Good month comes to a horribe close...

Seeing as I am not scheduled to play another session this month, I thought I would do an end of month update.

Hopefully this will cheer me up, because I just feel so depressed about several things that went wrong in the past 10 days!

Probably best to get the bad shit out the way...

Last night I recorded my 1st losing session after 12 consecutive winnings days, I played the £1-£3 game and dropped £720.

I felt pretty sick afterwards. Only winning poker players will know how hard it is to record a big loss like that, and the feelings that go through you.

I take losing pretty badly, and because I am fortunate enough not too lose too often, it is not a feeling I have sensitised myself to -which makes it worse.

I think that my inability to handle losing sessions, and generally losing money holds me back from progressing to higher stakes. I just don't want to lose money!

The thing is I accept the realities of poker, I am accepting, willing and mentally prepared to lose every time I sit down to play. But when it does happen, I feel horrible. I feel like quiting, not wanting to play again!

As extreme, and dramatic as this sound (even when I am typing it now, it makes me laugh), its true.

It takes character, strong will, an immense self belief to come back and play your A-game. Now I have just lost one session, when you lose a string of sessions its magnified. I really do have a huge amount of respect for Rosh, Jay, and Andre who come back day in, day out and they will look emotionally impervious (on the surface at least!), even when they are going through shit runs.

With me, I just take a fucking break, go play online, go buy a whole bunch of shit...I just stay away. Then I come back a month later, and everything is fine. I can obviously afford to that because after all I am a recreational player, but still it should not be the case. I should be able to man up, and takes the losses, as easy as I take the wins.

I don't really want to discuss the what went wrong last night, I probably did play bad. But I just want to forget about it. Yeah, sure I should analyse it but, I just don't want to. I lost. I could of won, but I lost. Early bad beat lead to some coolers, which led to some loose calls, which led to losing £720. I will be back on the rake game Sunday!

What else went wrong this week? Well I had to give the £250 from the £100 re buy back, which sucks. But well fuck it. I am more disappointed that I was 13 players (13 really bad fucking players, awful truly awful!) from £7k. That sucks big time. Why cant I get a little bit of luck one time? Yes I do fucking run good, great, but not when it fucking really matters!

I got deep in several online tournaments too, only to either blow up (spewing like a fat donkey) or getting coolered, or losing every single fucking race.

You know what if things could of gone a little bit better, I could of been up over £10k this week alone. Getting so close and ending up losing £1k in one night instead (£720 in cash + and £250 because I gave the re buy prize money back), is sickening.

I was looking forward to a fun trip up to Walsall to take part in some GUKPT side events, but fuck that now.

I am beginning to feel better actually (Rosh you should blog! I swear excellent therapy!).

So what am I left with to celebrate this month?

Well I did do better than last month.

January: -£230 Cash Games / -£20 Tournaments

February: +£2,852 Cash Games / -£420 Tournament

I played 20 sessions, and a total of 126 hours.

Average session length of 6.3 hours, and a hourly rate of £22.63

I won 80% of all my sessions, recording only 4 losing days.

If I was offered a winning month over £2k at the start of the month, but I would have to cope with the pain of a frustrating end to the month, well obviously I would take it! So I should be happy, and I am happy (ish).

I just don't want to play bad on Sunday, I want to be back to business, and play my A-game. I really cant afford for let another wasted month, which leads to a wasted year.

A bad losing session, can easily be a catalyst to playing bad and lead to string of bad sessions, but hopefully by blogging my feelings I will avoid it! I hope!

(I am still depressed!).

Just to cheer me up....

Talk about a bad beat...

I managed to get deep in the £100 re buy tournament on Tuesday, and after being told the money bubble had burst (top 12 got paid), I shoved my short stack in.

My pocket threes lost the race against my opponent's AK...and I was out.

Joe who was running the tournament told me to get my slip from Vash, and so I did. I was really down after let another deep run, that I cashed out my £250 prize money and went straight home.

I got a text message the following day from Steve saying that I had actually finished 13th not 12th, and so I had to give the money back!

Now I really don't care about the £250 that much, it is really the principal.

It was not my fault!

Joe who was running the tournament told me that we were down to the last 12 players, and he was the one who told me to get a prize money slip once I was knocked out.

They were also not keeping the clock / tournament info updated, so I could only go on what Joe was telling me.

So why should I give the money back? It was their mistake.

Imagine if it was a tourist who cashed incorrectly, they would never get that money back. So how come I should get punished for being a regular?

There is an early position raise up to £8, and several callers before the action gets to you on the button, you look down and see KQ off.

What is your play here in a relatively deep stack no limit cash game?

What goes through your mind before you make up your decision to call, fold or raise?

My logical thought process seems to be in a constant battle with my gut and my instinct. What I mean is that I will not necessary sit there and run through all the variables effecting the decision at hand.

I will snap it off, and await the flop.

Even though I haven't thought through the play, I do know that I am not playing for stacks if I flop a pair, I am looking for the off chance that I develop a nut hand.

Now believe it or not there are monkeys out there who will flop a king or queen and proceed to build a huge pot, as simple as this may sound to a competent player it shouldn't be taken for granted that a well seasoned gut / instinct will know doing that would be unprofitable to say the least!

Deeper a no limit game gets the easier the pre flop decisions become. You can pretty much limp, and cold call (even more so over call) a large range of hands due to the implied odds offered by not only the original aggressor but by the other opponents in the pots.

Basically you can make less mistakes pre flop in deep games, as opposed to games when your opponents are short stacked. I consider 100 big blinds deep, 50 big blinds short, and 150+ very deep.

I will really tighten my range, and sharpen my aggression when playing in a shorter game. So if I were in this same situation with KQ on the button (in a game not deep), I would be folding 65% of the time and 35% of the time 3 betting to isolate (and take the lead to the flop in position). Selective aggression.

However I really do losen my range, and will happily limp and call raises when deep. I will even utilise hands such as 99,1010,JJ for their set mining value as opposed to their face value, simply due to well disguised implied odds they offer.

Anyway, so I over call on the button with KQ off, and the flop comes down: J 10 x (two diamonds).

I think the pot was 5 way (I think, my recall is awful!) so there was around £40 in the pot.

The original raiser led (either the blinds had folded pre, or they checked the flop not quite sure) for £39, with about £170 behind (again not 100% sure but it apperared that he had a full stack).

Action folded to me (with a couple more live players behind me). So what now? What goes through my mind here? Pre flop was an automatic snap call, without thinking because the mechanics of the decision are quite simple, but here...I tanked...

I really have a very odd way of thinking through situations at the heat of the moment, I think I actually think through things the wrong way round. I actually reach a decision without breaking down the reasoning, then before I act I work my way back through the reasoning.

So last night I was like....

I am shoving this flop...and then I will be like hold on...what does he have? What does he think I have? What will he think I have if I shove? What will he think I have if I flat? Will he fold to a shove (do I have any fold equity)? What will he do on the turn if I flat? Do I have any fold equity on the turn, if he checks and I shove? Is he committed to the pot now? I will consider the current expressed odds, along with the implied odds offered.

When I explain to someone who doesnt really play poker, that I sit there and think through all these things (as well as make some mathemical calculations), while the whole table is waiting for me to act (and often calling time on me), they find it really hard to understand. But it really is not that hard, your gut, instint and experience pretty much takes over.

OK...so in my reverse thought process before I think about my opponent's range, I tend to evaluate the strength of my hand first...

I know that I am drawing to the nuts with a 9 or an ace. So I have 4x9s and 4xAces I can hit to win. Simply put 8 outs.

Ammm...well no not really. It is very unlikely that all my outs are live. Firstly considering my opponent's range, I am fortunate to have about 1,000,000 hours of table time with him, and based on his pre flop and post flop action I can pretty much narrow his range down to the following hands:

AA,KK,QQ,JJ,AQ (diamonds), AK (diamonds), 1010, 99 (unlikely but possible),KQ suited, QJ suited.

So basically nearly every hand in his range will have be using one of my outs, so I am drawing even thinner than before.

I also have to consider the players behind me who could be drawing to the flush, and with my call, will want to speculate, and say if I hit a 9 of diamonds on the turn, well...check fold?

But lets simplify the situation, and say we know they are all folding, where does this leave me?

I am not getting the expressed odds to call, and I am getting very thin implied odds. I am pretty happy in the knowledge that this particular opponent "plays for stacks" once in a pot, so if I do hit I am getting the rest of his stack.

What will he put me on if I flat? Maybe a set? Maybe I will get a free card on the turn. So if I call £39, and peel, there is chance I hit my straight, and get the rest of his stack, or I could miss, and I may even get a free card (unlikely but a possibility).

Shove? Maybe, but my fold equity is very thin on a board that draw heavy, and I don't like the idea of getting £200 in such a bad spot.

I much rather pay £39 and see what happens. That is basically what goes through my head, in a blur anyway...

The result of the hand is irrelevant, is the £39 call on the turn bad?

Yigit

Quick update....

I managed to blow a 60k chip stack in the $80k guarantee, and have been sulking since!

I managed to cash for $143.01 for like 98th place.

I also had a couple of bounties on Full Tilt for $14.00. So I ended up losing about $20 in tournament fees for the night, but the oppurtunity was there.

I will make a decent ($5k/$10k) plus tournament score this year! I can feel it.

Taking a night off The Vic tonight. Things are going pretty well on that front, I seem to be running as good as ever and keeping my discipline.

Anyway that's all for now...

Yigit out!

Night off from The Vic..to play some online MTTs..

Real quick post to say I am really excited tonight to be taking a night off from The Vic to play some online tournaments.

I have registered to play in the following:

Pokerstars:

15:00 $55 ($80k Guaranteed)
15:00 $5.50 (Turbo)
15:15 $11 ($10k Guaranteed)
16:00 $8.80

Full Tilt:

15:00 $26 ($13.5k Guaranteed)
15:30 $55 ($20k Guaranteed)
16:00 $6 ($5k Guaranteed)
16:02 $6 ($5k Guaranteed)

One time? Please?

Report to follow....

Yigit out!

They don't call me "yo-yo" for nothing...

So for readers of this blog (and for me in particular) it is really amusing to read through past posts, and see the different directions I randomly take.

When ever I set out to accomplish a certain goal I seem to lose focus, get bored (get frustrated), and give up. Then the next day I will devise let another challenge for myself to work toward.

Although it really is not a bad idea to have direction, I have to accept...

I lack "follow through". This is an attribute I believe that holds back people (not just in poker but in life) from fully realising their potential. This is my major leak!

My goals are equally insignificant and unachievable. Insignificant in the sense that even if I met my goals what will I have to show as an reward / incentive? A sense of self redemption is not enough.

So with that said and done, what am I doing?

Poker Heaven sucked real bad, so I have kind of retired from online poker.

This has given me more time to focus my efforts at The Vic.

Anyway, that's where we are at now...

Yigit