Running Like Antonius...

Continuing in the blogging drill vein, this is another small update on how things have been going lately.

Edit: Wtf***

What an insane weekend!! I traveled to Belfast on Friday to play in one of the regular games up there, lollivepokeraments, obv. The fun twist was that the other players were mainly people who had been regulars in the games I TD’d until last year. Needless to say, I’m very familiar with their games and this, combined with the awesome banter and some timely run goot made for an incredibly fun session.

One of the things that came up over the course of the night was whether any of us still enjoyed poker. Obviously, the answer should be ‘yes’…why else would we play? In all honesty however, my truthful answer at the time was ‘no’. Sure, I was having a great time mixing it up and seeing old faces again but this was an occasional and fun trip, with people who’s company I genuinely enjoy. This really couldn’t be further removed from the online experience where we often face a sort of solitary mental battle for hours on end, at stakes which may not seem particularly important and with the potential for little reward, either mental, emotional or financial in the end.

Grinding poker, even simply becoming caught up in the lifestyle of poor diet, late nights and waking up when most people are having lunch….is an impossible existence in some ways. I really believe that those who get mired in this sort of dissociative fugue are doomed to failure in the long-term, regardless of study, poker ability etc.

In essence, despite what we may think or believe about humanity in general, meaningful contact with other people is absolutely vital and will keep you in touch with life outside the grind. You’ll notice that I haven’t included the phrase ‘like-minded’ in that last sentence. Other poker players are important; they’ll empathise, criticise, motivate and cool you down at the right times and this is vital both to improvement and sanity ;), but there are other people, other schema’s, other world-views out there…don’t miss out on these for the sake of another .1 bb/100.

I’d really like to make a coherent blog post, just one time, but let me finish this rambling with a piece of cheese.

In life, as in poker, balance is key.

Cliffnotes:
Went to Belfast.
Tourney was essentially a homegame.
QQ < K9 3 handed vs drunk guy.
Talk to people…..even when you don’t want to or think they have nothing to add that could possibly interest you.
Be honest with yourself and those around you
Live poker is ez, Three 1st place’s, one 3rd.

• Go Cry Emo Kid

Skype: jonnyczz

This will be the first in a series of, to paraphrase Tommy Angelo…‘blogging drills’. Since starting the blog, with good intentions and serious aspirations, it’s really fallen by the wayside and I’d quite like to get back into it.

Even if it’s only read by a handful of people, it’s be pretty cool to have a place to store thoughts and rants whether or not they’re actually poker related and there’s always a distant possibility that someone finds a piece in here that’s funny or useful ;)

One of my main goals at the moment is to expand the network of players I talk to on a regular basis. It’s been going decently well so far, gotten some great feedback and hopefully added something along the way as well. I don’t really care what level you guys are at, if you want to discuss hands/sweat a session/ get a sweat or review videos of previous sessions etc then pm for my msn/e-mail address or add me on skype ‘jonnyczz’. I have a headset, teamviewer and all the cool stuff that makes poker players in ’10 insanely good. Run-good not included ;)

Closing with one of the running (groan) themes of the early blog, my general fitness has never been better and I’m way up on my original distance/timing goals as well as mixing in some strength work to compliment the extensive cardio workouts…feels AWESOME! Going to throw some Yoga/meditative practice into the mix from next week, milfs ftw.

Super quick update toady, mainly because there simply hasn’t been much to say, in terms of poker at least. Endured the rigors of a final year essay last week and haven’t played online at all really in June, although I did have some good (and not so good) live experiences.

I’ve kinda lost a little motivation to grind and need to work on getting that back I suppose, but for now I’m content to let it come back in it’s own way, rather than forcing myself to play when I don’t feel like it, I’m sure it won’t be long. :D

When I update this properly, probably in the next day or so I’ll outline the fun times I’ve been having in live poker in more detail, suffice to say I had a cash in a £30 tourney, a chop in a £10 rebuy and some extremely swingy mixed side game sessions. It’s pretty heartening to see PLO becoming a mainstay in these games, it can only be a good thing long run for any of us who’ve put in the hours online or watching instructional vids, the live mentality is still very much ‘ZOMG, 4 Cardssssss…..gamble gamble!’.

Running has been hit and miss, I’ve still been going out regularly but have kinda hit a progress wall in endurance which I’ll need to work on. Info on the really cool podcast tool I’ve been using in next blog too, want to go into a little detail on how it’s helped.

Lame blogs need awesomez cats, imo, peace guys

I know, I’ve just jinxed it, what can you do :)

I switched my online roll from Full Tilt to Partypoker last week. I’m sure some of you who remember the ‘glory days’ think this is a complete no brainer and it probably is, but there are a few things which really count against Party in my view. The main one for me right now is the ever present possibility of the client completely crashing without warning….just the sickest thing ever given that all of the PLO tables are(No DP)so it makes it difficult to confidently play a long session. I’ve just been dipping in and out today, really not cool with the idea of the client insta-shutting down when i have the nuts 200bb deep vs a fish who’s pot pot potting lol. The sheer reliability and ease of multi-tabling one can experience on the huge American sites really is unmatched elsewhere.

That said, today went pretty well.

I’m really enjoying my PLO experiment, sure, the variance is gonna be insane along the way…and I’m slowly but surely figuring that set=nuts is no longer true, but there’s so much more gamble in this game, something that draws in 90%+ VPiP fish with surprising regularity.

1st Few days PLO

My favourite hand of the week, villain was a slightly aggro fish, who I’d just made a note on which was essentially, ‘value bets too thinly’ when he owned someone in a previous pot with top and bottom pair. Thought turn and river were particularly good for this play.

Party Poker $25 Pot Limit Omaha Hi – 5 players
The Official DeucesCracked.com Hand History Converter

Hero (SB): $47.92
BB: $20.00
UTG: $42.73
CO: $25.31
BTN: $53.77

Pre Flop: ($0.35) Hero is SB with 2 9 6 T
1 fold, CO calls $0.25, 1 fold, Hero calls $0.15, BB checks

Flop: ($0.75) 7 8 5 (3 players)
Hero bets $0.72, BB calls $0.72, CO calls $0.72

Turn: ($2.91) A (3 players)
Hero bets $2.77, BB folds, CO calls $2.77

River: ($8.45) Q (2 players)
Hero checks, CO bets $8.02, Hero raises to $32.09, CO calls $13.55 all in

Final Pot: $51.59
Hero shows 2 9 6 T (a straight Five to Nine)
CO mucks 2 4 8 6 (a straight Four to Eight)
Hero wins $10.52
Hero wins $39.07
(Rake: $2.00)

Largest pot of the week so far, this guy had ran up huge stacks on a number of tables, but was pretty terrible imo, in terms of recklessness and mis-valuing his hands.
Thought process for me here was something like……I have the nuts…..wat is he doing, i have the nuts….i think….check again..23456, yep, + a blocker to 78…ARRR IN!! Reasonable vs spewtard?

Party Poker $25 Pot Limit Omaha Hi – 5 players
The Official DeucesCracked.com Hand History Converter

UTG: $28.60
CO: $4.81
BTN: $21.55
SB: $65.88
Hero (BB): $48.53

Pre Flop: ($0.35) Hero is BB with 9 7 3 4
UTG raises to $0.85, 1 fold, BTN calls $0.85, SB calls $0.75, Hero calls $0.60

Flop: ($3.40) 2 6 5 (4 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $3.23, UTG folds, BTN folds, SB raises to $12.92, Hero raises to $41.99, SB raises to $65.03 all in, Hero calls $5.69 all in

Turn: ($98.76) T (2 players – 2 are all in)

River: ($98.76) 7 (2 players – 2 are all in)

Final Pot: $98.76
SB shows 4 4 6 5 (two pairs, Sixes and Fives)
Hero shows 9 7 3 4 (a straight Three to Seven)
SB wins $17.35
Hero wins $96.76
(Rake: $-15.35)

This is how my week as a whole has gone…. lolvolumaments obv, but I’m in the middle of some final year essays, give me a break!

Top line is 50NL HU, where I know for a fact (From extensive play earlier in the year) I’ve got a huge edge at vs most players at those stakes there, but I just can’t stomach paying a whopping 20bb/100 in rake…esp with PP’s pretty pathetic points palladium rewards system (I promised alliteration sir, and I do believe, I’ve just delivered).

Anyone more PLO savvy, feel free to comment on my stats etc, although having played a little bit of PLO25 on FTP, I do think there’s a decent difference in how the games play. Still, any advice is always great.

Edit: Just went for a solid 20 minute ‘walk n run’. I’ve discovered a great mp3 series which really makes the whole thing fly in and also aids with pacing. Will post more about it later. For anyone thinking of getting fitter for summer, definitely recommend checking out future blogs as I’ll post whatever tips and aids I discover along the way, stick with it!

Live Long ’n Prosper Katz

Well here it is, my first ever blog post!

I think I’m going to keep this first post kinda short and simple, ease myself into this new environment, if you will. However, it’s pretty unrealistic to expect any interest in this blog without providing just a little bit of initial information about myself and my goals for this outlet to the wider world.

Goals….don’t you just love them!? It’s one of my short term aims to become more goal orientated in life, which is kinda sad, since I’ve been fighting this very phenomenon for about 7 years….. here, have a real goal to cheer you up :)
This is one of my all time favourites.

I’m a 22 year old final year English student from N.Ireland, in the U.K. (Shameless attempt to get all the Americans on my side here; UK players ARE donkeys, I cringe constantly at the advice given in UK mags/forums)

My poker playing ‘career’ so far has played out at low stakes 6 max and HU cash games with probably 80-100k hands in total since I began taking it more seriously around a year and a half ago. Currently beating 25NL at a solid clip, while last year I had some sweet results at 50NL HU over around 17k hands…….why haven’t I moved up? Read on….

I still have many, many leaks and flaws in my game, but probably my most damaging leak is psychological. ‘Downswings’ or even multiple losing sessions are really, really difficult to deal with and have resulted, in the past, in a ‘panic withdrawal’ of my online roll. The thought of losing it all, despite being adequately rolled for the games I play, is an overriding one and has been so, sooo damaging in my quest to move up in stakes. (Any advice here? I know it’s probably a common thing for players, probably having it’s inception in a fundamental lack of trust in my ability, though it’s better than it’s ugly cousin, ‘flippin’ 4 rollz, right?!)

One of my main aims in starting this blog is to create some accountability for myself in poker, fitness and in life. For various reasons, this is the perfect time for me to reflect and rebuild, but with that comes some difficult times, I’m hoping that the ability to get my thoughts out there and (hopefully) receiving feedback from people who’ve trodden this well worn path before me will really aid my focus on getting to where I want to be. In terms of poker, this will likely include session summaries and hand posts. With both life and fitness I’m intending to blog mainly thoughts and observations I come up with along the way, this might include some quotes, tips but will definitely, categorically…include lolcats.

Regarding fitness, I’m setting a 10 week goal which, if completed, will allow me to run 5k+ at a solid race pace (Hey, swingin like busta rhymes, alliteration next week, yo!) Tonight I ran for around 20 minutes, alternating between walking and a quick jog, it went pretty well considering my usual inability to run without involving a ball of some kind.

I think I’ll return to the ‘Life in general’ topic another time, it seems my version of ‘short and simple’ falls somewhere between Pokey and that other visionary genius, Tolstoy…

Wow, blogging is super therapeutic, who knew!? I admittedly haven’t read many blogs so apologies if this one rambled on at any point, will do some research for next time by gratuitously raping both Krantz’s blog and Death Donkey’s for ideas! Feedback along the road would be great guys and if you have a blog, post it with your comment or PM me for a shout out, I’m a request whore, I know ;) I also just generally welcome PM’s since it’s great to talk to other players…esp anyone on DC, cause in my few months as a full subscriber, if I’ve noticed one thing, it’s that we are the coolest people on the planet

Peace

P.S. I’d like to thank the auto-correct funcions in my braoser, without whih this blog could ne1th3r have been ritten or read.