Mission To Malta

So,

I promised a “Trip Report” about my last one and a half months, AKA my Supernova Run. On november 9th I was, like so many times before, rather unhappy with my work ethic in general. I was sure now that I wouldn’t even reach Supernova status on Pokerstars. Now, I have always been a player that saw rakeback as a supplement to my income and it was never my goal to be a “Rakeback Grinder”. Supernova however is something that a professional SSNL player should pick up along the way without really focusing too much on achieving it.

Looking at my VIP status page on PS disgusted me:

You need to earn 54,065.82 VPP by december 31st to achieve Supernova Status.

So, it’s less than two months to go and I’m not even half way there. In my defence I moved from FullTilt to Stars in april or may (don’t remember exactly), so It’s not as bad as it seems. Still I should have been supernova already or at least pretty close to it, had I grinded like I am supposed to, being a professional.

So I crunched some numbers, called my buddy and prop-bet him that I’d reach suoernova by the end of the year (see my blog entry from 11-15-2009).

On november 10th I sat down at my computer and started to grind…

Pretty much eight hours a day, pretty much every day with no days off. Well that was the plan, but how does this saying go (by genral Sherman I believe)? “No plan survives the first hostile contact!” or something along those lines. After a few days my brain felt like someone had put an immersion blender into it and turned it on at full throttle. My game suffered quite a bit and I “swonged” my way through november eventually pretty much breaking even for the month. Also I had days where I wasn’t able to put in more than 1.5k hands due to the fact that I just lost all of my focus, kept timing out everywhere etc.

I had put in 75k hands in november, which was by far the most volume I had ever put in over the course of one month. That’s a reason to be proud of, no? Well, yeah it kinda is. However I had only one month left and 90k hands in front of me. “I can stll do this, I can stll do this, I can stll do this, …” I kept telling myself and continued the grind. At this point I also got a bit better used to it and was able to maintain my focus for longer periods and overall started playing better. Couple that with one of the biggest heaters in my entire career and we’re looking at a good 45 buy in upswing over the first 20k hands in december (8 days).

Coming out of this heater, I entered the biggest downswing of my entire career. Over the next 40k hands (12 days) I ran 55 buy ins below all in EV (yes, fifty-five!). Couple THAT with numerous coolers and setups that won’t show up in the all in EV line and the fact that I’m not Tommy Angelo and certainly didn’t play my A-game when running like utter crap, and we’re looking at a 48 buy in downswing, dipping my month back into the negative.

I was on the brink of throwing in the towel. I couldn’t stand it anymore sitting down every day just to get beat up like an unpopular kid in highschool… EVERY SINGLE SESSION!

I said before that I didn’t see my friends a whole lot during that time so pretty much my only social contact over the course of this challenge was my “Pokerbuddy” Marc. I put that in quotes because since a very long time now (even before this challenge started) he’s become way more than just a pokerbuddy. It’s just that among all the people I know in my real life, he’s the only one I can also talk to about poker without explaining everything from scratch. Over these 52 days I think there were not more than five days that we didn’t talk on the phone. During my downswing he was the one who kept motivating me to continue: “Dude, you’ll have to go on. It’s just a bad run. Yes, it’s very bad, but just like any other bad run, it will turn around eventually. You’re a good player, No, you don’t suck, and you know that. Achieving this will be a major step towards your mission to Malta”.

In case you’re wondering: Yes, he is the guy who had $350 on the line against me in this challenge.

Thank You Marc!!!

Without you, this wouldn’t have been possible!

I still fell behind pace a good amnount during that time because even though I couldn’t really stop-loss, I had to quit numerous times because I went on big time monkey tilt. (EPTPE, I know). So before Christmas I had to make a decision. Go with my initial plan and take the holidays off to go see my family (and lose the challenge) or stay at home and grind…

It was not an easy decision, but I had come so far now and losing now would have crushed my soul even more. So for the first time ever I did not see my family for christmas. That was kinda tough for me but in the end it was a concious decision I made to achieve my goal, which will help me achieve the bigger goal I have in mind. Moving to Malta.

I still had a lot of pace to make up for, so from the 25th of december till the 31st I put in another 52 hours of grinding, thankfully running good again.

In the end I finished december up 38 buy ins and as a Supernova and am now enjoying my at least 7-10 days long break from poker.

In the end I played 159,320 hands after november 9th 2009 to achieve this goal. I know for some of you grinders out there that isn’t too big of a deal, but I don’t compare myself to anyone else. I know my abilities and boundaries, and I know that I stepped over them quite a bit during these 52 days.

I’ll be back as a contributor on the forums soon, but right now I’m gonna take a break from poker pretty much all together, that is: playing, studying, watching videos and posting in the strategy sections of forums.

I deserve it!

Until next time,

Sugar Nut