A small recovery

I ended last night with another loss. I was definitely in the wrong frame of mind, so I did what I normally do and read some poker theory. I started with sklansky's stakes hold em, and got to calculating pot odds. I've tried to learn it three times to no avail, but this time it clicked.

I stayed late into the night running through my old pokerstars hand histories to calculate the odds as fast as I could. Which is not very fast at all. Thankfully there's many a chart online to help turn hard math into memorization. Thank you everyone who came before me to make this .2% easier for me.

I can't say that making moves based on expected value is completely relevant in small stakes tournaments, but i think it did put me in the right frame of mind. Poker is for the long term. Win the war, not the battle.

With all this new info bouncing in my head I played one of my best games to date, and came in first.

Bankroll: $29.20

Or it could have been all the weekend fish.

2 losses

Looks like I finally hit a down swing. The first game was played very badly I admit, and I was out in a few hands. The second was played well, but I lost to a bad beat. I called an all in bet with pocket kings, and my opponent showed pocket threes. Of course a three came on the river. Time to regroup, tighten up and get back on the horse.

Bankroll: $26.80

Mid day play

A much tighter table this time, as I expected. I need to stop calling what I think are steals unless I have a top 10 hand. I was lucky to push all in with my last 300 chips holding pocket eights and catch an eight on the turn. Luck was the only thing that kept me in the game with a small cash at 4th place.

Once I make it to $50 dollars I'm going to try two tabling.

Bankroll: $30.40

Second $2 STT

Always bet the river... unless an ace comes down, and you're holding pocket queens. Had I known my opponent was holding pocket jacks I would have value bet like a crack farmer during harvest.

Funny how winning a pot doesn't really feel like winning when you're analyzing your play. I think that's a good thing.

I don't actually condone river bets by the way. It's just something my wife said while watching WSOP.

Did much better this time, came in second. I could have came in first, but I got a serious case of the tired. Crack harvest really wears a guy out.

Bankroll: $29.60

First sit and go

My first sit and go on Bodog was a single table beginner tourney with a buy in of $2 +.20.

Altogether not a terrible event, but I could have played much better. With only three people left I switched to "far too aggressive mode", and donked off half my stack with some very poorly timed check raises. I was finally kicked to the curb when I pushed all in with KQs against A2s and a 2 came down on the turn.

I really wish the hand history didn't suck so much at bodog.

Bankroll: $26.80

At least I'm in the positive.

The Plan

Here's the specifics, I've got a fresh account at Bodog and free $25 bankroll from pokersource. Bodog wouldn't be my first choice, but it's a start. I've played three free rolls so far just to get a feel for how the rooms work, and was surprised at how loose the play could be.

I managed to go deep into the last free roll by playing as tightly as possible. The levels were slow enough for me not to worry about death by blinds, I just had to be prepared to push all in with top pair top kicker a few times. Not too hard when your opponents are cold calling with middle pairs. Alas, I did not cash, (Opponent topped my king high flush with an ace high flush) but got a good feel for the movement of the game.

So here's the plan: I'm going to start building my bankroll by playing mico single table sit and goes, as it's a lot easier for me to track my progress until I can afford the hand grabber.

I wish I could start at pokerstars again, but my wife just started using the account to build her .30 bankroll. Wish her luck!

Tonight we grind together... that doesn't sound right.

How I got my free poker bank roll.

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