As from mid September this year, myself and Neilmc will be based out of Mount Maunganui, New Zealand for 6-8months.
Working 9-5.... going to be a shock to the system, but we feel it will:
a) Increase our MTT volume
b) Increase our winnings
c) Live a more normal life, working normal hours.
d) Be in a warm climate during the British Winter
e) Have a great time.
We're planning on renting a 3 bedroom apartment on the beach and living like kings... it is going to be EPIC.
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Cashgame challenge and Metagames.
Yeah I've been off poker again.... in the words of Neilmc I'm a "Part-timer".
May has been a very busy month socially for me, and at the weekend i was in St Andrews again - this time for a stag do. Good fun was had by all, although it was quite a tame affair, no nakedness (strippers or lampposts) and generally no stag baiting, other than the consuming of a dirty pint.
On the poker front, i have a new goal:
Myself, Neilmc and the beej have decided to have a little competition with the cash games. We've all started with $2k, playing 1/2NL, and when we reach milestones the other two have to purchase a prize for the winner.
$3k - fancy meal in Vegas
$5k - round of golf at a prestigious course
$10k - set of golf clubs
$25k - charity game of football at our team's ground
$50k - Day driving a F1 car
$100k - entry into a big live event.
$1m - trip into space.
Of course, I'm aiming to be at the $1m mark by the end of the year....
I started on our challenge yesterday. I only played a 90minute session, but four tabled, 1/2NL - all full rings.
I got off to a flyer and was up $340. There were a couple of interesting hands and hands that i definitely could have played better.
One that i still don't agree with my friends on unfolded like this:
I opened the button for $7 with 56dd, i had $200.
BB calls, with $150 total.
Flop 7d 8d Ac
I have an open ended straight flush draw. I am never folding on this flop.
He checked, i bet $12, if he had raised, i re-raise - if he calls I'm most likely racing, even versus a set I'm in decent enough shape and i don't see him calling much lighter at this stage, and if he does, I'm favourite.
He called my $12.
Turn Th
He checked - at this point i felt a check behind was probably best with my huge draw, i don't want him raising me at this point, and if he calls, i have built a big pot, and may feel inclined to bluff the river if i missed. I checked.
River Kd
Ok i hit my flush, but i hardly have the nuts. The ace of diamonds is still out there, he could still feasibly have hit the ace on the flop, with Axdd and rivered the nuts.
He led for $25 into a $39 pot, he had $117 back.
I saw this as a clear raise. I think I'm losing a ton of value at this level against a player who most likely isn't very good. The question as i see it is "how much do i raise?"
Do i make it $75, so it is $50 for him to call, or do i jam?
Well i figured if i made it $75 he would call with 2p+, and if i jammed he would call with a similar range - so i jammed. He thought for a while and folded.
I showed this hand to a few ppl, and a couple of them said they flat call the river, because only a bigger flush can call my shove. I think this is utter rubbish. One of my friends elaborated a little to say that against a good player he would flat call, and against a total idiot he would shove. I still wasn't happy with this answer. I found it too basic, why would a good player only call with a bigger flush? Would that not make him pretty exploitable (for a short time at least).
Say for example that i knew i was up against a "good" player in this example. Well a good player would surely value bet this river with two pair or a set - assuming they felt i had a hand to call a bet with. If they thought i didn't they could check and let me bluff.
My point is that when they bet the river, they will have: a) a bigger flush b) a set c) two pair d) a decent ace and expect to get looked up by worse e) air/missed straight draw.
If i shove 100% of the time in this spot, and we assume the villain is a "good player" and will only call with a flush, we can take advantage of them in a huge way. I can profitably shove 100% of my range, knowing that i will only get called by a small portion of his range. (It can be noted at this point that if we know he will only call with a flush, i should shove all my range but low diamonds, this could be overcomplicated further to include top set and the like, as if we think we will only be called by a flush we turn top set into a bluff, so a line has to be drawn somewhere, but you get the idea).
It gets a little tricky after you do it once, because it changes the dynamics - the metagame changes. Players have more information to make decisions.
For example - say the exact same occurrence happened 30minutes later - would the hand go the same way? Would my shove only get called by a bigger flush then? Perhaps, but i would expect a good player to adapt to the situation. The trick is knowing when they are ready to adapt and getting one step ahead of them. This is something that i am working on at the moment, and i think it is a leak in many a winning player's game. They often use their own thought processes and their own ranges to assess another player's holding.
Let me elaborate. Say you are playing a shorthanded cash game and you are raising 25% of hands (reasonable laggy shorthanded range). And you are playing against an unknown opponent, who you figure as kind of abc weak/tight. You raise the button, he folds in the bb. Next 5 orbits you raise on the button 4 times, and he folds each time. Then you open the button with 77, he 3bets you. You think this guy is tight, but then the thought drops into your head "wait a minute, he has to know that I've been opening 1/4 of hands and i have been pounding his bb, therefore he probably has got a little impatient and is fighting back, i have a hand way ahead of my range, I'll show him - all in!". It's at that point he snap calls and shows AA. Now, while this line of thought works against semi known foes, you have to be careful when to use it. It is important to be aware of your image, but it is even more important to know who is actually paying attention, and furthermore who will adapt to it. Is he typing in the chat box? Is he playing more than one game? Is he a regular at this level? All of these things and more contribute to your decision making process.
I will try and use the above in my low flush example.
The guy was only playing one table
He was sitting with $150 (ie had either bought in short or hadn't reloaded when he lost a hand)
He called my raise in the bb (not necessarily a bad idea, but in general you should try to limit the number of pots you place oop, as it is generally just spew)
These things suggest to me that he probably isn't very experienced, and certainly isn't a shark.
At the lower levels, players fall in love with their hands. "OMG i can't believe he just rivered me, OMG, but i have to call, i flopped a set!" I felt his calling of a shove range and his calling of $50 more range were pretty similar, so i shoved...
Now if i had him pegged as a regular who was playing multiple tables, i may have flat called - the reason being I'm new to these parts and he won't have any history with me, so metagame isn't a factor, but then again, i may have shoved.
Uggghghghh such metagames. He knows that you know, therefore you should... but when he knows that you know, that he knows... it goes full circle. The crux of the matter is that you need to be able to pinpoint where your opponent is in the cycle, and also what his likely range is, and compute this into your action. Of course this is much more difficult in practice, and can lead to over complicating things.
What's that saying again? KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID!
May has been a very busy month socially for me, and at the weekend i was in St Andrews again - this time for a stag do. Good fun was had by all, although it was quite a tame affair, no nakedness (strippers or lampposts) and generally no stag baiting, other than the consuming of a dirty pint.
On the poker front, i have a new goal:
Myself, Neilmc and the beej have decided to have a little competition with the cash games. We've all started with $2k, playing 1/2NL, and when we reach milestones the other two have to purchase a prize for the winner.
$3k - fancy meal in Vegas
$5k - round of golf at a prestigious course
$10k - set of golf clubs
$25k - charity game of football at our team's ground
$50k - Day driving a F1 car
$100k - entry into a big live event.
$1m - trip into space.
Of course, I'm aiming to be at the $1m mark by the end of the year....
I started on our challenge yesterday. I only played a 90minute session, but four tabled, 1/2NL - all full rings.
I got off to a flyer and was up $340. There were a couple of interesting hands and hands that i definitely could have played better.
One that i still don't agree with my friends on unfolded like this:
I opened the button for $7 with 56dd, i had $200.
BB calls, with $150 total.
Flop 7d 8d Ac
I have an open ended straight flush draw. I am never folding on this flop.
He checked, i bet $12, if he had raised, i re-raise - if he calls I'm most likely racing, even versus a set I'm in decent enough shape and i don't see him calling much lighter at this stage, and if he does, I'm favourite.
He called my $12.
Turn Th
He checked - at this point i felt a check behind was probably best with my huge draw, i don't want him raising me at this point, and if he calls, i have built a big pot, and may feel inclined to bluff the river if i missed. I checked.
River Kd
Ok i hit my flush, but i hardly have the nuts. The ace of diamonds is still out there, he could still feasibly have hit the ace on the flop, with Axdd and rivered the nuts.
He led for $25 into a $39 pot, he had $117 back.
I saw this as a clear raise. I think I'm losing a ton of value at this level against a player who most likely isn't very good. The question as i see it is "how much do i raise?"
Do i make it $75, so it is $50 for him to call, or do i jam?
Well i figured if i made it $75 he would call with 2p+, and if i jammed he would call with a similar range - so i jammed. He thought for a while and folded.
I showed this hand to a few ppl, and a couple of them said they flat call the river, because only a bigger flush can call my shove. I think this is utter rubbish. One of my friends elaborated a little to say that against a good player he would flat call, and against a total idiot he would shove. I still wasn't happy with this answer. I found it too basic, why would a good player only call with a bigger flush? Would that not make him pretty exploitable (for a short time at least).
Say for example that i knew i was up against a "good" player in this example. Well a good player would surely value bet this river with two pair or a set - assuming they felt i had a hand to call a bet with. If they thought i didn't they could check and let me bluff.
My point is that when they bet the river, they will have: a) a bigger flush b) a set c) two pair d) a decent ace and expect to get looked up by worse e) air/missed straight draw.
If i shove 100% of the time in this spot, and we assume the villain is a "good player" and will only call with a flush, we can take advantage of them in a huge way. I can profitably shove 100% of my range, knowing that i will only get called by a small portion of his range. (It can be noted at this point that if we know he will only call with a flush, i should shove all my range but low diamonds, this could be overcomplicated further to include top set and the like, as if we think we will only be called by a flush we turn top set into a bluff, so a line has to be drawn somewhere, but you get the idea).
It gets a little tricky after you do it once, because it changes the dynamics - the metagame changes. Players have more information to make decisions.
For example - say the exact same occurrence happened 30minutes later - would the hand go the same way? Would my shove only get called by a bigger flush then? Perhaps, but i would expect a good player to adapt to the situation. The trick is knowing when they are ready to adapt and getting one step ahead of them. This is something that i am working on at the moment, and i think it is a leak in many a winning player's game. They often use their own thought processes and their own ranges to assess another player's holding.
Let me elaborate. Say you are playing a shorthanded cash game and you are raising 25% of hands (reasonable laggy shorthanded range). And you are playing against an unknown opponent, who you figure as kind of abc weak/tight. You raise the button, he folds in the bb. Next 5 orbits you raise on the button 4 times, and he folds each time. Then you open the button with 77, he 3bets you. You think this guy is tight, but then the thought drops into your head "wait a minute, he has to know that I've been opening 1/4 of hands and i have been pounding his bb, therefore he probably has got a little impatient and is fighting back, i have a hand way ahead of my range, I'll show him - all in!". It's at that point he snap calls and shows AA. Now, while this line of thought works against semi known foes, you have to be careful when to use it. It is important to be aware of your image, but it is even more important to know who is actually paying attention, and furthermore who will adapt to it. Is he typing in the chat box? Is he playing more than one game? Is he a regular at this level? All of these things and more contribute to your decision making process.
I will try and use the above in my low flush example.
The guy was only playing one table
He was sitting with $150 (ie had either bought in short or hadn't reloaded when he lost a hand)
He called my raise in the bb (not necessarily a bad idea, but in general you should try to limit the number of pots you place oop, as it is generally just spew)
These things suggest to me that he probably isn't very experienced, and certainly isn't a shark.
At the lower levels, players fall in love with their hands. "OMG i can't believe he just rivered me, OMG, but i have to call, i flopped a set!" I felt his calling of a shove range and his calling of $50 more range were pretty similar, so i shoved...
Now if i had him pegged as a regular who was playing multiple tables, i may have flat called - the reason being I'm new to these parts and he won't have any history with me, so metagame isn't a factor, but then again, i may have shoved.
Uggghghghh such metagames. He knows that you know, therefore you should... but when he knows that you know, that he knows... it goes full circle. The crux of the matter is that you need to be able to pinpoint where your opponent is in the cycle, and also what his likely range is, and compute this into your action. Of course this is much more difficult in practice, and can lead to over complicating things.
What's that saying again? KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID!
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Poker poker blah de blah
I've had an incredible amount of non poker related stuff going on this month, which has really hampered my playing hours, but i have managed to put in three days in a row - woohoo!
Sunday was an interesting one. I made it deep in a lot of the majors, but ended up cashing only twice, and for rather paltry sums considering the level of buy ins i was playing. I ended up being about $1.3k down, which while is perfectly fine with my bankroll, it is pretty annoying considering i had been on a few day losing streak already this month.
Myself and a friend have an arrangement at the moment that any tourny over $100 we swap 25% with each other. Well on sunday he suggested me up it to 33.33% for the majors. I agreed, and it was one of the best poker decision I've made in a while. Mr_Noisy went on to win the Dise major for 25k euros ($38k) which earned me a nice little $12.6k.
Yesterday was another "so near but yet so far" kind of day. I ended up final tabling three tournies, all on ongame, and only making $3k.
9th in the 50 rebuy was the sickening one. With 13 left, the button moved all in on my bb i snapped QQ he showed AK and hit, had i held i would have had a third of the chips in play with 12 left...
The interesting thing about that is that my QQ against his range there plays ridiculously well, so i was unlucky to be only 55% vs his AK. Damn flippaments.
I came 4th in the 12k, nothing really to say about that one, and i also came 2nd in the Turbo shorthanded $100 for $2.5k or so.
I really love that shorthanded turbo, if i make it deep into the tourny i really feel i have a massive edge. That may sound strange given i would normally complain about crapshooty tournaments taking away from my edge, but because the blinds are so big i find an edge from elsewhere.
These tournaments are all about assigning pushing and calling ranges of your opponents and making the correct shove/fold or call. The edge is there to be seen when at the final table you have players folding with over 2/3 of their stack in blind.
I got to the final table of the same tourny tonight, with a little bit of luck along the way, but as soon as i got there i knew i had a huge chance to win it. I just had to hope no one woke up with a monster behind me when i pushed, because i knew i wouldn't get looked up with a hand like K8 even if they did have 1/3 of their stack in blind.
As it happened i managed to bully my way to heads up, then it was all over when he shoved his QT into my AK and failed to outrun me. Ship the $4.4k!
I'm off for 5days or so from tomorrow - champions league final, then the (anti) climax to the SPL. Friday sees another trip to St Andrews for a mate's stag do, then my sister is coming to visit on the Sunday for a couple of days - bus busy busy.
Sunday was an interesting one. I made it deep in a lot of the majors, but ended up cashing only twice, and for rather paltry sums considering the level of buy ins i was playing. I ended up being about $1.3k down, which while is perfectly fine with my bankroll, it is pretty annoying considering i had been on a few day losing streak already this month.
Myself and a friend have an arrangement at the moment that any tourny over $100 we swap 25% with each other. Well on sunday he suggested me up it to 33.33% for the majors. I agreed, and it was one of the best poker decision I've made in a while. Mr_Noisy went on to win the Dise major for 25k euros ($38k) which earned me a nice little $12.6k.
Yesterday was another "so near but yet so far" kind of day. I ended up final tabling three tournies, all on ongame, and only making $3k.
9th in the 50 rebuy was the sickening one. With 13 left, the button moved all in on my bb i snapped QQ he showed AK and hit, had i held i would have had a third of the chips in play with 12 left...
The interesting thing about that is that my QQ against his range there plays ridiculously well, so i was unlucky to be only 55% vs his AK. Damn flippaments.
I came 4th in the 12k, nothing really to say about that one, and i also came 2nd in the Turbo shorthanded $100 for $2.5k or so.
I really love that shorthanded turbo, if i make it deep into the tourny i really feel i have a massive edge. That may sound strange given i would normally complain about crapshooty tournaments taking away from my edge, but because the blinds are so big i find an edge from elsewhere.
These tournaments are all about assigning pushing and calling ranges of your opponents and making the correct shove/fold or call. The edge is there to be seen when at the final table you have players folding with over 2/3 of their stack in blind.
I got to the final table of the same tourny tonight, with a little bit of luck along the way, but as soon as i got there i knew i had a huge chance to win it. I just had to hope no one woke up with a monster behind me when i pushed, because i knew i wouldn't get looked up with a hand like K8 even if they did have 1/3 of their stack in blind.
As it happened i managed to bully my way to heads up, then it was all over when he shoved his QT into my AK and failed to outrun me. Ship the $4.4k!
I'm off for 5days or so from tomorrow - champions league final, then the (anti) climax to the SPL. Friday sees another trip to St Andrews for a mate's stag do, then my sister is coming to visit on the Sunday for a couple of days - bus busy busy.
Thursday, May 8, 2008
A week of debauchery and a return to the grind
Until today i had been away from online poker for a week.
Thursday night was the start of the binge with Neilmc and the beej arriving in Edinburgh. We went out for a bite to eat before watching Rangers trounce Fiorentina on penalties in the Uefa Cup semi, I was subsequently chucked out of a club at 2.45am having consumed the bars entire supply of red bull that was making their cheap vodka palatable.
I recall attempting a stealth mission to get back in, which failed, but considering the place shut at 3, it really wasn't worth it.
Friday night saw myself and a few boys (including the beej, neilmc and micky d10) make a trip to St Andrews for more debauchery. It was the annual football club ball on the saturday night and the annual poker society tourny on the saturday/sunday afternoon - perfect.
Friday night ended similarly to Thursday night, which really didn't bode well for the poker the next day. But did introduce what was to be the word of the weekend - "Murder". None of us were directly (or indirectly for that matter) involved in any homicide of any kind, but having heard the word used in place of "terrible" a few times in the past we adopted it as our inappropriate word of the weekend. Think Taggart "there's been a mirdur" and that closely resembles what we were saying - add a cockney twist to that and a little bit of confusion in your voice and you've pretty much got Neilmc's accent.
My tournament was rather short, and i played only a few hands (it was mirdur).
The major hand was as follows:
Belgian guy who could play a bit raised the button to 400, i made it 1.2k in the sb with ATo with 12k back, he called with 8k back.
Flop 3 J T two diamonds.
I led for 1.6k and he called.
At this point I think he is either floating me or is drawing. I think he raises with a big piece of the flop as it is rather draw heavy and i've shown strength twice.
Turn is a brick and i elect to check to allow him to bluff. He fires 2.5k, i think for a while and decided that he wasn't drawing as he would check the turn, and that he was on air, so i called to let him hang himself on the river.
River Ac
I checked, he shoved... i time-banked, now going back over the hand and started to doubt my thought he wasn't drawing on the flop/turn. I decided the way i had played it i had set up a bluff, so i couldn't fold when i rivered two pair, i called and he sheepishly tables QK for the nuts apologising profusely.
I asked if if he would have shoved if he missed and he said he would have done, so i guess that vindicates my play a little, but i wasn't entirely happy with it - but to be honest i didn't really care.
I then shoved AKs a while later and couldn't outrun 77.
Incidentally Micky d10 came 2nd the next day.
The evening approached and having donned kilts or dinner jackets we attempted to ruffle some feathers at the ball, it proved to be a disappointingly tame one. although Neilmc and i tried to liven it up a bit with some sidebets.
We each bought £20 worth of raffle tickets and had money on the other person winning, he won the raffle, i won the side bet - ship it!
After that it was the player of the year awards. Considering we didn't know the players this made it rather difficult, but we settled for surnames from A-L, M-Z. People were looking at us rather bizarrely when we were on our knees as the women's 2nd team most improved player was announced.
Shortly after the awards, desert was served which this year was apple crumble. The tradition at football club balls has always been to eat your desert without your hands, but apparently our table were the only ones who had heard of this tradition. Neilmc laid Puggy as evens favourite but then refused to take Puggy's bet of £100 (yes i am referring to myself in third person).
I took it down anyway, and the lack of any bet didn't take anything away from me despite my tongue having swelled to twice its orginal size.
The boat races followed the speeches - pint downing competitions vs the current students. I tried to set up a book declaring our alumni team the favourites, but again struggled to find action. We won at a canter, adding more fuel to the rumour that the old days were better - there was a lot of looking through rose tinted glasses over the weekend.
Sunday saw another ball, and another chance to show the town what it was missing, and again it was a rather dull affair. We arrived just before the raffle and were disgusted to find out that they had run out of raffle tickets! Who runs out of raffle tickets? Surely that's something you buy more of as they cost nothing and retail for a million times their value.
No raffle tickets denied us the chance of making more ridiculous sidebets. The raffle included a signed Barcelona shirt and ball, and when we saw two girls take both prizes we were appropriately disgusted (sexist often?). The girl who won the ball claimed she wouldn't sell it for £500, so we approached the girl who won the shirt, who agreed to sell the shirt to Neilmc for £150 - his first bid. She later said she would have accepted £100. She needs to learn how to value raise, and Neilmc's pot control was definitely questioned.
The after party events included two St Andrews allies dancing on the table, but that was as rogue as it got. Although there was much hilarity at one ally's attempt at chatting up a girl with the line "So er... do you want to go for a walk on the beach". When she said it was a little far, he didn't give up, instead asking for clarification if she had knocked him back or if indeed the beach was too far to walk. Unfortunately for me, sorry i mean him, the clarification never came.
Monday we stayed and played a £5 rebuy with the students who i think were a little appalled by us moving all in pre blind for the first few hands, and unrivaled nittiness was shown when they refused to call said blind all ins with hands as strong as AQ.
"I can't call with AQ with him behind" As the two guys all in exposed 42o and 97s. AQ boy wasn't done yet "See that's 4 live cards, i'm hardly even favourite. Of course he would have flopped broadway and his head was in his hands. Wp sir, gg.
Only 13 runners, 4 of the 4 allies made the final, i busted in 6th, the beej in 3rd and Neilmc in 2nd. As a side note the winner was a guy who i backed in the annual event on the Saturday - i guess i chose the wrong tourny - damn coinflips.
It was homeward bound for me on the Tuesday, but the beej and Neilmc joined me for one last day. We managed to arrange a golf game with the long lost member of the alliance - Mark "thehills1" Hillson. He's a little better at golf than he is at poker which he proved when carding a 64, which could easily have been a 59 after he birdied the first 3.
Much of the chat on the golf course centred on the beej's conquests over the weekend. He had been claiming 3 in 3, but when pushed it emerged that he had merely kissed 2 girls, one of them on two days. Of course they were both absolute stunners. None of us saw the first one, although i have it on good authority that she was indeed female and the white stick she was carrying belonged not to her but the fluorescent jacket covered Labrador following her around.
The binge wasn't to be finished there, we headed out on the town that night for one last hurrah, but having sat in the corner of particularly quiet club for 3 hours drinking cans of red stripe (from glasses of course) and talking about football, we retired back to casa Puggy.
I really wasn't in any state to be playing poker yesterday, so took another day off planning on blitzing it today.
Blitz it i did, although in the 15 tournies i played i managed only a solitary cash. Not bad though when you win said tourny for $4k.
I have really felt i have been getting on top of my game recently, and i know there ar still areas which require a lot of improvement. I am 8 tabling max at the moment, and i would say that my performance is dipping severely when i go from 7 to 8, so I'm definitely not ready to up that just yet.
I have been looking to replace some tournies in my schedule though with some bigger ones. Until today i had only played the Ongame 50r once as i have a problem with the structure, and I'm a bankroll nit, but i really should be in it every day, so now will be.
Only 6 weeks until our American trip, so I'm looking at putting in a lot of volume between now and then. It's very easy not to bother playing some days, and to take lots of time off for holidays when you play poker for a living, but i believe to be truly successful you need to be putting in the hours. I've had a weeks holiday, now it is time to get back to the grind - and crush!
Puggy.
Thursday night was the start of the binge with Neilmc and the beej arriving in Edinburgh. We went out for a bite to eat before watching Rangers trounce Fiorentina on penalties in the Uefa Cup semi, I was subsequently chucked out of a club at 2.45am having consumed the bars entire supply of red bull that was making their cheap vodka palatable.
I recall attempting a stealth mission to get back in, which failed, but considering the place shut at 3, it really wasn't worth it.
Friday night saw myself and a few boys (including the beej, neilmc and micky d10) make a trip to St Andrews for more debauchery. It was the annual football club ball on the saturday night and the annual poker society tourny on the saturday/sunday afternoon - perfect.
Friday night ended similarly to Thursday night, which really didn't bode well for the poker the next day. But did introduce what was to be the word of the weekend - "Murder". None of us were directly (or indirectly for that matter) involved in any homicide of any kind, but having heard the word used in place of "terrible" a few times in the past we adopted it as our inappropriate word of the weekend. Think Taggart "there's been a mirdur" and that closely resembles what we were saying - add a cockney twist to that and a little bit of confusion in your voice and you've pretty much got Neilmc's accent.
My tournament was rather short, and i played only a few hands (it was mirdur).
The major hand was as follows:
Belgian guy who could play a bit raised the button to 400, i made it 1.2k in the sb with ATo with 12k back, he called with 8k back.
Flop 3 J T two diamonds.
I led for 1.6k and he called.
At this point I think he is either floating me or is drawing. I think he raises with a big piece of the flop as it is rather draw heavy and i've shown strength twice.
Turn is a brick and i elect to check to allow him to bluff. He fires 2.5k, i think for a while and decided that he wasn't drawing as he would check the turn, and that he was on air, so i called to let him hang himself on the river.
River Ac
I checked, he shoved... i time-banked, now going back over the hand and started to doubt my thought he wasn't drawing on the flop/turn. I decided the way i had played it i had set up a bluff, so i couldn't fold when i rivered two pair, i called and he sheepishly tables QK for the nuts apologising profusely.
I asked if if he would have shoved if he missed and he said he would have done, so i guess that vindicates my play a little, but i wasn't entirely happy with it - but to be honest i didn't really care.
I then shoved AKs a while later and couldn't outrun 77.
Incidentally Micky d10 came 2nd the next day.
The evening approached and having donned kilts or dinner jackets we attempted to ruffle some feathers at the ball, it proved to be a disappointingly tame one. although Neilmc and i tried to liven it up a bit with some sidebets.
We each bought £20 worth of raffle tickets and had money on the other person winning, he won the raffle, i won the side bet - ship it!
After that it was the player of the year awards. Considering we didn't know the players this made it rather difficult, but we settled for surnames from A-L, M-Z. People were looking at us rather bizarrely when we were on our knees as the women's 2nd team most improved player was announced.
Shortly after the awards, desert was served which this year was apple crumble. The tradition at football club balls has always been to eat your desert without your hands, but apparently our table were the only ones who had heard of this tradition. Neilmc laid Puggy as evens favourite but then refused to take Puggy's bet of £100 (yes i am referring to myself in third person).
I took it down anyway, and the lack of any bet didn't take anything away from me despite my tongue having swelled to twice its orginal size.
The boat races followed the speeches - pint downing competitions vs the current students. I tried to set up a book declaring our alumni team the favourites, but again struggled to find action. We won at a canter, adding more fuel to the rumour that the old days were better - there was a lot of looking through rose tinted glasses over the weekend.
Sunday saw another ball, and another chance to show the town what it was missing, and again it was a rather dull affair. We arrived just before the raffle and were disgusted to find out that they had run out of raffle tickets! Who runs out of raffle tickets? Surely that's something you buy more of as they cost nothing and retail for a million times their value.
No raffle tickets denied us the chance of making more ridiculous sidebets. The raffle included a signed Barcelona shirt and ball, and when we saw two girls take both prizes we were appropriately disgusted (sexist often?). The girl who won the ball claimed she wouldn't sell it for £500, so we approached the girl who won the shirt, who agreed to sell the shirt to Neilmc for £150 - his first bid. She later said she would have accepted £100. She needs to learn how to value raise, and Neilmc's pot control was definitely questioned.
The after party events included two St Andrews allies dancing on the table, but that was as rogue as it got. Although there was much hilarity at one ally's attempt at chatting up a girl with the line "So er... do you want to go for a walk on the beach". When she said it was a little far, he didn't give up, instead asking for clarification if she had knocked him back or if indeed the beach was too far to walk. Unfortunately for me, sorry i mean him, the clarification never came.
Monday we stayed and played a £5 rebuy with the students who i think were a little appalled by us moving all in pre blind for the first few hands, and unrivaled nittiness was shown when they refused to call said blind all ins with hands as strong as AQ.
"I can't call with AQ with him behind" As the two guys all in exposed 42o and 97s. AQ boy wasn't done yet "See that's 4 live cards, i'm hardly even favourite. Of course he would have flopped broadway and his head was in his hands. Wp sir, gg.
Only 13 runners, 4 of the 4 allies made the final, i busted in 6th, the beej in 3rd and Neilmc in 2nd. As a side note the winner was a guy who i backed in the annual event on the Saturday - i guess i chose the wrong tourny - damn coinflips.
It was homeward bound for me on the Tuesday, but the beej and Neilmc joined me for one last day. We managed to arrange a golf game with the long lost member of the alliance - Mark "thehills1" Hillson. He's a little better at golf than he is at poker which he proved when carding a 64, which could easily have been a 59 after he birdied the first 3.
Much of the chat on the golf course centred on the beej's conquests over the weekend. He had been claiming 3 in 3, but when pushed it emerged that he had merely kissed 2 girls, one of them on two days. Of course they were both absolute stunners. None of us saw the first one, although i have it on good authority that she was indeed female and the white stick she was carrying belonged not to her but the fluorescent jacket covered Labrador following her around.
The binge wasn't to be finished there, we headed out on the town that night for one last hurrah, but having sat in the corner of particularly quiet club for 3 hours drinking cans of red stripe (from glasses of course) and talking about football, we retired back to casa Puggy.
I really wasn't in any state to be playing poker yesterday, so took another day off planning on blitzing it today.
Blitz it i did, although in the 15 tournies i played i managed only a solitary cash. Not bad though when you win said tourny for $4k.
I have really felt i have been getting on top of my game recently, and i know there ar still areas which require a lot of improvement. I am 8 tabling max at the moment, and i would say that my performance is dipping severely when i go from 7 to 8, so I'm definitely not ready to up that just yet.
I have been looking to replace some tournies in my schedule though with some bigger ones. Until today i had only played the Ongame 50r once as i have a problem with the structure, and I'm a bankroll nit, but i really should be in it every day, so now will be.
Only 6 weeks until our American trip, so I'm looking at putting in a lot of volume between now and then. It's very easy not to bother playing some days, and to take lots of time off for holidays when you play poker for a living, but i believe to be truly successful you need to be putting in the hours. I've had a weeks holiday, now it is time to get back to the grind - and crush!
Puggy.
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
To infinity and beyond
For the last year I’ve been talking with a friend of mine about leaving the UK for the winter – jetting off somewhere considerably warmer and setting up base there for 6 months or so playing poker.
Until the last couple of months it has been nothing more than a pipe dream – there was quite a lot of red tape, and even in the areas where no red tape existed – ie neither of us have any family commitments, our prospective leaving date was so far away that anything could happen to throw a spanner in the works.
Where to?
Of course it would be too easy if we stopped at
One of the main things we have to consider is the time zone of a country. One of our primary reasons for moving is so that we can play a full day of MTTs during normal working hours so that we can lead as normal a lifestyle as possible as a professional gambler. Ideally we’d like somewhere with a time zone 6-7 hours behind GMT, allowing us to begin our current
Before we ruled out
Tauranga is the fastest growing city in
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