I’ve played a fair bit since my last blog but I haven’t anything to report in terms of the bankroll other than it is where it was last time.
That includes the staking bankroll, which is now continuing into its third month. I keep promising I’ll eventually give my backer some cash return but at the moment I can’t give him anything but whingy blogs about how I can’t get over the hump.
Since I started the staking deal I’ve gone from $120 loser to $70 winner, back to $80 loser and then up to nearly level again.
That brings me up to this weekend. Over the past week or so I’ve been investing a lot of time into poker, without really playing that much. I finished off reading the Poker Mindset which I have to say is one of the most disappointingly over-hyped books I’ve read. I mentioned before that I personally thought a lot of the concepts were blatantly obvious and if you need a book to tell you them then you’re in trouble. Also, some of the stuff the authors talk about just isn’t true. In particular there’s one bit where they talk about when to quit and they say: “If you quit because you’re ahead or behind, then you really are just delaying the results of your next hand until your next session,” and they go onto prove this by showing a graph. Well of course that’s blatantly not true. Poker isn’t a linear set of circumstances that never change (like reading a book or watching a film). Every decision you take beyond playing a hand has an impact on what you do next – whether it is consciously or subconsciously.
I’ll admit that this critique of the book is rather contrived and lazy but there we are. If you want to argue about it, post a comment. Suffice to say I think it’s done very little to change my poker mindset which (although the blog posts may not seem to reflect that) is pretty solid.
As well as the book I’ve been watching more Dueces Cracked Videos, (although the most recent ones I’ve been watching by Foxwoods Fiend while entertaining are possibly distorting the way I should be playing at my stakes) and I’ve been investing a lot of time into getting my support software working to its best potential.
One change was through necessity. Poker Tracker 3 is gone. 5gb of hard drive space for 500k of hands? Bloody hell! So I spent much of the weekend transferring my stuff to Holdem Manager which does look very good I must admit. It has the old Realtime HUD software that I used to use which is pretty awesome. But, as with any new HUD I’ve had to spend hours reconfiguring it for my personal preferences. And finally I invested $4 in 250k of observed hands on the stakes I play at just so I have some information on the big losers, winners and regulars on the tables I play on.
Now, onto the poker and the purchase of the bulk hand histories had an immediate and positive impact. Table selection is made easier because I can work out whether tables will be profitable after 15 or so hands (if the majority of players are TAGs with a lot of hands and profit and no big fish, just leave). It’s also helping with making decisions that win small to medium pots too such as when to c/bet, when to steal blinds and when to take away those pots against those that missed A high flush draws and straight draws when they blank on the river and could win with high card – I’ve had a few of them already.
However, the general summary of the weekend has nothing to do with the subtleties mentioned above. The weekend was governed by the massive variances of good cards and bad cards. On Saturday I crushed the tables with monster hands and monster fishes. I made nearly three buyins within 250 hands.
Then on Sunday I gave it all back (and a fraction more) in 400 hands with, not bad beats, but just some smelly cold decks and running into monsters. I had a flopped straight lose to a turned flush – lost the minimum. I had two players flop sets that turned into full houses and they both checked-called the flop, river trying to trap me - I had JJ both times and probably lost the minimum. I had another half dozen situations where I just had to lose 15-30bb pots finding out where I was and then I lost this hand,
***** Hand History for Game 1154579099 *****
$20.00 USD NL Texas Hold'em - Sunday, September 07, 09:46:24 ET 2008
Table Bloomington (Real Money)
Seat 3 is the button
Seat 1: aguendass18 ( $4.37 USD )
Seat 3: meatncheese ( $7.14 USD )
Seat 5: GoogleWTC7 ( $17.55 USD )
Seat 6: madmessie ( $37.01 USD )
Seat 8: RTRFelix ( $21.31 USD )
Seat 10: Tatanka74 ( $6.93 USD )
GoogleWTC7 posts small blind [$0.10 USD].
madmessie posts big blind [$0.20 USD].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to RTRFelix [ Kh Ac ]
RTRFelix raises [$0.80 USD]
Tatanka74 folds
aguendass18 folds
meatncheese folds
GoogleWTC7 raises [$1.70 USD]
madmessie folds
RTRFelix calls [$1.00 USD]
** Dealing Flop ** [ 9d, Ks, 2h ]
GoogleWTC7 bets [$2.00 USD]
RTRFelix calls [$2.00 USD]
** Dealing Turn ** [ 2c ]
GoogleWTC7 bets [$3.00 USD]
RTRFelix calls [$3.00 USD]
** Dealing River ** [ 8c ]
GoogleWTC7 bets [$10.75 USD]
RTRFelix calls [$10.75 USD]
GoogleWTC7 wins $34.30 USD from main pot
GoogleWTC7 shows [As, Ad ]
I keep getting into this situation with AK and I think it’s a leak in my game. I’m not sure whether to 4bet preflop or continue what I’m doing and be able to find a fold on the river, or am I just going broke here? I feel as though I shouldn’t be.
So, back to the Pokermindset philosophy. Was I destined to win $50 and then give it back no matter whether I played the last 650 hands in one session, two sessions or seventeen sessions? No. I would have obviously won or lost some of the money if I had carried on Saturday but definitely different volumes. I don’t think I played horribly on Sunday, the situations just weren’t conducive to making money. I’m not complaining about losing the money. It’s just what happened, I accept it and move on.
So here’s a graph of how the staking deals has gone so far. Up and downs but, inevitably I am still where I started.
That includes the staking bankroll, which is now continuing into its third month. I keep promising I’ll eventually give my backer some cash return but at the moment I can’t give him anything but whingy blogs about how I can’t get over the hump.
Since I started the staking deal I’ve gone from $120 loser to $70 winner, back to $80 loser and then up to nearly level again.
That brings me up to this weekend. Over the past week or so I’ve been investing a lot of time into poker, without really playing that much. I finished off reading the Poker Mindset which I have to say is one of the most disappointingly over-hyped books I’ve read. I mentioned before that I personally thought a lot of the concepts were blatantly obvious and if you need a book to tell you them then you’re in trouble. Also, some of the stuff the authors talk about just isn’t true. In particular there’s one bit where they talk about when to quit and they say: “If you quit because you’re ahead or behind, then you really are just delaying the results of your next hand until your next session,” and they go onto prove this by showing a graph. Well of course that’s blatantly not true. Poker isn’t a linear set of circumstances that never change (like reading a book or watching a film). Every decision you take beyond playing a hand has an impact on what you do next – whether it is consciously or subconsciously.
I’ll admit that this critique of the book is rather contrived and lazy but there we are. If you want to argue about it, post a comment. Suffice to say I think it’s done very little to change my poker mindset which (although the blog posts may not seem to reflect that) is pretty solid.
As well as the book I’ve been watching more Dueces Cracked Videos, (although the most recent ones I’ve been watching by Foxwoods Fiend while entertaining are possibly distorting the way I should be playing at my stakes) and I’ve been investing a lot of time into getting my support software working to its best potential.
One change was through necessity. Poker Tracker 3 is gone. 5gb of hard drive space for 500k of hands? Bloody hell! So I spent much of the weekend transferring my stuff to Holdem Manager which does look very good I must admit. It has the old Realtime HUD software that I used to use which is pretty awesome. But, as with any new HUD I’ve had to spend hours reconfiguring it for my personal preferences. And finally I invested $4 in 250k of observed hands on the stakes I play at just so I have some information on the big losers, winners and regulars on the tables I play on.
Now, onto the poker and the purchase of the bulk hand histories had an immediate and positive impact. Table selection is made easier because I can work out whether tables will be profitable after 15 or so hands (if the majority of players are TAGs with a lot of hands and profit and no big fish, just leave). It’s also helping with making decisions that win small to medium pots too such as when to c/bet, when to steal blinds and when to take away those pots against those that missed A high flush draws and straight draws when they blank on the river and could win with high card – I’ve had a few of them already.
However, the general summary of the weekend has nothing to do with the subtleties mentioned above. The weekend was governed by the massive variances of good cards and bad cards. On Saturday I crushed the tables with monster hands and monster fishes. I made nearly three buyins within 250 hands.
Then on Sunday I gave it all back (and a fraction more) in 400 hands with, not bad beats, but just some smelly cold decks and running into monsters. I had a flopped straight lose to a turned flush – lost the minimum. I had two players flop sets that turned into full houses and they both checked-called the flop, river trying to trap me - I had JJ both times and probably lost the minimum. I had another half dozen situations where I just had to lose 15-30bb pots finding out where I was and then I lost this hand,
***** Hand History for Game 1154579099 *****
$20.00 USD NL Texas Hold'em - Sunday, September 07, 09:46:24 ET 2008
Table Bloomington (Real Money)
Seat 3 is the button
Seat 1: aguendass18 ( $4.37 USD )
Seat 3: meatncheese ( $7.14 USD )
Seat 5: GoogleWTC7 ( $17.55 USD )
Seat 6: madmessie ( $37.01 USD )
Seat 8: RTRFelix ( $21.31 USD )
Seat 10: Tatanka74 ( $6.93 USD )
GoogleWTC7 posts small blind [$0.10 USD].
madmessie posts big blind [$0.20 USD].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to RTRFelix [ Kh Ac ]
RTRFelix raises [$0.80 USD]
Tatanka74 folds
aguendass18 folds
meatncheese folds
GoogleWTC7 raises [$1.70 USD]
madmessie folds
RTRFelix calls [$1.00 USD]
** Dealing Flop ** [ 9d, Ks, 2h ]
GoogleWTC7 bets [$2.00 USD]
RTRFelix calls [$2.00 USD]
** Dealing Turn ** [ 2c ]
GoogleWTC7 bets [$3.00 USD]
RTRFelix calls [$3.00 USD]
** Dealing River ** [ 8c ]
GoogleWTC7 bets [$10.75 USD]
RTRFelix calls [$10.75 USD]
GoogleWTC7 wins $34.30 USD from main pot
GoogleWTC7 shows [As, Ad ]
I keep getting into this situation with AK and I think it’s a leak in my game. I’m not sure whether to 4bet preflop or continue what I’m doing and be able to find a fold on the river, or am I just going broke here? I feel as though I shouldn’t be.
So, back to the Pokermindset philosophy. Was I destined to win $50 and then give it back no matter whether I played the last 650 hands in one session, two sessions or seventeen sessions? No. I would have obviously won or lost some of the money if I had carried on Saturday but definitely different volumes. I don’t think I played horribly on Sunday, the situations just weren’t conducive to making money. I’m not complaining about losing the money. It’s just what happened, I accept it and move on.
So here’s a graph of how the staking deals has gone so far. Up and downs but, inevitably I am still where I started.
Are the limits more challenge? I don’t think so. Am I getting really unlucky? I don’t think I’ve had loads of bad beats. Occasionally very expensive ones, but not loads. Am I not playing as well as before? Well I’m playing with a much deeper level of thinking and I believe that my average level of play has improved, but that doesn’t necessarily mean I’ll earn more money because 20 tabling as a nit is probably the most profitable way to play these stakes. Am I tilting? Maybe occasionally but even when I do that I still get it in good, the only difference is it produces higher variances.
So why aren’t I making money?
The answer at the moment is that I don’t know. Probably a combination of all the things above combined with confronting thousands of situations which have produced a slightly negative period of poker luck, which is offset to neutral by the fact I think I am a better player then most at these stakes so have a slight edge.
Does any of this make any sense at all?
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