Up and away?

Back from holiday number 2

2007-08-06T04:07:00.000-07:00

After the prolonged period of silence I am back.

The Dublin trip was great but I didnt experience a full holiday feeling. So when I returned I planned another trip: sporting in the belgium ardennes. Now im back and finally in the right moodset.

So the blog will be up to speed once more.

More to follow.

wednesday

2007-07-18T04:08:00.000-07:00

The last couple of days have been uneventfull for me pokerwise. There not many interesting hands but today I have one that I would like to share.

I was running 19/14 at the time and the villain was 20/0/2.3 after 60 hands.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1275179

With the reraise from the guy I figured that he must have had AK/AA/KK and perhaps QQ so I called for set value. With the flop coming all low cards I was prepared to call a c-bet but an all-in definately not. Is this a missed chance?

On other related news. I will be on a short trip to Dublin from Thursday to Monday so no updates in that period.

Good luck with the games.

The preflop raise

2007-07-14T05:37:00.000-07:00

At cardrunners they basically teach you to normally bet 4BB + 1 per limper. This is a rule I normally abide by.

Today I was playing on Absolute. I had a couple of guys that continued to call my preflop raises. So I decided to make it 5 BB instead of 4 BB as I didnt want three callers to every raise. I was sweating at the time with Noel and he disagreed with that move. One should stick to the rules or change it 5BB+1 permanently.

I raise to get more value out of my hands and to get HU or against two players per flop. In that order I raised more. Is that a logical move or should I stick to the same plan?

Holiday, 6 weeks of sun, fun and poker....

2007-07-13T13:33:00.000-07:00

Finally the last days of work are over and my summer holiday has begun. I am free from work until the end of August and I need it so bad.

The last week I haven't been playing that much. I played about 1k of hands and won about $50. My start on Absolute has been rocky to say the least. Hands that I should have won I lost and more so. However this is beginning to turn around.

A really nice hand today. Basic ABC I guess but it was very nice.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1260422

Another hand has me 3-betting a CO raise with JJ against a 22/20/6 (about 40 hands)

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1260429

I wonder what you guys think.

Anyway I will be taking a good look at the blogs tomorrow morning. Take care and good luck at the tables.

Saturday poker

2007-07-07T05:14:00.001-07:00

I played some live poker last night with a few friends. The kind of poker where you raise 5 x BB and get 6 callers. In this session I had two amazing hands: a royal flush and quad 5's. Needless to say I got paid off quite well. Overall profit: 8 buyins ($55). I almost felt guilty about it ;-).

TOday I 4-tabled a little bit and made about $28 (15.38 BB/100). I was quite pleased with it but still made some dubious decisions. One cost my a full buyin and was clearly an error but the other were marginal.

This is number one: villain is 19/3 over about 250 hands. I wasn't getting out of line at the table and was playing 14/9.

Hand 1:
Seat 1: matt84 ($56.99)
Seat 2: lidas123 ($19.75)
Seat 3: Hero ($25.90)
Seat 4: farim ($13.84)
Seat 5: -IceWolf- ($54.00)
Seat 6: mp321 ($31.83)
mp321 posts the small blind of $0.15
matt84 posts the big blind of $0.25
The button is in seat #5
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Hero [Qs Qh]
lidas123 folds
Hero raises to $1.00
farim raises to $3.40
-IceWolf- folds
mp321 folds
matt84 folds
Hero folds
Uncalled bet of $2.40 returned to farim
*** SHOW DOWN ***
farim mucks
*** SUMMARY ***
farim collects $2.40

At the moment I was convinced I dodged a bullet with this one. Considering his low PFR I considered him to have AK/KK/AA. A call would be out of the question I think so the only choices were push or fold and I chose fold since my gut told me not to.

I am wondering what you guys think.

The second hand was also a real brain breaker (for me that is). What would you guys have done. The villain is a good winning player and had been cleaning out one of the donks at the tables. The hands he showed down were good. His stats were 15/7. I had been running cold and had a 6/4 (yeah way too nitty but I was carddead).

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1241388

Same question.

July so far:

I got my VPIP down to 18. So that is going quite well. I do need to up my PFR a bit more. I call too much instead of raising.

Overall I'm not displeased. The negative number in position 2 is because of one $33 hand that I lost.

Sweating is a good thing!

2007-07-03T15:26:00.000-07:00

As a biology teacher I can say that sweating is good for the body and keeps the machine working and functioning at optimal efficiency.

With poker its even better! Today i had two sweat sessions with Robin and Noel and its a good way to learn poker. Nothing out of the ordinary happened on my side but I got some nice pointers from the sweaters.

Thanks guys.

I am always up for some sweating:

ed_sweden@hotmail (.com)
AIM: edsweden12
General time would be in the evenings for me (europe) / afternoon (US)

Down and up

2007-07-01T04:50:00.000-07:00

July the 1st. Yesterday was a bad day pokerwise. I lost about two buyins, partly to stupidity, playing against calling stations that kept hitting and partly due to bad luck (set over set).
One hand in the beginning had me puzzled. I did get pushed off or could I have called?

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1223675

One hand was typical of my lack of concentration:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1223664

First was the minraise from a shortstack with 50/12 ish stats. I decided I would reraise. Then the minraise of the minraise came by a guy who had like 50/1 in stats. I knew (by gut and because of the minraise from a guys who raises 1% of his hand) that he had AA. But I still reraised to make sure (cough). To the guy with the short stack goes all-in (as was my original plan). Then the guy with 50/1 flatcalls. Warning number two. Still I call and hope for a good flop.

On the flop he check, I check, he checks, I figure what the heck..he might have JJ. Then he reraises me and I am obliged to call (or so I felt). When that hand was over I felt so stupid. All the signs were there but did not listen. Aaargh.

However today things went fairly well and I regained the two buy ins plus something extra. One hand near the end of my session went as followed:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1223657

The villain was relatively new to the table and little info on him. I was playing quite solid poker and had doubled up with AQ vs QQ. When the flop came I figured I was showing strength and the limp/caller probably had a small pp or suited connector. So I c-betted. He called it and then another low card fell. I decided to fire a second barrel, representing a big pair. However he called it also. Then on the river I got no help and thought about another bet but figured that he would call that so I checked. What would you guys have done?

Nutjobs

2007-06-28T15:02:00.000-07:00

Today I played some hands and I was going up and down.

Played some standard ABC hands and totally misread one guy which lead to the loss of half a buy in. Then I managed to get two persons all in with AA in my hand. Unfortunately one hit his runner runner flush with JJ.

On another table my KK got cracked (http://www.pokerhand.org/?1217039) by a set of 2's but I'm relatively happy. I kept my aggro to a minimum and don't think I could have folded on the river.

Fortunately I don't do crazy stuff...cough. A few orbits later I made a few big bluffs against a calling station (58/0/0,5) on a QQQJ5 (3 diamonds) board with 22 over several streets. In the previous orbits he bet and raised his made hands I figured there was I chance I was stronger and that I had some fold equity from my table image. Stupid yes prolly, however he called my bluffs and lost to my smallest full house QQQ22. I'm still confused as to why he called. (http://www.pokerhand.org/?1217050)

On different note: I qualified for an 8/9 person online SNG somewhere in July.
The winner gets a $3000 package to play live in Vilnius (Lithuania) in 4 tournaments with travel and expenses paid. Would be nice to win that SNG. Perhaps I should do a few practice SNG's before that time and watch some CR vids.

Bankroll: + 20 --> $1077

Current situation

2007-06-26T07:28:00.000-07:00

Second update. I will post my current situation in pokerland.

Sites Im playing on and bankroll:

Everest poker: $437.88 (bonus to release: $75)
Pokerstars: $78.25
Pokerroom / Prime: $277 (bonus to release: $150)
Titan poker: $175.19
Pacific poker: $36
Neteller: $50

Total bankroll as of 26th of june: $1054.32

Goal for the end of july: to up my bankroll to $2000 and to begin playing on NL50.

Pokertracker stats up until now (since playing 6 max):

Things I need to improve on are playing a lot tighter and more aggressive from the small and the big blind. To that end I will use the chart from cr with maybe one or two personal adjustments. And in general I need to tighten up. VPIP should drop to around 18. A whole 6 points. Lets see if I can do it next week or two.

Welcome

2007-06-25T12:15:00.000-07:00

I just created this blog in anticipation of the coming poker summer.

In the next two months I will be posting some of my experiences.

Enjoy,

ed.