PokerStars Win

Ok, so a few days ago I mentioned my biggest win in a multi so far which took place. I haven't had a chance to post details until now as I've been busy over the weekend. I reckon I've forgot most of what happened by now, its all a bit of a blur. So here it is, as best as I can remember....

Just under 300 entrants and I start off pretty well, quickly getting myself into top 30. From then on nothing spectacular happened and I just managed to stay around 30th by gradually building my stack along the way. I hadn't got involved in any major pots until the last 50 when my lucky moment of the tournement takes place:

Serial raiser does his usual 3xBB from late position and I've got 22 in the SB, he's raises about 1/4 of my stack and has about 1 and a half times as much as me. I go for the re-steal but run into KK. First card is the 2 and I'm up to 5th or so thanks to a lovely outdraw :)! Boy do they feel good to be on the delivering end of.

I stick around 5th place or so until we get to the final 30 when something strange happens. About half the players start sitting out. Some awful connection problems which fortunately I wasn't on the receiving end of. Those of us still playing rarely get involved with each other, as slowly some of them start to get their connection back. But still 1/3 of the players are sitting out which makes it pretty easy to make the final table with a just above average stack.

Final table starts and 2 unfortunate soles are still disconnected. Poor buggers. Well this means not too much action takes place until one is ante'd out and the other manages to get back on. So we're down to 8 and it gets going.

Almost every time I raise the guy to my left who I think was second CL cold calls me. Very annoying. But despite missing most of the flops I still managed to take the pots down there and then, bit strange from him. Guess he was just waiting to nail me for my whole stack.

Sitting in 3rd, with 6 or 7 remaining, I raise utg with AQs 3 x BB and he does it again, cold calls me. Mid position player then goes all in for not even double my raise. Straight away I'm clueless as to what to do. I've got a cold caller, and then a re-raise all in which isn't big enough to really push us off our hands so can't be a steal. Although I can easily be dominated, I'm quite happy to pay to see the flop, but just don't want the cold caller to re-raise me all in. One of the later player disconnects and they get 240 seconds to re-connect. So I'm sat here for about 5 minutes trying to decide what to do. My first instinct was to muck it, as the re-raiser is most probably stronger than my AQ. I then think I should re-raise all in to isolate myself with him, hoping he has a lower PP, and on the basis that cold caller should fold as I know he doesn't need anything special to call my raises. I finally talk myself into just calling the re-raise, and pray cold caller doesn't come over the top. Looking back on it I'm thinking this may not have been the right move. I definately had too long to think about this one! Well I called, strangely cold caller mucks, and to my delight I'm up against AJs. I flop the flush and its all over, I move into the chip lead.

Soon we're down to 4 and I find myself with double anyone elses stack. I can't exactly remember how I got such a chip lead, but I'm sure I took 1 or 2 more players out. So in the final 4 I suggest making a deal. Two of the other players are interested but the shortest stack wasn't responding. Either foreign and couldn't understand me or just ignorant, I'm not sure. Well after doubling up one of the other stacks in a race I find myself falling back into the pack and not so comfortable. Fortunately I soon take out the guy un-willing to make a deal and the 3 of us remaining can start talking....

It takes a while to get management to come sort out the deal but finally we do. I was initially trying to negotiate the deal myself, starting high asking for $7.5k, the moving to $7k, and even $6.5k was getting me no-where, so we finally decide to sort it on a chip count. With half of the chips in play I walk away with just over $6.5k, which I'm happy with. I'm new to deals but details of the one we made are below. I added what I roughly remember the chip counts to be to get a rough idea of how it worked out.


Player ................. Payout .......... Deal ............. Chips
Coca919 #1 ........ $7947.50 ...... $ 6547.73 ........ 220k
gmctank #2 ..........$ 5057.50 ..... $ 4520.82 ....... 82k
Ron_G924 #3 .......$ 3352.40 ..... $ 5288.85 ........ 122k

I was happy to walk away from this situation with $6.5k in relation to what chips I had. Seemed like a good deal to me. I went on to win the tourney too just to make the win a little sweeter. Overall, a great success :)!

I'm starting to enjoy playing multi's a lot more at the moment, obviously due to new success I'm having in them. Whether this can last will remain to be seen, but I did have another cash tonight.... 9th in a $100 rebuy for $620. Not such a bad result, but a little disappointing to go out on a race which would have put me right up there, 1st prize was $10k. Hit my top pair on the flop only for him to hit his set on the turn which rubs it in a little. Still, $600 is obviously not to be sniffed at, so I can't complain.

Buzzing ....

Just managed to win a $100 freeze-out on Stars. We made a deal at final 3 on chip counts. I was CL and I came away from it with a nice $6,500 paypacket. My biggest mutli win to-date, just beating my 3rd place in the Crypto 35k, and I'm well chuffed!

More details to come once I get some sleep .....

Sunday Tourney's

I played a couple of the big'ish sized tourneys on Sunday. The Crypto35k, Pokerstars $500k and Betholdem $100k. Would have played a couple more sites but it seems I've managed to misplace a couple of their account details during moving up to uni, will have to get the sorted!

Crypto 35k - Out 2nd hand. My AA walked into the monster that is J10. He raised pre-flop, i re-raise from the blinds and he still thinks his hand is good. J high flop and he raises my bet, I just call. Turn another blank and I check-raise him, he calls leaving himself with just 800 remaining of his 2500 starting chips, so obviously now commited to the pot with his obvious Jack. 10 on the river looks like a blank to me and the rest of my chips are all his :)!

Betholdem $100k - This one's a bit of a blank to me. I know I doubled up early but was out by the break with top 2pr vs bottom set which I couldn't get away from, don't remember much else.

Stars $500k - 3,316 entrants. So a big field to get through here for the $170k or so top prize, easy enough. I've done this one a few times before, never with any success what-so-ever though. I can honestly say I didn't get involved in a single big pot all tourney when I had a decent hand. Only found myself all in pre-flop with someone twice the whole tourney that I can remember. First time we were down to 500 or so and I came over the top of someone with who seemed to making a few too many pre-flop raises for my liking with the monster that is 22. Oops he had KK this time, spiked my 2 though which was bloody lucky. This never happens? My lucky day.

Was going pretty well around 25th or so for quite a while, but found myself short after losing a race when down to 80 or so. Got back by going all in the next few hands in a row though with no-one wanting to play with me. Managed to go out 47th I think it was in the end after getting my 67 outdrawn by AQ, all in pre-flop. Lucky fucker. Wasn't exactly short stacked but the blinds were just too tasty. So I pick up just under $1700 for my troubles. Not exactly $170k but a much-welcomed pay packet, especially seeing as the 6pak tables on Betfair have taken a turn for the worse at the moment!

Looks like this month multi's are my source of income. Use to be LHE cash games, last month it was the stt's, this month the mtt's. Ahh well, just as long as money's coming from somewhere I'm happy.

Why?

Why did I just bother playing the $11 rebuy tourney on Stars with a $45k gt'd prize pool? It started at 3:15am so what was I thinking? Seemed like a good idea at the time! With 1300 or so entrants it was gonna be all kinds of a late night if I planned on going deep. Of course I was destined to go pretty far only to lose a race for a complete waste of time and sleep. Now it's 6am and I'm gonna have to sleep all day tomorrow and miss any lectures I might have otherwise managed to get to.

Ahh well, won't be doing that again in a hurry!

September Results

Ok, so I've been meaning to publish my results for September for a while. This hasn't been possible until now as I've only just got hold of them after forgetting to get the spreadsheet off my home computer before coming up to university. I'm not too sure if I'll keep doing this each month, I mean I kept really detailed records in September so I may aswell publish the results but for example this month I haven't been recording yet. So, whether or not I carry on to keep detailed records and publish them will remain to be seen. Anyway, here goes:

LHE (6 seaters) -£1,573.27
Ok, so this is where it all went wrong this month. Up until September Limit Holdem has always been my main game and where I have made the majority of my money. Admittedly I haven't been doing well at these tables for the past few months but it's always still been my main area of play for the month. Until this month that is. Finally had enough of the Limit Holdem tables so I've moved elsewhere for the time being. I've always had people tell me I should move to NLHE, as LHE is a mugs game, but I've never really gotten into

NLHE (6 seaters) -£4.35
I've always had people tell me I should move to NLHE, as LHE is a mugs game so I'm told, but I've never really gotten into it. A lot of people I speak to seem to think limit relies on luck too much, which to an extent I do agree to. Seeing as I've decided to stop playing Limit it would make sense for this to be the game for me to move to. Well, that hasn't happened as I still just can't get into it and played a total of 3 very short sessions throughout September. I get bored too easily and find myself just wanting to take a whole stack quickly. Maybe one day I'll get the hang of it.

PL Omaha -£100.06
Of all the cash games, this is the one I enjoy the most, so I often find myself back here when I'm getting a bit bored. I've had pretty good success on the omaha tables on Betfair to-date, with some pretty big pots coming my way earlier in the summer. September started off no different as I was up £800 here but blew it in a couple of mad sessions in the last week. I don't think Omaha will ever be my main game, but I know I'll always come back to it for a bit of a fun. Can't help myself.

6pak's +£2,469 (ROI = 22.85%)
Finally, some profit from somewhere. Previously I've only really dabbled into 6pak's a few times, never quite sure what to make of them. Well, since giving up LHE this has been where I've spent most my time at the tables, and it's gone as well as I could have hoped. Only time will tell if I can consistenyly win here. Long may it continue though as I'm hoping to rely on this game as my main source of income now. My ROI for 6pak's this month was 22.85%. I'm really not to sure what kind of ROI the main earners at 6pak's aim for so I'm not quite sure what to make of this figure yet.

Single Table Tournement's +£1956.8 (ROI = 53.6%)
Just as with 6pak's, I've played a lot of these this month due to basically giving up LHE. I've always played Stt's now and then for a bit of fun and think I've had pretty good success at them. However, I've never really known how good I've been doing at them without record keeping though. Well this month went better than as expected. Throughout the month I thought the 6pak's were going better, but now I have just calculated the ROI for stt's as 53.6%. I hear people talking of a figure around 30% being good for stt's so I'm more than happy with this, although I know I can't expect to carry on quite as good as this.

Multi-Table Tournement's -£482.80
So I didn't get that "big win" anywhere in September, that's yet to come, and didn't get to play as much of these as I would have liked to. Most of this money, well £360 of it, is from not cashing in any of the 3 Sunday35k's I played, so really there isn't much to report on here.

Overall = +£2,265.28
To summarize I'm pleased with how the month went. It was a large improvement on the previous couple of months, which wasn't hard. The cash games went awful, and the sit and go's went really well, so I know where I'm going to continue playing for the time being!

Crypto 10K Guaranteed

Ok, as mentioned in my previous post I had a pretty decent result in this tournement on Wednesday night. So here's what happened....

After an hour or so I found myself near the top and from then on, without seeing much in the way of decent cards or hitting anything noteably great on the flops I managed to stay in the top 3 all the way to the final table. We probably all think we played a great game when we go deep in tournement, but I'd definately say this was the best I've played in an online tournement.

Once down to the final 8 I look around and see that me and one other are sitting on 200k stacks, and 3rd place has a huge 30k! I know it's far from in the bag but I know I'm now going to be disappointed if I don't place top 2.

Me and the other big stack bump horns quite a few times as we both try to be dominate the table. Whether this was such a good idea or not I'm not so sure. Well he was getting the better of me and when we get down to the final 3 (which didn't take long considering every other player was short stacked), he has a commanding lead with 270k, me 160k or so and the other on 80k.

The CL steps it up a gear in the final 3, often raising pre-flop to such an amount it covers us both all in to call. Either that or he'll raise smaller pre-flop and bet out big on the flop. Just need a hand against him. Then this happens....

Me on 150k and CL on just 300k. He raises 5xBB to 20k on my BB, he is SB. I call with 56hh hoping to nail a flop knowing he will bet regardless. It comes down 47Q and he bets out his mandatory 55k. I now move in hoping he passes but of course knowing I've got the outs if he calls. As long as he hasn't hit the Q here he should the pot should be mine... well he has Q10 and, despite the 5 turn giving me a few more outs, river is a blank and I'm out in 3rd for £900.

Maybe I shouldn't have got involved with the CL and maybe I should? I'm not so sure. Can't complain with a nice £900 for 3rd though either way.

Catch Up

Ok so since returning to uni I've barely played any poker, that was until I bought a new Desktop a few days back. Now I'm starting to play a bit more again as I don't have to rely on a dodgy laptop anymore!

I joined Titan Poker a few nights ago ready for the Blonde Tourney on there tomorrow. Decided I may aswell try the site out first and entered a $50 tourney. Only 43 entrants but I went on to win it for $1000, so a nice start to the site. I found the tourney real soft towards the end and it was pretty easy/very to pick up pots. I rarely find myself in these kinds of lower runner mtt's but might start to give them a bit more attention.

To continue on the mtt front I had a good result in the £10k gt'd on crypto lastnight, more of which I'll post about later, and I think I'll give the Betfair Forum tourney for players of the BFWCOP a go tonight. That is if I decide not to go out, although I had planned to. We'll see....

Pokerstars Blogger Championship

Just registered for this...

I have registered to play in the
Online Poker Blogger Championship!

This event is powered by PokerStars.

Registration code: 6503469

Blog needs updating and I will do so soon when I get the time to (aka get up off my lazy arse)!

Back at uni ....

Moved back up to uni yesterday. Looking forward to getting back into the ways of uni life. I'm also hoping to play live a few times over the coming weeks at the Gala in Notts to get a bit of practice in before the Carribean. I've barely played all summer.

Went for a night out in London on friday and couldn't believe what happened... We queued for 2hours for Fabric Nightclub only for me, my mates and about 10 other blokes in the queue to be filtered out once we got to the front and not into the club, all because they had too many blokes going in and had to get rid of some. Two hours of queueing and they fucking wouldn't let us in for no decent reason. The after us they started letting more blokes in so we were just part of the unlucky randoms. Every 5mins or so they would do the same to more guys. Unbelievable! Finally got in at half 3 after going back later on, but it didn't end there as after it finished someone got hit with a hammer outside. It must have been pretty serious as it was on the London news and caused all the surrounding roads to be taped off all next. An eventful night to say the least but not quite what I was hoping for!

Anyway, back to poker... Played the Sunday35k tonight (well lastnight as its now 4am). I spent most the evening in top 20 until I had to lay down KK pre-flop when down to 70 players or so. I think this is the second time I've ever done this. The hand went as follows:

Utg 17k Stack limps for 400 chips.
Folded round to button 11k stack who raises to 2,400.
With a 14k stack I make it 4,800 with KK from the SB.
Utg then goes all in (at this point im thinking must be AA but can I bring myself to let go of KK and wonder for the rest of the tournement)
Button raiser calls the all in. This makes my decision a lot easier as I'm now certain at least one of them must have AA.

Sure enough utg turns over AA, and the button... 99? What a stupid call. Thanks for making it though cause it got me out of a potentionally tricky situation. He spiked the 9 as expected but I'm just glad I managed to get away from that one.

I'm now up and down quite a bit, keep seeing cards like AJ and being forced to lay it down after someone comes over the top of me. Just stealing the blinds is keeping me in it. Raising 23s from the sb when folded round to me gets me into a bit of trouble though and I'm down to 7k. I could have taken the pot on the turn too but stopped firing so pretty annoyed at that one. Next round with blinds at 400/800button raises my BB and I wasn't paying enough attention and just call with A6 (such a textbook over the top all in so I really don't know why I didn't). Flop comes down JJ5 at which point I decide to take a stab at it and move in. Button sitting with J8 makes a dodgy call and I'm out 38th for basically money back. Oops! My own fault though.

I've managed to win my money back that I lost the other day from 6pak's and a bit of omaha but can't post results at the moment. I was hoping to start putting up monthly summaries but I forgot to transfer my spreadsheets from the home computer to laptop to bring to uni so that'll have to wait. Also this laptop runs shit, it can't handle more than one table at once anymore and just freezes up. Might have to pop to PC World tomorrow to get a Desktop for myself so I can get back to good old 6-tabling!