Silly jitters

I am not a big donkament player and I have nowhere near the bankroll to go play in the WSOP in Vegas. Still... that time of the year kinda feels like Christmas to me. The 6 weeks circus that is the WSOP is always entertaining to follow ( and bet on! ).

So here I am, adding poker players I know to my twitter, talking about the WSOP, reading articles and interviews with players and of course finding myself wanting to play more than usually.

I had a pretty nice day of poker last friday. Decided to dedicate that day to playing and studying my game and something clicked. It came to me as a revelation in the middle of a session. I found out what was one of the big leaks I had created in my game and that was in no small part responsible for the downswing I am in. Without going into details, it's something about a kick ass article I read a few months ago that I started applying wrongly.

So here I am, waiting for WSOP results, trying to squeeze as much play as I can and filled with renewed focus and a lot of confidence thanks to what I discovered about my game.

April recap and May goals

April was, as you may have guessed by looking at my graph, a pretty rough month.

I did not play much and whatever poker I did play did not go too well. I've started reviewing some sessions, something I definitely don't do nearly enough of. The downswing I'm on seems to be the results of a bit of variance (like for example I seem to hit sets less often than I should, and they don't seem to hold much), and a whole lot of bad play.

This whole thing left me apprehensive and I found myself hesitant to play. That showed in my play volume. That said, I had a good session recently and it was enough to give me back the urge to play.

The good news is that bad play can be corrected. Already since the beginning of May I've posted a few sessions where I felt a lot less "spewy". I will most likely pay myself a coaching session pretty soon to help me spot some stuff that I do that are costly.

Now, what are the goals for May?
- Play at least 15,000 hands of online poker.
- Post a winning month
- Get a coaching session
- Start reviewing my play more
- Start participating on the 2+2 forums again.
- Update this blog more frequently

Ain't variance great ?!?

I'm in the middle of a very rough streak. I seem to have been on the wrong side of variance for quite a while. I make second best hands a lot, my sets are cracked at an absurd rate and I can't hit a draw to save my life. And all that and the frustration that comes with it makes me play way worse than I should.

The good point is that I am definitly playing a lot of hands and should hit my volume goal for January. the bad point is that I stuck being slightly in the red.

I have a few things planned to get my focus back, while I can't control variance, I know for a fact that I am making things worse by being frustrated, playing a bit impatiently or scared. So what's the plan?

- More game studying. I need to start to study my own play and the other regs play more regularly. About 6 months ago, when I was in my best poker period, I was doing that a lot. That includes session reviews, posting hands on 2+2, discussing specific hands a lot with Alex, Joff and whoever else wants to discuss poker.

- Spend time just "focusing". I realised a few days ago that if I take time to just close my eyes, try to relax and take a few deep breath (even if only for a few seconds) it helps putting me back in a calm and positive state of mind. Gotta do more of that, especially when I feel myself becoming frustrated at the tables.

- Keep on playing. I cannot let that rough patch sidetrack me. If I do the two other things I've mentionned and just keep on playing I know the results will come back.

Stepping back down

NL50 has been brutal to me. I feel like I'm playing well enough, but man the beats have been coming!

The losses I've had are not even that impressive really, but when you just stepped up to a new stake, losing a few buy-ins hurts a lot. So I decided to step back down for a while, lick my wounds, regroup and grind some more before I take another shot at NL50.

April thoughts and May goals.

A quick recap on april and then I'll move on to my May goals. The goals I had stated for myself for april were :

- Play 12K hands of NLHE online
- Play at least 3 times at the casino
- Post a winning month online
- Keep updating this blog as frequently as I did in March.

Now other than the casino play I reached all 3 of my goals. I played over 12K hands and definitly feel like I could have played more. While I had a pretty big downswing (more on that later on) I still finished the month up which is always good. Means that in the last 6 months I've only had one losing month which I'm pretty proud of. Now the casino play took a backseat after that bad evening I had there at the beginning of april. This was a conscious decision and I'm glad I let that goal go.

Now what's next for May? Well I want to play even more than in April. I want to again post a positive month and, of course, I want to keep that blog updated. So here are my goals for the month of May :

- Play 15,000 hands of online NL Hold'Em
- Post a winning month
- Take a shot at NL25
- Keep updating this blog.

The most interesting thing that happened though in the last few days is that I had sort of an epiphany. I just realised why my game is pretty swingy. I play my drawing hands VERY aggressively. If I have an open ended straight draw or a flush draw out there I'll go out and fire bets. This means that when I hit my draws I will win bigger pots on average, but it also means that when I don't hit, I kinda "spew".

I am still not sure if it's something I want to change in my game. I think I'll just start by trying to pick my spots better for my semi-bluffs. Anyway, you can call me stupid for just realising this... I'm just glad I did!

March 2008 online results

Well March was kinda rough (isn't that some understatement?). First time in a while that I post a losing month. For a while there it was a downward spiral but it helped me identify a big leak I can have at times. Next step is to find how to prevent it.

Good thing is, I broke the 10K hands and the end of the month was not so bad. I managed to stop the bleeding and win some of my losses back.

On a side note, March was also the month where I kept that blog updated the most frequently with 13 posts.

Stopped the bleeding... I think

Woke up early this morning (knew I wouldn't sleep too well) so I decided to log a few hands before coming to work. Well I had a pretty good session. I made a few bonehead plays again, but much less than the last few days (weeks?). Finally managed to have a session where I felt good about my game and managed to stay relatively focused.

I also started posting on 2+2 again. I think the 2 hands I posted from this week end are quite interesting.

Hopefully I can now move on and get back on track.

Week end recap : it sucked!

What a horrible, horrible week end.

On the cash game side I played horribly and whenever I found a good play in me I would end up paying the best hand with the 2nd best hand. My roll is now in pretty rough shape and I have to reassess what I will do and do a lot of session reviewing to get out of that funk.

I am also finally out of the WSOP step thingies. After busting 4th, 2nd and then 5th on the step 3, I finally busted out in 9th, being kicked out of the loop.

Somehow I doubt I'll sleep well tonight.

February 2008 online results

Well I finally took a shot at NL25. Sadly, this afflicted me with a severe case of Fancy play syndrome combined with a getting cold cards for quite a while. As you can see from the graph, results were pretty bad. Stepped down at NL10, returned to basics, and I am almost ready to move up to NL25 again.

Missed the 10,000 hands mark again, goal in march is to hit it. Also as a goal in march I want to move up to NL25 but for good this time.

Feeling good about a bad session.

I've been on a brutal downswing lately. Pretty sure part of it is the way I play, but also I've been running bad. Anyway, because of that swing it had been quite a while since I felt good about my play. Well that all changed last night.

I played on an off all night long and overall I lost money. That said, I finally feel like I've settled back into my game and that I am back to where I was at the beginning of January. I think the slow pace to which I've switched after my prop bet with Alex made me play with less focus. I was getting used to playing A LOT, and playing less made me impatient and wanting results NOW. Well last night I think I played really well. Minimizing errors and maximizing return on my good hands. Actually, if not for 2 brutal bad beats (will post more about them when I get back home tonight) it would have been an awesome session.

On a side note, I've decided to dip back in Pot Limit Omaha a bit. Well that is not going so well. Think I'll wait a bit for that. There is a really good PLO book out I want to buy, I'll wait to read it before I step back at an Omaha table.

Downswing and a nice comeback

It seems like an habit for me to start a month with a downswing. I don't know if it's just a random trend or if I'm on to something. But anyway, last night I decided to start playing and grind the few $ I needed to finally move up stakes. Well turns out it was one of those nights where I just couldn't hit anything and people would keep hiting against me. I ended up with a 350 BB downswing and a steaming a bit.

I decided to take a short break and when I came back I thought "what the heck. I want to play but feel like it's one of these nights where I need to do some damage control". That's how I decided to invest a small amount to enter a satellite for the Sunday Hundred Grand on stars.

It took me some time to get this thing rolling and I did not really pick up a hand until the first break. Then after the break I had to take some chances and I doubled up twice to put me back to the average stack. Then I turned on the aggression and managed to steal a few pots and I was finally in good shape. Then I just hit the zone. I don't know how else to describe it... When I play tournaments I sometimes end up feeling like everything just clicks. I instinctivly know when to steal, when to tone down aggression and when to go all out.

Anyway, when we got 6 handed I had a stack I had managed to build up to about 16K (about 10K behind the chip leader) and I picked up pocket Kings in mid pos with blinds of 300/600 and a 50 ante. UTG calls the BB and I make it 2400 to go. The shortest stack pushes his last 1818 chips in the middle and another relatively short stack pushes half his remaining chips in the middle for a call. Dlop comes J-J-5 rainbow.

The guy in the small blind then checks with only 2587 chips left, so I bet 2600 putting him all in figuring that there's a good chance I have the best hand and even if I lose the main pot AND the sidepot I will still be left with plenty of chips to play. He thinks for a while and calls.

The small blind flips 9-9, the shortest stack flips A-K. Turn comes a deuce and the river brings a harmless ten and that's all she wrote. I now have a seat in next sunday's hundred grand!