4.5K by May

I love this blog. For some reason, I connect with this one more than the others. I think we must have similar tendencies.

And Erpel is the man...great dialogue ITT.

I think I need to have one of you guys sweat me sometime soon. I ran good at 25nl for a while, then went flat, then took a +10bi cliff dive. I dropped back down to 10nl and went right back to 20bb/100. But I can't seem to get my head right at 25nl again. It's buggin me.

Originally Posted by kb coolman

I love this blog. For some reason, I connect with this one more than the others. I think we must have similar tendencies.

And Erpel is the man...great dialogue ITT.

I think I need to have one of you guys sweat me sometime soon. I ran good at 25nl for a while, then went flat, then took a +10bi cliff dive. I dropped back down to 10nl and went right back to 20bb/100. But I can't seem to get my head right at 25nl again. It's buggin me.

Hewwo!

Originally Posted by Robb

Poker is not even on my radar for the next few days.

how about running and weight loss? how much do i owe you i went on a four day climbing trip with no running, no training, and no working my local area project = $$ for you!

Originally Posted by daven

Originally Posted by Robb

Poker is not even on my radar for the next few days.

how about running and weight loss? how much do i owe you i went on a four day climbing trip with no running, no training, and no working my local area project = $$ for you!

LoL. I worked about 150 hours in 11 days, took a day off, then logged 60 more hours so far this week. I owe $12 for missed runs, I think, but haven't managed any time for FTR to admit it in our prop bet thread. Made the weight loss goal, though.

Wow. I didn't expect life to be quite this. The second half of my Spring semester is always crazy, and as I've said several times in this thread, the main reason I started this thread was to keep from going off the rails like last year with poker. Why does my March/April suck?

North Georgia Summer Honors Program Web Site

The main reason is the Summer Honors program I run each June. I hire all the counselors from our undergraduate students, arrange all the academic units with our faculty around their summer teaching loads and vacations, schedule rooms and facilities, transportation, and - oh, yeah - recruit all the kids who attend.

This year, the economy and funding issues put me a month behind schedule, so the craziness was compressed into the last two weeks which happened to coincide with a couple regular faculty deadlines. A colleague and I are redesigning several courses to start an Undergraduate Stats Research Center and developing new courses to launch a Stats Minor.

Until last night, I hadn't played poker in at least 10 days, and I had only dabbled with it then. I haven't played poker seriously since the doomswitch incident.

Last night was a small victory. Playing exhausted and stressed isn't good. But I've been sleeping better lately, and getting back to normal, so I loaded up FR 25nl, played about 300 hands and won a BI.

Of course it's results oriented, purposefully so, however. I want to enjoy poker. I want to ease back in and like the process of grinding again. I'm still rolled for 50nl and will probably move back up after 5k hands at 25nl. I just need to get my mind back around poker issues. My poker brain is atrophied.

Last night I'm preflop raiser in EP w/ AdKs and the flop comes QdJd2h. And I'm stuck. I'm heads up with the CO and have no read since I have almost no HH's at 25nl on FT. It should be a straightforward hand to play. I'm really walking through it with baby steps. OK, 10 outs to TP or straight, 9 cards set up the BDFD. Oh, yeah, put villain on range. I almost time out on a flop scenario I've played hundreds of times, just because my poker brain is so rusty.

I got in a few interesting spots, made one 25bb mistake call, and then generally played pretty well.

So I'm back playing poker, and really enjoyed it. My poker stamina is way off, so I played only half an hour and ditched.

What's gonna happen with this operation? I dunno. I'm gonna focus on getting my mind right and playing well at 25nl for a week or so, then consider if and when it makes sense to move back up to 50nl.

I would appreciate anyone's advice on the following considerations.

1. How many hands should I play at 25nl before moving back up?
2. Should I consider a switch back to my preferred 6max at 25nl for 25k or 30k hands?
3. Does a person really learn much in the FR nit fest at 50nl, or would developing a better postflop game at 6max be more beneficial to my long term progress as a poker player?

The reason 6max appeals to me is that FT's "deep 6" tables are pretty loose and aggressive at 50nl, and some of the deep-stacked pots get played with TP and draws. That doesn't happen much in FR.

I definitely need to take it slow and easy, so this would be a good time to think about the long term. There's no way I'll hit 4.5k's by the end of May without a massive heater, but I'm OK with that. Any advice?

Two short sessions 5-tabling 6m 25nl yielded two 25nl BI's. About 1k hands total. I'm up 3.5 BI's at 25nl since returning to poker. I'm starting to feel decent about my game again. I'm at 1.9k bankroll, so another 4 BI's at 25nl and I'd be comfortably rolled for 50nl. I'm still undecided about 6m vs. FR. My biggest success has been at FR, but the 6m game is more my style. I probably won't move up to 50nl right away. I need some time to groove my game again before I play "for real."

Originally Posted by Robb

1. How many hands should I play at 25nl before moving back up?
2. Should I consider a switch back to my preferred 6max at 25nl for 25k or 30k hands?
3. Does a person really learn much in the FR nit fest at 50nl, or would developing a better postflop game at 6max be more beneficial to my long term progress as a poker player?

1 - 5k sounds good, but anytime after 3hrs play if you're feeling back ready for it
2 - you prefer 6-max, yet make more money playing FR. Ask again your motivations to play. I think FR for now
3 - i hope it's possible to learn playing FR, otherwise i won't get better. There's a lot to learn playing all styles

Originally Posted by daven

2 - you prefer 6-max, yet make more money playing FR. Ask again your motivations to play. I think FR for now

In the year of winning poker prior to moving to Full Tilt, I won more at 6m at 25nl and 10nl. When I moved to FT, I set up my game to clear the bonus, and I was earning more points/bonus at FR. I've never really focused on 6m. So most of my recent success is FR, but over my poker career I'm a solid winner at 6m.

Like you said, though, gotta decide my motivation for playing, and where I want to invest energy getting better.

Still not playing much, but I got in about 1k hands of 25nl 6m and won just more than 2 BI's. Some positive variance / heater, but I did lose a stack AQ < A3s on a flush draw board. I've hit two similar draws myself for stacks. So the variance has been on my side. Feel like I'm playing well and will move up to 50nl by the weekend.

Keep up the good work robb! I dunno if your goal is still 4.5k by May, but stay focused on the game, not the results and you will reach it in no time. Good luck!

Back over 2k BR on FT, playing 50nl again, this time 6m (sorry daven, I gave it a good bit of thought and think it's best right now). Played 1k hands and was up nearly 2 BI tonight. My first 500 hands of 50nl two nights ago I was down a BI, set under set, but played decent. I feel like I'm making good decisions again, and sort of have my game back on track.

Weeeeeee!!

Poker is fun again. Up more than 3 BI today in 1.3k hands. BR is back to 2.2k.

The total from March? Down 1.1k and change. Only like 8k hands. Jeez.

Total from April is up more than $300 and only about 4k hands so far. But I've a got a good bit more time to play poker the next few weeks. Funny thing, despite the incredible spewfest/downswing, if I just play well, I'll get near the 4k mark by the end of May. I can get 40k hands in pretty easily by June 1st, and running 3 ptBB/100 will get me past 3.5k. Add in almost .5k in rakeback, and I'll be near the goal. Oh, well, no hurry. Just gotta keep playing well and grinding up. May will take care of itself.

Another 800 hands, another 2 BI. Like to get in another 1.5k hands this evening and play a good bit tomorrow, too. BR is 2.3k+. Wish I could get the operations manager to work.

Edit: Ran into quads w/ a straight for 160bb's, and lost a couple of other big hands, down to + 1/2 BI today. Still have time to play more later :P

Originally Posted by Robb

Another 800 hands, another 2 BI. Like to get in another 1.5k hands this evening and play a good bit tomorrow, too. BR is 2.3k+. Wish I could get the operations manager to work.

Edit: Ran into quads w/ a straight for 160bb's, and lost a couple of other big hands, down to + 1/2 BI today. Still have time to play more later :P

After posting the 160bb hand in the short-handed forum, I have to admit it was spewy. Still, I ran into quads again, this time with a full house. I'm not bitchin', gotta admit I blew it on one, but I'd stack off with the full house hand again.

Anyway, after whatever variance and spew, I'm up a BI over 2.2k hands. I'm also reviewing a bunch of hands and posting the worst mistakes here. I suck at poker, but I'm gettin' a bit better. Decent day - won a bit, and learned a bit.

Weeeeee!! Me luvs poker again. Played another 1k hands late last night, up 1.5 BI's. BR > 2.3k. Here are some things I know:

1. This month, I'm 5.5 ptBB/100 over 6k hands of 50nl 6m.
2. I'm playing well again (despite small sample, my game is actually getting better!).
3. I still REALLY suck at poker, and most of my suckiness relates to bigtime desire to gamble "with the right odds" in big pots. Problem is, when I tilt or even just get tired, I twist my reads around so I get "the right odds" to throw my bankroll away.
4. I am learning to think out poker problems on my own, to develop innovative approaches to my game, finding leaks and exploiting others.
5. I still need to post more HH's, 'cuz the downside of #4 is that I often wait too long to get other perspectives on my games and hands. People here at FTR think really differently about poker, and some of the contrasting ideas that used to simply confuse me now highlight new avenues of poker thoughts I can use to try to sort out better lines and different approaches when I do come across leaks.


Regarding #5, here's a HH where I ran into a tough problem. The SB is a 40/18 LAGG w/ 15% 3bet (mostly in the blinds) over 100 hands. The BTN is a decent TAGG w/ a 40% BTN steal% over 500 hands. So both of their ranges are well behind JJ. With position on the SB and his smaller stack size, I'd be willing to stack off w/ JJ. If the BTN were short, too, I'd just shove all-in. Any help preflop would be much appreciated, 'cuz I was confused as heck about what to try here.


$0.25/$0.5 No Limit Holdem
6 players
Converted at weaktight.com

Stacks:
UTG ($45.10)
UTG 1 ($51.10)
CO ($107.00)
BTN ($136.70)
SB ($24.50)
Hero (BB) ($58.85)

Pre-flop: ($0.75, 6 players) Hero is BB
3 folds, BTN raises to $1.50, SB raises to $5, Hero raises to $12, BTN calls $10.50, SB calls $7

Flop: ($36, 3 players)
SB goes all-in $12.50, Hero calls $12.50, BTN folds

Turn: ($61, 2 players)

River: ($61, 2 players)

Final Pot: $61 - Results in white below.
Hero shows: Jd Js:
SB shows: Ah Jc

Played 25 plo on my laptop while watching the kids play outside this afternoon. Up 3 BI's. Wanna get 1k+ 50nlh this evening. BR > 2.4k.

i might need to play some PLO

I opened 5 new tables thanks to spenda's advice, and got into some huge and crazy pots. A couple of the crazier hands are at the end of this thread:

Thanks Spenda - started new table

Short version: A7o < 32o and KK < KK in 3-way all-in preflop action.

I like starting new tables, it definitely draws in fish and regs who don't adjust correctly as the table fills up. But I need practice HU and 3-way/4-way to be more successful. If I keep starting tables, I may go down to 25nl to refine my super-short game, maybe play some HU cash games.

It's certainly a whole new experience. The game's still NLH, but the all-ins are super wide ranges.

If I start new tables at 50nl, I'll probably only do one at a time and grind normal on my other 4. I have a table layout with 4 tables cascaded and a fifth "out" where I can follow every hand and make more notes when I'm not involved in the action. I could get 4 quality tables selecting like normal and open up the fifth where I can really concentrate on just that action. HU is all about reads, and you get < 20 hands typically against an opponent (usually with no relevant HH's) before the table starts filling. So it's important to follow and remember each hand.

I'm calling it quits on this operation. I have 2.3k in roll and I'm doing fine at 50nl 6m. I'm just gonna work on my game and plan for my shot at 100nl in July, after my crazy work schedule for June is over.

Thanks to all y'all who have contributed. I'll just be back in my other operation and continue that one long term.