Got back from Devon yesterday afternoon and as expected had a good time. We left at 6am on Friday and from that moment on was pretty tired, playing a lot of golf in the day and then drinking till midnight every night. We played a 54 hole individual competition and i got off to a nightmare start, finishing dead last by 7 shots after day 1. I hadn't played for a couple of months and only 3 times this year so i wasn't shocked by this outcome, i was also giving 3 of the guys between 4 and 8 shots a round so it wasn't looking good. I played a lot better on day 2 and was still in last place but had shut the gap to 3 shots on mike and Liam so the 3 of us went out in the wooden spoon match on the final day. After a ding dong battle with Liam i managed to sneak past him on the 17th to finish 8 out of 9. I played better each day and by day 3 was at my very best tee to green, i putted terribly however which cost me a lot of shots and overall i was just glad not to finish last. Congrats to Ben 'big cheese' Warwick on his victory who played very solid all week and deserved it 100%. I only lost about £50 on the golf course thanks to my victory in the closest to the pin comp and won £30 in the paper/scissor- rock comp after a dramatic 4-3 victory against cashy in the best of 7 final. That's 2 in a row for me and am very pleased to rank myself as the number 1 player in the group, if not the world. We also played a 7-man £5 poker crapshoot which i obviously won winning every single all in pre showdown along the way, my favourite being the 8-3 V A3 classic coin flip scenario, lol. As far as the rest of the holiday goes, rooms were fine: 4/5. Food was good enough and a lot of it: 4/5. The main problems were that it felt a bit like an old peoples home and the rest of the people were mostly over 40 but this is to expected from a golf holiday i guess. Looking forward to next year.
Looking into the immediate future i've decided to set myself some goals for the upcoming month. I've been a bit of a lazy fucker of late and i think my results have reflected this. September was a decent month and it was nice to get back to winning ways after a shit August but i threw away a lot of good chances for $5K + paydays and am looking forward to trying to change this over the next few weeks, i also feel like i once again didn't put the hours in and am looking forward to pushing myself as hard as i can. Finally i ate real bad throughout the last few months and havn't put the hours in the gym and in the swimming pool since my return from Las Vegas. So with this in mind my goals for the month are:
1) Play a minimum of 100 MTT's before the end of October Ranging from anywhere between $50 to $550 freezeouts and $30 - $100 rebuys.
2) I'm not allowed to eat any fast food including pizza, indian, chinese, kebabs etc. Also make a conscious effort to eat less crisps, chocolate and biscuits.
3) Swim at least 20 times. Each session being 100 lengths of the 15m pool.
4) Go to the gym at least 10 times. 2000M on the rowing machine each time and weights as well.
So those are my 4 simple goals for the month and i think with a bit of hard work i should be able to manage. I was thinking about giving up alcohol but that might cause my body to die of shock so i'll just stick to fast food. I don't think i've gone a month without eating junk sine i was about 12 so this could be a struggle. As for the poker i'm not sure what effect a dramatic increase in play will have on my results. If i can keep my ROI above 100% on party and Full tilt i would be a very happy boy as that would result in a $10K month. I think the average day will be something like this; get up at 1pm, eat, go to the gym/pool between 2pm and 4pm. Play tiger woods-watch tv/read and eat dinner until 8pm and then play 4 or 5 tournies starting between 8 and 1am. The sleeping pattern might get a little fucked but as long as the last tourney i play doesn't start later than 1am and i'm always up before 2pm i should get plenty of sleep and be rested enough to achieve my goals. Will probably to a progress report after each week explaining how each of my objectives are going, who says poker player have no structure?
Tuesday 30 September 2008
Tuesday 23 September 2008
Poker, Golf and drinking.
As you may be able to guess from the title, this blog is going to be about 3 of my favourite things; poker, golf and drinking. In truth this is pretty much all my blogs are ever about so it shouldn't be to hard to write and certainly not to hard to follow.
Before i move on to my WSOPE event 1 report i'll just mention a few things from the night before. Jonn Taba organised a birthday party for reigning WSOPE champ Annette Oberstadt and very kindly invited us along. We had a few drinks before hand but seeing as the boys had work the next day and Will and i were playing i didn't plan on staying to long or drinking that much. This plan changed very quickly when we found out the drinks were free and most of us decided to take full advantage. Long story short after about 10 double vodka and Oranges and a bad night sleep i arrived at the empire feeling a little worse for wear and looking a little fragile. I was however dressed amazingly in my pink headband sunglasses and a rather fresh looking shirt. Just going back to the party for a sec Greg thought it would be funny to ask Phil Hellmuth if he was Phil Ivey, it was funny. It was even Funnier when he asked him again 10 minutes later, that boy cracks me up.
Anyway i took my seat in the upstairs section of the empire which was away from the main pit and got down to business. Folded for the first 10 minutes and was just having a look at the opposition and soon realised that i'd drawn a pretty weak table and everyone was playing quite tight; if its 1 thing to get over a hangover it's a weak table. So i raise the 74 soooted to 150 get 3 bet and fold, he shows AA. Raise the 10 8 off a few hands later, get 3-bet, fold. Wait a few hand raise on the Co with AJ get 3- bet, fold and get shown AK. So i'm sure you can notice a theme going on here but i wasn't to worried about this and just hoped that this pattern would fade out sooner rather than later. Managed to chip up to 6800 from a 6k start and felt like things were going rather well when this hand took place: UTG limps and i look down at 77 in mp so opt for the limp in behind and flop a set tactic. Folded round to the bb who checks before we see a rather sexy Q 7 6 rainbow flop. BB checks as does the limp and i bet 125 into a pot of 175. BB raises to 350 and limper folds. At this point i was sure he had atleast a queen and maybe 2 pair. He also was over 30 and seemed quite nervous so i'm not gibing him the straight draw as i think would check call in that spot. So now i'm thinking how can i try and get it all in by the river and raise to 900, he insta calls. Turn is another Queen which seems a great card for me considering his range and he bets 600. For some reason i just insta flat called, not sure why. Anyway river is a 9 and he bets 1500. At this point i have 2 options, call or go all in for another 3800. Online i would have just moved in in on the turn but the guy looked quite relaxed so i knew he though he had the best hand but obviously it's been 30 mins and i have no idea if this guy can play, he may think KQ is the nuts in this spot. Going back through the hand i made a desision that Q6 was a massive part of his range and decided that just a call was the correct play, he flipped Q6 and i managed to survive an absolute cold deck and still have over half my starting stack, very happy with that.
After about 5 orange juices the hangover was totally gone and i was feeling in the zone. Got my stack back up to 8000 during the 50/100 level witha few good bluffs and a some decent hands before i got the dreaded table move. The 100/200 level was a bit of a blur slipped down to about 7K and then got moved again to Will's table which was funny. This table was looking very serious and despite my good natured banter the rest of the guys were pretty much in the zone so i just tried to quite down a little bit and get on with it. The standard was certainly better on this table and as soon as we started playing 100/200/25 the aggression was a lot more noticeable. Soon got my stack to 11K when i won a flip with 88 v shortstacked J10 and then this went down: I look down at AK sooted on the Co and raise to 575, button folds and then the Sb (young American guy who just yelled online player) made it 1900. He had been looking for a spot to 3 bet me and i was sure his range was massive. I thought about smoothing but i thought he would bet most flops and it would be hard for me to call unless i hit so i thought 4-betting all in was the better play. I know he is unlikely to call with much but thought he would call with 1010+ and maybe even AQ, AJ considering the table dynamic, He did call but the bad news for me was it was with AA.
It turns out that young guy was Yuvgeni Timeshenko and he is a pretty big deal, he ended up finishing 3rd and has had some other big results as well:
http://www.pokerpages.com/players/profiles/91983/yevgeniy-timoshenko.htm
We talked the hand over and he agreed it was just standard, seemed like a nice guy though and is clearly a great player. Overall i'm happy with the way i played but there was nothing i could do. Was a miracle i survived the first cold deck but surviving 2 in a structure that isn't the best is next to impossible.
Not sure when i'm going to play live again. Maybe the GUKPT Thanet if my 6 month ban is over, was thinking about going home anyway so would be a double whammy. In the Online world it's been a solid month, up about $4K ish and took down my first ever PLO comp last night on full tilt. It was only a $30 rebuy with 120 runners but the $3.3K was nice and i was surprised how bad the standard was. Twice i got donked on by other big stacks and had a big chiplead from 3 tables out. I didn't push quite as hard as i would have in a holdem comp as i wanted to avoid to many marginal spots but i played an aggressive game and in all honesty think i played quite well.
Finally its time for Oakhampton on friday and can't wait to get down there. We're leaving at 6am which sucks and i'm pretty sure i'll play crap but there are other sports down there as well and i just shot a 59 on tiger woods 2009, that had to be a good sign.
Before i move on to my WSOPE event 1 report i'll just mention a few things from the night before. Jonn Taba organised a birthday party for reigning WSOPE champ Annette Oberstadt and very kindly invited us along. We had a few drinks before hand but seeing as the boys had work the next day and Will and i were playing i didn't plan on staying to long or drinking that much. This plan changed very quickly when we found out the drinks were free and most of us decided to take full advantage. Long story short after about 10 double vodka and Oranges and a bad night sleep i arrived at the empire feeling a little worse for wear and looking a little fragile. I was however dressed amazingly in my pink headband sunglasses and a rather fresh looking shirt. Just going back to the party for a sec Greg thought it would be funny to ask Phil Hellmuth if he was Phil Ivey, it was funny. It was even Funnier when he asked him again 10 minutes later, that boy cracks me up.
Anyway i took my seat in the upstairs section of the empire which was away from the main pit and got down to business. Folded for the first 10 minutes and was just having a look at the opposition and soon realised that i'd drawn a pretty weak table and everyone was playing quite tight; if its 1 thing to get over a hangover it's a weak table. So i raise the 74 soooted to 150 get 3 bet and fold, he shows AA. Raise the 10 8 off a few hands later, get 3-bet, fold. Wait a few hand raise on the Co with AJ get 3- bet, fold and get shown AK. So i'm sure you can notice a theme going on here but i wasn't to worried about this and just hoped that this pattern would fade out sooner rather than later. Managed to chip up to 6800 from a 6k start and felt like things were going rather well when this hand took place: UTG limps and i look down at 77 in mp so opt for the limp in behind and flop a set tactic. Folded round to the bb who checks before we see a rather sexy Q 7 6 rainbow flop. BB checks as does the limp and i bet 125 into a pot of 175. BB raises to 350 and limper folds. At this point i was sure he had atleast a queen and maybe 2 pair. He also was over 30 and seemed quite nervous so i'm not gibing him the straight draw as i think would check call in that spot. So now i'm thinking how can i try and get it all in by the river and raise to 900, he insta calls. Turn is another Queen which seems a great card for me considering his range and he bets 600. For some reason i just insta flat called, not sure why. Anyway river is a 9 and he bets 1500. At this point i have 2 options, call or go all in for another 3800. Online i would have just moved in in on the turn but the guy looked quite relaxed so i knew he though he had the best hand but obviously it's been 30 mins and i have no idea if this guy can play, he may think KQ is the nuts in this spot. Going back through the hand i made a desision that Q6 was a massive part of his range and decided that just a call was the correct play, he flipped Q6 and i managed to survive an absolute cold deck and still have over half my starting stack, very happy with that.
After about 5 orange juices the hangover was totally gone and i was feeling in the zone. Got my stack back up to 8000 during the 50/100 level witha few good bluffs and a some decent hands before i got the dreaded table move. The 100/200 level was a bit of a blur slipped down to about 7K and then got moved again to Will's table which was funny. This table was looking very serious and despite my good natured banter the rest of the guys were pretty much in the zone so i just tried to quite down a little bit and get on with it. The standard was certainly better on this table and as soon as we started playing 100/200/25 the aggression was a lot more noticeable. Soon got my stack to 11K when i won a flip with 88 v shortstacked J10 and then this went down: I look down at AK sooted on the Co and raise to 575, button folds and then the Sb (young American guy who just yelled online player) made it 1900. He had been looking for a spot to 3 bet me and i was sure his range was massive. I thought about smoothing but i thought he would bet most flops and it would be hard for me to call unless i hit so i thought 4-betting all in was the better play. I know he is unlikely to call with much but thought he would call with 1010+ and maybe even AQ, AJ considering the table dynamic, He did call but the bad news for me was it was with AA.
It turns out that young guy was Yuvgeni Timeshenko and he is a pretty big deal, he ended up finishing 3rd and has had some other big results as well:
http://www.pokerpages.com/players/profiles/91983/yevgeniy-timoshenko.htm
We talked the hand over and he agreed it was just standard, seemed like a nice guy though and is clearly a great player. Overall i'm happy with the way i played but there was nothing i could do. Was a miracle i survived the first cold deck but surviving 2 in a structure that isn't the best is next to impossible.
Not sure when i'm going to play live again. Maybe the GUKPT Thanet if my 6 month ban is over, was thinking about going home anyway so would be a double whammy. In the Online world it's been a solid month, up about $4K ish and took down my first ever PLO comp last night on full tilt. It was only a $30 rebuy with 120 runners but the $3.3K was nice and i was surprised how bad the standard was. Twice i got donked on by other big stacks and had a big chiplead from 3 tables out. I didn't push quite as hard as i would have in a holdem comp as i wanted to avoid to many marginal spots but i played an aggressive game and in all honesty think i played quite well.
Finally its time for Oakhampton on friday and can't wait to get down there. We're leaving at 6am which sucks and i'm pretty sure i'll play crap but there are other sports down there as well and i just shot a 59 on tiger woods 2009, that had to be a good sign.
Tuesday 16 September 2008
Full tilt V's Party
I've now been playing on full tilt poker for a few months and am pleased to say that i had my first mini score on the site a few days ago. I took $3.8K for 6th place in a $162 comp but was pretty fucked off with it as i had the chiplead with 8 left; then i just kept losing showdowns and eventually ran QQ into AA and went busto. Was pretty happy with my decision making throughout the tourney and am pleased to have a positive ROI on the site after a slow start and a terrible FTOPS.
The problem with starting to play on a new site is that you can't simply presume that you can play exactly the same way and make the same positive returns, a lesson i have now learnt. I'm not saying that you shouldn't keep the same general plan but i've just simply had to make a few changes to combat the contrasting style of the opposition. I'm not going to go into great detail on this one but one thing i will say that in general the standard on full tilt is a lot higher especially as you get deep. Despite this however the structure of the double stack tournies is also far superior to the regular comps on party poker. For the time being i'm happy to play on both sites and am planning on putting as many hours as i physically can in when we get back from Oakhampton.
On that note i simply can't wait for this golf holiday!!I'm not expecting to much from myself on the course but the banter will be awesome no doubt and it'll be good for some of the boys to get a break from the real world, man am i glad i'm not doing something to serious with my life.
Planning on buying into WSOPE tomorrow and then going to watch a little bit of champions league action after. Still not sure if i'm going to sell any % in myself, i think i should but at the same time i quite want to take the risk and just say oh fuck it lets gamble i don't want to give away any of my £150,000 first place, one time etc etc.
Not much going on at the moment in truth and think i'm writing this blog out of boredom more than anything else. Played 5-side football today and nearly died. Our team got quite easily beaten and i played pretty bad on pitch but was quite good in goal. Have finished Harry potter 5, another very good book and am now looking forward to smashing up the last two in the next few months.
Finally i think i have a new hero, this guy is sooooooooooooo sick funny:
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=xQWYfbqFiGE
The problem with starting to play on a new site is that you can't simply presume that you can play exactly the same way and make the same positive returns, a lesson i have now learnt. I'm not saying that you shouldn't keep the same general plan but i've just simply had to make a few changes to combat the contrasting style of the opposition. I'm not going to go into great detail on this one but one thing i will say that in general the standard on full tilt is a lot higher especially as you get deep. Despite this however the structure of the double stack tournies is also far superior to the regular comps on party poker. For the time being i'm happy to play on both sites and am planning on putting as many hours as i physically can in when we get back from Oakhampton.
On that note i simply can't wait for this golf holiday!!I'm not expecting to much from myself on the course but the banter will be awesome no doubt and it'll be good for some of the boys to get a break from the real world, man am i glad i'm not doing something to serious with my life.
Planning on buying into WSOPE tomorrow and then going to watch a little bit of champions league action after. Still not sure if i'm going to sell any % in myself, i think i should but at the same time i quite want to take the risk and just say oh fuck it lets gamble i don't want to give away any of my £150,000 first place, one time etc etc.
Not much going on at the moment in truth and think i'm writing this blog out of boredom more than anything else. Played 5-side football today and nearly died. Our team got quite easily beaten and i played pretty bad on pitch but was quite good in goal. Have finished Harry potter 5, another very good book and am now looking forward to smashing up the last two in the next few months.
Finally i think i have a new hero, this guy is sooooooooooooo sick funny:
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=xQWYfbqFiGE
Monday 8 September 2008
Fixing some leaks.
I think one of my main weaknesses as a poker player and as a person in general is my over-confidence/arrogance. I'm certainly not a modest person and i also think i am realistic about my skills across the board; i am however a very gifted poker player or to be more exact a great NLH tournament player. The problem with this attitude is that sometimes it makes it hard to look at my game and analyse the weak elements of it, especially when running good and making plenty of cash.
Carrying on from my last blog things haven't been going great but i do feel that i've been able to make a few adjustments to my play that have already swung me in the right direction (cashed in 4 from the last 6 comps). The main problem was that i was simply busting to early in a lot of tournies and really not giving myself a shot. The main skill element comes deep in the tournies when applying a lot of pressure and essentially knowing when to gamble and obviously start 3 betting all in with utter filth etc. To be able to do this however you have to get there first and i certainly recognised that i was making a few to many plays early and maybe hitting the gamble button to soon. Obviously i was running quite bad which sometimes makes me want to gamble but i really should be trying to avoid getting it all in pre in the first few levels in a coin flip situation when there are so many easy double ups out there. The truth is that anyone who plays a lot of MTT's will agree that there is simply no point playing fast early on because there are so many morons out there just waiting to give it all away.
I also found that to a large extent my concentration levels were at an all time low, either i was bored, simply not paying any attention or watching tv and although playing an auto pilot stratergy is easy its certainly not the most profitable, especially when you get deep.
So anyway i'm trying to improve and am sure that a $5K payday will pop up soon. Until then i'm happy in my own head trying to make as many good decisions as i can and trying to ignore the results (some of the beats have just been disgusting).
In other non poker related shit; first i've been a lazy fucker recently very little gym or pool action and i did 100 lengths today which is standard and nearly drowned!! Sports betting is going as well as ever, lol, had $50 on Murray to win the US open at 15/1 gg me. I also put a massive $600 bet on the womens semi-finals, woooooooooops!! never betting on that retard dementieva again! Also my cheeky bet on spurs to make the top 4 is looking fantastic, the usual strong start to the season as we'll no doubt float around in the relegation zone for 3 months and then start playing sometime in 2009, the pain of being a spurs fan is just sick!
I'm half way through Harry Potter 5 which so far is quite slow but i'm still enjoying it and am proud to say that for once in my life i'm going to achieve something that i set out to do. On the music front i'm getting more and more into kings of leon, i've always liked them but they just have so many great songs and the songs i've heard from the new album are quality. On the golf front i'm shitting myself. Looks like i might not get a game in before oakhampton and despite showing signs of promise last time i played i'm nowhere near ready to compete with some of the guys and would be more than happy to go down there play ok and not finish last.
Finally i saw the full line up for the wsop final table and i hadn't realised that i played a lot of poker with 3 of the guys on the final. The American chess prodigy with the jewish name is actually the guy i ran the huge bluff on on a J J 7 flop for all the tea in china, glad to see he put my chips to good use. I'm not sure he has the game to win it but he will certainly be a threat and he was a fan of the pinkheadband so i'm behind him 100%. Its now 5am so better go to sleep £180 sat to the WSOPE event 1 tomo at gutshot which would be nice to win, gotta start running good again soon.
Carrying on from my last blog things haven't been going great but i do feel that i've been able to make a few adjustments to my play that have already swung me in the right direction (cashed in 4 from the last 6 comps). The main problem was that i was simply busting to early in a lot of tournies and really not giving myself a shot. The main skill element comes deep in the tournies when applying a lot of pressure and essentially knowing when to gamble and obviously start 3 betting all in with utter filth etc. To be able to do this however you have to get there first and i certainly recognised that i was making a few to many plays early and maybe hitting the gamble button to soon. Obviously i was running quite bad which sometimes makes me want to gamble but i really should be trying to avoid getting it all in pre in the first few levels in a coin flip situation when there are so many easy double ups out there. The truth is that anyone who plays a lot of MTT's will agree that there is simply no point playing fast early on because there are so many morons out there just waiting to give it all away.
I also found that to a large extent my concentration levels were at an all time low, either i was bored, simply not paying any attention or watching tv and although playing an auto pilot stratergy is easy its certainly not the most profitable, especially when you get deep.
So anyway i'm trying to improve and am sure that a $5K payday will pop up soon. Until then i'm happy in my own head trying to make as many good decisions as i can and trying to ignore the results (some of the beats have just been disgusting).
In other non poker related shit; first i've been a lazy fucker recently very little gym or pool action and i did 100 lengths today which is standard and nearly drowned!! Sports betting is going as well as ever, lol, had $50 on Murray to win the US open at 15/1 gg me. I also put a massive $600 bet on the womens semi-finals, woooooooooops!! never betting on that retard dementieva again! Also my cheeky bet on spurs to make the top 4 is looking fantastic, the usual strong start to the season as we'll no doubt float around in the relegation zone for 3 months and then start playing sometime in 2009, the pain of being a spurs fan is just sick!
I'm half way through Harry Potter 5 which so far is quite slow but i'm still enjoying it and am proud to say that for once in my life i'm going to achieve something that i set out to do. On the music front i'm getting more and more into kings of leon, i've always liked them but they just have so many great songs and the songs i've heard from the new album are quality. On the golf front i'm shitting myself. Looks like i might not get a game in before oakhampton and despite showing signs of promise last time i played i'm nowhere near ready to compete with some of the guys and would be more than happy to go down there play ok and not finish last.
Finally i saw the full line up for the wsop final table and i hadn't realised that i played a lot of poker with 3 of the guys on the final. The American chess prodigy with the jewish name is actually the guy i ran the huge bluff on on a J J 7 flop for all the tea in china, glad to see he put my chips to good use. I'm not sure he has the game to win it but he will certainly be a threat and he was a fan of the pinkheadband so i'm behind him 100%. Its now 5am so better go to sleep £180 sat to the WSOPE event 1 tomo at gutshot which would be nice to win, gotta start running good again soon.
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