Poker Tracking sites

I use OfficialPokerRankings.com extensively to record my tournament results and to track my progress on this poker journey. There are several similar sites out there but this one is allowed by Pokerstars and FullTilt and is very informative.

I use the site  in several ways:

1. It records all tournaments you enter and tracks your finishing position and money you win along with cost and ROI numbers.

2. It provides a leaderboard of the top players (highest winning players) on Pokerstars and FullTilt sites and allows you to see which tournaments they entered and where all their winnings come from.

3. It allows you to lookup in real time the players on a table that you are on to see their normal average buyin and current form. I think it provides an edge to know if a player on your final table has never won this big before or if they regularly win big. It helps you to decide which players are out of their depth and you can target with raises and re-raises.

4. It shows how you are progressing as a player by showing you ROI for each calander year in the last 3 years, the last 120 days and the current YTD.

For example I can see that:

- in 2007 my ROI was -88% - completely useless

- in 2008 my ROI was -11% - this reflects a poor first 6 months and a stronger last 6 months

- in 2009 my YTD ROI is 189% - this is reflecting a good January (so far)

- my ROI for the last 120 days is 60%

This information suggests I am on the right track. It also shows that for FullTilt at least (all stats above are site specific and are for Full Tilt) I am having a good month. I may even make my $100 per day profit target depending on how I do from now until the end of the month.

So officialpokerrankings.com, or OPR as I like to call it, well done. It is a great site and very useful to a poker player like myself who is trying to measure their progress.

Do good poker players need luck

I had an interesting chat today with a player called snoop86 about luck. Do good poker players need luck to win tournaments, and more to the point, as snoop contends are they good enough that they dont rely on luck.

I think all poker players need luck, Even aces are only 82% likely to win pre-flop so you need to be lucky to dodge that other 18% of cards that will beat you.

When you push in with KK on that final table, you need to be lucky for it to hold up and put you into a chip-leading position.

When you are playing aggressively around the bubble, you need some luck in that other players do not play back at you that one time you are making a move with marginal cards. and hopefully they will play back at you that one time you have a monster hand.

So I think luck is needed, and relied upon. But snoop disagreed with me!

Wrapping up 2008

I wrote my first blog entry in November 2007 and stated I have 3-4 months to train to become a poker player and get to the pinnacle whatever that means.  I really started my journey the month before in September. I finished up my computer job for a year of rest and decided I might as well fill in that time trying to play poker.

In September I carted around the casinos and poker rooms in Southern California and realized how much I hated commuting and sitting in traffic and how much I enjoyed working at home. I found online poker. In October I signed up for Full Tilt and in November I tried Pokerstars. I also found a bunch of poker magazines with articles on strategy, a number of poker learning books at the book store and online websites and forums that train you to become a better poker player. I decided after 3 months I was ready to try some big tournaments in different countries around the world.

So 2008 was about combining my enjoyment of travel with my new found passion of competitive poker. I travelled to Australia and played in a tournament in Adelaide in January coming 3rd, then I played in the Aussie Millions event #1 in Melbourne and came 33rd. It seemed to be a great start.

I went to Las Vegas in February and played in a bunch of regular casino tournaments. I then played in the LA Poker Classic at Commerce Casino in March and headed to England in April to play in the casinos over there. In May I went to Monte Carlo for the EPT grand final and played in one event and some live SitnGos.  I was back in Las Vegas for June and July and played in one event in the WSOP.   For all the experience I was gaining I did not yet feel good enough at poker to be out of training. 

So I decided August was a study month. I decided as I had started the journey in September it was more reasonable to allow for a 12 month training period. I would start to play for real in September 2008 tracking my results and setting some goals.

So I did. I set a goal of earning an average $100 per day clear profit from online poker. It started well in September but then went downhill. My results:

September - win $2212

October - win $58

November - lose  $477

December - win $114

I guess if I met the goal right away it would be too easy.  I struggled in October, November and December to stop the rot. I reviewed all my training material - what was I doing so right in September that went wrong in these three months. Or was I just lucky in September and playing the same way now without getting lucky. Or was there an online conspiracy that I was victim to .

So here I am in January. Trying to review the past year I have enjoyed the time playing poker and travelling the world. I am in a very lucky situation that I can afford to continue playing poker during 2009. I want to meet my goal and then pass it.  

The big question is am I good enough? Or can I become good enough? I guess the only way to find out is to play on during 2009 and continue to learn and adapt my game. 

December summary

It looked like December was going to be another disaster money-losing month taking my downswing into its third month, but I had a late month comeback of sorts which left me barely in profit:

SUMMARY - December 2008

         FTilt  PStars   Live  Total   Profit

                                          0

12/01   - 24    - 11      0    - 35    - 35

12/02    - did not play

12/03    - did not play

12/04    - did not play

12/05    - did not play

12/06    - did not play

12/07    - did not play

12/08    - did not play

12/09     33       0      0      33    -  2

12/10   - 22       0      0    - 22    - 24   

12/11      0       0      0       0    - 24 

12/12   - 18       0      0    - 18    - 42 

12/13      0      12      0      12    - 30 

12/14      0       0      0       0    - 30 

12/15   - 31       0      0    - 31    - 61 

12/16   -135       0      0    -135    -196 

12/17      9       0      0       9    -187 

12/18   -  7    - 11      0    - 18    -205 

12/19   -  9       0      0    -  9    -214 

12/20      0       0      0       0    -214 

12/21      0       0      0       0    -214

12/22   - 15    - 99      0    -114    -328

12/23      0      23      0      23    -305

12/24      5    - 32      0    - 27    -332

12/25      0    -  3      0       3    -335

12/26    319       1      0     320    - 15

12/27    115    - 28      0      87      72

12/28   - 93    - 18      0    -111    - 39

12/29    296      54      0     350     311

12/30   - 44    - 35      0    - 79     232

12/31   - 77    - 41      0    -118     114

So I ended the year not thinking I was totally useless but still very disappointed in my roller-coaster results. If I win one day I seem to lose the next. I am obviously not playing consistent poker or maybe this is just the variance all the pros talk about so much. 

 

Making a profit again

So since the day after Christmas I finally cracked my downswing and returned to winning ways with a modest profit.  Notable small victories:

12/26 - came 2nd in a 200 person $11 tourney ==> $330 

12/27 - came 5th in a 90 man $26 SnG ==>$144

12/29 - came 1st in a 90 man $11 SnG ==> $230

12/29 - came 1st in a 90 man $3 SnG ==> $72

I am hoping this will enable me to finish December in profit and get back to my $100 per day profit target in january.

Some of the things I have changed to get past the downswing:

- fold KQ in early position and play real cautious with it in ANY position (similar to how I play AJ)

- focus on bullying small and medium stacks around the bubble

- slow down on final table

- build chips early by positional play

I've also been more relaxed over the Christmas period and with all the travels, shopping and partying completed I have been able to slow down and focus a bit better.  This may or may not have helped my poker :-)

Pokerstars blogger freeroll

My great luck continues and I continue to smile. I was playing the blogger freeroll (the prizes are great so why not). This was a NL satellite with top 72 players qualifying out of 538 runners and I was going nicely having some banter with the table then hit the following 2 hands:

QQ v 87 - the flop was J87 and he checked, so I led out with my QQ and he called. Turn was a 7 and he checked.  I checked a little scared of the paired board and the river was a 5. He put in a small bet and did not have many chips left so I raised to put him all in. He called and showed the FH  and there went half my stack leaving me with 22oo chips or so.

AQ v 88 - I was SB and he was BB. Preflop I just called because I wanted action and he raised - things were looking good. The flop was 8AQ. Hows that for a setup. I bet and he raised, so I called and we played a bit of cat and mouse. I figured he had A-rag or maybe even A-8. I had a good banter going in the chat box and everything was looking rosy with all the chips going in the middle. His set won the day!!

I saved the history for this hand:

PokerStars Game #23034721655: Tournament #124189661, Freeroll  Hold'em No Limit - Level IV (25/50) - 2008/12/18 14:39:14 ET

Table '124189661 35' 9-max Seat #9 is the button

Seat 2: ace-redman (2076 in chips) 

Seat 3: Nis Puk (4326 in chips) 

Seat 4: DrewFours (3294 in chips) 

Seat 5: bigpoppaboat (2439 in chips) 

Seat 6: MrAckley (3650 in chips) is sitting out

Seat 7: ImRafa20 (2465 in chips) 

Seat 8: Priitk (1261 in chips) 

Seat 9: SiresNme (4574 in chips) 

ace-redman: posts small blind 25

Nis Puk: posts big blind 50

*** HOLE CARDS ***

Dealt to ace-redman [Ad Qs]

DrewFours: folds 

bigpoppaboat: folds 

MrAckley: folds 

ImRafa20: folds 

Priitk: folds 

SiresNme: folds 

ace-redman: calls 25

Nis Puk: raises 200 to 250

ace-redman: raises 200 to 450

Nis Puk: calls 200

*** FLOP *** [8h Qd Ac]

GRobman is connected 

ace-redman: bets 350

Nis Puk: raises 350 to 700

ace-redman: calls 350

*** TURN *** [8h Qd Ac] [2d]

ace-redman: checks 

Nis Puk: bets 450

ace-redman said, "gl all"

ace-redman: raises 476 to 926 and is all-in

Nis Puk: calls 476

*** RIVER *** [8h Qd Ac 2d] [Kh]

*** SHOW DOWN ***

ace-redman: shows [Ad Qs] (two pair, Aces and Queens)

Nis Puk: shows [8d 8c] (three of a kind, Eights)

Nis Puk collected 4152 from pot

Nis Puk said, "gg"

*** SUMMARY ***

Total pot 4152 | Rake 0 

Board [8h Qd Ac 2d Kh]

Seat 2: ace-redman (small blind) showed [Ad Qs] and lost with two pair, Aces and Queens

Seat 3: Nis Puk (big blind) showed [8d 8c] and won (4152) with three of a kind, Eights

Seat 4: DrewFours folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Seat 5: bigpoppaboat folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Seat 6: MrAckley folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Seat 7: ImRafa20 folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Seat 8: Priitk folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Seat 9: SiresNme (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)

On a positive note I had another session yesterday where I lost 4 tournaments (I cannot win a tournament right now), but won all the buy-ins back and a little more in a cash game. So maybe I should just play cash games right now!!!!

That would be smart, but I am not smart. I am persistant - this tournament luck has to change at some  point!!

Pokerstars bloggers event

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

This PokerStars tournament is a No Limit Texas Hold’em event exclusive to Bloggers.

Registration code: 178421

The conspiracy theory - online poker

I am in the middle of a downswing which I am hoping will end soon but it leads to inevitable questions from my friends and family about the possibility of online poker being rigged. I am very optimistic that this is NOT the case but it did lead me to think about the possibilities and how it would work:

1. DBA/Programmer cheats

Of course I am very familiar with computers and running databases because this is what I have done for the last 14 years. The recent Ultimate Bet/Absolute Poker scandals prove it is easy for programmers to hide code or hooks into the system that someone could abuse (for example to see hole cards of the other players on the same table),  but with competent code reviews and ongoing software upgrades by other programmers these hooks would always eventually be found out and exposed.  A more likely cheat is the DBA who has access to every game, every hand history and every player record stored in the database. They could use this information to improve their own game or share it with other players and interested parties - this would be much harder to detect but is not so different from the current occurrence of players using training sites to see the full hand histories of other winning or expert  players.  Even though the DBA can access this information it may not provide immediate benefit.

2. Pokerpro type tables.

The new electronic tables also could store all hands played so it could be possible for someone (a DBA) to run through the full hand history of the person who won a tournament playing on these machines to determine when they bluff, how much they bet for certain starting hands etc, to either improve their own game or to fully understand how another player plays - the main difference between this and the training sites is the player may not even be involved in this information being shared.  For example Mike McDonald (aka TIMEX) won the Pokerpro tournament in the 2008 Aussie millions event - who owns the hand history stored in the PokerPro machine?

3. Player collusion

We all know this exists expecially in mid-stakes cash games and single table SitNGos. The most likely scenario is 2 players who are friends  sharing information over instant messaging software regarding their hands while they play on the same table.  This would be very hard to detect if it is done sporadically but fairly easy to detect if it is done regularly. I suspect the online poker sites are working hard to identify IP addresses that regularly play on the same tables together and tracking any money transfers/chat logs etc. between players with those IP addresses.  The other form of player collusion is in large MTT tournaments where player 1 may play the easy part of the tournament and hand over to the more experienced player2 for the end game, OR one player will play the same MTT with several accounts aka multi-accounting. Something similar to this appears to have happened in a large Pokerstars tournament recently but Pokerstars had a system in place to detect this and disqualified the eventual winner. I think the  "player collusion" form of cheating will always happen to some extent but the online sites are working to stamp this out.

4. The online sites player retention scam

This is where things could get interesting. I do not think the big sites would dare to do this but because I am a programmer I know it could be done. The worst form of cheating would be an algorithym to encourage players to win a little and then lose a little, win a little more, then lose a little more eventually losing their bankroll so they have to reload. This would maximize the amount of play each player would make and therefore increase the online sites rake. How would you disguise this - basically it would just look like a run of bad luck where players appear to have a number of bad beats. Who would you target - probably the mid-range players who are the bread and butter of the site. The higher end players and the  pros know the percentages and would quickly discuss skewed statistics amongst themselves and to avoid certain sites. But the mid-range players would just keep depositing a little more money and assume their lack of skill and "bad luck" caused them to have a bad run - after all they were winning the month before!! 

Number 4 is the type of conspiracy which can only be prevented by competent regulation by an authority that can punish any offenders. It is possible self-regulation (which exists now via the importance of reputation) would also prevent the online sites from doing this. But as much as I am very optimistic this is not happening, it is impossible to know for sure.  And I am in the middle of a downswing....and several people have said to me "it must be rigged".....

Food for thought!!

Still trying to figure it all out

My downswing is ongoing. the last 3 months have gone as follows:

September - win $2212

October - win $58

November - lose  $477

Early in December I decided to take a week or so off from playing online  poker hoping this would refresh me and get me back to winning ways. Unfortunately it has made little difference as evidenced by my December month to date results:

SUMMARY - December 2008

         FTilt  PStars   Live  Total   Profit

                                          0

12/01   - 24    - 11      0    - 35    - 35

12/02 no poker played

12/03 no poker played

12/04 no poker played

12/05 no poker played

12/06 no poker played

12/07 no poker played

12/08 no poker played

12/09     33       0      0      33    -  2

12/10   - 22       0      0    - 22    - 24

12/11      0       0      0       0    - 24

12/12   - 18       0      0    - 18    - 42

12/13      0      12      0      12    - 30

12/14      0       0      0       0    - 30

12/15   - 31       0      0    - 31    - 61

Not too good. After my break I started playing again and had ONE day of positive results at Full Tilt, then continued losing money. The strange thing is I have been playing cash games on Full Tilt and winning.  For example I played on 4 tables low-stakes NL on 12/15 and ended up $71 in profit for about 2 hours work. But in the tournaments and SitNGos I continue to lose money.

Possibly the simplest reason is the lack of a winning mentality (or going on tilt). Maybe my continuing playing tournaments where I go deep and then losing around the bubble is causing me to make bad decisions. Or maybe my recent reading up on cash game play has somehow affected how I am playing tournaments.

I am hoping to figure this out and get back to positive ways. 

November summary

As mentioned in my last post, November started ok and then went downhill. The full results are shown below:

SUMMARY - November 2008

                                                            

         FTilt  PStars   Live  Total   Profit

                                          0

11/01     67    - 19      0      48      48

11/02      0       0      0       0      48

11/03    100    -  2      0      98     146

11/04   -158    - 12      0    -170    - 24 

11/05    229       0   - 60     169     145

11/06   -245       0      0    -245    -100

11/07   - 35    -  3      0    - 38    -138

11/08   - 23       0      0    - 23    -161

11/09   - 85       0      0    - 85    -246

11/10   - 33       0      0    - 33    -279

11/11      0       0      0       0    -279

11/12     16       0      0      16    -263

11/13    140       0      0     140    -123

11/14    138      15      0     153      30

11/15   - 77       0      0    - 77    - 47

11/16   -107    - 12      0    -119    -166

11/17   - 10    - 28      0    - 38    -204

11/18      0       0      0       0    -204

11/19   - 42       0      0    - 42    -246

11/20      0       0      0       0    -246

11/21   - 26       0      0    - 26    -272

11/22   - 68      29      0    - 39    -311

11/23     58    -  0      0      58    -253

11/24   - 95    - 57      0    -152    -405

11/25   - 22       0      0    - 22    -427

11/26   - 38       0      0    - 38    -461

11/27      0       0      0       0    -461

11/28      0       0      0       0    -461

11/29      1    -  0      0       1    -460

11/30      0    - 17      0    - 17    -477

The final loss for the month was $477. When will this downswing end? The obvious question is what am I doing about it. I am reviewing my hand histories, writing down how I am playing certain hands, moving to different buyins and different types of games, re-reading certain books and re-watching certain training site videos that seemed to help me before. 

So far I have not cracked the nut. I am going deep quite often and then losing near to or on the bubble. For example, some of my recent beats:

AQ v A8 (he hit the 8)

set v pair (he back-doored a straight)

AK v AA

AQ v AA

KK v JJ (he hit the J)

QQ v 33 (he hit the 3)

Jh9h v As7s (me short stacked on the bubble, money goes in post flop on flop of 2d, Js, 7c - he calls with pair of 7s and gets a backdoor flush 5s, Ks)

I decided to take some days off from playing poker - maybe a break will get me back to winning ways in December.

Back home

So Im back in California after staying an extra 10 days in Australia for some additional R&R.  Its kind of an inside joke as a lot of my friends are bemused by my time off "work" playing poker and probably think my whole life is R&R.

What happened in Australia after my great little 6 final tables in a row?  A massive downswing.  Once again the gods (or Full tilt shuffler) seemed to go against me. Every time I went all-in I seemed to hit AK V AA, or QQ v KK, or AK v AQ with a miracle Q appearing, or KK v JJ with a miracle J appearing. My step-dad was watching and was amazed how unlucky I seemed to be - he is now convinced Full Tilt is rigged. Of course I do not believe that - I am just on another downswing that will eventually end.

Anyhow I am back home to the wife and dogs and with no sign of the downswing ending in Australia I am hoping it will end over here. I have been reading some additional poker books - currently I am reading "Online Ace" by Scott Fischman.

Australia

So i am on vacation in Australia out to see my parents and hang out for a few weeks. One of the joys of online poker is you can travel anywhere in the world and if the internet is available you can continue to work. This gives me the freedom to stay home in California, visit parents in Australia or visit my brothers in England and still play poker.

Also the timezone is 17.5 hours ahead of California (or 5.5 hours behind but the next day) so when I login to play it is possible I will be playing different players. One could argue that more online pros live on the west coast of California than anywhere else so when you play during the day in California you are playing pro grinders a lot - this is much tougher opposition than playing against the night-time warriors who login after their day job is finished. So maybe while i am in Oz I will play against weaker players just because of the time difference.

And so it seems. I have been playing a lot of 45 seater $11 and $26 tournaments recently and I just had a little spell where I final tabled 6 tourneys in a row. Normally I will final table one or two and then have a couple of 15/16/17th type finishes. But not this week. Six in a row leading to a decent profit to help makeup for my losses on the FTOPS entries.

My plan is to keep playing these 45 seaters for a little while to boost my bankroll. The nice thing about these tournaments is they do not last long (normally 75 mins or so) which means I have maximum flexibility to still go out over here and visit people.

It will be interesting to see if I can get back on track with my $100 per day target after the October shortfall (because of WCOOP) and the problems last week (because of FTOPS).  I will post an update here for November when the totals are in.

FTOPS

So Full tilts FTOPS series is here and its a chance to win some serious money. 

I entered satellites to win an entry into FTOPS #1 for $191 instead of $220 so I was ahead before it started. Just prior I had placed first in 2 smaller tournaments and was also going pretty deep in most tournaments I entered so my confidence was high. 

There were 5124 starters and 492 got paid with 1st place getting $170,000 or so. Anyone in the last 27 got really good money. That was my target. But alas, it was not to be. I came 1184th place and went out in a bad way. My stack was getting lower (about 12 BB) and I was card dead for a while and then picked up AJs. I decided a double up at this point would give me a chance to make a decent run for the money so I pushed and was called by a player with 2-2. The flop came A, 8, Q so it was looking good but the turn and river combined to give the guys with 2-2 a backdoor flush. And I was out......no money, no glory!  

As ever I always think about the big tourneys after and doubt my moves. I had enough chips to wait longer for a premium hand (AJ suited is not really premium) but the longer I waited the smaller my stack would get and the less effective a double up would be. This is a little bit of Snyders philosophy I still think is good - its better to double up earlier so you can change 12BB to 24BB instead of later when you change 6BB to 12BB and are still low and need yet another double up.  So I went for it. And missed. No problem - I think it was an ok move.

So to the next FTOPS. Generally I only keep a few hundred dollars in my poker account and withdraw the rest so I decided to satellite into FTOPS #9. Well this did not work and I lost about $200 trying and just going out with bad luck (AA, KK - that kind of thing). Finally I had to decide whether to put enough money into my account just to buy in to the FTOPS - after much agonizing this is what I did. So FTOPS #9 - this cost $322 to buyin and had 5370 entries. Again the top prize was massive - $270,000 to the winner. The top 27 spots all paid well so again this was my target.

I played much better in this tournament again expecting to go deep. I was keeping above average right up to the money bubble. Then I played like a scared chicken. Maybe it was because I bought in with new money or maybe because I lost the satellites but I wanted to make the money. I remembered TJ Cloutiers advice which is he first plays to make the money and THEN plays to win the tournament. I also remembered the advice of every good player and good book on poker that says the bubble is the time to gamble, to pick up chips from everyone who is scared of not making the money - this is when REAL players get going.  So even remembering all this I wanted to make the money damn it. I folded and folded and played slowly and advertised to everyone else I was a scared chicken to be bullied. Even when I picked up a couple of hands (AQ, 88, AK) I just folded them like a wimp.

Hey hey hey - I made the money. After making the money and patting myself on the back I waited for all the immediate post-bubble stuff to happen. This is where all the scared chickens start pushing all-in with some gamble because now they've made the money the pressure is off and they do not care if they go out. I know all this - I've read about it, I've seen it - heck I've exploited it in most tournaments I play. But not today - today I wanted for a while, then got KQ and decided to push all in just like all the other scared chickens. I got called by AA and that was that. I won $418 - yes I paid $322 to enter, played for 5 hours and 10 mins and WON $418. So my profit of $96 did not even cover the cost of the satellites I entered. 

So maybe in reading this you can sense my frustration. If I had pushed pre-bubble with AQ, 88 or AK and lost I might have gone out with no money but at least I would have the pride of knowing I played the right way. Instead I have earned the right to say I cashed in one of the big FTOPS tournaments..............by playing like a scared chicken.

So thats my FTOPS experience so far. I feel  lost one tournament (did not cash) by playing well and making (arguably) a good move at the right time, and I cashed in another tournament by playing terrible (like a scared chicken)  around the bubble. 

October results

I started October with a visit to Las Vegas so did not play too much online poker.  In Vegas I came out about even with one decent cash in tournament play and some cash game winnings (against drunk tourists mind you). I was disappointed in the trip because I thought I would be a winner. My expectations were way above my results.

My online results this month were up and down. I hardly played from October 1st to October 10th due the the Vegas trip and ended up with a $17 profit.  I played a bit more when I returned from Vegas and I was up to just under $800 profit on the 19th. But then I went for broke on Sunday 20th with entries into some big buy-in tournaments. I ended a decent loser on the 20th losing almost half my profit. I finished the 10th to 20th  period with a total profit of $432.  This sent me on a downward spiral - between the 20th and 26th I lost all my monthly profit and went into the red. I was still in the red on the 30th but then had a very good 31st to bring me back to a small profit.  The final profit for the month was $58. This is about $1.50 per day and only $3042 less than my monthly target of $100 per day.

Notable results:

->Oct 10th - $55 freezeout - I came 35th out of 1818 runners and won $173. 

->Oct 13th - $28 freezeout - I came 2nd out of 225 runners and won $984.

->Oct 16th - $55 freezeout - I came 82nd out of 1729 runners and won $130.

->Oct 19th - $109 freezeout - I came 63rd out of 1079 runners and won $236.

->Oct 22nd - $4 Sit n Go - I came 9th out of 180 runners winning $12

->Oct 26th - $55 freezeout - I came 88th out of 1854 runners and won $139

->Oct 31st - $26 Sit n Go - I came 2nd out of 45 runners winning $270

Monthly review

----------------

So what went wrong this month. I think there were 2 main issues:

1.  "Snyder".  his book made me think about playing a totally different way. I think I overplayed his methods during the middle of the month and had to stop myself by going back to my prior strategy. Now I am slowly incorporating his methods into my overall game.

2. Large tournaments - success in $5, $10, $20  tournaments do not come anywhere close to matching the payouts in the $55, $55 rebuy, $109 and $109 rebuy tournaments. This is where the big boys play and I decided this month to join in. On Pokerstars  I played nine $55 tournaments,  one $55 rebuy, three $109 tournaments and one $109 rebuy.  I paid $1200  to enter these tournaments and won $678. That's quite a loss. For now I am going back down in stakes where I have been more successful.

So how am I feeling. Surprisingly good.  Although I am way below target I have just posted another profitable month. Also I made quite a comeback towards the end of the month by playing fundamentally sound poker. If I can continue playing this way, I hope I will have a decent profit in November.

 

Arnold Snyder - quack or genius

Most poker books are very similar. Its had to find a book that suggests a different method. Each book I read may suggest slightly enhanced strategies but very few are as bold as the new book I am reading by Arnold Snyder. The book is called the Poker Tournament Formula 2. This book basically refers to other books like Harrington, Sklansky and the like and literally says they are wrong. 

How can that be. Harrington is a bible for a lot of tournament poker players. Snyder refers to them as 'Harringbots' - players who blindly follow the Harrington methods and are easy pickings in tournaments. How credible can this guy be? Maybe Snyder is wrong!

I googled Snyder and found an interesting  thread in 2+2 poker forums where Mason Malmuth and David Sklansky take great offence at Snyder and call him out as an idiot. But there are other posters who are far more positive and say his original Poker Tournament Formula book changed their game and helped them immediately become more successful at winning tournaments.

So what is the big revelation in the book and did it help me.  The answer first - yes it helped me right away. I started enjoying poker more and came 2nd in a Pokerstars tournament. The revelation is something we all know but do not practice.

Play your opponent

Build a stack, then use this stack to dominate

I saw this in Vegas. While I was doubling up through small pairs that made a set, and occasional showdowns with AK or AQ and creeping towards the final tables, some guys were building monster stacks. When they eventually came on my table they piled on the pressure. If I called a preflop raise my post flop decision was ALWAYS for all my chips against these guys. If I tried to check to see a flop they always put in a huge 5 or 6x raise. Basically everyone else at the table had to shut up shop and wait for hands while the big stacks stole blinds and antes again and again and got bigger and bigger.

This is exactly the point Snyder makes. He talks about Utility odds and chip utility and other things but ultimately he is saying you must do everything to build a monster stack early in the tournament when everyone is playing tight (the Harrington way). Even if you bust out trying to build the huge stack it is worth the effort to try.  When you have this stack you have "full utility" and can basically run the table. Snyder points out several pro players like John Phan  play exactly this way - they do anything and everything to get a big stack and then use it to steam roller the other players.

So how to build a monster stack. Some people on 2+2 say Snyder does not explain exactly how to do this but I think he does. He says to pretty much ignore your cards. Play position and other players regardless of your cards. To me this means you will be betting preflop, postflop, after the turn and on the river sometimes with complete air. You must spend some time scoping out the players at the table first to see who seems to fold to pressure.  Then you will be the guy applying that pressure against those players regardless of your cards. Another important point - Snyder suggests we forget the GAP concept and be more than willing to call preflop bets made by weak players.  Especially loose or aggressive players.  They will be more prone to fold to post flop pressure. Snyder emphasizes you must be willing to gamble early on to double up your stack. For example J-10s v an all-in raise may be a callable hand, because if you double up your chip utility will be massively enhanced. And if you bust out - just play another tournament another day and do not worry about it.

Its certainly an interesting book. In the next post I will explain how I put his ideas into action and how they worked for me. 

Vegas trip report

I love Las Vegas. The last time I was there was when the WSOP was on and poker tournaments were everywhere and pretty well attended. Almost any time of night or day you could walk a short distance along the strip and play in a tournament.

This time I took the wife for the weekend (no poker!!) and then stayed an extra 4 days on my own (loads of poker!!). I've been to Vegas loads of times over the last 13 years and this was the first time I can say it looks like the tough economic times are hurting it. There were still tourists, locals, drunks, hen-parties, 21st Birthday groups etc. but noticeably less so than previously.

In July several people told me that poker was the one bright spot in the casino industry - still growing and bringing in revenue. On this trip it was evident the poker boom was slowing down significantly. Several small regular tournaments around town appeared to be cancelled due to lack of players - you only found this out when you turned up to play. During the day some of the poker rooms are completely empty - even to the extent that they were closed down.

I saw some of this first hand. The new Hard Rock poker room had one table of players playing $1-$2 and about 30 empty tables. There were more staff than players in the casino. In Treasure Island the poker dealers were playing gin amongst themselves.

I was staying at the Venetian. This casino seems to have weathered the storm and still had an active poker room - several regulars told me it had the best tournament turnout in town. The Wynn, Bellagio and Ceasors were also still pretty active I was told.

I played 6 tournaments in the Venetian poker room and a couple elsewhere. My schedule and results are shown below:

Sunday - 7pm - 1am - Venetian - finished 26th out of 90.
Monday - noon - 6.45pm - Venetian - finished 16th out of 90.
Monday - 7pm - 2.30am - Venetian - finished 6th out of 90 ---------> CASHED
Tuesday - noon to 1.30pm - Venetian - finished 80th out of 100 (out with QQ v AK)
Tuesday - 2pm - 4pm - Treasure Island - finished 9th out of 18
Tuesday - 7pm to 1.30am - Venetian - finished 13thout of 100
Wednesday - noon to 6pm - Venetian finished 32nd out of 100
Wednesday - midnight - 2am - Osheas - finished 5th our of 18

My thoughts on the trip:

1. The Sunday night, Monday and Tuesday marathon sessions took a bit out of me. I had a stinking headache on Weds and decided to cry off the evening tournament and get some sleep. As much as I love poker, 16 hours per day is too much for me!!

2. In the Venetian I played against a bunch of Vegas regulars and feel that I held my own. I cashed once and bubbled twice (13th and 16th) which suggests I was playing ok but still need to work on my end-tournament play. I talked to a few pros who complimented me on my play so that was nice.

3. On Tuesday afternoon I went over to Treasure Island to play a 2 table SNG tournament but went out in 10th place with QQ v AK. After a sleep I went over to O'sheas and played some cash games against the drunk tourists. I left the casino at 4.30am after a fun session.

Overall I was disappointed by my results on this trip. Something is still missing from my game especially in my endgame. I am bubbling too much still. As soon as I got back home I went and bought a couple of new poker books to continue my education. I am also looking for some local peer poker players to discuss my strategy with.

September progress report 3 - 21st to 30th

Here are my results from September 21st thru September 30th:

SUMMARY

         FullTilt  PokerStars  Live  Total   Cum. Profit
                                                2742
09/21       0        -341       0    -341       2401
09/22       0        - 13       0    - 13       2388
09/23    -189        +  6       0    -183       2205
09/24    - 21        -  3       0    - 24       2182
09/25    - 20        +  7       0    - 13       2168
09/26    - 12        - 61       0    - 73       2095
09/27    - 18           0       0    - 18       2077
09/28       0           0       0       0       2077
09/29    +217        -  2       0    +215       2292
09/30    - 52        - 28       0    - 80       2212

So as of September 30th my total profit for the month was $2212. This is below my target of $3000 and was largely due to a large downswing from 9/16 to 9/28. For 12 days straight I made a loss.

It is hard to say why downswings occur. I am the same person playing the same way but the cards just went against me. I recorded some of my beats. It just seemed every time I got KK the other person had AA. When I had AA another person would make a straight or flush even when we both got it in pre-flop. If I had a set another person would hit their miracle river card to get a higher set.

The downswing started with my failure to make the WCOOP despite entering numerous satellites. Could this have mentally affect me. Probably. Or maybe I was affected by watching the WCOOP. Who knows.

The important thing is to get back on the up. And how better to do this than to take a trip to Las Vegas to play some poker.

Off to Vegas I go......

WCOOP - winning part of 10 million dollars

The WCOOP main event on Pokerstars costs $5200 and has a 10 million dollar payout. As far as I know it is the biggest online tournament ever. Both first and second place earn more than a million dollars and the top 9 all get more than $120k. I decided to try to satellite into the event.

So I enter a satellite. The first one I enter is a $5 rebuy to win a place in a $109 qualifier - no problem. I win the $109 place, enter the qualifier where the top X places get the $5200 entry and I just miss out. So I enter another satellite. Again I just miss out. So I enter another satellite...I just miss. So I enter another satellite....I just miss. So I enter another......Can you see where this is going?

As the $5200 WCOOP tournament gets closer and closer the satellites get more expensive and I get more ambitious. I enter a $109 rebuy satellite to try to qualify. Oops. I can enter a $215 freezeout satellite to try to qualify. Oops.

In hindsight I think I was blinded by my share of 10 million dollars and just kept entering satellites. I spent a lot of money. Needless to say I did not qualify for the event.

Even though I did not qualify I was emotionally attached to this tournament. I had to watch and think about what might have been. So I spent 2 days watching the event railing 9 players who I thought might have a chance to win (one of them eventually came second). After they made the money I found it really interesting watching how they each played the closing stages. I think this is educational but I am pining inside that this should be me! If only.....

When the event is over I am somewhat relieved. At least I will not spend any more money chasing a tournament that clearly was outside my bankroll.

September progress report 2 - 10th to 20th

Here are my results from September 11th thru September 20th:

SUMMARY
       FullTilt PokerStars Live   Total   Cum. Profit
                                            1016
09/11    - 76    - 55        0    -131       885
09/12    - 88    +126        0    + 38       923
09/13    + 51    - 24        0    + 27       950
09/14    +120    -  6        0    +114      1064
09/15    +435    +110        0    +545      1609
09/16    +492    +996        0   +1488      3097 
09/17    + 59       0     +100    +159      3256
09/18    -169    -241        0    -410      2856
09/19    + 30    - 93        0    - 63      2793
09/20    - 51       0        0    - 51      2742

So as of September 20th I have made an additional $1600 profit which is great news. I have provided some analysis below for this period.

It is noticeable that I have been going deep in tournaments and just not making the final table where the bigger money is. To fix this I have been reading everything I can find on how to play the closing stages of the tournament trying to get that little edge I need. You can see the progress I made below in a few example tournaments:

9/13 - 85th in a $11 tournament with 2060 entries
     - 15th in a $26 tournament with 892 entries.
9/14 - 83rd in a $33 tournament with 658 entries
9/15 - 44th out of 2000 players in a $11 rebuy
     -  9th out of 401 players in a $75 buyin.
9/16 -  8th in a 210 player $55 rebuy 
     -  1st in a 300 person $22 tournament.

Yes - I finally got that first place with a $1053 prize. So maybe all the reading paid off (or maybe I just got lucky!). I will keep an eye on this during the next 10 days.

Also very noticeable, I had some problems and negative swings towards the end of this period. This was largely due to my trying to qualify via satellites for the WCOOP main event on Pokerstars. This was an unprofitable and unsuccessful project which I will write about in another post.

Overall I am still progressing. I made 1016 in the first 10 days of September and 1626 in the second 10 days. I will post an update at the end of the month to see if this progress can be maintained. I hope to have 3000 profit at the end of the month which will be $100 per day - not a bad target for my first month after graduating!! Obviously if I make my target in September I will need to increase it in October....so playing poker is just like working in sales then...!!

September progress report - $1000+ profit in 10 days

Here are my results from September 1st thru September 10th:

SUMMARY
       FullTilt PokerStars Live   Total   Cum. Profit
09/01    +109       0        0    +109       109
09/02    -104    - 10        0    -114        -5
09/03    +174    - 12        0    +162       157
09/04    - 55    + 47        0    -  8       149
09/05    + 96       0        0    + 96       245
09/06    - 28       0        0    - 28       217 
09/07       0       0        0       0       217
09/08    + 25    + 50        0    + 75       292
09/09    +244    - 19        0    +225       517
09/10    +545    + 14      -60    +499      1016

So as of September 10th I have made over $1000 profit. Its interesting when you analyze the results to notice that:

1) I am more successful on Full Tilt than I am on Pokerstars right now, and
2) I have some big swings on a daily basis.

I have also played a few cash sessions not included in this analysis and been moderately profitable.

So I am making progress - it will be interesting how the next 10 days go and if I can keep up the momentum!!

August poker training

So after some enjoyable distractions with visiting family members over the summer (who doesn't want to come and enjoy California weather) I finally have had some quality time in August to focus on my poker training.

I am still reading and re-reading the Gus Hansen (Every hand revealed) and Collin Moshman (Sit n Go Strategy) books trying to drive the ideas into my head. I also have spent a decent amount of time on pokerxfactor.com looking at training videos by JohnnyBax, Sheets and PearlJammer. My preference is to look at Sheets videos for SitnGo tournaments and JohnnyBax/PearlJammer videos for large MTT strategy. Its interesting that since I joined pokerxfactor.com the main guy JohnnyBax is listed at the top of the rankings for pokerstars on officialpokerranking.com. I think it is fantastic to be able to learn from the guy at the top of his game.

I have also thought and re-thought (even dreamt) about how I play and how others play in the training videos. I have had ideas that I discuss with my brother in the UK really just to get his opinion and allow me to vent. Most of the time he brings me back to the simpleness of this game - he suggests forgetting all the theory and just playing more.

And I am playing. Especially online. Maybe too much. Several tournaments and SitNGos a day with a sprinkling of cash games. The good news is I feel I am getting better. I feel I am on the cusp of a major breakthrough. I feel that I understand how to play MTTs successfully now, when to be tight and when to be aggressive, when to bet, steal or re-steal. How to play various stack sizes. How to maintain a stack size, how to bully with a big stack and when to bluff/semi-bluff. Its like the training is coming to an end, and I am about to graduate.

So on to September where I will track my results closely. Lets see if my "feelings" can turn into a big wad of hard cash. That would be nice

WSOP report

So I did not get too far in my event. I think it was level 4 when I limped in with 9-9. There were 6 other limpers and the flop came Kh, 9d, 4c. Player 1 bet $1000, players 2,3,4 folded, I raised to $2500, all others folded to player 9 who went all-in. Player 1 folded and I called also putting me all-in.

He turned over 2 pair so I thought I was good with my three 9s. He showed Kd, 4d and the turn and river were both diamonds to end my tournament with a backdoor flush. Poker is such an unfair game at times.

I played some smaller tournaments in various casinos while in town including
Stratosphere, Excalibur, Luxor, MGM, Mont Carlo, Alladin, Harrahs, Venetian and The Orleans. The last casino is interesting because the poker room is literally surrounded by mirrors. It is very hard to protect your cards!! I also played some cash games and did better in the cash games than the tournaments.

I made some notes which I have since thought about since returning to California. Int he tournaments I was going deep and just missing the money. I put this down to my eagerness to not just limp into the money but to attack during the bubble so I could make the decent money. But I made my moves with weak hands, especially mid-pairs (77, 88,99) which almost always lost the race against overcards. So I have added to my poker knowledge the following thought. Slow down near the bubble. Still try to attack but do so with decent (high card, high pair) type hands and skip the mid-pairs. I will see if this makes any difference.

WSOP - here I come

I've been practicing like crazy to have a run at one of the events in the WSOP in Las Vegas. Finally I decided to play in event #32. I will drive to Las Vegas on Monday and play on Tuesday. This is a smaller buy-in event ($1500) and should allow me to see how far I have come as a player in the last 9 months. It is still scheduled to take place over 3 days and probably will have several thousand players. I will drive back to California on Friday.

Part of my practice has been continuing to read books. Currently I am reading Sit N Go strategy by Collin Moshman and Every Hand Revealed by Gus Hansen. Both books are excellent but I think the Gus Hansen book is a little more readable. He takes us on a journey through most hands he played in the Aussie millions in 2007 where he won the tournament. He explains various details on how he played the hand, what he was thinking about the other players decisions and how position,math and his hole cards influenced his betting decisions. I am finding the whole story fascinating and quite educational.

I may also play a couple of non-WSOP tournaments while in Las Vegas. The Venetian has a deep stack tournament going on and Caesars and Golden Nugget also have concurrent tournaments. Most other casinos have their normal daily schedule of tournaments so there are a lot of options. I am really hoping to go deep in the WSOP event but if I bust out I hope to cash in a couple of smaller tournaments.

Wish me luck !!

Back in the US, back to the grind of online poker

I arrived back in California from my European trip on May 21st. This was about 20 days later than planned due to a death in my family.

I am back playing online at Full Tilt and Pokerstars and the big change is I am winning some SNG tournaments and building a small bankroll. It is a bit of a grind because I have a lot of distractions right now. I am playing for 1-2 hours in the morning and 1-2 hours in the afternoon or evening. It took me a good few days to recover from jetlag and start sleeping properly again.

I have found a groove 4 tabling the $10-$30 SNG tournaments (typically 2 Full Tilt and 2 Pokerstars) concurrently. I can play 9 seaters, 18 seaters or 45 seaters and the games are normally over within 2 hours. The only challenging thing for me is where I have 4 games all down to short play on the final table at the same time. The action is moving pretty quick and its hard to keep up with the bets while giving it some thought. I have found if I play 6-7 games in the 2 hour sessions I normally will cash in 2-3 of them making $80-$120 profit. Not much but at least its mostly positive cashflow. I say mostly because I occassionally have a session where I bubble a lot and do not make any cash finishes and this really hurts my average.

I am still trying to figure out which games to play in to make a living. It seems a number of pros grind out the cash games and a number of pros play big tournaments only. I have read some pros started with SNGs (like me) but eventually moved to big tournaments and do not play SNGs any more.

My plan for the next 3 months:

- build my online bankroll
- determine which games to play to make consistent profit / cashflow
- restart playing torunaments at my local casinos
- enter at least 1 event at the WSOP in Las Vegas

Why enter the WSOP and am I ready? - I will write more about that a little bit later.

European Tour - Monte Carlo EPT grand final 2008

I've been learning and playing poker for just over 6 months and although I think I have got better each month I still cannot justify entering the main event of the EPT costing nearly 20,000 dollars.

But I can justify spending some of my bankroll flying my brother and myself to Monte Carlo for 2-3 days to watch the main event closing stages and enter the 500 euro event on the last day of the tournament. This would allow us to hang out in the players lounge and meet some pros, drink some beers, enjoy the sunny South of France (compared to rainy England) and still be able to wear the EPT hat with some authenticity - we WERE there after all.

So off we went. When we arrived in the Bay Hotel and resort casino on Weds April 16th at about 2pm, the main event was down to 5 tables. We watched the main table for a while just in time to see Joe Hachem, Freddy Deeb and others talking some poker talk and generally having fun. We watched for a while and got the layout of the poker room down ready for our event the next day. I found out one of the guys I have been railing regularly online trying to learn from was there in person and still in - westmenlo77 (Isaac Barron). Immediately I decided he was favourite to win in my mind and I watched him play for a bit including taking a big pot from Joe Hachem. I spoke to some of Isaacs friends who told me he had come 11th in San Remo a week or so earlier. There were a bunch of French guys noisily backing their runner so I setup a last longer bet for 500 euros between the French guys and Isaacs mates - I knew this was easy money for his mates!!

Am I the only guy who is slightly embarrassed when meeting players you have been railing and trying to learn off for several months. I feel like a closeted stalker and think introducing myself would be weird!! However during one break I did at least manage to wish Isaac good luck and he said thanks - made me think he was just a regular nice guy (like me) who is bloody good at poker (unlike me....yet).

We left for the day and when we came back the next day they were down to 10 players and Isaac was still there - great job!! My brother and I registered for our tourney and it was down to business. I got up to 7000 chips about 45 mins into the tournament when my AK became 3 aces. Then I slowly donkeyed off most of my chips on several hands where I hesitated and a really aggressive player kept putting me under pressure. One hand I had 99 and the flop was 10-10-2. I bet 60% of pot to find out where I was and he called. On the turn (an 8) I checked and he checked - here I was thinking I could just check it down and win or lose a smallish pot. The river was a K and he bet into me - I folded. I had a couple of similar hands and all of a sudden I only had 3000 left and the blinds were getting up there. I got A-10 suited and a flop of A-9-9 giving me top pair and 3 cards of a flush. I raised and got called. The turn came and was a low card giving me 4 cards to the flush. With my top pair and overcard and flush draw I pushed in my remaining 2200 chips and lost to pocket aces that were slow-played.

A-10 suited is my bogey hand!! It is the same hand I went out of Aussie millions with.I was about 90th out of 204 players. My brother did better and came about 40th going out with pocket 9s (we had lengthy discussions about if he should have picked that spot as he was getting close to the money but also only had an M of 3-4). In the players lounge I watched the final table and Isaac was getting closer and closer. I saw Chris Moneymaker come in and play table football (foos-ball) and Greg Rahmer but still feeling like a stalker I did not say hi. My brother has no such concerns and had a great chat with Vanessa Rousso who was on the final table of the 2000 euro side event - she actually offered him and me some free personal coaching as we turned up for her players tactics talk and were the only people there but she had to cancel. She is not only a very good poker player but from the few mins we chatted seems like a lovely person.

After I got knocked out of the tourney I used most of the rest of my euros to enter a 200 stt (sng). It paid 1st and 2nd and as I have been winning or getting in the money in most of the single table SNGs I have entered recently I figured I would win the 1400 main prize, enter a 1000 stt, win the 7000 main prize and still go home profitable. In fact I thought, why did I not just bring money to enter the stt's - I could make more money quickly at these with a higher probability of winning. Also in Monte Carlo I assumed there would be some soft players (amongst all the pros). So I played well until the last 3 (the money bubble). Player 1 (SB) had 8k, Player 2 (BB) had 2.1k and I have 4.0k. I get A-7offsuit and raise all-in. The SB folds and the BB tanks for a while before calling and turning over 5-3 unsuited. No cards hit until the river which was a 3. I shipped my chips. I keep thinking I should have folded this hand and let the big stack in the SB take the short stack out......but I didn't and its too late now. The next hand I (now the short stack) go all in with K-J suited and the big stack calls with A-K - I lose, come third and miss the money. And I do not have enough Euros on me to enter another stt. And as silly as it seems, there is no ATM in the poker casino!!

I watch the other SNGs for a bit and the remaining players in the 500 euro tourney. I think I see Annete_15 go out of the 500 tourney and then I see TIMEX (Mike McDonald) playing a 2000 euro tourney with a bunch of foreigners who clearly have no idea who he is. I am thinking he must be making loads of money in the stts but did not stay around long enough to see him win. I saw TIMEX play in Australia where he cashed in 3 of the events and he is another very good player (esp as hes only about 19 yrs old!!).

After my brother got knocked out of the 500 and we both had one last look at the final table of the main event (Isaac is looking good - I still think he will win) we left hoping to catch the last bus in Monaco back to the train station (which we missed) and the last train back to Nice where we are staying (which we just made after a long walk through the grand prix streets of Monte Carlo).

So thats it. I lost 500+50 euros in the side event, the 500+50 euros I staked my brother and 200+20 euros in the stt. But I never really expected to win - not yet. This trip to the south of France and Monte Carlo was an experience that I was happy to pay for. But in the back of my mind (and prob. my brothers who has never played in a big event like this) I am thinking 'but what if I am good enough to win, what if I did make the money like I did in Aussie, how far away am I from being able to enter a main event, what if I had won that stt and got enough prize money to cover our costs, what if.........

European Tour - UK Casinos

The casinos in the UK are MUCH smaller than anything you will find in America. Typically 10 slot machines, 1 or 2 blackjack or 3 card poker tables and 1 or 2 roulette tables and a bar. Some casinos have space for poker tournaments for 30-50 people. This was the case with Stanleys casino in Portsmouth which has small re-buy tournaments 3 or 4 nights a week. I believe there a bigger casinos in London and some other cities but the smaller casinos seem to be the norm.

I enjoy rebuy tournaments but only after the rebuy period is over. Every casino has their share of loose aggressive maniacs in a rebuy who go all in every hand and pride themselves on having rebought more than any other player. I like to pick my spots and play premium cards hoping to double up once ot twice against this player. Sometimes though they just get lucky and your AA, AK, KK, QQ etc. get beaten on 10-3o. What can you do - just play on through the pain and rebuy as necessary.

I convinced my brothers to join me in the casino tournaments instead of their pub league games a couple of time. The allure of playing for real money and me offering to stake them worked. However it just meant I lost 3 times as much money. I think playing in the free league poker encourages bad decisions on marginal hands - there is no cost to going out of the tournament so why not all-in with 7-7 pre-flop in the 4th hand of a tournament. My brothers and I have had several discussions re this type of play which they like to make. At least in a rebuy you can just buy back in - especially if it is someone elses money...... To be fair, we all limited ourselves to 3 buy-ins and one brother finished 6th in one tournament meaning we broke even on the costs - well done bro.

Things I did not like - the poker tables are small round tables holding 8 players each (unlike the 9 or 10 player American style tables). The casino did not provide dealers which meant each player took turns to deal. The floor person seemed inexperienced and mainly there to give out more chips for people who wanted to rebuy. Several times I saw people miscounting chips (sometimes less, sometimes more) but because almost everyone splashed the pot for every bet and threw their raise directly in the middle you could not really complain or prove the bet was not what they said. Often burn cards were thrown in with muck cards and several times people looked at your cards without your permission (always accidental...!!). Frequent rabbit-hunting was going on with dealers dealing the board to completion even if action was over on the flop. The dealers were in charge of the hand but often the stronger-personality regulars would dictate what would happen on the table with multiple players hands/fingers going in the middle to tidy the chips, the cards or whatever. In all this confusion I am sure cheaters can and do flourish. In one hand the dealer had folded during the first round of betting. We were on the second round of betting and one player went out of turn. Before you could blink the dealer grabbed all the players cards from the table and declared a misdeal. This was NOT the house rules - just something he decided needed to be done but he was so quick to grab and muck the players cards it could not be undone. I had aces and was raising (and no it was not me who went out of turn)!! Unbelievable - I almost got in a fight over that one!! In my opinion this was blatant cheating.

However it was not all bad - the social side was again great with many regulars cracking jokes. The personal insults, innuendos etc. thrown around players is more intense with no dealer present which I found oddly amusing. It always seemed likely a fight would break out but unlike California no guns would be involved :-) But in all the time in the UK I did not see a poker-related fight so for all the intensity I guess common decency prevailed. I liked being able to order a pint while I was playing and the casino did throw in a buffet as part of the entry fee to the tournament. Some regulars had great stories and often could recommend other places to play cash games.

Strangely it seems the pub poker league and the casino/club cash games are entirely separate worlds. Few players cross-over as far as I can tell. The casino players are more like American players in the card rooms - they know they are playing for money and are serious about trying to win. They also tend to know where another tournament will be starting soon for more money. The pub league players are having fun and arguably in the more enjoyable night out. It is a mixed bunch with husband/wives, father-sons etc. and is a fairly cheap night out.

European Tour - UK pub league

So one day after arriving I am at a Royal British Legion Club in Hampshire playing poker in the Live Pub Poker League. The concept is simple - you sign up online with your name and email address and then attend one of several games they host each night at various pubs. You play for points instead of cash and periodically the players with the most points play in regional and grand finals where they can win big prizes.

With me only being here a month my points were irrelevant and I wondered if I could motivate myself to play poker without any money at stake. Surprisingly the answer is a resounding yes.

First the social side is great. Everyone at each location seems to play there most weeks so they all know each other, crack jokes, buy each other drinks and generally have a great time. Everyone was really welcoming to me and I enjoyed this atmosphere. The quality of the poker was mixed with some soft players likely influenced by their pints of beer and some very strong players - normally the same bunch of strong players make the final tables in each location and get the most points. Also as a bonus the players knocked out of the official game often play low stakes cash games on the side - winning these games can cover your costs for the night!!

The purpose of the league is to bring customers into the pubs and clubs on quiet nights (the pub pays the league a hosting fee). Therefore on Friday night and Saturday night there is no game but normally this is offset by at least one of the regulars hosting home cash games (completely legal in the UK). These tend to be 5-10 pounds per game with 20 players or so - enough to enjoy winning a little spending money but not enough to feel too upset if you lose.

I have played at about 5 different locations in the 2 weeks I have been in England so far and enjoyed the company of the different regulars at each place. Could this pub league concept work in America. I am not sure - the culture of the bars over there makes me think it would not. Especially as the card rooms and Indian casinos would compete and offer real money games. However my opinion is based on my time in California where there are many places to play - maybe in other states the league would work very well.

I am still here for another week or so - hopefully I will continue to enjoy playing lots of poker in these games, even without having money at stake!!

European trip - April 2008

My brothers have been inviting me back to England to play some poker with them in their pub league for some time. I finally decided to go over there for April. I will play in the UK games and then go to Monte Carlo to catch an event in the EPT grand final.

I will post blog entries of my experience.

Oceans 11 - no third time lucky this week

I went to Oceans 11 on 19th March hoping for my third final table in a row. Instead I lost my chips in the following way about mid-tournament:

Hand 1: I have A-J suited and limp with it. The flop is all low non-connected cards and a rainbow. A player who is short-stacked moves all in for about 1800 chips (I have 3300 in my stack) and it folds round the me on the button. I look at him for a while. He is quite a well-known player and I am told he is "good" whatever that means. He is staring directly at me and the more I look at him the more I feel he has a low pair from the flop and little else. I have not hit anything so I have to decide to call or fold. All I really have is 2 overcards with no flush/straight possibilities but they look so pretty and I am so focused on 'is my read on this guy right' that I end up calling just to find out. Hey good move you dummy. My read was right and my overcards did not hit on the turn or river so I gave away most of my chips. Stupid stupid move.

Hand 2: about 5 hands later I am pretty short stacked and pick up kings. I move all in and am called by A-6 off suit. He hits the ace and I am history.

So what did I learn from this week. Tournaments are won and lost on mistakes as much as good play. When I missed the flop and he bet I should have got out of there. But I have spent much of the last week reading up on poker tells and how to read other players and I got so caught up in my new latest greatest theories I made a basic mistake. All I had was a draw - albeit with pretty high cards. I only had 6 outs which meant I was at least a 3-1 dog if my read was right. I have to put in 1800 chips to try to win 2700 so my pot odds are horrible. Everything I did on this hand is wrong.

Next week I want to make the final table again - maybe instead of 3 final tables in 3 weeks I can boast of 3 final tables in a month. That still has a good ring to it!!

Pokerstars - a cold streak (is it rigged)

Maybe I suddenly turned into a bad player. All of a sudden I cannot win a race on pokerstars to save my life. I lose with AA, KK, QQ, AKs you name it I lose with it. Pretty much every tournament I enter I bust out of with fantastic premium hands. Is my timing off suddenly.

I play pokerstars and full tilt concurrently. I may have 2 or 4 windows open with different tournaments. At the same time I lose consistently on Pokerstars I am winning consistently on Full Tilt. How can that be? I am the same player. I play the same way on both sites. But I am consistently getting unlucky on pokerstars right now.

I tried to analyze this.

Maybe there are better players on pokerstars - people who call with A-4 off-suit and crack my kings, people who call with 44 and crack my aces, people who hit their miracle backdoor flush or straight against my top pair when we both went all-in preflop. I do not think this is the case but maybe....

Maybe its all rigged. Can certain user-ids be set to run hot or cold for a while in their software? Now I am not accusing anyone of anything but as a computer programmer I know it would be easy to program things that way. I am sure a smaller startup might have something like that in their code but not the biggest poker site in the world. They *have* to run good clean honest software don't they?

Maybe its all in my head - or I have some moronic tendencies on Pokerstars that I do not have on Full Tilt.

I have no clue why this is happening to me - my plan is to take a couple of days off from pokerstars and then see what happens. I'll be sure to let you know when the cold streak ends......(if).....

Oceans 11 - why not chop?

After my 3rd place finish on Weds 5th of March I returned to Oceans11 for the next Weds tournament and came 9th. This is 2 final tables in a row.

Interesting I was about 7th in chips at the start of the final table and the chip leaders needed to be somewhere soon. They wanted to chop the prize money evenly 9 ways. This meant each player would get slightly less than the 3rd place prize amount. All players agreed apart from one who was about 6th in chip count.

Why would he disagree? It is true the smallest stack was going to be the BB and may be quickly eliminated but even so it was extremely unlikely this player would make 3rd place because the 5 bigger stacks were much bigger than his. As it happened the small stack got a lucky break on his BB and play continued.

I cannot understand this guys logic. Did he think he was a much better player than the other players at the final table? Did he just want his tournament to last longer? Why do players not do the math when it comes to chopping at the final table?

Frustrating - you bet!!

Monte Carlo qualifier on Pokerstars - another bubble

Pokerstars are running a $9.99 rebuy super-satellite to win a trip to Monte Carlo and entry into the EPT final event. I entered on Weds evening (after my Oceans 11 cash in the afternoon) and was pleased to build my stack to a pretty good size without having to rebuy at all. I did take the add-on and then played fairly aggressively to get to the top 20% of players in stack size. Then I plodded along playing premium hands until I got to the final table.

After all the buyins and re-buys there were 2 entries into the $1050 Monte Carlo qualifier and a third place of $608 (not bad for a $20 buy-in).

So of course I came 4th when my big pair got beaten by a lousy back-door runner runner straight. I was the short stack and felt sure this hand was my double-up opportunity but the poker gods reminded me I am still "bubble boy" at least for a while longer.

Sigh - try again.....

Oceans 11 - finally hit the big money

Well, big is relative. I finished 3rd this week and took $585 (for a $60 buy-in). After tipping the dealers my take was $522 which is $460 profit. The tournament lasted from 10am to 2pm so about $115 per hour. This almost matches the money I used to make as a computer consultant.

I was kicking myself on the way home about how I went out. The big stack was bullying people at the table (as he should) until I took a large pot off him and at the same time eliminated the 4th place guy. Now the stacks were about 65k, 51k and 45k with me in 2nd place. We offered to split the money but the big stack wanted to play. Here is how the very next hand went.

Antes were 2k. I was the BB (8k) and the big stack on my left raised me to 16k (as he had done most hands when he was a much bigger stack than everyone else). The SB folded. I looked down at K-J which is a pretty good hand 3-handed and PUSHED all-in. More about this play below. I knew if I won this pot I would probably win the tournament. The big stack went into the tank and eventually decided I was making a move on him and called showing A-4o. The ace held up and I went out in 3rd.

So should I have pushed? The key thing going through my mind here is that he raised me first so I should have folded and waited until I was the raiser. Did I get impatient? The very fact he raised suggested he had a hand (or did it - as he raised most of the pots prior while he was a bigger big stack). I am sure there is an answer to this question based on the math - please let me know your opinions.

Hey - I'm still happy to have cashed in 3rd but 1st place got $1800 so I am just a bit disappointed (similar to how I felt at the Aussie millions where I got $2650 for 33rd but the top 10 got 20k+ each).

Maybe next week I can get first.....

Poker training sites

So how do we advance our poker training. Are the "paid for" sites worth it. My brother and friends in the poker world suggest there is enough information available online and in books that there is no need to pay for a training site.

However after my recent run of bubbles (just missing the money) I wanted to improve. I looked at various different sites but finally settled on:

http://www.pokerxfactor.com

This site is run by users 'JohnnyBax' and 'sheets' and mostly features videos/hand-history playbacks of tournaments they have entered and hit the money (often winning). There are also several guest pros with video commentaries showing how they play cash and tournament games. So far I have been a member for a week or so.

So what do I think. First I noticed several areas where I play differently to the pros in the videos. Then I listened to commentaries where they explain some of the biggest leaks in peoples games some of which correspond to my play. I tried watching a range of videos (different pros talking about different games) but one thing I immediately noticed is some contradiction on how different pros play and how different types of games play. This probably just made me more confused and made my game worse. So being a smart guy, I changed my approach and watched just one of the many pros and all of his videos relating to ONE type of game. I chose single table SnG games and watched the videos posted by 'sheets'.

There is no doubt this has made me a better player at single table SnG and this has been proved in my results. It has also taught me how to play the bubble in a much more effective way. I am very pleased about the improvements in my game this week.

Of coure there is a flip side. My MTT (multi-table tournament) play has got worse and where before I was cashing occassionally in 90 and 180 player SnG MTT tournaments now I am missing by a mile. This is probably because I have taken some of the single table SnG strategy and it is no good for multi-table. So I will have to spend more time watching the other videos and try to figure out the difference.

I will let you know more about the training as and if my results get better (which I really hope they do).