50K Challenge Update and Review

Well, I got off to my usual as of late start, total hands: 3724, winnings: -$1086.



I can't say that I'm too happy with how solid I've played, although I've definitely ran terrible I can also show probably $1k of hands where I've just pure spewed. I'd rate myself a 4/10 for playing solid thus far.



Losers:



Hand 1: Although I have TPTK, which is usually the nuts facing aggression on Party, I still think spewing 120bbs on the flop is really bad. There are several draws out, but against his entire range here I do very badly. I think calling and re-evaluating is much better.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3206863


Hand 2: I think this is a cooler. I couldn't put him on any hand that beat me, perhaps maybe a5s. Turned out he didn't 3bet qq pf and managed to flop a fullH vs my trips.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3206884


Hand 3: I'm in the sb facing a button 4bet with QQ. I think I'm easily ahead of his 4betting range BTN vs blinds, given that he's aggressive and will have a few bluffs in there.

To be more exact, after he 4bets, there's 83 in the pot, meaning i have to put in
177 to win 224, thus needing 177/(177+224) = 42% equity. Having stoved his range I had 51% equity so not a bad spot I think.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3206887


Hand 4: I got owned here pretty bad, I decided to bet fold my KK on the river and he bluff raised with a pair of 99 and showed. Hmm, my river equity to call is excellent but I only beat a bluff.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3206911


Hand 5: Villain in this hand is weak passive and folds a lot, I decide that I can semi bluff him on a pair lower than a J on the turn here. He has a jack though. I think here I didn't apply the principle of me not making shovy moves that I think are marginal EV, so a thumbs down for this one, especially after he calls my flop raise.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3206919


Hand 6: Villain in this hand 3bets a VERY wide range in the blinds, so I decide to call and play a flop with AQ IP. Given his huge range, I decide to float flop and take it away on the river, repping a KQ type hand. Unfortunately he had K2s for top pair no kicker. Don't know if I hate it or not, I prefer playing a flop to 4betting as this basically turns my hand into a bluff.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3206924


Hand 7: A slight cooler, but I'm still not happy with the way I played it. I should blatently get all the money on on the turn with the 2 flush draws out there, but I was hung up on villain possibly having 68 and so I wanted the board to pair before getting all the $ in. This is daft thinking, 'cos if he shoves river I'm prolly calling anyway.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3206929



THE THREE WORST ONES



Hand 8: The kind of hand that makes me furious with myself, Dan; he FLAT CALLED a 4bet oop, and a K hits the board and you have a pair of 9s. What do you think his range is? Don't you think its SLIGHTLY weighted towards strong hands? Don't you think the VERY BOTTOM of his range still crushes you? Then why the fuck do you do this?
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3206935

nb to above: Content flat calls 4bets oop with KQs.


Hand 9:
Enough said about this one, I'm extremely angry at myself for all aspects of this hand. It was late etc etc but this is so fucking terrible its beyond the pale.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3206944


Hand 10:
What Dan, what? If anything shove this flop vs this cally villain. (Calls all 3bets and 4bets).
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3206954


So, in summary I still haven't ironed out my tilt problems and general bad play problems as of yet. Its early tho, 3k hands in. Plently of time to iron that out, just need to concentrate on stopping these ridculous hands that cost me an average of $600 every session.

I'll post a further review after this session:



laters. dan

Read more...

So, 3 Avoidable Hands

3 avoidable hands on my first day, totalling $500 or so.

hand1: definitely could have found a fold here on river. Annoyed as my gut really said fold but i ignored it. When MY gut says folds, spewmonkey himself, I should be pretty sure its a fold.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3202454

hand2: afformentioned hand shoving aqhi in a 3bet pot. ludicrous.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3202455

hand3: villain in this hand calls 3bets REALLY light. I should have shoved this flop all day with the bd flush draw, overs, and likely the best hand with some FE of the hand he actually did have. Decided he had air and was bluffing but he was 'bluffing' with 55. Guilty of A) Bad play on the flop and being without a proper plan preflop and B) Not thinking enough about the turn call.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3202456


Will do better later I think. Important to keep remembering where the edge lies I think.

Read more...

New 50K Hand Challenge- Done By 16th October 2008

So,

I've moved most of my roll to Party poker now. The advent of all the new 'speed' tables on AP 1-2 combined with the extortionate rake taken for the BBJ meant that I'd rather play on Party. I think that the amount of lose in bonuses is more than made up by the greater choice of tables and the lesser rake on Party.

I've noticed the players are much more aggro than on AP. To the point where I hardly ever fold any piece of the board to a checkraise in position on the flop to a regular. This is a new thing for me.

My first 5k hands on there I've done well I think getting used to the software and adjusting to the different players on there. I've ran terrible in all in spots however, and so my actual winnings are $500 down compared with $1.2k expected winnings.

Having taken this time to make the jump, I sorted out a couple of other things with my HUD, namely including a 'flop check raise' stat that I think is more pertinent on Party than on AP, given that regulars don't like to give you the pot oop by simply check folding too often.

100bbs are the order of the day on there, which is fine as it means I'll have decent comparitive experience whenever I do get 200bbs against someone.

With the move, and with the aim of giving myself direction and purpose, I am to begin another 50k hand challenge, with the aim of making $10k i this time. I expect the 50k hands to take around a month, so by the 16th October I should have them completed. If I'm way short of that, time to get a coach and sort my life out I think.

If I'm somewhere about $10k, then I'll probably do another 50k 200NL hands before looking to move up to 2-4. If I exceed $10k by a decent amount then I could move to 2-4 straight away and look to get a coach then as well.

In doing this challenge, it's important that I know exactly how I'm going to make my money, what my plan is and what my edge is. This way I can review my hands after every 2k hands or so and ensure that I'm sticking to the plan and that I'm playing well enough that I actually have an edge and should be making money.

Where My Edge Lies

1) 3Betting regulars in position. Identifying those who will fold too much to 3bets, those who will check fold a lot of flops, and those who will call light and spew in 3bet pots. Obviously different strategies for all 3, which are listed below.

• Fold too much: 3bet them almost with any 2 IP. Understand that a standard CO open raise to $7 means that a button 3Bet to $21 means they have to fold 67% of the time to be instantly profitable. Be cautious on flops when they don't fold PF.
• Call light and fold too many flops: 3bet a wide value range, and any 2 suited cards. Understand the correct board textures on which villain will most likely checkfold, and double barrell scarecards if necessary. I should fold to any resistence.
• Call light and spew: 3Bet a decent value range vs them, tone down the bluffing range. Be prepared to give them rope to hang themselves postflop where appropriate, and value bet good hands very strongly. Rarely fold TP to them in 3bet pots.

2) Isolating the bad players (VPIP of 40+) frequently when I have position. Increasing the frequency of my MP and CO raises when the fish is in the blinds in these positions in order to get HU and in position vs him.

3) Removing all traces of FPS. Although I may sometimes genuinely think that there is EV in bluff raising a tight player's river value bet, from experience I cannot be certain that I don't just want to do it 'cos I'm a degen. For this reason, they are practically banned for the duration of this 50k hand experiment. I'll have to take the EV losses on the chin, if any, but something tells me that I might just be saving myself a bit of $ in reality.

4) Lower Variance: If in doubt of whether to shove or fold in PF or flop situations, I will fold to lower variance and to save myself money. Why does this save me money? Because my natural tendency is to WANT to gamble, to shove all the money in and make people fold. If there is a shovy decision that I think is fairly EV neutral, the chances are that it is not EV neutral at all but -EV, with my brain pushing up the supposed EV chances in my head cos i want to GAMBLE. I have to allow for this.

5) Mental side: Super Important this one... I think a real edge is to be had over other 4-6 tabling regular 'robots' by carefully thinking through each and every decision before it is made.
I also think that after learning the 'basics' of 200NL, tilt control is the single most important skill to master. If I have one stack per session shipped to me by a tilty customer, then it is super important that I maximize that edge by not in turn tilting off any pots myself. I think this edge in itself is a huuuuge one, actually understated by 2+2 and the like even considering how much is spoken of it.

I'll be reviewing HHs after session and talking about aspects of the above to make sure that I'm applying everything correctly.

Day1- Not happy with my play after only 145 hands. Namely one hand where I shoved all in with AQ hi in a 3bet pot OOP. Villain made a wierdo call with a pair of 7s and I had some equity, but still the point is that I didn't obey point 4 above, about lowering variance and accepting that the very fact that I think shoving is a marginally +EV play probably means it's quite the opposite. You can see it here.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3200116

Laters for now:

Daniel

Read more...

Looong Session. Good Results, 3000 hands, Won $899.

I definitely played solid this session. So much of my mental thought was going into not hating myself for giving away $800 in any stupid pots. At the same time, I was more aggressive and bluffing more scarecards, as I've noticed Speedlimits do and its very effective.

Winners:

hand1:
Got decent value with a set from Hovabluff here. I don't rate him at all and he got very cally here. I was very unsure about optimal river betsizing, i plumped for like 40% as I didn't think he'd call more with just an overpair. He had a flush though, could have bet more with my FullH.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3165219

hand2:
funny hand this one. NEVER FOLD TO SPEEDLIMITS. He read my thin value bet for exactly what it was on the river, a weak made hand getting greedy for value. So he comes over the top for like $185 more. Thing is, he's never not betting the trip 7s more strongly before the river, and so repped completely nothing. I thought for a while, but it was more of a slowroll. He said 'Awful' then instaquit. Don't know if he meant me or him though.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3165238

hand3: I always get accused of FPS when taking this line with an overpair, ie cbet flop, check raise turn all in OOP. But, I think its the single most effective line for a strong hand VS an aggressive 100bb stack when OOP. Gets value off floats, and most villains will even bet the turn with a draw rather than take the free card. here, a fairly soild Reg stacks with overpair 1010 on 9 high flop. I think he played it baaaaad tho.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3165256



losers:

hand4:
this one could have got nasty. A 4bet pot deep OOP with AA, he hits a set of 88. My pot control on flop and his weak betting allowed me to lose the minimum. Obviously I'm most afraid of KK QQ, but his weak bet on the river made me think he may be betting AK... One more note about this, I 4bet bigger than my standard because of the deep stacksizes, this was something suggested to me in a 2+2 thread recently.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3165276

hand5: i bet fold river with KK. I think lobster has 89 here a lot... no matter, think it was played ok.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3165295


No other real nonstandard hands to talk about. No spew for a change. Goldstar Grog.

laters

Read more...

1191 Hands, +$942

I'm playing probably another 2k hands today, but I thought I'd 'bank' this session anyway so that its there on record that I'm not doomed to always fail.

Achieved my goal of taking the big pots I win, without leaking similar sized ones to my losses. Also, concentrated on being more aggressive on the turn to pick up pots, without getting wedded to the hand and throwing in a wasteful triple barrell.

Winners:

Hand1.
Got 3bet in the blinds by a very tight player over a smallish sample. Flat called to keep qq and JJ and possibly AQ in the pot.
Checked turn to allow villain to improve if he has an ace, or to disguise my K if he has JJ-QQ, allowing me to get 2 streets of value possibly.
Luckily, he had A7 making 2 pair on the turn and stacked off to me. Was certain he must have had AA at one point but obv this isn't getting folded.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3163073

Hand2.
This hand is semi interesting, as myself and Hemmel had an aggressive dynamic going on. I think my raise on the flop basically represents nothing except a K and 77, and who raises a K in that spot right? Bit of a yeti situation I think. He folded flop to my 3bet all in and said he had 7 hi. I believe him.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3163078

Hand3.
Called down an aggressive double triple barreller with AK on ace hi board. Don't like his play.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3163090

Losers:
not many to talk about today...

Hand4.
I try a river bluff which I dont hate here. Kricket would fold without a ten for sure.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3163092

Hand 5.
I have top pair second kicker, and when villain donks into me I think he has air or a draw a lot. I raise him up on the flop and bet the turn. Unfortuantely he has TPTK. In hindsight, there weren't a lot of draws out there and so probably flatting the flop and turn is best to allow him to keep bluffing.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3163097

laters. daniel

Read more...

877 Hands, $-273

This session reminded me harshly that I'm yet to be solid. I lost $600 to pure spew plays, one stacking off 200bbs deep with AA, the other a ridiculous triple barrell bluff that was calmy called down with top set. So, I'm mad at myself anyway.



Losers:

A cooler I think, perhaps could have gotten away from my trips considering my kicker's bad, but he was a fish.
hand 1.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3160564

The worst hand ever played. He jacked it up pretty quick on the turn, so I think 'wellll, he must have flush draw'. Try top set. Think I'm going to stop playing deep for a while...
hand 2.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3160846

Oh no, make this the worst hand ever played. I think my sizing looks scary setting up for a river shove VS Synodic, but w-ever. terrible.
hand 3.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3161375

Winners:

Pick off a bluff from speedlimits here. He plays such a wide range and ALWAYs tries to bluff scare cards, especially on the river when often it makes no sense. He likes to check raise the turn a lot with draws and sometimes complete air, so I check behind turn to make my life easier and to get him to bluff river.
hand 4.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3160630

Speaking of Speedlimits raising the turn with air, here he does it again. 0% chance I'm ever folding to him.
hand 5.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3160740

I 3bet OTB with 46s, and end up winning 200bbs. Villain flops a straight and donks into me, luckily I turn a flush. Torn between calling and raising turn, but he was v agrressive and I wanted to give him chance to bluff again.
hand 6.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3160504

I do some wierd betsizing here. I think villain nearly always has KK, possibly 89 here.
hand 7.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3160460

Decent value betting here vs a big fish.
hand 8.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3160530


laters

Read more...

The Heater Starts Here

817 Hands, $317 up.

Winners

A 4bet pot with AA vs Taffy Jones. I think I prefer betting the turn again here, I think I didn't as he's a disbeliever and its a dry board and I think this way he looks me up with qq on the river. I can't imagine a hand he has, other than maybe KQ or AK, but he folded the river pretty quick. I like my shove I think...
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3153398

I flop an OESD in a 3bet pot, call flop, get a free card turn, and value bet river strongly;
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3153407

I suckout pretty bad here. No way of getting away though.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3153411

I flop trips in a limped pot, some disbeliever pays me all their money.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3153415


Losers:

I flop and OESD and flush draw, but we're deep vs Taffy so I just call flop and turn. Blanks out.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3153418

A bad double barrell in a 3bet pot. These are starting to cost me a lot of money. Villain is a big fish and I thought he might peel AK AQ then fold to a turn bet.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3153424

I played this hand horribly horribly. Why I'd want to stick in this much money vs 5 players on a flop this wet with top pair no kicker is beyond me. hmm....
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3153426

A lot of confused thinking this hand. I decide I prolly have best hand on flop, then decide I don't want to build a massive pot on the turn, then I decide to bet fold the river. No joined up thinking whatsoever and this makes me unhappy somewhat.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3153431

grog

Read more...

Day 3: I don't like money anyway

314 hands; -$686! I didn't even have any pots over $300. Just a real cumulation of $150 pots that went against me. I was actually making a video this session.

Biggest pot I won was $120. And there weren't many more...

Losers:

Hand 21:
A 4bet pot with KK on an AAxxx board. I attempt to value bet river but he shoves.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3152916
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showthread.php?t=292940

Hand 22:
The guy in this pot is a megafish and I get coolered with trip 1010s. Lost the minimum though...
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3152918

Hand 23:
This hand, I randomly decide to bluff raise the flop to get villain of an overpair type hand. Then its a bluff vortext on the turn as I follow up with a turn bet on a bad card for me. Mark this one as spew I think.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3152919

Hand 24:
I look stupid in this hand, but the guy is a 91/x/x megafish, leading to my call with 3rd pair vs his AA or something. I think turn call is ok with a lot of likely outs, but not so much river... spew
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3152925

Hand 25:
I flat a 3bet with 67s. Flop is OESD, I call one bet on the flop but have to fold turn I think. I hate this hand but can't tell you why.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3152926

I'm not even going to post any winners. Not till I get some good ones.

laters

Read more...

Day 2- Another Losing Session

1100 Hands, $-293. I ran terrible in all in EV siutations though, basically lost them all. My EV result for the session was a princley $8.42. No super spewy hands and I felt fairly solid I think.

I've been thinking about where the edge seriously lies in basic 200NL. I think 90% of the edge is situations vs reverse situations. Example, if I hit a set, and villain has AA, then they pay me 100bbs. The edge comes from the fact that in the exact same reverse situation, I do not pay the villain 100bbs with my AA and get away from it somewhere.

The above is opposed to maybe something like 5-10, where winning depends more on non-showndown winnings and finding the right situations to pick up the pot with any two cards.

This 200NL edge depends on situations occuring in your favour though. I don't think I've really been getting my share in the last week or so. I've been concentrating on wiping out spew, so this may have saved me $x amount, but I'm lacking the bread and butter situations where you just get to stack a player because they are bad and cant fold 1 pair etc.

Onto some hands...

Losers:

Hand 7
I felt like such a fucking idjit in this hand. But... villain is a big donk, and prolyl does this with a 9 or a flush draw etc etc etc
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3151341


Hand 8
Nickwebzilla, the godfather of tagfish. He 3bets light oop (A10os etc) so I decide to flat his 3bet. On the flop he'll always shut down with no pair, so I decide to flat and take it away on the turn hopefully. His double barrel scuppers that...
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3150511

Hand 9
Included this one as I find this siutation difficult to play: I want to take control with the overpair 1010s, but am basically bluffing as when villain raises I have to fold I think;
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3150516

Hand 10
Same situation as above, but with 99:
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3150931

Hand 11
Another ace hi flop in a 3bet pot I attempt to float. I plausibly represent AQ/ AK. But he happens to have AQ himself. Pick up a draw on the turn, doesn't get there. I officially hate the penguin.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3150891

Hand 12
Biggest loser of the day. BvB, I have AA he has AK. Gets in on the flop with his nut flush draw and he makes it. Bah. I decide to flat PF just because Matvey was a taggish player who would re-raise a wide range (A8s etc) there but fold to a 4bet.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3151189


Winners:

Hand 13
This hand was wierd. I have KK, and the suspicious slightly fishy 27/15 donk bets the flop and turn and calls my raises. I couldn't decide whether to value river, but thought there was a good chance he made a straight on the river.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3151031

Hand 14
I have a set of 66 by the river, but good chance villain has a 7 giving him the straight, so I opt for a gay bet on the river here to get paid by a weak ace or something. works.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3150918

Hand 15
I have QQ, some spaz comes along for the ride:
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3150807

Hand 16
AK in the blinds, I play it passively VS penguin as he'll double barrell a lot and I'm OOP and I'm deep and to be honest I'm afraid of the penguin. I bet river as I think he doesn't bet AJ/ A-10, but maybe calls it.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3150689

Hand 17
KK, I decide to flat as we're deep and I REALLY want to keep kickwebzilla in the hand as he'll pay with all sorts. I think I completely screwed this hand up though from top to bottom. I should raise flop methinks. Nickwebzilla can't read hands tho, so he's always going to pay me a little regardless.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3150606

Hand 18
Called the 3bet here as I had noticed him stack a few times deep, once with AA and once with KK so he basically gets stuck on them.
I plan to checkraise flop: he doesn't oblige by betting. Then the J scuppers me putting in a big bet. Then when the K hits I try to get AK to pay me. Pays me with AA instead, I'm not fussed: I like my potsize bet anyway, looks bluffy.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3150555

Hand 19
I have AK, the board comes dry A hi vs a fish. betbetbetbet. He folds river though.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3150428

Hand 20
Very small pot, but I think worth including as by concentrating on the tables I'd seen this villain bet the nuts with half pot bets. here he bets full pot when draws miss, and I call with 3rd pair or something...
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3150489

Thanks for reading. grog

Read more...

Day 1: Losing Session

Hi y'all. I'm going to use this blog as a kind of therapy to get away from my spewy state of mind when playing poker. I'm going to do this by posting the results of my session, and all the big hands using pokerhand.

By not hiding or avoiding any of the big spewy hands I have, I hope to eventually purge them from my system. I welcome comments on how I played all hands as well....

Day1: 1300 hand session, down $625. Here's the biggest losers:

hand1: coolered by the penguin IMO. I think his flop call is iffy to say the least. bah.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3148998

hand2: I flat call a 3bet with KK, villain has AA. Whatever. Although, having started to 4bet bluff I think I would've just liked to 4bet get it in vs this supertight villain.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3149005

hand3: I posted this one on 2p2. I think check folding the river is best, but his stack size just sucked... even check calling I think is superior to how I played it as he can bluff missed flushes.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3149012

hand4: i decide to float an ace hi flop in a 3bet pot, erm cos Aejones told me to do it. Didn't work out.... FPS wayyyy!
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3149019


a couple of winners...

hand5: get paid off by a megafish:
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3149023

hand6: fullH over straight I raise strong on river. in hindsight prolly calls a shove...
http://www.pokerhand.org/?3149027


Thanks for reading. More later....

dan aka Grog

Read more...