Thursday, June 28, 2007

Noooooo Limit

I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit ... I will not play limit

June has definately been my worse month so far. My only positive has been my no limit cash games. Limit is just killing me, I have no luck in that game. Even lost to a straight flush last night! I'm down in my omaha cash games, though my last couple of sessions I'm pretty sure I'm making the right decisions, I'm just not benefiting from them yet.

ex)
Preflop: ep pot raise, mp call, I call on the button with AKxx ds
Flop: 985 ep pot raise, mp call. I flop top 2 with nut flush draw.

easy allin?

Omaha is fun, and I do want to improve on it. Still have the Slotsboom and Ciaffone books sitting on my shelf I have to read though. I definately to get more practice on this though.

I'm down on my mtts as well, though its mostly from wsop sats.

Doubt I'll be playing much more with the long weekend coming up, maybe watch some videos, haven't watched as much as I planned to.

Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Book Recommendation - The Full Tilt Poker Strategy Guide : Tournament Edition


I hardly ever do book reviews, better yet I never to book reviews before I have finished a book, but this book deserves a recommendation. I guess its mostly because I thought it would just be nothing more than a "shill" book, not sure why I got it in the first place. I've only started through the first few chapters, but I can honestly admit that Andy Bloch writes one of the most resourceful sections I have ever read in a poker strategy book. His section is just sick full of wisdom.
Here are the authors in this book:
  • Andy Bloch
  • Richard Brodie
  • Chris Ferguson
  • Ted Forrest
  • Rafe Furst
  • Phil Gordon
  • David Grey
  • Howard Lederer
  • Mike Matusow
  • Huckleberry Seed
  • Keith Sexton
  • Gavin Smith
  • and edited by Michael Craig

I have just started the Chris Ferguson section, and so far so good. I'd definately recommend picking up this book if you want to improve your tournament game.

Monday, June 18, 2007

Chokage Sunday

So yesterday was WSOP qualifying Sunday. Played the Full Tilt 100seat and the Poker Stars 150 seat guarantees. I'm pretty sure if I qualified, I would have just taken the cash, but I guess no decision was necessary, I choked.

I believe I played very well in both tournies, at least until the end. Continuosly building my stack and not looking back. In both cases though I know where my problem was. When I turned off the aggressive switch, I forgot to turn it back on when required. When I played aggressively, I won chips easily. I even dropped the hammer once! I barely lost chips from confrontations, I lost them cause I bled them away. I let my stacks drop to the 10-12xBB range, and pretty much played push/fold mode till the end. In this type of satellite tourney, I can't get those bets called though unless I'm up against legitimate hands, so all I could pick up were blinds.

I eventually lost on Stars on a blind protection from the cutoff stealer with A9s. Had about 12x BB at that time. Villian had stolen from me before, but this time wokeup with AK. 420/6200
Full Tilt I got knocked out 1min later. Another CO steal attempt, but my stack, 9xBB was not big enough to resteal. 33 vs KJ and I couldn't hold. 300/1700? So I made it deep in both tournies, but rewarded with nothing.

I did a minor cash in Mansion though, 58th for $200. Same problem as above, plus a miscue on my part when I folded AJ to a shove after I made an MP raise. Left myself with 7-8BB. I should have shoved myself. I also managed to finally qualify for the ipoker $500k freeroll. I probably played that about 7 times, top ten qualify. Usually about 500 players. 900mpp to enter, figured I might as well use my points.

On that note I think I'm done with Sunday tournies for a while. Weather is nice outside, and hate being stuck indoors. I'll stick to weeknight cash games, and watch a ton of videos. Paying for it might as well watch them. I'll prob even read a book or two!

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Hey, an actual satellite win!

Finally after feeling like years between satellite wins, I actually finally won one. Its actually probably only been a couple weeks, but feels like a while. I am now entered in the $500 100 WSOP seat guaranteed on Full Tilt this Sunday. I've given up trying to qualify on Stars, because I suck. The double shootouts there are good value, but they are turbos. Instead I just bought some W$ for about 90% and I'll just buyin. Now if my plan runs accordingly, I'll have 2 seats by monday morning. :)