I'm not one to normally post and cry about bad beats, but when its over 100BB and I have a 98% equity on the flop, theres my exception.

Full Tilt Poker $0.01/$0.02 No Limit Hold'em - 6 players - View hand 1098177
DeucesCracked Poker Videos Hand History Converter

MP: $2.08
CO: $0.97
BTN: $3.03
SB: $1.13
BB: $2.03
Hero (UTG): $3.03

Pre Flop: ($0.03) Hero is UTG with A A - 80%
Hero raises to $0.06, 2 folds, BTN raises to $0.16, 2 folds, Hero calls $0.10

Flop: ($0.35) 6 2 5(2 players) - 97%
Hero checks, BTN bets $0.22, Hero raises to $0.66, BTN calls $0.44

Turn: ($1.67) J(2 players) - 88%
Hero checks, BTN bets $1.34, Hero raises to $2.21 all in, BTN calls $0.87 all in

River: ($6.09) Q(2 players - 2 are all in) - Oh My God!!
Final Pot: $6.09
BTN shows Q J (two pair, Queens and Jacks)
Hero shows A A (a pair of Aces)
BTN wins $5.69
(Rake: $0.40)

[X] OP is aware he is playing for cents

[X] losing 150BB with AA and 88% equity hurts at whatever stakes

I reg $1.20 and $2.25 STT's. Yesterday I entered for a $0.10 + $0.50 rebuy. Played for 4 hours and came 52/3600+. Won $4. It was pretty dissapointing because I was CL for about 3 hours of the tourney.

It was about 4am and I was pretty tired,  I decided to call AI with AJ (when before I insta folded it to action because its nearly always dominated) and of course I ran into AK. I wasn't too fussed because I started the tourney at about 10pm and it was now about 4am, with college in the  morning.

However I logged on today and (because I ran SOOOOO good yesterday) I figured I might still have some bottled karma that I earnt from having a 8BI varience/downswing the day before.

In come the $2.20 Turbo tourney, I run pretty good and end up on the final table with bottom stack. I work my way up to 2nd stack and as the blinds got super high everyone was just going all-in with Kx , Qx. I knocked out the guy in 3rd and it was now HU for $95.

The funny thing was about this HU is that the guy actually annoucned his hands in the chatbox, and I still couldnt call them. He had my every hand dominated, then called me off light when I finally fought back.

The final 5 hands, he had my every starting hand dominated by a better kicker. I had 10 9, he had T A.  I had 97he had A 9. After 4 folds (with 6BB) I shoved with 75 and he insta called with Q8.

Landed the 2nd place with $54 - A nice double up.

Today I came home, turned on my comp, set up my programmes and rinsed the tables. Played 5 games: 1st: 3 2nd: 2.
Made a nice little peak in my graph, $4 from matching my intial deposit. 

Peaked at $17 and carried on playing, although tired and on about 70% focus rather than my previous 95%.

Although I just lost $8 from playing 'tilted' I did manage to identify my leaks that have been getting me into a lot of trouble.

1. I play too much from the blinds, I need to let them go.
2. Barreling on the turn when missed with AK. I would normally fold this but I guess because I was tilted I didn't let my mouse click 'fold'. (Early game)
3. Instacalling all-in with decent stack (agaisnt a middle stack) on flush draw and 1 overcard. The guy shoved on the monotone board, and this is textbook 'tell' that he has TP and doesnt want to be called by drawing flushes. (Hero: 68BB Villian:27BB) I insta called with KJ on T75 flop agasint Villian's AT. Looking through Pokerstove I am actually a fav by 5%. However is this really +EV? I don't seem to think so.. Considering how deep I am, and how early into the game we are, there's no real urgency to get players out of the game, and plus, he was a bad player. The way I see it is that I'm giving the bad player a 2:1 dog on beating me, whereas I would actually put him as a 3:1 dog. Does this make sence, is it still +EV to call with a 55% fav?
4. Playing at night is leak for me - I lose focus. I think my premium time for playing is in the evening (5pm - 9pm) any later and I can feel myself slipping away. 
5. Oh and, no MTT's.
   

Apart from this ^ I feel that I've 'crushed' $2 SNG' now; I'm playing great, focusing, putting in good bet sizing, C/Ring when HU. Playing well generally. It's no longer a matter of whether I can beat it, but just putting in the hours of grinding to get my BR to allow me to move up, or go to cash.

My plan is to go to 2NL when my BR is at $100.

I'll post my final graph at the end of the week. I'm moving house on the 21st, and won't have internet for a couple of weeks; this should give me ample time to study DC vids, read the books, get my theory up to date.

It's 11:34pm now, if I stay up past 12:30, I'm guarenteed Insomnia for the rest of the night, seriously.

I'd just like to secure a blog entry where I'm not moaning and groaning about how bad I run. The last couple of days I've been running pretty well; byproduct of running well =

• Positive frame of mind
• Eager to learn
• Enthuasastic about playing
  
• Total concerntration at the tables
• Dicipline to fold big spots (because "hey, I'm up I dont need this pot. right?")

I know I should have these mind sets when I'm running bad, because that's the only way you'll get out of a DS, but it's just so much easier to do when you're running well.

In all honestly, I'm a losing player. When I learn something new, I usually make as many mistakes as I possibly can before getting hurt so bad I acutally learn my lesson. This has been the case for Poker: I deposit $50, my brother tells me about BRM and playing without my limits. Do I listen? DO I BOLLOCKS! insta-10nl, then with the  money I have left >>  heads up with $34 on the table to chase losses.

After depositing another $50, I've worked at my game and taken it more seriously; I feel that after 500 $1 SNG's I've finally grasped it. I've read DN's tourney book, I've watched AMT's Last Man Standing series, Tommy Angelo's Eightfold Path, I've made and networked poker contacts; the lot. I feel that I've had to pay to learn, and for me to be able to crush $1 - $5 SNG's (because there is no difference between $1 and $5 mindset) I'm thankful that its only cost $80.

I was talking to my brother on the phone today while playing $2 SNG's, as we were talking about how he got 97% equity in the FTOPS and got felted, I was looking at my chip leads on my tables, and while talking I casually instafolded AQ to heavy 3way action. Didn't even think about it...untill 3 minutes later I thought "wow, I just folded AQ preflop without blinking." I know to a lot of regs that might/might not be reading this, it probably isn't a big deal. However, I feel that it's a progressive step in the direction of a winning player; considering that not too long ago (months ago) I couldn't fold KJ without wincing.

 Love to fold: 

Folding AQ without blinking turns out good:

I think I like this game.

It's been a while since I've made a post. Since my last report I've gone on a pretty ugly downswing. I was doing pretty well until one night I decided to play when I was tired (after getting up at 6am that day for the first time in months). I kept re-registering for tourneys when I was still playing others, I didn't do too well and ended the night 8BI down.

The next day brought hope as I'd played 5 games, cashed in 3 in them. It was looking up UNTIL, yet another 3/4 game downswing. I'd like to assign the blame on variance for the most part, however I was still playing way to aggressively, c-betting nearly every flop in position and had the idea that "if he calls on the flop, I’ll get him off his hand on the turn" - no such luck.

I took a break, watched the first couple of episodes of Last Man Standing and the next day I got up early and started afresh. Funnily enough, when I was only playing 2 tables, awake and concentrating, I came first in the first 3 games I played (I came 3rd in the one after that due to a stupid bad beat, 3 outer ya-dee-ya-dee-ya).

Today as I was ploughing through the first few games, I started talking to a guy at the table called Anytime69. He sparked up conversation by commenting that he had 70 hands on me, and asked if I'd like to know what they were. I of course said that I also had hands on him; we exchanged and the conversation started from there. I asked if he had Skype (always looking for poker contacts) he gave me his SN, fantastic - one more person to talk poker with :)

I looked up Anytime69, with no real expectations - just me being nosey really. I jumped out of my chair when I saw the swimming shark next to his name, and a profit in the tune of $5000! Wow. So as you'd expect I pulled him up on this, and while idolising his winnings I got on my metaphysical iKnees and begged for tips/coaching etc. He very kindly agreed to help me out, look over some HH's, talk strategy etc.Since the last update I've had many bad beat, and many suckouts - nothing special. HOWEVER, my golden moment of the week happened only ten minutes ago; I'd like to think I did it on purpose (after reading Tommy Angelo's article on folding AA pre, I was eager to see if I could pull of some insane fold for no reason but my inner daredevil taunting me with "I bet you can't!"

So...what could possibly top folding A's preflop? How about, folding the golden nuggets while two stacks ship their chips in the middle of the table?

Okay, as you've read, I didn't REALLY want to fold. I basically took the screenshot because I 'knew' one of those two stacks had the flushdraw, and I wanted to know the chance of them hitting their flush (not that it would make any difference, I would call anyway). So after getting tricky with Pokerstove, I was gleaming as it read a 92% fav against any 40% of opponent’s range; only to find that I had timed out and had to watch in agony as the two stacks flipped over A3 and A5, no spades...

In my previous posts (and my inital goal) said that I would post every tournament I played it, screwtinise them, and write a summary on why I won/lost/cashed. After talking to my brother, he strongly disagreed with the scheme - "You need to be playing 80% and studying 20% at most what your doing will mean spending at least 70% of your time studying. You need to be putting in lots of volume."

I agreed and suggested that my blogs posts will be more casual, rather than analytical. I'll post a brief summary of the day/week and how it went. I'll post some interesting hands that I've aquired across the day/week. This should cut down on the amount of hours I spend writing the blog/week, which allows me to spend more time playing.

Since I last posted, I've hooked up with 3 poker contacts of which I'm hoping will turn into long time poker friends. They are all really friendly, eager, and determined to do well at the mircos. I've been playing the $1 + $0.20 SNG's, and after talking to otplayboy he advised me to play higher SNG's due to the enormous rake (20%) that $1 SNG's are. In theory to be able to crush the game I'd need at least a 20% ROI, which is pretty high.

I was doing pretty well at the $1 so I thought I'd give $2.25 a shot....it didn't go so well. I believe the first 3 games were a "welcome to the stakes" initiation. By this is I mean I 'never' hit my flush draws, I got it in with the best and lost, bad players who make horrible calls win the AI's. 

For example in the first game, I made it to the bubble and pushed 20BB with A10o, and got called by JQo (3:2) and of course the board came Q5K108. Another one would be the fish min-donk betting into me with the nuts and thus being confused the hell out of and raise my stack in with TPMK. 

Here's a funny one.

Full Tilt Poker $2 + $0.25 No Limit Hold'em Tournament - t25/t50 Blinds - 6 players - View hand 1058272
DeucesCracked Poker Videos Hand History Converter

SB: t1282 25.64 BBs
BB: t1410 28.20 BBs
Hero (UTG): t1365 27.30 BBs
MP: t1300 26 BBs
CO: t863 17.26 BBs
BTN: t2780 55.60 BBs

Pre Flop: (t75) Hero is UTG with A J
Hero raises to t1365 all in, 3 folds, SB calls t1257 all in, 1 fold

Flop: (t2614) 8 2 A(2 players - 2 are all in)

Turn: (t2614) 5(2 players - 2 are all in)

River: (t2614) 9(2 players - 2 are all in)

Final Pot: t2614
SB shows Q 4 (a flush, Ace high)
Hero shows A J (a pair of Aces)
SB wins t2614

Admitidly agasint Any pair/Any broadway I'm only 54% fav, AJ from UTG open-shove probably isn't showing me in a great light. I guess I deserved this horendus call, and the huge bad beat that followed. 

Last BB I can find is 97 'v' 65 pre all-in and 65 hits. meh. 

After having such a horrendus welcoming commity, and an eye-opening realisation about just how bad these players are, I stuck around and in the next 4 games I came 1st x2 , 2nd x1, 3rd x1. 

My explained Graph:

 

It's been a learning curve, and while I think I've 'sussed' $2.25 SNG's , I'm going to stick with $1.20 for now until my BR is suited for $2.25 SNG.

:BRM STRUCTURE:
After watching a posted youtube BRM video, and with a few tweaks, I've designed myself a structure to which I'll stick to (as long as my brother doesn't suggest a better one).

Grind $1.20 until you hit $66.5 BR

(20x$1.20) + $10[profit]= $34

(10x$2.25) + $10[profit] = 32.5 <<<< For taking shots with

= $66.5

Play $2.25 SNG’s with the 5x Attempts, if you fall under $40 fall back down to $1.20 and grind to $70.

> Just so there’s a steady profit even if you continuously fall back down, you’ll be slowly churning a profit

 Play till your Bankroll is back up to $70 and take another 5 attempts at $2.25 SNG’s.

If in the 5 Attempts at $2.25, you cash, continue to play at this level until your BR is $90.

(5x$3.30 + 5x $2.25 + 20x$1.20 + $38.25 [Profit]  = $90)

Have 5x Shots at $3.30, if you fall below $75, drop back down to $2.25. If you fall again and your BR is below $40, drop to $1.20 SNG’s. Rinse and repeat.

I'm going to a mates house for his 19th this weekend, and with exams next week I won't be putting in as much volume as I'd like. However I'll make a goals list tomorrow etc. 

Night :)

Lost 7 games in a row. I know that I can't excuse all of them, but there's a definate trend and I have been losing in +ev spots. It's just frustrating when you seem to NEVER hit. You can argue that I shouldnt put myself in those situations, and I agree. However sometimes they're nessessary.

As you can see most of the games are a maximum of 14 minutes, which is so short.

The Tournaments:

Minutes: 10
Tourney #: 201215067
Biggest Hand:

Equity -

Minutes: 1
Tourney #:  20124478
Biggest Hand:

First hand of the tournament. Normally have a thing about shoving pre with AK/QQ/KK/AA on the first hand of every tournament in hopes that someone things I'm a nutter and calls me with any Ax, low PP.
After talking to my brother about it, and coming to my senses, putting my tourny life on a coinflip isn't the best thing, especially when I make my money from post-flop play.Meh.

Minutes: 3
Tourney #:  201109519
Biggest Hand:

I could have avoided this, by putting more pressure on the turn. And I could have just called the t150 river bet instead of raising him all-in with 1 pair with J as a kicker.

Minutes:  14
Tourney #: 201104556
Biggest Hand:

This tilted me because I was doing well in the tourney (making it down to 3 players with a decent stack) it was a perfect situation, I did exactly what I could ever hope him to do, get it in ahead.

Equity - 

Minutes:  14
Tourney #:  201012108
Biggest Hand:

I was short-stacked (12BB?) and made a squeeze play with a decent holding. QT calls me and hits.
This would be okay because "That's poker folks" if this hadn't been in line with the succession of bad beats I'd been taking.

Equity -

Minutes: 7
Tourney #:  201011835
Biggest Hand:

No-one's fault but my own. I was way too aggressive. 

The last tournament was the KK v QKA and the guy had JTs.
I've played another game since all these bad beats and won it, I have to admit that in the game I ran pretty good, but I made some great folds, value bet in all the right place, applied presssure HU with a new strategy my brother taught me.
---------------------

Hopefully I'll look back on this blog post and realise that although I may have equity in the hands I lose, I needn't put myself in such marginal coinflips.

My next blog post will be of me winning, you'll see.

Intro

This blog is primarily for me. I'm not going to add any tags, as this blogs is exclusively for my own benefit.

Poker is a great game and I wish that I'd come across it earlier, there's so much to learn from it: Analytical thinking; awareness; social skills; life skills; different approaches to life; anger management (aka controlling anger/tilt control) and probably the most obvious: a way of earning a decent amount of money. I'm going to be posting daily. However it's going to be the nitty-gritty side of poker (analysis) rather than 'the life of a poker player', which many poker blogs are about.

I'm going to be playing $1 SNG's and after each tournament I'll write down the Tourney #, how many minutes it took, and the position I came in. I'll then post the top 3 winning hands, and the top 3 losing hands, then a conclusion on why I won/lost/cashed the game.

I feel that writing a blog on each tournament I play will:

• Allow me time to think about what I was doing, how I could have made a better decision, how I can improve my game and try to understand what the opponent was doing.
•  Force myself to spend 15/20/25 minutes on each tournament, thinking about poker, trying to educate myself and therefore grow as a poker player.
• Increase my discipline when playing multiple tournaments, to appreciate each tournament I play and make sure that while playing I know exactly why I'm doing it, so I don't look like an idiot when I add it to this blog.
• Indirectly improve my writing skills  :$

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step

Tourney # - 201011756
Minutes - 35
Finish– 3

Hand History:

Preflop

Call'd from CO. I think I remember this being a miss-click, not my usual line taken with middle PP's. Usually >55 I 2.5BBr , <55 I call and set-mine.

Why?

Because if I raise pre, a lot of broadway cards will be calling me rather than ATC. With a higher range calling me, I have a rough idea of when I'm beat and I can easily lay it down. However if I limp in I'll never be sure whether im Ahead/Behind. Luckily King Forrest(BTN) raises for me (*phew*) and thus kicks out all the limpers.

Flop

OOP I check with 2nd pair, he bets 2/3 pot and for some stupid reason I call.
E: Oh yes, I called because 53K is a very dry board, he's on the button and will c-bet this the majority of the time.

Turn

5 Blank imo, I check again. He shoves all in and I call. Retrospectivly I think I should have folded, not very often is such a strong line a stone cold bluff.

River

Spike the 7or the full house; irrelevant as he had air.

Hand History:

Preflop
Standard defending SB with A7o, raise 2.5BB.

Why?
To make him fold crappy hands + reinforce the strength of my precieved hand.

Flop
1/2 C-bet pot on low board. I don't think he's called a raise pre with such low cards. The board texture is a pretty safe C-bet imo. After running through all the limp-call hands he would play with, on the flop I have 56% equity. I wasn't thinking of that at the time (maybe I should   :-/ ) 53% is more than enough to 1/2 pot c-bet.

Turn
I really don't think he has anything here, but with high cards it's easily plasuable he'd float any c-bet I put out on the flop. The Kcomes and this is a perfect card to represent, as it would be someone I'd raise with pre. I fire enough 1/2p barrel to take it down.

Notes
This is pretty much how I build my stack up during the early stages of the tournaments. I rarely get to showdown, and when I do I normally have the goods (because if they call both my Flop+Turn bets, they generally have it so I fold on the river).

Hand History:

Preflop
Preflop 3BB raise from SB.

Why?

Normal raise is 2.5x, but these players aren't observative enough to tell the difference between 2.5x and 3x. So to them it's just "oh, he raised."

Flop
Pretty much floppd the nuts. I'm hoping that he has AK,AQ and just slowplayed them pre. (however this same logic would also mean he could slowplay A's pre...)
I think that it's very feasable he's hit the K, or Q at least. The only hand that I could really be in trouble with here is the JTo because that's a hand that he would limp with.

I check to induce a bet from Ax , Qx or even Kx. He checks back, I'm thinking he's missed with somthing like 89s , 67s. Maybe he's trying to get to showdown with a middle pocket pair.

Turn
I don't want to miss value here so I bet 1/2p like I normally do. He flat calls. Again this strenghens my read that he's trying C/C and get to showdown for as cheap as possible.

River
Blank comes. I value bet again, he min reraises. Not exactly sure what his line is to min-reraise. Maybe get me off a Qx, Kx , or TPBK?
I reraise all in and calls off his 560 more.

T J, flopped the nuts.
As soon as he flipped over the ONLY two cards I was afraid of, I think my thoughts were something like ":mellow:...don't tilt, don't tilt..don't tilt...don't tilt.  "

Notes
Agasint his limping-call range I'm about a 90% fav. I don't think I did anything wrong and he played it super passivly (I guess you would with the nuts, but the check on the turn threw me off I think. Unless he knew I was an aggressive player and he knew I'd bet for him.
Meh.

Conclusion
Why I didn't win:

In hiensight, although this situation I was actually +ev with 56% equity, there really was no reason for shoving with 7's when we're all even stacked. I think I have more than a 56% chance of making it to HU, and to put all my efforts into a single pot where I'm only 56% fav is selling myself short.

I played a game at the same time and lost with KK's v QQ's all-in pre and lost to a set. I guess that I was pretty tilted  and that might have influenced my all-in. I also figured that 7's don't play very well on the flop so I'd shove and hope for 99+,AJs+,AsKh,AQo-AJo,KQo (of which I'm at 3:2 dog, so it probably wasn't the best move afterall).
E:

I think that from now on I'll only be posting the most interesting hands (rather than hands I lost the most BB/won the most BB) and I'll be posting 1 of each, because there's no way I can blog 4 tournaments of 3 hands each in great detail without it taking literally 3 hours.

I'm happy with the out come of the blog so far, and I feel that with this blog always in my head while I'm playing, I'll be forced to play better, and think about what I'm doing rather than just going on 'auto pilot'.