Weeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!

Had my best result ever last night! Finished 4th in a 1,200 man $10 freezeout on Mansion poker fo $730. Just 2 days after coming 2nd in a $5 rebuy for $370. Needless to say the old graqph is looking a little better now :D Don't know what else to say really other than I ran like a god and played well, as is required for these huge tourneys. Big thanx to Chica for railing me 2! was a great help having a m8 by my side :)

The last hand was somewhat of a cooler, which I'm not bitter about. There were 4 players left and I picked up JJ on the button, early position folded. I made a smallish raise hoping to induce a re-steal and my opponent in the BB shoved. I insta-call and he flips over KK!!! Brutal! But tbh I was just happy to go out on a hand I could feel happy about rather than something that was gunna haunt me 4 ages lol.

Came 2nd in a $5 rebuy 2day out of 173 players for $370 :D

This has done wonders to mitigate this months downswing. In other news:

• Came second in a GUKPT sattelite for the $100 game and negotiated for 30% of the winnings should the player (McKinney from NPF) cash.
• Signed up to SNG Grinders training site for 3 months (only $45).
• Got offered some online sweat sessions by Karl Mahrenholz for free!
  

So things goin pretty sweet poker wise. Had a good weekend 2 as I went clay pigeon shooting on Saturday. Despite the fact I was shit (came last out of males) I really enjoyed it, especially the game BBQ afterwards :D

MTT or STT SNG's??

Hello, just another short post reflecting on some stats :) I dug the above graph out from my old Sharkscope reults. It shows my results (profit and ROI) on the Y-axis and the no. of entrants into that SNG on the x-axis. As you can see my results for 18 man SNG's were much better ($400 profit and 40% ROI) than my results for 9 man SNG's ($75 profit and 15% ROI) whilst both were over a sample of around 200 games.

What does this mean? Well I fear the sample size is too small to draw any major conclusions but it has got me wondering! Am I significantly better at 2 table SNG's than 1 table SNG's and if so why??? I know they're recognised as softer and also that the more entrants the higher the achievable ROI perhaps that explains it... Combined with the small sample size I think I may have as best an answer as I can come up with at this stage. In the meantime I will continue to play a combination of 10 man and 30 man SNG's on mansion to see what I do best in.

Variance?

I was intending on only updating my bankroll supply progress on a monthly basis but I've just hit a 'terrible' downswing and thought it was a good time to take stock. As you can see from my
sharkscope graph above, I recentlty went on something like a 20-30 gagme losing streak! Someting I am not used to... especially at the $20 stakes.

However after a group training session with Paul Jackson and other SNG players for bankroll
suppply I made some much needed adjustments to my game. Combined with a stubbornly avoided move down in stakes back to the $10 games this saw my 'form' on sharkscope go from 'super tilt' to 'hot'. Unfortuneately this can only be seen on my graph as a short levelling out of a big downswing.

So it appears the rest of the month is gunna be damage limitation at the $10 level, trying to
claw back some of that nasty loss. On a brighter note though I ran deep in the $10 $4k GTD last
nite finishing 36th out of 500+ runners. At one stage I was 4th in stack sizes but it wasnt to be
this time. In the end I went out on QQ Vs AK all-in pre-flop.

Having completed my first month with Bankroll Supply I feel it is time to reflect a bit on how
things have gone. I think the most significant outcome of the last month has been my jump from
the $5 games to the $20 ones as previously mentioned. This occured toward the end of the month thus my results can not be representative of how I'm doing at these stakes.

The hardest challenge of my first month was probably finding the time to put in 7-10hrs per week,as I work full time this was a bit of a challenge. However moving up in stakes has made this challenge a lot more interesting! If I could only learn to multitable more tables I would be able to complete my hours much quicker!

What have I learnt and what are my goals for the future?

I've learnt that HUD stats are invaluble when multitabling, even just VPIP and PFR :) I've learnt that even poker players as successful as Paul Jackson are able to bring themselves down to your level and offer highly relevant advice. And I've learned that I need to be a little less results oriented as the swings in SNG's, when you are playing low volume like me, mean you don't get much of an indication in the short term of how you are doing.

As for my goals, I feel a lot more focused than a month ago, when I was seriously lacking in
direction. For now my goals are to keep playing the $20 SNG's until I establish a large enough
sample size (400-500 games maybe) to decide whether I'm winning or losing at this new level. Thisshould be attainable by the beginning of July when I will be heading to Australia to visit my
family. When I add these results to my previous sample of 550 games on Full Tilt I should have a sample of 1000 games which I have read will give me a fairly reliable ROI.

Not much more else to say atm than gl me!!!

I had my first lesson with my new mentor at Bankroll Supply last night. I feel extrmely lucky to be mentored by such a high profile player as Paul 'actionjack' Jackson! For those of you who haven't heard of him watch this video!

The session consisted of using software that allows him to view my screen and skype to discuss my decisions whilst playing. If I were paying for this kind of coaching I would shudder to think of the cost!

The main outcome of the session was that he felt I was playing at stakes well below my capability and has urged me to move on from $5 and $10 SNG's and start playing $10's and $20 to begin with moving on to $20's and $30's a.s.a.p. I'm really looking forward to this as SNG's have become a bit of a grind lately that are hardly worth it if you are not making a decent amount of money.

I must admit I was a little apprehensive at first because I wondered if a player of his caliber would be interested in someone playing at my level but was happy to find that he's a very down to earth guy who considers all levels the same. I can't wait for our future sessions now and am really looking forward to this great oppurtunity to move up in stakes!

Virgin Festival

This is the hand that I busted out on in the Virgin Festival (not a bad beat story i promise!):

I'm in the BB and a fairly new player at the table is on the button, he min raises. My only read on him is that he is probably tight due to something he has said. He doesn't know I've been playing tight because he is new. I have 83o and elect to call reasoning that I don't want him to believe he can steal my blind that easily. I'm not v.happy with this part of my play due to my read and position.

We see a flop heads up though, I have about 6000 chips and the blinnds are 150/300 and are going up soon to 200/400. The flop is AQ7 rainbow i think and he checks, I check behind. The river is a brick but brings a second club and he checks again so I take a stab at the pot and bet 1000 (into a pot of 1350) he calls. The river is a 3rd club and makes a gutshot straight on the board, however I have nothing. He checks again and I think for awhile before moving all-in for another 4000+.

My reaoning behind this was as follows: The pot was now 3350 about 3/4 of my stack and I was soon going to be down about 10 BB due to the immenent blind increase. I sensed that he didnt like the texture of the board and had checked for that reason. So I decided to represent the flush or straight. In the heat of the moment I neglected to put him on a range of hands but his checks on all streets had indicated to me he was not confident in his hand. Therefore I made a move... Unfortuneately he read my nervous demeanor and after deliberating for a long time and repeating to himself 'you've got shit' lol called with trip A's :(

I believe my my mistakes in this hand were as follows: calling the min-raise pre-flop (I've been reading Gus Hansen's 'Every Hand Revealed' lol) and making a bluff that I could not maintain my composure afterwards sufficiently... probably due to playing priimarily on the net. Also of course not taking the time to put him on a range of hands was a crucial error!

The good news is afterwards I won a STT that was a sattelite into another tourney the next day and then came 4th out of 16 in that which paid about £150, a slight consolation :)