higher. I took a full house over full house up the hoop when my A-10 ran into A-Q on an A-10-8-Q-x board. Ouch. But I had the other table over $100 so all in all not bad.

I also signed up for the tracking program https://www.checkyourbets.com/ a good tracking program. Name there is SlurpeeDude if you want to add me as a friend.

Also should get around to signing up for that hand displayer program, but have not yet.

Net net is that I grew my bank roll by over 10% today, so I gotta be happy. Let's hope it continues.

9th.

Finished 9th. Got A-9 in vs A-3, but the first card up was the 3. Good times though.
Karl Copp
Field Consultant
7-11 Canada.

Final table.

10 left. Top 5 money. But I have to be somewhere 8th-10th in chips. Have maybe 4-5 BB left. Only 1 move. Will see how it goes but weeeee!!

The bad beat that takes me out will be posted soon. Lol.
Karl Copp
Field Consultant
7-11 Canada.

St James Legion Tourny.

Here for a 40 dollar buy in. Down to 27 or so, but I will need more chips soon. Have a semi loose image but will tighten up and pay aggresive when in. Sense a double up or bust soon. Top 5 paid.
Karl Copp
Field Consultant
7-11 Canada.

Still playing...

Not a lot on the poker action note...but what there has been has been positive.

Had a blast as Kesh's house, and due to some staking situation with Dave I actually cashed. LOL. Gotta like it.

Then in this stake challenge at Poker Starts I have managed to turn the $10 into $17. Who knew that the $1.20 sitngo's are soo soft. LOL

And finally tonight I made my return to the Hu's on First cash game. Unlimited $50 buy ins. Only bought in once..and took second.

So overall not bad, just not a lot of time. That being said though, my game has never been this solid and I hope that as the winter goes on, things slow down and I can play more.

Part of a poker Mutual Fund.

Local poker board is holding a staking challenge. Rules below. Basically you all start with $10 and have a month. But we are working together. Sort of like communist poker LOL. Here are the rules...

You are staked and allowed to take part in this challenge at the consent of the backers and if at any time the backer decides you should be removed you must transfer all cash back to the backer immediately. If you don't you are a little bitch and will be treated as such. Only active PCH members who post often and participate in other PCH events will be considered for this challenge.Rules and Regulations:
1. You must start with an empty account. Preferably at PokerStars but if you already have money there you can ask for it to go to another popular site that has the ability to transfer for the amount of the stake, and is agreed to by the backer
2. Before any money is transferred the account information including password will be emailed to the organizer (Big Felter) (7-11@mts.net). Felter will take a screen shot of your account history screen and account screen to show balance at zero. (Any loose change in the account is forfeit into the challenge if it is there)
3. Horses may not change the password for the duration of the contest unless they email all of the above to let them know in advance including new password
4. Horses may not withdraw money for the duration of the contest.
5. If you bust out and want to use the account for something else you need to post saying you are out. Felter will take closing screen shots and then email or PM you to tell you to go ahead and change your password. There will be much sass and back talk from the PCH members when you bust out, prepare for it you likely will deserve it
6. Felter will spot check the balance at least once during the contest, the amount must equal what you have posted.
7. Players must not turn off the option to make themselves unsearchable at any time during the Challenge
8. By playing in this challenge you accept that there are some security risks that can't reasonably be aoided and you hold none of the organizers accountable to any amount of money that you might claim has gone missing from your account. None of the money is yours until the challenge is at it's end and the final transfer of your prize goes back to you.
9. This includes freeroll cashes made on the account during the promo. If you are going to cash huge and don't want to share, don't do it on the acount that you are using for the promo
10. If you bust out you will still be included in the 20% team shared payout. However, if it is deemed you did not put in a full effort (i.e. hardly played, blew the whole stake immediately, etc.), you will most likely NOT be considered for the next challenge. Also, Big Felter and GroovyT reserve the right to remove anyone from the challenge who has obviously not put in much effort and/or play, has not posted on the forum, and/or has violated any other rules. If you are removed, any remaining funds will be transferred to the group.
How we are going to do it:
1. Backer will transfer $10 to each of the horses on the same day (as decided on by GroovyT)2. That day is the start of a one month time frame
3. The challenge will stop at midnight on the same date of the next month (so if starts on the 16th, then closes 16th at midnight (end of 16th day))
4. There will be a new forum area where each horse has a thread where we encourage you to BLOG your progress and game plan. There are a bunch of ways to do this, and we encourage you to share yours, before and during, what worked, what didn't etc.
5. You should post in your thread that you are playing when you sit down to play (this is more for fun so that the guys who are on and want to cheer you on can)
6. You are required to post your start cash and end cash in your thread for every session
7. There will be one thread where Felter will post a PCH challenge group summary (weekly or likely more frequently) likely with graphs and other crap that is cool but we don't need (but I like to do)
8. You may play any game you choose, any stake, tourney or cash, you do not need to follow Chris Ferguson's rules (but it is recommended)

Money Handling and pay outs:
1. Over riding all other uses for the moneys left over at the end of the challenge is that the backers are paid back to zero before anything else is considered. This will be done by taking $10 from each player. The $10 from any player that has gone bust will be taken evenly from the remaining players evenly. Any player with less than $10 will be drained to $0 and the remaining amount (to get to $10) will be taken evenly out of the further remaining players.a. Example a: 10 players all have $10+ each pays $10b. Example b: 10 players 9 bust out, one makes to $100, last man standing pays the $100 back before anything else is donec. Example c: 10 players, 5 bust out 1 has $5 the other four have $50+. The player with $5 goes to $0, the reamaining four evenly split the $95 left at $23.75 each2. Once the principle is pulled out of the equation (as per above) the profit will be split as follows:a. 40% of net profit goes to the backer (divided based on the percentage of cash put up by each backer)b. 40% of net profit goes to the horse who earned itc. 20% of the net profit is divided evenly among the among the team of horses (including those that bust out)d. To get the final pay out I have a spreadsheet that calculates everything. The simplest way to settle up is to transfer the total amount back to Travis, then he will pay out the with a transfer back as per the spreadsheet I will give him.

Played a little poker in Dallas, and got a live tourny tonight.

Hey there.

So 2 out of the last 5 weeks I have been down in Dallas, and so not a lot of time for online poker (Can not connect from there...damn American laws). Anyhow, but I did get some live action in there with some sitngos. Now there were a lot of beginners, but in the first time I lost quick on a bad, booze fueled bluff on my part. Second game though I challenged myself that I should win, as there was only one guy who even sort of knew anything beyond basic beer poker, and he was on my left. So I always played him aggressive, and it turned out to be a long cake walk. Even when most of my chips got sucked out I thought I would still win..and managed too.

Tonight off to Kesh's home tourny, and I think that it will be a little stiffer competition. I hope to make top 3, and if I do, play for the win like a mad man.

And so today to get ready for that tourny I played a 10 dollar sitngo just to prime the pumps. It was soo funny because after one guy was out, and most people had around 1000 or so, I had 3200. Played a little too lose in the middle, but caught it, focused my aggression and won. So I night little confidence builder. Will promise to post the horrid suck outs later.

Gettin a little better.

Played some nice steady poker for 2 sessions. One was a "losing" one but except for one hand my control really limited the losses (Less than 1 buy in over 3 tables) so not bad...definite improvement.

The second session was today and the opposite. Except for 2 hands near the end (Fuck I suck the last 5 minutes of a session...and I mean AFTER I decide that I am leaving after this rotation) giving some money back. But did grow the roll a little, and am back over 500 at Hollywood.

Also played a live SitnGo last night with fish, and although it was low stakes and only one other pseudo player at the table, it was a nice practice to try and control the game...and so I won.

All in all nice...just wish I had more time to play.

Humilty before Bankrupsty, that is what I always say.

So went away for a week for work to Dallas, and while I was there I was thinking about this poker thing of mine. What exactly am I trying to do. I mean I know since I went to Cuba I have not played a lot, but and I am ok with playing less. What has bugged me is letting peer pressure and ego let me play a game that has NEVER been profitable for me. I am specifically speaking to the short handed games. I just do not have that game yet. My game is more trap and wait.... I think I play big hands well in big handed games. That is what made all my bank roll. So I really had to sit back and say what am I doing here.....is it time to cash out what I have left (about 1000 over both Full tilt and HP, maybe a little less) and buy something, or go back to what made me money....

...Well as I hate to admit defeat I am going back to where the money was. I have demoted myself to 25 cent 10 person tables....(will go to 50 cent later) and see what happens. Tonight was the first night in a long time and I was able to make almost $100 dollars doing it, and that was while losing 1 buy in at one table. So that was nice.

Also played a 96 person person $5 dollar tourny and that was nice...finished 5th. Big part of the game there was being patient.

So all in all not that bad. Looking forward to some more results. Not sure how often I am going to be able to play, but I do want to play smart.

Gotta either manage the bank roll, or just take it out. Lets see what happens!

Even better....

Fuck I did not see this one...and that makes me mad because maybe I should have. Hit the high straight and all I heard was the roar......lol.

Texas Hold'em $0.50-$1 NL (real money), hand #668,604,151
Table puma23 xxxx's HE, 2 Aug 2007 8:12 PM ET

Seat 3: steven1338 ($51.25 in chips)
Seat 5: puma23 xxxx ($53.85 in chips)
Seat 8: tillhelm0 ($38.15 in chips)
Seat 9: Kindek ($38.40 in chips)
Seat 10: Grinding Up [ 7S,7D ] ($49.20 in chips)
ANTES/BLIND
Spuma23 xxxx posts blind ($0.25), tillhelm0 posts blind ($0.50).

PRE-FLOP
Kindek calls $0.50,
Grinding Up calls $0.50,
steven1338 folds,
puma23 xxxx calls $0.25,
tillhelm0 checks.

FLOP
[board cards 4D,6C,5H ]
puma23 xxxx checks,
tillhelm0 checks,
Kindek bets $0.50,
Grinding Up bets $1.50,
puma23 xxxx folds,
tillhelm0 calls $1.50,
Kindek bets $4,
Grinding Up calls $3,
tillhelm0 folds.

TURN [board cards 4D,6C,5H,9C ]
Kindek checks, Grinding Up checks.

RIVER [board cards 4D,6C,5H,9C,3H ]
Kindek bets $8,
Grinding Up bets $16,
Kindek bets $25.40 and is all-in,
Grinding Up calls $17.40.

SHOWDOWNKindek shows [ 8C,7C ]Grinding Up shows [ 7S,7D ]Kindek wins $77.80.

Easy come easy go. :)

Just to show Felter that it goes both ways.....All in on the flush draw is one way to play it I guess. LOL.

Texas Hold'em $0.50-$1 NL (real money), hand #668,480,232
Table 6HELLRAISER9's HE, 2 Aug 2007 7:48 PM ET
Seat 1: Toma 78 ($18.60 in chips)
Seat 2: Jacksony187 ($77.20 in chips)
Seat 4: wisedm85 ($83.40 in chips)
Seat 5: kessieeh ($21.40 in chips)
Seat 7: ana75 ($66.80 in chips)
Seat 8: Grinding Up [ 2D,2H ] ($46.25 in chips)
ANTES/BLINDS

wisedm85 posts blind ($0.25), kessieeh posts blind ($0.50).

PRE-FLO
Pana75 folds,
Grinding Up calls $0.50,
Toma 78 calls $0.50,
Jacksony187 folds,
wisedm85 folds,
kessieeh checks.

FLOP [board cards 6C,2C,4H ]
kessieeh bets $3,
Grinding Up bets $6,
Toma 78 folds,
kessieeh bets $6,
Grinding Up bets $10,
kessieeh bets $11.90 and is all-in,
Grinding Up calls $4.90.
TURN [board cards 6C,2C,4H,9C ]
RIVER [board cards 6C,2C,4H,9C,QH ]
SHOWDOWN
kessieeh shows [ 4C,QC ]Grinding Up shows [ 2D,2H ]kessieeh wins $42.05.
SUMMARY
Dealer: Jacksony187Pot: $43.55, (including rake: $1.50)
Toma 78 loses $0.50
Jacksony187 loses $0wisedm85 loses $0.25
kessieeh bets $21.40, collects $42.05, net $20.65
Grinding Up loses $21.40

Just have to be patient.

At Micro limit (anything less than $1NL) I really believe that one of the largest keys to profitability (and for sure mine) is just to be patient...wait....take it easy....wait for the hand...and just take the easy money. Do not fight for the pots.

I feel that most players when they start out just do not have the patience to wait..and they eventually panic or get board or something, and want to win more pots per hour. I also think that there are more of these players at the lower limits.

So just wait. The hands will come, and you can turn most of your sessions positive.

Ok, this sounds retarded and simple, but it is true. At this level of discipline in all areas of your game is what I believe the pros have.

Been busy, but pokering more now.

With the summer months not as much time for poker, but i want to clear a big bonus I have by Aug 16th, so I am going to find the time to play more.

As you can see by the chart at the bottom I had a downturn for a bit, but that was not really running bad. I tilted a lot of that money off in 2 sessions if I remember, and that made me mad. I just refuse to believe I am beat sometimes. Wish I had the details to post on the hands, but really it was obvious I beat, and made a bad crying call just to be sure. Anyhow, that was like 200 dollars.

So I smartened up, and really started to try and put people on hands. That has been working well. Keep asking myself, what do they have, and what am I beating. Since then I have almost clawed it all back. Had a nice 4th place finish in the Canadian poker night last night, and almost quadrupled up a .50 table today to 183 dollars, and it was not all in one or 2 hands. I really did grind it up.

On one hand though there was a guy who was more aggressive, and kept raising to $2. I get KK and raise it to 5, he makes it 12 instantly. I think....does he really have AA? Odds are no because this is not a rock, and this is his standard bet. He has made many re-raises at the table already. So I push 102 at his remaining 40 something, and he waits...and calls. He had QQ. I am glad I went with his read...and it held up.

Other than that it was just a matter of the increased aggression. I hope to continue this trend. I would love to have $1000 again by Sept. Lets see if it can be done.

Getting better...but only through discipline.

Just really working on 2 things. On about a 180 heater due to:

a) Making more value type bets when I think I am ahead, instead of checking marginal wins down, to get more profit per win.
b) Believing when I am beat and stopping to make dumb ass calls.

I really think with this focus things could stay better...but watch the big bad run that I know is coming crush my confidence. I do really believe though that what I read about Chris Ferguson and his only changing the size of his opening bets due to position, but otherwise keeping them the same regardless of cards has really increased my profit and forced me to play more aggressive with those hands that I would normally limp with. I mean hey, if it is good enough to play...then play. That has been the hardest part so far.

Felter 2 - Slurpee Dude 0.

So Felter and I have started a heads up match. $5 a game on HP.
I want to do this as I want to refine my heads up game, and he is a good one to play. Should make for some interesting times. I want to play with a level of aggression that I am slightly uncomfortable with, and this is a safe forum to try so.

We played the first 2 games of the series tonight. In the major hands of each match I got my money in good, but once was only 60-40sh, the other 2 pair to a open ended straight. Good on him though. Well plaid and looking forward to this.

This guy was fun to play with...

There was a guy at a .50NL short handed table who was treating the bets like they were pennies. But he was catching. As you can see here he ran himself up to 600 dollars. Felter was steamin a little and called and said I had to come and sit at this table.

So I did and WOW did this guy like to bet. For a while we have 117 average pot. LMAO. That was nuts. Anyhow, so speaking of nuts that was all I played, and was as high as quadroupled up, and ended up tripled up as it was getting late and I was happy to bank that. Should have left earlier but I do have a bonus I need to finish this week. Anyhow, against a guy like that who you would not see that often, I guess that is what you do. He was over 90 percent hands played with 120 hands in poker tracker and was not slowing down. His opening bet was anywhere from 10-30 dollars to 100-600 dollars. Problem was...he would not loose. 3-5 against KK would turn into a straight. 4-9 would 2 pair someone. J 4 would hit JJ on the flop. It was funny to watch. Anyways, finished up 200 tonight playing bingo and it was ok.

Another nice Tourny Run

It was the Canadian Poker Night on Hollywood. A nice number of people (90 I think).
I Cruised to the final table, and was doing pretty good. Went out in 8th when I trapped a large stack with QQ vs his JJ, and he spiked it on the flop. Oh well. Money was in good.

And then there are those hands you are SURE you are winning...

Texas Hold'em $0.50-$0.50 NL (Real Money), #453,743,815
Table Mount Vernon, 12 Jun 2007 10:51 PM ET
Seat 1: fffreezing ($4.10 in chips)
Seat 2: guslondon ($69.85 in chips)
Seat 3: daytona.. ($46.90 in chips)
Seat 4: Grinding Up ($45.75 in chips)
Seat 5: xkillaqueenx ($35.65 in chips)
Seat 6: iblis2k ($63.05 in chips)
Seat 7: HarryKings ($4.25 in chips)
Seat 8: erika1414 ($55.15 in chips)
Seat 9: vicver ($44.85 in chips)
Seat 10: Tangfastics ($50 in chips)

ANTES/BLINDS
guslondon posts blind ($0.25), daytona.. posts blind ($0.50), Tangfastics posts blind ($0.50).PRE-FLOPGrinding Up calls $0.50, xkillaqueenx folds, iblis2k bets $1, HarryKings folds, erika1414 calls $1, vicver folds, Tangfastics folds, fffreezing folds, guslondon calls $0.75, daytona.. calls $0.50, Grinding Up calls $0.50.

FLOP [board cards 4H,KH,9C ]
guslondon checks, daytona.. checks, Grinding Up bets $3.50, iblis2k bets $7, erika1414 folds, guslondon folds, daytona.. folds, Grinding Up bets $30, iblis2k calls $26.50.

TURN [board cards 4H,KH,9C,9H ]
Grinding Up bets $11.25 and is all-in, iblis2k calls $11.25.

RIVER [board cards 4H,KH,9C,9H,9S ]

SHOWDOWNGrinding Up shows [ 4D,4S ]iblis2k shows [ KC,JC ]iblis2k wins $93.50.

BECAUSE REMEMBER, YOU SHOULD ALWAYS WORRY ABOUT THE RUNNER RUNNER 2 OUTTERS!!

Sometimes poker confuses me...

This hand confuses me. I was sure I was beat....then I wasn't. So I pushed...and one. Not sure what to make of it.

Hand History:
View Previous Next hand for this table.
Texas Hold'em $1-$1 NL (Real Money), #453,710,051
Table Mombasa, 12 Jun 2007 10:28 PM ET
Seat 1: ender470 ($99 in chips)
Seat 2: HotLemon ($112.30 in chips)
Seat 3: rockoya ($45.50 in chips)
Seat 4: DonFerrum ($75.40 in chips)
Seat 5: Grinding Up ($113 in chips)
Seat 6: DR.MUZL ($118.20 in chips)
Seat 7: LucCaptan ($81.95 in chips)
Seat 8: HarryKings ($11 in chips)
Seat 9: John88888 ($117.90 in chips)
Seat 10: Jeremy-1986 ($143.35 in chips)
ANTES/BLINDSLucCaptan posts blind ($0.50), HarryKings posts blind ($1).PRE-FLOPJohn88888 folds, Jeremy-1986 folds, ender470 folds, HotLemon folds, rockoya calls $1, DonFerrum calls $1, Grinding Up bets $3.50, DR.MUZL folds, LucCaptan folds, HarryKings folds, rockoya calls $2.50, DonFerrum calls $2.50.

FLOP [board cards 7C,8D,3S ]rockoya checks, DonFerrum bets $6, Grinding Up bets $12, rockoya folds, DonFerrum bets $19, Grinding Up calls $13.

TURN [board cards 7C,8D,3S,2C ]DonFerrum bets $32, Grinding Up bets $84.50 and is all-in, DonFerrum calls $14.90 and is all-in.

RIVER [board cards 7C,8D,3S,2C,8S ]

SHOWDOWNGrinding Up shows [ QC,QH ]DonFerrum shows [ 9H,KH ]Grinding Up wins $37.60, Grinding Up wins $152.80.

Peg City online tourny

Played pretty good....but not for long enough :)

Good news: I "think" I outplayed some of the better players in the city on a couple of hands, and stacked one of the best.

Bad news: I have my chips to Felter which was really dumb, but I did not see the straight coming. Guess I could have turned it into a Full House on the river. But Bad Bad call on my part. Enjoy the $20 Felter!

Wow, what a bad week for local poker

For a couple of reasons, the first of course being...that I have not had much time to play. Thats right, until recently poker has been sort of on the backburner...but after enough pressure from Felter I am back on the saddle...just finished an hour session and more on that later.

But beyond that there is the fact that all the local poker clubs here in 'peg city were raised last thursday. 63 Police were involved in operation "Waste of tax payers money". It is a sad sad day when poker is the most pressing issue in the car theft/violent crime captical of Canada. If it were not for Ballhockey Felter and I would have been there last Thursday and would have gotten our court summons along with the rest of the people.

Now it is alleged that the poker rooms were taking a small rake (although officially it was donations only). Now would I say that a "couple of chips" might have made it into the box on occasion, maybe. But more than 95 percent of them would have had to have been DONATIONS, so the spirit of the law, at least at the Barca club, would never have been questioned. I have taken money out of the pots at our home game to buy pizza....(with agreement from player)....should I expect a raid?? Wait...is someoen at the door??

In regards to the session tonight it was what I am coming to expect. Once again I seem to avoid the wild swings that Felter has (even playing short handed) but never really down. Had 2 full handed $1 NL tables and a 5 person .50 NL table, and finished up probably around $60 total. I ama going to try and more enough now to take advantage of this rakeback program as with a stable game, it really and truly is free money. And how knows how long this cash cow will be around.

No real hands to post and did not win or lose any real large pots. Tables were so timid that if I did get a monster did not get paid much. But did manage to amp up the aggression and grind out a nice profit for the work I put it. We will see if this is a start of a trend...(Bet the next post starts with OHHH NOO!)

I remember when I played poker...

Just have not had a lot of time to play as of late, especially online. Which is really pissing me off as because of the time I have to think about playing, I feel my game is really coming along. I think patience is the biggest part of it.

I did play live last weekend and was happy with my place. 2 WPL tournies and did not money in either one, but did play well. 2 killer hands took me out.

First hand AK sooted, I make is 50 early. Blinds are VERY small. Anyhow, Ethan makes it 200 to go, and Joey calls. I feel they are not on monsters, so I MIGHT be able to steal, or might hit. So I make it 1000 more. Ethan goes into the tank...then calls. Joey insta calls with a much shorter stack.

Flop comes down A J 5. Soots do not matter. As I see the A turn over I instantly say ALL IN before I even see the other 2 cards, trying to get them a litte off their game. Ethan insta calls, and so does Joey!! LOL. Oh no.

Of course Ethan has JJ, and Joey has 55. So they each flop sets to my AA. To rub it in, the turn is another A. Their boats to my set, and I can not even hope the board pairs. (Gives one of them quads). River is a blank, and I am out. Replay the hand every which way (Just flat call the 200 preflop instead of raising) and Joey goes all in on the flop no matter what (shorter stack) and Ethan and I end up all in too anyhow. So it played itself.

Second tourny of the night, and we are half way through it. I have slightly more than starting stack. Get a free walk with Q 6 off. Flop comes down 2 3 5. Min bets and I call with my gut shot and overs. Before the turn comes down for kicks I call "Four!!" and it comes. lol. So I hit my gutshut on a mixed board. I push all in crazy like trying to look a little weak, and it was getting late. Up against 2 guys. The first guy...nice fold, looks at his set of fours..and folds. Wow. Nice. But the chip leader is looking at me, so I put on a show. I put out every weak tell I could. Even go so far as to knock over my chips. Then he finally calls and I instantly show him my 6 knowing I am HUGE. He flips over A 7. Small straight....and a gutshot to...thats right. 6 on the river, gives him a straight to the 7 to mine to the 6.

A 2 outter!! But i have never been happier as I GOT the call that I was no way thinking I was getting. Oh well. Thats poker.

Not a lot to update...

Played a little this week online, but I think I am like + or - 10 dollars total, and I can not really remember a memorable hand, so nothing there. Certainly not playing as much as I would like but there has just been too much going on with both my recovery and Nancy having her surgery yesterday.

Playing 3 tables right now and was down 40 in 10 minutes, and flat 5 minutes later. Lol. Thats poker.

And going to Ethans tonight for some more live action. Hope to do well there.

And I will update that chart at the bottom of the blog as soon as I get all my money back into the account. Damn Click2Pay will only allow you 410 a week.

Bah

Tale of 2 worlds right now...

Wow. Seems like I am living in Bizzaro world. The reason I say that is that right now my Live game has been VERY good, and my online game has been very bad (unlucky?). I dont know. All I know is that I can not win a cent online right now, but in person I can not lose.

Followed my tourny 4th at Barca with a nice cash session at Barca. Ok, after 4 hours there I left like 60 down. 1 - That is a huge improvement (lol) and 2, I was able to trust my reads, and get away from some VERY dangerous hands against what turned out to be monster hands like 3 times. So very happy.

And then today I went to my first WPL game in a while. Was card dead early, but did not donk off too many chips. Then caught a few cards, ramped up the aggression, got heads up against Jeff (whose game I respect every time I see him, and who also went card dead at the wrong time) and won. So still feeling pretty good about my life game. Not looking at cards till my play, and really watching for any semblance of tells, and trusting my reads.

So just gotta fix the live game. I am bearing the downward swing OK, but I do feel I am much better than I am getting right now. Damn Skalansky dollars do not pay the bills.

Win some and lose some...

Well overall I have to say that not looking at results I am REALLY happy with my poker right now. I say that because I can honestly say I am not sure when the last time that I got my money in bad was. A slight favorite at worst and like a ton of 82-18s. Online cash though... I am losing too many of them.

Oh well, we all run bad. I just have to have the discipline to RIDE it out and step down in limits. And I have. I hope that things improve.

Live things are going ok as well. Went down to the Barca Club for the first time since they brought the tournies back, and finished 4th out of 49. Cash was top 6 (7 after some weird deal) and so not bad. Actually very happy with the play considering I did not really get a lot of live hands. A lot of very directed post flop aggression on my part gave me the chips to get me to the final table.

So all in all I am happy, and just gotta be willing (and financed) to ride out the bad runs. But that is poker. (I hope!!)

Oh yeah....that's poker

So I am playing a little short handed tonight with Felter. Not a game that I am comfortable with, and only because I always seem to take it up the hoop, and so probably never really comfortable with the up and down swings. I don't feel the beats are any worse there, it is just that short handed you are going to be involved more, so they are going to come more often. And I just don't think that I am comfortable with that at the limits I want to play at. (No wonder Felter goes bust...but that is another story for another time).

So yeah. Hand is there is me and a guy who has been trying to bully the table.

One flop I have top pair good kicker, and he bets a little to big so I call.

Turn in a blank, and so he moves all in. I replay the hand over and over, and feel that I am winning. I call.

The river did complete his straight, and so whatever he wins. But oddly I FINALLY felt better about the call, then about losing the hand. I was right. So he got my money this time...good for him. I am going to trust my reads, I did, and I won some nice skalansky dollars there. Even if the real ones were gone.

I'm back

Wow. I am back from a semi-unplanned retirement. Here is what happened. Went to Cuba, came back...Neteller kicked out Canada Players. Took out my money. Put some back in...had an account issue with Ongame where-as I was unable to re-deposit much money at once. Created a new account. (Grinding Up). Got sick. Hosptial. Surgery. 2 weeks of long recovery. And here. I am back. Today. Starting my career again.

So what do I have. Well in that time I won $22 tourny online with the Peg City hustling guys. Fun tourny with a TON OF CHOPS on my part. Should I have won?? Prob not. Did I?? Yep??

And of course I got to take Fetler Out. Always feels good there.

My bank roll will be a little lower. About $1600 or so I would think as I had to spend some of the money while off sick.

But anyways. Lets got back to the game so I can find all my soul baring flaws and point them out here.

Thank and it is hard to type with the body racked from coming off of all the damn pain killers.. (lol)


See ya at the felt!!

We all knew it was coming!!

The gravy train could only run so long. After my big win this week at the tourny my online game has ran into a vicious painful run. Each session seems to start with a fairly hard beat and then just trickle from there.

I will update the charts when i get home, but right now I am sitting on 2253, which is about 250-300 down from my high, and all pretty much this week. I am going to look at poker tracker and can pin it down to about 4-7 hands where most of the money went.

Now I have to be careful here, as each time I lost I was rivered I think maybe 85-95% of the time. I think there is one hand for sure I should have played different, but the others I would want to go to the river. My worry here is that am I pulling an old school Felter here (grin) and putting too much on the line when I have the best hand. I want to go back and review each hand and make sure I was not only marginally ahead. But at least 200 of it I am sure I was 75% plus to win on the river, and more than that usually. Want I want to convince myself this is the part as Felter said that you play within your bank roll, and be prepared to lose 5 times in a row (As god knows for a while there I was winning them all).

So not shaken, but concerned. And the only reason I am not really shaken as I am feeling confident that it is not "bad play" that got me here. I am pouring through poker tracker data trying to confirm that, and feel pretty good so far.

And I win!!

Well it went till 2:45am, but it was worth every minute of it. Once we got down to the final 5 it became very apparent to me that you can really take over a table if you change up your game. I turned the aggression on and off, with both monster hands and semi bluffs. That really set the stage for later parts of the tournament, as people found it hard to call my all-ins. I tried to ensure that I had shown a semi-or bluff hand shortly before I made an all in. And then made sure the all-ins were backed with decent hands.

This all lead to a me taking out 6th, 5th and 4th place. Then my heads up opponent took out the second place. I had a chip lead which was great as it allowed me to get out flopped or rivered a couple of times heads up, and still be in. Must have been all in 8 times heads up, and probably won 5 of them. More important to me though I was ahead EVERY time we turned over the cards. Some of the draws I lost were my A8, vs his A7. 7 on the turn. AJ, vs KQ, he hits Q, etc. Some of them were only marginally ahead on the turnover, but ahead they were.

So all in all a good evening. Very happy with the play and the results. Just the time killed me. lol.

Top 2 get paid....

4 left. Playing pretty good.
Probably the short stack though.
Karl Copp
Field Consultant
7-11 Canada.

Try again...live!

So I am just sitting down at the COOLEST LIVE GAME EVER (sorry felter lol). Hope tonight results are better than last week. (6th).

Last week was a cold deck. Tonight going to try and losen and up see if I can hit a flop. Maybe felters famous 5-6 will work?? Lol.

Anyhow, wish me luck.

Played some 1-2 tonight online. About an hour and finished down 14 dollars. Not bad as the action was a little crazy. Felt pretty good (but not that good, was down afterall).

Karl Copp
Field Consultant
7-11 Canada.

NEW FORUM IS UP!!!

Thats right 2 things:

1) Never play at a 50 cent Table with Felter. Just lose money. No point.

2) Look to the right side of the Blog and you will see the new Forum. It is up and Active!!

The over under is 6 months to get to 5 active members. :)

Cracked 2500!!

Bank roll that is. Just happy as I am viewing that has half way to my stated goal of getting to 3000 by April. Now I know anything can happen, but I do feel that we the progression of my game that is certainly within reach. I can certainly see where Poker Tracker is helping to stop me from pissing away 30-70 dollars away each session on Marginal calls, when I have no business in being in those hands.

And long term seeing a flop with non-monster pocket pairs is paying off. 3 of my 5 most profitable hands sinse starting this blog are JJ, 77 and 88 in that order. 500 dollars right there.

What I do need to work on are suited connectors. I need to work on that piece of my game. I believe IF I am ever going to make those profitable I need more positional preflop aggression.

Anyhow, off to bed.

Poker Tracker Time

Well after numerous people had asked if I used it, the last draw was sensai Bruce saying that we needed poker tracker. So I ponied up the money (Too lazy to go out and play hands at another site to earn it) and bought it. WOW, impressed. I think it took all of 10 minutes of anlysis with that program to poke about oh a million holes in my game.

Still way too many marginal hands in marginal positions.
Stupid, stupid STUPID blind vs Blind wars.
Not nearly enough aggresion when I have good cards.
And going to the river and calling too many river bets with sub par hands (I only am winning like 51% of my showdowns?? Oh my god).
A great reality check and I am look forwarding to data mining more issues for me to look at.

Finished in 6th on Monday

...sorry. Had some computer issues and could not post the results. A neat collection of guys. None really intimidated me, and some were outright bad. (The guy who was the worst apparently won but he was a card magnet and sucked everyone out). I will definately be back at that game.

Trying out the live game

So going out with the hospitality boys (and making Felter jealous) and trying out their weekly game. From what I understand it is a $50 buy in with $50 rebuys first hour. Paying the top 2 or 3. So there is money to be made, I just wonder if it is mine. :)

I know Kevin (guy I am playing with) is a loose cannon, and so I wonder what the other guys are like. I will go out and play my game and adapt as need be. Will go through the night one decision at a time...and hey..my tourny game rocks...right?!??!

Wish me luck!!

You do have to respect the game....

Especially when you go DOWN in limits. That's right. Down. Because then you think that you can loosen up your game, and call with more stupid hands, and then you start down that slope. The one where even though the bets are small, you end up nickle and diming yourself. And then you wonder where the money went. I will update the charts tomorrow but this weekend I pissed away a good 100-150 dollars just calling shit that if I was respecting the game I NEVER would have called.

STUPID STUPID.

And now I got to bed.

To summarize. One you get a sense of what your game is, play that game no matter what limits you are at.

This is for Felter

To help him solve his morality issues regarding Poker!! I knew it was ok.

2 Bounties

Well played in Canadian poker night and did pretty good. Finished in 5th (Out of 100) and better yet, took out 2 Celebs. So that 2 bouties added up to 100 dollars. And finished in the money. Not a bad night.

Off to bed.

Those Damn Hands you should not play.

You know the ones, the marginally nice ones...that seem to come in marginally nice situations. Here is the latest that pissed me off.

In a simple $5 multi table that is winding down. There is like 75 people left, top 60 money. I have 8k in chips left which puts me somewhere in the middle. No worries...

Very tight table, get dealt QJ suited in middle position.

Mistake #1 (Which would not have mattered in the outcome but I can still admit it is a mistake, never call late in tourny). I call the blind of 800. I did not think it would get raised, and it did not.

Everyone else folds (I was the first to call) and the BB waits...then pushes all in with about 3k more.

Mistake #2. I call. I mean why am I putting what will be half my chips on a call this late in the tourny. Man am I a sucker for playing the blinds.

OK, so I had QJ. Now to play this out, the flop ends up with a JJQxx. And get this....I lose.
Now as the suits did not matter I can say that there was only 1 HAND THAT COULD HAVE BEATEN ME. JUST 1.

But because I was playing a marginal hand...I deserved it. Thats right, I end up with a FH. But yep...he had the hand.

QQ.

BAH!

Finally!!

Only took 4 or 5 tries, but won my 100 ticket in a tubo 14+1. So that is slightly profitable anyhow.

Looking forward to blogging about my big tourny final table. :)

Up and down and up and down....getting sea sick.

So as of late as I have added SLIGHTLY more hands into my game I have experience more fluctuations into my bankroll, confidence, etc. Nothing dramatic but the swings each day have been closer to the 100 or more mark, and not the 20-40 dollars as before. Not a bad thing but I did think that it deserved a comment.

In my quest for winning a ticket to a 100 dollar tickets (And WOO HOO for Felter for winning me one :). I have come up OH SO SHORT a couple of times. I make the "money", but always a place or 2 away from the ticket. But it will come......I HOPE.

And I just found a website called http://www.officialpokerranking.com that gives me hope. Says that in MTT's I am in the money 26% of the time. I am sure that is not great but 1/4 is a great place to start. I would love to get that up to 1/3.

...and I am back in the saddle. Took me 24 hours.

So I got it all back and more in almost exactly 24 hours. Through some patience and a couple of tough, and one lucky call. Actually got it back and a little more. While tying this though I did learn that KKK beats JJJ, even if the K only comes on the river. Bah.

Pretty happy with the recovery. I just really tried to make it back no hour by hour, or even hand by hand, but decision by decision. Really not trying to get caught up in any flow but looking at each decision and deciding if what I was doing was the best thing. It really worked. Did not get distracted and although a couple of times there were some coin-flip type situations I was never really at risk for any serious amount of money where I was an underdog when the cards were turned over.

Really have to work on avoiding any of the situations of where I would call something just becuase I was up huge and could "afford" it. Quite simply that is retarded as you can NEVER afford to make stupid decisions. That is when you need to stop playing.

Tilt Sucks. About $200 worth of suckage.

Ok, so I am pissed at myself. Sitting here beside Felter as I write this all calm, but internally just MAD AS HELL at myself. And here is why.

There was a player at one table just being hyper aggresive. And that I am fine with as I have patience for that. Wait and strike. So I did. Finally had AK on the button. Called the dollar. He is on Big Blind. He makes it 11, so I make it 20. He calls.

Now here is where I made my mistakes...

Flop is QQ something. I am sure he missed. He makes it 10...I push. (Now no need to tell me why this is wrong, I know why). I needed to hit before that. Anyhow. So I did...and he waited till the very end and called. Pocket nines and with only 2 more cards to come I did not hit. So I lost my 100. But I am sure I proved that you can not just push me around :)

Now that was bad, but this is worse.

Very next hand, but at another table. I get pocket QQ's. Someone makes it 4 dollars, and I call. (I was too tilty to even be thinking straight and re-raise to get some more info). Flop is undercards, and without that info I end up all in after a couple of raises. Of course he had the aces, and on any other hand i would have been smart enough to find that out before all my money was in. I mean I made that fold last night.

So I just essentially gave back 200 or 10 percent of my bank roll just because I am not that good and can get tilty. Now I am not saying I should not have not lost any, but I should have


ok...as as I am typing this, the stupid laptop had locked up when I had Kings to the river and lost another 25-35 there. My new challenge is just to make up for this bone headed play today.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

Slowly but surely....

I am really starting to believe that it is the small wins that get your to where you want to be. Have not posted much in the last week because I did not think there was anything exciting to post.....till I realize this morning that is a GOOD thing. Of course you are going to have your occasional races but I believe that a solid cash game player should MOSTLY be in charge of his game and his growth. Sitting at just over $2200 now and 1/5th of my way to my goal of 3k by my birthday (Looking at going from 2-3k).

Finished 2nd in a live 10 person tourny on new years eve! Props out to Mike's sister to push all in with an open ended straight. Never expected that from a newer player, and she hit on the river.

Finished up close to 100 today with a combination of solid play and a lucky suck-out where my Jacks caught their set against a smaller stacks all in with AA. Proof that it does go both ways.

Outside of a couple of bubbles for small cash and no tickets, nothing yet from my attempt to enter small multi-table tournies for larger tourny tickets. But i have come close so I do believe I will eventually have some success.

And finally I hear rumors that Felter's announcement of his retirement was premature and that he may be back in the saddle. There is always HOPE!!

And the 2007 starts off with a ......ahh fuck I suck.

Well not that bad. Just had one of those sessions where I only played a few hands. Had KK to AA. AK to AA with a K flop (That one only cost me 45 dollars) and a Set flopped to a gut shot straight on the river. All in all about 100 down when I could not seem to dodge the bombs for the life of me. Not horrified as the hands played themselves. I just take this as the lesson where this is why you play within your bank roll limits as you can run bad and you need to just try and minimize the losses. I tried....
....could have done better....but tried!!