[Closed] Nose to the Grindstone - Again

Hello again. this is a bit of a brag post so be careful

This week it really went well. I used to assume every player on this site was a terrible loose passive who never folded to a steal or conti bet and play accordingly and that worked quite well. I've now got decent numbers of stats on some pretty bad regs and It's let me put some pressure on all the tight players and all that.

Anyway I ran really well on thursday night and managed 6 top 2 finishes in a row which wins you a $300 consolation prize (as opposed to the jackpot for 6 wins)

I was reading lessthantree's blog the other day and his notes on the importance of HU play in sng and I realised how true this is. I also realised how shit my HU play has been as of late, this week my goal is to do some serious work on my HU ranges. I'm surprised because I used to consider this to be a strong point of my game. Funny how as a poker player you never suddenly "realise" you're good, you just assume you're good then get cut back down from time to time. Maybe i'm just arrogant.

One of my friends came to brisbane and we went to the casino for an epic session from 9pm friday night til 9am saturday morning. I cant remember that much of the night but I bought in with $200, playing $1/2, and remember have $300 then all of a sudden its 6:30 in the morning and i had about $700 in front of me. then I sucked out on some a shortstack (typical that my memory comes back for that) with AQ v AK and did a bit of bet/conti for awhile. ended up leaving with just over 1k.

So in summary my total profit this week was $1450 which is my best yet.

This week hasn't been as great as last week, altough it was still a week, so that's something.

It started out ok, I didn't play much at the start of the week and ran ok I think I made a couple of BI cant really remember but decided to have a massive grind over the weekend. I started out running very well and made almost 10 BI in my first couple of hours on saturday then it all turned to custard and I lost about 10 over sunday/monday. Anyway you all know what downswings are so I wont whine too much, instead, I'm going to describe how my play has deteriorated in order to try and patch up the holes.

1. I have been trying to steal pots where I wouldn't if I was playing my A-game. I remember 1 hand in particular last night I tried stealing after a flop check on the turn and even worse again on the river without really thinking and getting called down by bottom pair. In tilt fasion I got annoyed that his call was retarded but THAT IS WHY YOU DONT BLUFF THESE PLAYERS.
I honestly think I've made more bad bluffs in the past 50 games than in the 250 prior to that.

2. Making blind steals with a bad risk/reward ratio. Cant really say much more about this one. I think I just haven't been quite playing the bubble right, I'll have a hoon on ICM trainer and try and sort it out.

3. Calling one bet too many. You know that call when you think you know you're beat but your getting 3:1 and you want to KNOW you're beat?

I think that's about it, that is how I tilt in general and this time's no different. There are some positives to draw from this situation too.

1. My bankroll is still pretty solid at $1093 thanks to rakeback, plus the rakerace finishes tomorrow so that should give me $100-$150

2. Even on tilt I feel like i'm still breakeven at worst. I think I've caught it early this time and hopefully I can fix it quickly.

I think I'll take a day or 2 off then get back into it later in the week.

This post is getting on the longish side but i'll quickly describe friday night at the casino.
Wasn't feeling like gambling it up massively so I just bought in with 50bb ($100) to figure out what the game was like at the start (standard raise size is ~5-7bb so you can play a semi decent SSS) planning to buy in deep once i'd seen a few hands. ground it up to about $150 then lost it with a set over set situation.
Rebought with $100 and almost Imidiately sucked out with QQ v AA and hit a set of 5s to stack someone and get up to about 400. Then I played a hand where I raised from early to ~$12 with KK and the guy to my left shoved 110bb, I called and he showed AA.

Ended up losing about $100 so not too bad.

Have a good week everyone (including me)

Hello.

I'm quite happy poker-wise at the moment. The main reason is I found a whole lot of holes in my game! This may not seem good but I've been on a bit of a plateau lately in terms of improving my game and now I feel like I'm in the process of learning a lot, this is due to the 3 hours I have on the train everyday to study.

The day I wrote the short story about my tilt episode I went home and played a lot better straight away and in addition i've run ridiculously well and way above EV since my last post.

I made it to diamond! Silver to diamond in 2 months thanks to 10 points/$1 rake on william hill and switching from MTT to sng. Cant wait for the T-Shirt.

Keep it real

Hi

The focus of this week for me has been improving my bubble calling ranges. Up til now I've been using common sense and knowing that i have to call tighter on the bubble and everything but this week I read through The sng gold article on bubble play. It has been very helpful so far. I'm really trying to sqeeze every bit of profit I can out of the sng i'm playing so i'm putting quite a bit of effort into my game.

I'm really really enjoying playing poker at the moment (not that I usually hate it) I think playing for only about 10 hours/week is making it more enjoyable.

my ROI has started settling down to I about 5% sfter 450 games. Still a small sample but i'm getting there.

I aim to download pokerstars this week so that next wednesday I can participate in the sng gold coaching that takes place during my train ride.

Stay cool

hi bradomurder,
whats up with your blog here. since your status is diamond you probably have some success in your challenge - or not? i'd like to read some more about your roi and stuff. It kinda motivates me to see it when people have success in their poker career. I guess it makes me feel better after looking at my roi of -4% at 1$ sngs. i actually started great and had a roi of +11% at the beginning but some time later i came into a downswing or did i just tilt? i dunno what happened but im just running bad right know. so please motivate me by posting your success ♦

Hei.

Nice challenge. Just finished watching 2 seasons of "the flight of the conchords." I really loved the show. You NZ are even wierder then aussies : D

Do You really have this kind of relationship as on the show?

Kinda offtopic but goodluck on the tables and update more often ..

Hello.
Been reading your blog today.
What about William Hill how do you like it?
I'm currently stuck to only 1$ SNG's with my starting capital.
Have been playing Double Up 1$ SNG's but my winning rate is really bad I keep on sucking badly.
What do you suggest what SNG's should I play?

Please update bradomurder you are my hero.

Hi I've had some time off due to moving back to NZ and getting a new job. got offered one all of a sudden and everything sort of went crazy for a bit

My new blog can be found here

I'm going to switch it up and focus on getting to know a bit more of the reasons behind my actions (right now I sort of know what to do but not really why)

I'd reccomend switching to a small site for sng (ipoker is seriously way softer) and jackpokt sng are good once you get to $5 sng.

the equity from jackpots/consolation prizes more than balances the extra rake but you get rakeback (points) on the whole rake.

I worked it out that EV wise I was paying no rake at $20 jackpot sng but its quite a long term thing

hopefully I can get a bit of volume in and keep my new blog going a bit longer