I'm rich!

Well, not really. Made a "spin up" video - trying to see how much I can turn $100 into in 30 minutes. Made it to $183.30 and to be honest I was suprised I didn't go bust.

Some "interesting" hands

My god, the play at $0.25/$0.5 is poor....

Full Tilt Poker Game #3210650326: Table Lindell (6 max) - $0.25/$0.50 - No Limit Hold'em - 13:27:45 ET - 2007/08/10
Seat 1: gekko unltd ($66.55)
Seat 2: edward2ndbase ($44.85)
Seat 3: pokermarx ($90.15)
Seat 4: 32suited ($52)
Seat 5: Deadwood41 ($53.65)
Seat 6: Tall_Mat ($50.65)
Deadwood41 posts the small blind of $0.25
Tall_Mat posts the big blind of $0.50
The button is in seat #4
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Tall_Mat [7h 3s]
gekko unltd folds
edward2ndbase folds
pokermarx calls $0.50
32suited calls $0.50
Deadwood41 calls $0.25
Tall_Mat checks
*** FLOP *** [3h 3d 6d]
Deadwood41 checks
Tall_Mat bets $2
pokermarx calls $2
32suited folds
Deadwood41 has 15 seconds left to act
Deadwood41 calls $2
*** TURN *** [3h 3d 6d] [7s]
Deadwood41 checks
Tall_Mat checks
pokermarx bets $5
Deadwood41 folds
Tall_Mat raises to $16
pokermarx has 15 seconds left to act
pokermarx raises to $40
Tall_Mat: 66? <- lol, how precient is this comment?
Tall_Mat has 15 seconds left to act
Tall_Mat raises to $48.15, and is all in
pokermarx calls $8.15
Tall_Mat shows [7h 3s]
pokermarx shows [9s 6h]
*** RIVER *** [3h 3d 6d 7s] [6s]
Tall_Mat shows a full house, Threes full of Sevens
pokermarx shows a full house, Sixes full of Threes
pokermarx wins the pot ($101.30) with a full house, Sixes full of Threes
Tall_Mat adds $50

Still, sometimes the good guys win:

Full Tilt Poker Game #3210673356: Table Stewart (6 max) - $0.25/$0.50 - No Limit Hold'em - 13:31:23 ET - 2007/08/10
Seat 1: Big Terd ($24.80)
Seat 2: Peterpihl ($50)
Seat 3: TravDiddles ($18.45)
Seat 4: khop1 ($50.30)
Seat 5: Money Maker 852 ($10.90)
Seat 6: Tall_Mat ($83.35)
khop1 posts the small blind of $0.25
Money Maker 852 has 5 seconds left to act
Money Maker 852 posts the big blind of $0.50
5 seconds left to act
The button is in seat #3
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Tall_Mat [6c 6d]
khop1: like i said doggy call or quit crying
Tall_Mat raises to $1.75
Big Terd folds
TravDiddles calls $1.75
khop1 folds
Money Maker 852 has 15 seconds left to act
Money Maker 852 folds
*** FLOP *** [6h Th 6s]
Tall_Mat checks
TravDiddles bets $2
Tall_Mat calls $2
*** TURN *** [6h Th 6s] [8d]
Tall_Mat checks
TravDiddles bets $4
Tall_Mat raises to $8
TravDiddles raises to $14.70, and is all in
Tall_Mat calls $6.70
TravDiddles shows [Ts Ac]
Tall_Mat shows [6c 6d]
*** RIVER *** [6h Th 6s 8d] [9h]
TravDiddles shows two pair, Tens and Sixes
Tall_Mat shows four of a kind, Sixes
Tall_Mat wins the pot ($35.80) with four of a kind, Sixes

Baseball-tastic

Been playing this baseball game recently - and level 9 was proving to be a complete bugger. This morning got 26,661 points and completed it so that's definitely a result - I can stop wasting time on it and waste even more time playing poker instead!

Doledrums

Can't seem to get anything going at the moment. Played a couple of sessions getting up 2-3 buy-ins and then ending up level. Had some corkers today - AA all-in preflop vs 55, obviously didn't stand a chance. Misplayed a KQ hand rivering a straight which gave someone else a flush that I hadn't bet them out of chasing. Then against a very aggro player saw a raised pot with KT and the flop came T42 two hearts. I bet, he raised, I shoved for 110BB and he called with 7h8h. River gives him the flush and there goes 250+ big blinds.

All in all I think I played ok though. Early morning UK time certainly seems to be the best time to play on Full Tilt - lots of tired Americans giving away money...all I need to do now is hang onto it once I've got it.

I play sooooooo bad

Bleugh - that's the only way to describe it really.

Firstly stacked off with AQ on an A73 board - I was sitting there thinking "he has a set" and yet still couldn't quite stop myself re-reraising all-in on the flop. He had A7 which in all honesty was about as good as I could hope for.

Then I raised UTG with QQ, button calls, SB calls, BB re-pots it. I of course sense a steal going on so shove...and he has AA.

Just to really make my day I get KK in the C/O. I raise, the button calls. J72 2-club flop. I bet $11, the button min-raises. Now he had done this a few hands earlier when I had KJ on a KT3 board and I folded but this time I was going no-where, so I shoved and he calls with...Ac6s ummmm WTF. Of course, turn 6, river 6 and there goes a $240 pot.

Ended the session down $280.

BTW - there's an interesting article on the Full Tilt website about Chris Ferguson turning zero into $10,000 by exercising the sort of bank-roll management I wish I could stick to!

Thanks for the comments

You're right, 30 buy-ins is about what you need to be properly bankrolled at no limit, but I have my roll spread over 3 main sites so I'm using 10 buy-ins per site...maybe a bit of self justification for playing over the right stakes but at least there's some logic to it!

Played a bit (2k hands) over the weekend and ended up +$376.85 or 9bb/100 It would have been so much better if I hadn't donked a couple of hands - one getting it all-in pre-flop with AK in a 3-way pot (actually, not such a bad move really - I raised the button, SB re-raised and the BB flat called, so I shoved) which turned out to be AK v AK v QQ and the Q's held. The other hand was a shocker really. I had been having a bit of a war with another player on the table - lots of 3 betting and calling light when I raised A5 sooooted from the CO. He re-raised in the SB and I called. Flop came 456 rainbow, he bet 2/3 pot and I came over the top...he had 66. ooops.

Actually I don't think I played all that well - I was 19/11 and a bit on autopilot but there we go...

I never was any good...

...at following rules.

So after my last post I sat down at a $2/$4 HU table on Ladbrokes and moved my bankroll there from $1,398 to $742. Since then I have played $0.5/$1 6-max and it's now at $1,828.

On FTP I played some PLO and got my bankroll down to $450. Since then I've played $0.5/$1 6-max and it's now at $990.

On UB I played some $1/$2 PLO and got my backroll down from $1,326 to $795. Haven't been back there since.

Anyway, despite donking off $1k+ at higher tables I am actually up since my last post by playing a game I know I can beat. I think there's a lesson in all this ;-)

I have also come to the conclusion that beating the $0.5/$1 game is more about minimising losses than maximising gains. In other words a marginal fold is preferable to a marginal call.

An example: 4 handed on a $0.5/$1 table, I have $190, villain has $400. I get QQ in the big blind, villain raises to $3.50 UTG, I re-raise to $14, he calls. Flop Jd8d4c, I bet $25, he moves all-in. What do you do? Certainly a couple of weeks ago I instacall...

Let's think about what he's shoving with here.

AdXd, AA, KK, QQ, JJ, J8, Td9d, 88, 84, 44.

From the pre-flop action we can discount AA (he 4-bets), A9 or worse, J8 and 84 he folds. Probably he folds Td9d and 44 as well but we were deep so maybe he calls.

Putting this range: AdKd, AdQd, AdTd, KK, QQ, JJ, Td9d, 88, 44 into pokerstove vs. my QcQs shows I have 20% equity. Ok, he may show up with a few other random hands but it's not going to affect it enough to make this a call.

I folded (incidentally he showed AdQd so it was a coinflip pretty much).

Certainly however folding here has plugged a leak in my game.

Bankroll

What a muppet - you decide. So I was taking a quick look over the PLO HU tables and noticed someone was sitting at a $10/$20 table with $800. Now people who don't buy-in full are normally the weaker players (that said, David Benyamine does it at the $200/$400 tables so it's a rule of thumb, not a God-given fact) so I sat down with a matching $800 and sure enough, about 5 hands in, it all goes in on the turn when I have the nut straight. He calls me with a 9-high flush draw and hits it on the river. Now you may be thinking I mean that he was a muppet, but really I think I was the muppet, since $800 was about half my full tilt balance so I really couldn't afford to carry on and take advantage of this "weaker" player - I had to quit.

Which brings me onto bankroll management. "Bankroll" is such a moveable feast that I will define it as the balance I have on the site I am playing - therefore I have different bankrolls depending on the site I'm playing, and so game selection rules can be different for different sites.

I will adhere to the following rules for the rest of the year:

1) Play only NLHE or PLO games for which I have 1,000 big-blinds.
2) Quit playing for the day if I lose 20% of my bankroll on a particular site.
3) Maximum buy-in STT is 5% of bankroll.
4) Maximum buy-in MTT is 5% of bankroll.

Sadly this means no playing $10/$20 with a $1500 bankroll, nor entering $500+$35 tournaments with a $800 bankroll. That is probably no bad thing. In fact on the evidence of the year to date it is positively a good thing!

As an example I have around $700 left in my (much depleted) FTP account, so I can play $0.25/$0.50 cash games, and tournaments with a buy-in of $30 (to account for the juice) or less. However on UB I can play the heady heights of $0.50/$1 and tournaments up to $50.

I really don't subscribe to this "I can't beat the low games - noone respects my raises. But I can beat the bigger games!" mentality. Sure you may need to play a little differently (more ABC at the lower levels) but if you were able to beat $5/$10 you could surely beat $0.50/$1

I played an interesting $20 heads-up STT the other day against a manic-hyper-aggro-donkey. Actually I say donkey but his "strategy" could be quite sucessful (I put it in quotes since I'm not sure he was playing a well-thought out game-plan rather than just being over-aggro). Basically he just bet, bet, overbet, pushed at the slightest opportunity, and it wasn't until I was down to 1000 chips that I really figured out what he was doing (rather than just hitting cards). Then I got a K-high flush and he had a straight-flush but rather than his usual all-in move he bet small-ish. I guess I should have realised this represented a monster but called anyway and was down to 450 chips. Now if he had been playing a hyper-aggro strategy now would be the time to tighten up a little and bleed me to death with small pots, but he continued and, being short stacked, I was forced to go with some less that premium hands - I say less than premium but that's against most players, not him. For example second pair on the flop was almost the nuts, as he would bet with two undercards and shove all-in with one overcard. This enabled me to get back up to level at 1,500 chips each. By now the blinds were $50/$100 and the final hand sort of summed up the match. I raised on the button to $300 with AsQs and he pushed all-in. Now if I was raising a marginal hand I would have had to let it go and he moves into a 1800/1200 lead. As it was I called and his 45 o/s isn't really in that bad a shape. Fortunately the AQ held up.