An Ape and a notebook, how long will it take?

[jgcblack]

ARRRRGGH!

One mistake and one thats I'm not sure about........


First one is a mistake:- (im pretty sure it is)
4 handed on direct bubble in DTD150 sat
I have 90k @ 2000/4000

UTG opens for 15k from 75k, fold, we find  in sb and reshove...
This is wrong because:
- we're never getting a fold! which means our equity in the hand is ALWAYS 52-54%
- a BIG part of reshoving/ shoving with low pocket pairs is the fold equity combined with the pair vs overcards equity and the 20% vs overpairs..
- we're risking our stack vs an unknown range with a player behind and poor equity when we don't need to and its the direct bubble..
- we're fairly sure our shoving/ calling ranges will be much closer to GTO than our competitors from their play so far

we get sigh called by    and find a

    board to practically flop us dead with no 'get theres' except the  ...

we don't get there and are now left with 6bb's FML!


Then we shove well and get some nice  x and  x hands to get back to 36k and then get  in vs  .
We get there with a flopped  - tyvm.
So, we're back in it and no more mistakes!!!!!!!!


Make some nice raises now its 4000/8000 and we have like 12bb's.

Then the previous villain from the hand above makes a massive mistake by raising 3.5x and calling off vs the first 3bt shove from another player..

Villain 1 vs Villain 2  ..  - what was he thinking when he calls 4/5 his stack off here!?
Villain 2 holds and we're down to one tiny 3.5bb stack utg.



Mistake???
In the sb we find  and decide that we have to shove for the 14k in the middle and the fact we have a high card and theres a 3.5b stack going into bb next hand. i.e. the bb should NEVER be calling here.. even with the top of his range.. correct?

He snaps off with  and we flop a gutty to go with our live cards....
we brick and gg 4th!

bubble was like £125... and we gave it to Villain 1.
should we just raise/ fold vs bb? (wouldnt think he would 3bt light here ever! - seems better in hind sight but this is like the 5th direct bubble in the last 3 days... think im too aggy....)

[jgcblack]

So.... we got another dtd500 seat tonight. - this means we're freerolling the dtd500 which is always nice. tyty



Properly bossed it from the mid-stages onwards.

Were sitting pretty avg for a long long long long long.... long time.
Raise BTN  1825 @ 400/800 (playing 10k ish)
SB call, bb folds

pot (4050 +antes)
flop


he checks, we bet 2200.... he raises to 5200.... we take 5 seconds and shove... its like 3600 more to him, into a 17k pot..... LOL
I'm literally 100% sure this guy is at it.. and that he won't call it off like ever... still a sick shove though, really.


From this point onwards we then play snug and proper and have some really nice BB hands... where people shove A8 and we have AQ or AK... all hold. runnnngooooods!

Then from 20 down we knock out 7/10 to get to the 10 seats... obv accumulating chips and raising like 60% hands and just getting way too many through.

[Leatherman]

well done again.. Was railin you and Eso for a bit, i saw that you was massive chear leader and with 20 odd left basically had a seat locked up providing no spewage..
 Gl for today at dtd..

[jgcblack]

So..... We just bust the dtd500...

Been really steady and careful all day.  Not done anything too silly, got KK in vs 88 pre for a double up to 27k then an orbit later double up when decides to take off on Q high board, A river. When we had QQ.

Just bust in level 10 with QQ vs 77 on 954...

He check raises all in cos he thinks I have AK.. I snap and he's like 'oh shit'.. So im thinking ... Brick, brick if you please Ben the dealer-man.


Turn 8... Omfg dont u dare....



River 7.

Seeya later 95k.. Gg WP, NH.

Sigggggghhhhhhh.... Better luck next month.

[jgcblack]

Just a quickie..

Firstly I'd like to say thanks to everyone I spoke to @ DTD at the weekend, I think everyone said positive things about this diary.. With more people than I'd realised saying they were enjoying all the posts and that it was 'very me'.  Guess that's the point.  I'm accurately oozing through the keyboard into your screens!

Secondly.. I'd like as many comments, tips, advice, suggestions, likes, dislikes and ideas on the hands I post as this forum is definitely one of my 'key places' I'm using for improvement.. even if much of it is 'shaming me into improving' (whatever works folks!)

Finally - full report to follow tonight from the dtd500 and I'm now going to commit to posting bankrolls and long term plans/ goals and br targets.  (kinda afraid as im then 'measurable' for failure).



Good luck all, well done on the DTD deal to Blonde.

peace

jb

[jgcblack]

So, this is my full deepstack report, including the satellites before hand.  Just for a change I made it pretty long..........
PART 1/2


We won a satellite to get a seat into the DTD500 on the Wednesday before the tournament.  However we'd spent around £250-350 in order to win it.. and therefore it got to the point where we might as well have been playing cash on stars in order to win the money for a seat.  So we decided to keep playing the £100 freezeouts for another seat in order to 'pay' for the time and make it worth our while.

I then played the Thursday and Friday night sats.. I made a mistake in the Thursday night one.. its a few posts up but basically I played a weak flush really badly and called off my stack when I'd check-raised the river and the dude 'shoved' - the nut flush obv.

On Friday I played pretty solid and managed to get a decent stack and run pretty sweet in some nice spots - we had 3 or 4 BB hands where we had  or  and people shoved rag Aces into us.  Once we got to the last 25 (10 seats) I completely opened up and ran the game from here on.  I even took out 7 of the last 10 players from 20 left - which obviously gave me enough chips to really survive through the tight and arduous bubble stage.  Lucky for me, people value their chips more than I do, which allows me to chip up and I only lose any when I either run into a hand and I have one too.. Or I commit myself to a shortie and have enough equity to make the call.




DTD500 - Saturday 4 Feb 2012, Day 1b
We arrive a little late, having dropped Charlene (gf) off into town so she can keep herself busy while we get settled and ready to make day 2.  Tom Kugelstadt a friend of mine calls to let me know that he is on my table and to ask when we're turning up, this is not the best news as I think Tom is a pretty good NLHE player and having him on our left could cause trouble, and having him on our right is going to be hard to get value.

We get to the table and sigh... We have probably one of the toughest overall first table draws in the entire competition. 

37    1    Dean Morris -
Seen him before, understand he's a solid 'regular' player but might not be playing optimal poker.
37    2    Anonymous -
I know this guy, played with him before... weak passive, solid starting hands, doesn't like the fold button but can be persuaded.
37    3    Tom Kugelstadt -
Solid, good, capable player... can make moves but will likely use the fold btn + combat the weaker players instead of mess with us
37    4    Anonymous -
Never seen this guy before, but within a few hands I can see he's on the weaker side with obvious bet sizing tells, weak/ bad-tight
37    5    John Black -
I'm going to try and exploit seats 2 and 4 the most from this seat, and abuse my button should 6 or 7 try to play more pots with us than they should when we do
37    6    Gavin Kan -
Decent luton regular, will likely be cautious for a while but able to make moves and could be a pain.
37    7    Xenophon Constantiou -
No idea, on first impressions only... He's an over 40 foreign gentleman, seems emotional as he got upset with Lintons opening frequencies in a few orbits.  Probably not playing optimal poker, hoping he likes to defend his BB a lot.
37    8    Peter Linton -
I've never played with PLinton but I know who he is, I know he plays decent stakes and he's considered an aggressive and competent opponent.  I've seen things saying he has a spewy side, so if I see evidence of this I'll try to let him hang himself - glme.

Out of these players, Seats 2, 3 and 6 know who I am.  I'm pretty sure 2 and 6 will know the 'old' me... an egotistically stunted wannabe 'hero' bluffer.  However I know TomK knows I've been working on my game and trying to improve it, only played with him once or twice in the last few months... Unsure how his opinion of me has changed.


We have missed around 30 mins of the first level and understand that PL has been opening a lot of pots, taking most of them down.  Nothing of note has happened and so we settle into play.. our intention is to play really steady, solid and tight poker for the first few levels, my understanding of the DTD table breaking order means we're likely to be together for a large part of the day.  We don't need to be doing anything silly when we have a 40min clock and 30,000 chips.  We don't play a hand for close to 4 orbits and watch PLinton tear it up a little, he gets bluffed by Seat 7 in a silly spot where 7 calls from BB and check calls a then leads a .  He shows PL the  and says "you're taking the piss boy...".
Pete is less than impressed and it seems his tilt button has been pressed and he looks like he's slowly rolling downhill.  I give it an hour or two until these two play a big pot...

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Hand 1
Eventually we peel  in Co after Seat 2 has raised and 3 called.  Seat 6 has been very very tight, not playing a hand so we're assuming we'll get the button in this hand.. with the only threat being PL if he decides to try and squeeze out of the blinds.

flop
 
Relatively happy with our hand, often having the best hand now but if not its going to be relatively easy to squeeze TomK out if he has marginally better and close to impossible for the OR to continue to the river on this board.

OR bets 1/2 pot, Tom calls and we decide to call - we would be doing this with our entire range A6s - 77/ 86s.

turn
 
Not the best turn, but it will almost always make the hand impossible for OR to continue and Tom is hardly going to mess around here when my range contains all the nutty hands, his less likely so.

OR checks, Tom bets 1/3 pot, I call, OR calls (this is really strange! should be easy to fold AA here but I don't think he always would).  When Tom leads this turn I'm now 100% he has a good hand of some sort - 2p minimum, probably a 3 or 8.. he might make it a little bigger with 89 however I don't expect him to be peeling flop with a bare gutshot, so the only straights he should have 48, 58 or 78.  However I dont expect him to be betting his 2p/ set hands all the time so straights are definitely a bigger part of his range.

River
 
Pretty interesting river... at this point they both have no clue with my hand and the pot is close to 12k with 20-25k behind each.  My plan is to take the river action and evaluate my options.  If they both check, which I expect them to (as Tom shouldn't have a house very often after betting the turn) then I will consider betting close to pot in order to get any one/ two pair hands to fold from Seat 2 and Tom will fold a straight if I bet here - its just too strong a line to be bluffing in my first pot - esp when my range pre is soo much more likely to be pocket pairs.  The only reason I consider this line is because I know that Tom is a competent hand reader and Seat 2 will be squeezed up against Tom as he lead the turn.  By having a 7 in my hand and the 4 pairing on the river there is only one cominbation of 77's full (excluding 74) and there are three combos of 55.  Either way, Seat 2 will be unable to do anything but fold 99% of his range and Tom isn't willing to take any risks here when my line looks exactly like the nuts.

This is all taken apart however when the OR leads the river for 1/3 pot. WTF!  He should not be bluffing here! unless this is a blocker with AA he should only ever have full houses here and as we've just said, thats really really hard.
Tom calls, so he does have an 8. Hmmm.....

Now we take some time and weigh our situation up, if we shove here.. we would be shoving 25K ish to win around 18/19k and we expect it to work over 90%+ of the time for the reasons above.
However...
There is something wrong about this, the river lead.  We think back to hands played with this villain in the past, and suddenly something clicks and we realise he will be the type to make bad calls but in retro-spect...... in this exact spot...... I'm close to certain he wouldn't lead AA's.  Which means he can only have a house.  People don't like folding houses and so I decide that I'll save my stack, protect my image and get back to playing like a nit.


Seat 2  shows  and our instinct was correct, he wasn't folding.  Tom sigh folds his 8 and we save all sorts of image, looking like we folded an 8 too.
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Hand 2
We played pretty snug after hand 1 and eventually find  in the BB after PLinton opened MP1.  We don't see any need to 3bt, and he knows we've been playing tight, folding our SB and BB often so he's clever enough to realise we have a 'good hand' (im aware K10 might be the bottom of this 'range').

Flop
 

We check, thinking about check-raising but are unsure how PL will react and expect him to rep the high cards as well as have them so some caution will be best here - obv his EP range should be strong but that's not 100% the case.

He bets 1/2 pot (his std cbet), we call..

Turn
 

Not a bad card, he will often hit this but it does give us a gutshot as well as our fd and over.. we're probably going to check-raise, repping a strong range with a lot of outs and it will likely elicit a fold - all depends on his sizing.

River
 

We believe that after his check-back on the turn his hand is A high/ 2nd pair at best, almost certainly not top pair/ better and he is probably going to expect us to lead the river with top pair or better.. unlikely to try to take us off our hand so our only hope for any more chips/ guarantee we get to showdown is to check and give him one more chance at it.  At this point we haven't represented any strength and could easily just have a pocket pair that didnt fold the flop.  I don't think its unreasonable to think he will give this one more punt.

He checks back A high as we win.. getting berrated by the whole table... PLinton even telling us we 'played the hand great...' sigh.
Anyone think I could have done anything different here, except for lead 1/2 pot I guess....?

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Our next hand is losing one to PL when we cc flop and turn the nut straight and he rivers a house... we lead the river and sigh call his small raise - this might be a mistake..

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Hand 3
We open in CO and Gavin Kan has woken up a little, this is the 2nd time he's flatted our open from btn... I don't think its optimistic to think he's decided to use his 'nitty' image from today to try and take more than his fair share of pots away from us.  This will be harder than he imagines.

Flop
 
We cbet 1/2 pot, he hasn't seen our cbet size and so isn't going to be getting anything from this.  We've recently made our bets smaller in general as the stack:pot ratio needs to be as high as possible for us to have manouverability in a hand.  Gavin calls, this doesn't mean anything really, he would be 3bt-ing us for sure with his big value hands pre so we will re-evaluate on the turn action.

Turn
 
Probably the nut card imo..  It gives us lots of equity in the hand vs any range! It makes it hard for him to go crazy with most of his hands but definitely adds to his likely-hood of now having a pair + draw kind of hand.  He will often continue to call with any pair, he may give us credit for betting  and such like hands.. but I also suspect he thinks we might just barrell overs anyway.

We decide to make this larger, confirming his opinion its less likely to be for value.. and with the idea of setting up a small river 'bluff' that will be getting called close to 100% by all his 1pair hands - we will be betting pretty much any river, the worst being 7's, 6's and 4's.

We bet 3/4 pot and he takes some time, looks to be considering raising but now realising that raising will now be hard because my sizing is too large (thought of) and he calls.

River
 
One of the best rivers.... nothing has improved and if he raises here we will have a decision but effectively he's good enough to know that he just needs to call here with ALL his hands as I don't think he's bad enough to float both flop and turn.

We take our time and finally (after acting it up a bit) bet 1/3 pot and stare at the flop like we try to do in all pots with both value and bluffs.
He takes quite a while, I think a little shocked at how small the bet is.. and is now worried its for value, this is PERFECT! as he would've snapped with and 8 or better, so we were right and he has a weak one pair hand.......  He takes around 30 seconds and realises it won't hurt his stack too much, and calls.

We say "I do have an 8 Gav" and he disgustedly throws his hand in the muck.  BOOM! wp john.  I know many will think the river is a little thin... but I can't see many hands better than ours he doesn't raise the turn with except a better 8... and that will suck.

[cambridgealex]

The phrase tl;dr was invented for that post.

[jgcblack]

Part 2/2 - sigh @ writing so long.... not even done my grind for today.. thats off now, im knackered!
(I've just seen Cambridgealex's response and I appreciate your pains... I had to write it and check it godknows how many times.)



Hand 4
Again this is a spot vs Gavin, again we're in late position.

Seat 1 limps.... (hmmm) and we open and get Gavin flatting us behing on btn, with SB coming along.


Flop
      (or similar Kxxr)

SB checks, Seat 1 checks, We check, Gavin Checks...  We will now expect both SB and Seat 1 to lead a K on the turn, and Gav is probably betting a K when behind me (this is significant later).


Turn
 

SB checks, Seat 1 checks, I decide to turn my hand into a bluff here as I will often be behind to a K but Gav shouldn't have one and both SB and Seat 1 will call turn but fold river imo close to 100% vs me here (remember I haven't been caught out in any spots and always had a premium at showdown.. so they should see me as a nit).

I bet just over 1/2 pot and Gavin calls but the other two fold.  I should have thought about his range here more.. but I guess I assumed it would heavy and should have realised it would include flush draws sometimes.


River 
 

I decide to give up here, figuring that after the  hand Gavin will call more often than he should and check back his  hands or other one pair hands often.  Then he bets 1/3 to 1/2 pot... by this point this is around 40% of my remaining stack.

I try to work this out here... to see if I can ever try to rep a monster and check shove.. obv I would be repping AK only.. but also doing so pretty solidly imo.  I don't think he will ever call with a bare A and would be folding Kx a decent chunk of the time.

What flits through my mind, but not really for long is that it seems strange for him to bet here....  I might be being results orientated here but I should really have reminded myself that he would probably have bet the flop with a K.

I sigh fold and wisper to him, it'd be a nice bluff spot.  He oblidges and shows me the  for a turned FD.


ARGHHHHHH!!!! he was still pissed about being owned before and couldnt resist, but after the hand I thought about it and realised its a ridiculous bet from him and that I should've fistpump snap called as he isn't betting worse pairs than an A and the he should never have a K.  This pot would have been great for me and given me a nice 34k stack just over average.  Instead I was down to 14k and now going to be on 'life support' -ish with 35bb's.



This is where the most important part of my last years work on my game came into play.  This is where I would have made one of the biggest mistakes I see players make and would have certainly wasted both my time and the money involved.
I would have 'blown up' trying to get a stack... even though I had 35bb's!
Instead, I used my more sensible, calm self to re-set and remind myself that I have 35bb's and that basically it removes all plays/ moves from my arsenal and that we will just be playing for value from now on.

We re-nit it up and avoid a few trouble spots where we wanted to open  or  utg vs a competent table.
We carry on with watching, learning, paying attention and picking up some very reliable bet sizing tells on a couple of the players - once I see something confirmed 3 times I take it as 'fact' until I see otherwise.  Then we end up going to the break with about 12k and 20bb's.


Come back from the break a minute or so early.. to actually get our mind right and chillout. NO SPEW NO SPEW NO SPEW!  We did go out of the last DTD500 with a TPTK + NFD combo but it was in a spot where we shouldn't have got our stack in, we should have called the turn and shoved if we hit.. turns out we ran into a gutshotted bottom straight who snapped, saying "you've got a bigger straight right?" OMG wp kid.... and we didnt hit.

By now the table has changed, Seat 2 has been moved, Seat 3 has gone bust - replaced by a big stacked Adam McGuiness (know him well), Seat 4 has his starting stack, Seat 6 has our 35k! , Seat 7 has bust into PLinton - replaced by an aggressive older gent who PL seems to know.. and Seat 8 has left our table.  So the table is much better for us imo and with Adam having a lot of chips and we have a history where he will call me down lighter than I think he should I look forward to finding a hand.  Deekon is now dealing and we have chatted to him a lot in the past, really nice guy... ask him for a few hands please, it would really help.


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First hand back from break - 

Both SB and BB aren't there and we open UTG+1 ...            (hoping to get action here because of absence of blinds)
We min +25 to 1625 and the table folds right around - ok so not that unusual, we're opening a 15bb stack utg.. we should be strong.

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Second hand back from break
Now the BTN is back but the SB (Adam) isn't and we find  ... hmm this couldn't be better timing.. looks like we're stealing again and praying someone wakes up here... shame Adam isn't here as he won't be folding to me too much pre-flop.
Everyone folds again and we sigh as we look at Deekon and he realises we had it both times.. his face saying 'sorry dude I gave you something obviously...'

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Adam comes back and makes a chatty "hey, how are you" kinda comment, its nice to see him but there is certainly a look of 'dont even think about it John' in his eyes.


---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

An orbit or so later
There is an EP raise and Adam makes a small 3bt, we're back to our 16-20bb stack and find  ..... ****!!!!
How the hell can we get a call here from him when we cold 4bt shove over his 3bt when we're still 2 off the BTN?!?
ITS GOING TO LOOK LIKE WE HAVE  OR  ..... (no John.. that's what 'we' might think.. they dont!)

- Then we think about our history, can we afford to flat here? Maybe, but with his stack he is more likely to call it off pre
- Will he stack off post flop as easy or easier than pre? No
- Does he 3bt light often enough for this to be a 'move' in MP? NO!
- How big is his stack really... Will the 16k dent his table CL significantly? No, he has around 70k

So we reason the only play, despite the fact it should scream 'MONSTER' is that we have to shove.  I think he will put us on AK/ AQ too much and snap with any pair.. but almost certainly call with those hands himself.. = we should be getting called.

We shove, and he takes a minute or two.... then realises there's no way he's passing 'this hand' to John Black when it won't hurt his stack and its probably the best hand right now.  He calls with  and we hold!

BOOM! back to a playable stack and we're off to the races ladies and gentlemen!

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So........ Like a nit... we nit it up and decide our stack and table is now perfect for extracting value and dodging any kind of tough spots.. then this hand happens.

We find  and open min+25 UTG playing 30k-ish and then get really small 3bt from the 'older aggy gentleman' that PL knew, he's seemed a little too lose pre but has certainly not done anything aggressively out of line preflop.  He has shown he will call too much pre, but it was always in position (peeled  to my HJ open and bet flop n turn when checked to on  ).

I really really really hate this min3bt here.... its just so evident of hands I've played in the last 12 months when people have 'telegraphed' their hand strength to me and I've not listened.  Online, small 3bts have always been AA's...
So I decide to play this rather carefully as he covered me I thought.

I call his 3bt and we see
Flop
 

I check, and he puts out a healthy bet... I wanted to raise/ get it in here to make sure he believes I have a FD but my instinct told me that he would be barrelling the turn 100% of the time so wait till then (he will be commited with any one pair hand).

Turn
   (or other similar brick)

We check and he snap checks behind.... Hmmmm, not sure what to do on a river.. its a big'ish pot and we should always have the best hand.. but maybe he's cautious too.  If he has the dreaded AA, KK he will always vbet the river!

River
 
I check and he looks genuinely happy to see the A... My stomach lurches.. literally climbing up to strangle my Oesophagus and make sure my tongue doesn't say anything my cards can't match!
And I sigh.... then take 30 seconds... put the 'call' (turns out I have him covered but it is 80% my stack) to one side and think about this.
I announce to the table "sorry if this seems like a slow-roll, I can't see myself folding but I need to think.."
He doesn't look worried, no problem at all... I'm still sat there trying to convince myself he doesn't have AA:-


When something doesn't sit right >>> Why would he shove when it completes a flush and it probably looks like I'm drawing.. >>> It looks like I have a flush, he wouldnt try to get me off this...  >>> Then I feel like durrrrrr and realise there is no spoon >>> and despite realising that I should always be ahead... I call saying 'please show me the  sir.....'.

He stands up, laughs and shows me the  .... and I now have a massive stack... 58k and its definitely time to ROLLLLLLLL!

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From here the story is relatively short we play pretty snug on the table from there on in.. using our stack quite well and staying away from danger..Then we move tables and we're now going to have to start all over again.  We now have 50kish..

An orbit or so in and we find  and open our HJ, Finalist Paul Romain peels his BTN and one of the blinds comes along.

Flop
 

Pretty good flop considering our hand/ image (new to table) and we decide a cbet is manditory.. We stick to our 1/2 pot sizing and Paul takes some time then calls (he's playing 80k or so, has us covered).  We don't think he will have a monster here very often, my 'stereo-typing' of him (which is rarely wrong in a big way) is that he seems like an experienced player (- he seems very comfortable at the table), who probably doesn't play GTO poker, and may have a tighter range pre/ as a result may not find the fold button often.

I don't think he will hero me with a K through 3 streets, but will likely fold to a 2nd barell with worse than tp and obv we have lots of outsies!

Turn
    Oh hello dere!!!

Pretty good to make the nuts first hand vs a guy we "now hope" doesn't fold too often....
We take some time and work out stack sizes, raise sizes.. and stack:pot ratios if we do X, Y or Z... We remind ourself that players of this 'stero-type' will rarely do the betting for us, so we have to bet!
We decide a larger size is definitely the way, maybe even overbetting the pot.. but resign to a 4/5 pot bet.. making a river shove a perfect just over pot size. (lovely for bluffs and value imo).

We bet 4/5 pot and he takes very little time in 3.5x-ing our raise... OMFG! he has  and he slowplayed the flop... - boomtown!
We're always shoving now, with it being just over a min-raise back to him... but we decide that its possible he might only have one pair here... and if he does we need to make sure we get called.  So we take the longest we've ever taken to shove the nuts in any hand of poker we've played ever.... close to 3 minutes.. with mumbling and talking to ourselves.. Imagining what it's going to be like to have 110K when the average is 37K and then wait some more..... finally we say "I'm all in"

Paul checks - "did he say all in??? I call."

F***MyFMFMFLFDJDOFJDSOFM life... he only snaps with QJ... and he rolls over  for a chop pot.... SIGGGH!

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Nothing much else happens and we only seen one more pot of significance involving Paul (who at this point has about 120k)

Where he raises CO and BB flats...

Flop
  

BB checks, Paul bets 1/2 pot, BB Craises to 3.5x and Paul takes a few seconds then declares All in, BB sighs and calls...

Paul - 
BB - 
And we're off to the races in a ridiculous spot worth about 140k when the average is only 38/40k.

Turn
  - BB takes the lead

River
  - Pauls retakes the pot with a full house! mbn sir..


The BB storms off in disgust but there is a lot of commotion as the dealer realises that the BB has Paul covered and that he has around 14k left..

Next hand he shoves his SB over Pauls raise and I cold call  knowing that Paul is never going to get out of line here..
He calls and we see

Flop

I check, he checks..

Turn
 
I check, he checks.. going to value bet any river now..

River
 
I bet 11k, and he folds... the BB shows down  for a now chopped pot.. FFS! That was 27K that would've boosted my stack by like 40%.

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We don't do much else for quite a while, some small pots here and there... we realise that the table is actually quite good and that there quite a few chips up for grabs if we can make a hand! (I'm starting to realise deep down that live poker shouldn't involve a lot of bluffing - yay = learning!)

We find  again and open (some nice starting hands yes, but we've been very patient tbh!)
We get 3 callers, Paul in CO and the two blinds..

Flop
 

SB Checks, BB Checks and we bet around 4/5 pot with the intention of setting up a turn pot sized shove even if we only get one caller, Paul folds, SB folds and BB hesitantly shoves - covering us.

We snap his hesitant shove, knowing he hasn't got a set 'this time'... and he turns over  ! He exclaims "****!" and I'm loving life! we're about to get back into a good stack again with 2.5x avg and a great table... CMON SON! 91% here we are!

Turn
  - In my head I'm like "Don't you ****ing dare mate..... don't even think about it...."

River
  - GG, WP, NH, mbsf-jkldjflkdfkjdsgfhdskjghdsfldsjhf-nice

He explains his shove by saying "I thought you had  so I shoved..." - ty ty ty sir.

And this gentlemen then goes on to finish the day in the top 5 chipstacks and not even cash I believe... This is the bit that makes me most upset... I'm completely happy with the way I played, but I know.. for certain that winning that pot on that table would really set me up well for a solid run.  Nevermind, next time then please.



Well that was my DTD500 report...
I hope you survived it, that you enjoyed it, and would appreciate all comments......... Next month if I'm around I'll be there! £70K 1st please!!!!

I finished the day playing a little bit of 50/1 cash and lost a bowl (of rice = not a lot).. but played well and only missed one spot where I folded  pre and it came  and a deepstacked player who has massive tells and can't release a pair, had the  and I would have received a full £300 double up.. sigh @ £5 disciplined SB folds...........


Now onto BRoll commitments...

[jgcblack]

The phrase tl;dr was invented for that post.

I appreciate that mate... sorry but this is me.

Soooo Bankrolls.


Live - I have £585 in cash as a small tourny roll/ small punts in 50/1 or 1/1 games. 
- Insanely small I understand, however the tournys will likely be £50 fo's..
- Might speculate in the Luton friday £100... I have a sick record in that comp.. played 6/7 won 2 (£1800/£2200), 6th in another (hero calling 1/2 CL stack with on  when nit shoved for 1.5x pot - AA obv)
- I will also be putting £1k of my recent overtime into this 'pool'... It's definitely a 'short' roll by most live MTT standards.. but tbh in the super 50's/ sub £100 comps.. my edge is significant. 
- The super 50 is a big target of mine, having finaled it 3 times in the last 3 months.. 2x with CL, winning one and 6th the other two times. (one was an aggy blowup/ other JJ vs A10 + Btn into BB 2orbits in a row). I find if i run 0ev then its just flexible enough for me to crush though... and when in last 60 I absolutely destroy that tournament.

Online - I play sats on DTD and 10NL on Stars
DTD - £483.27
- This is for satellites into the GP, 6max, DTD150 and DTD500...
- This will involved 1 or 2 £100 re-entry 10 seat shots.. so far 2/3 then hitting the £4's and £20's to get into it.
- I have played some 25 + 50 NL on DTD and crushed it so I may even look at some 25NL to build up for the end of month 'sats'

Stars - $395.13 for 10NL
- Have a couple of $10 rewards to claim
- I realise this is kinda the bottom of a sensible bankroll my plan is 40bi's at each level... by the time I get to $1000 for 25NL I am sure I will be able to move up very quickly... the big jumps will be 50NL/ 50NL HU and 100NL.
- Had a bit of spew when I started (played at a mates house and exploded $300) but now steadily winning over last 8 sessions, up $285 over 6150 hands.. with about -$45EV.  Works out at a good rate if i can keep it up.
- I'm playing 6-8 'fast' tables at a time, and find I only ever seem to 'lose' a stack when I'm either super cold decked, getting 10-20%'d or running into the abso-top of peoples ranges... I'm winning so much at NSD, taking pots of regs and fish alike.
- I make a lot of notes and try to use that to experiment pre and post flop..
- I'm much better with the ol 'fold' button now, which is massive for a 'live' player! You have to realise how many river calls I can make live that just are never ever calls online.
- I don't want to go to more than 10 tables at the moment... I want to still be making notes and adjusting to the reg's... my understanding of winning at cash poker is that you use 'standard' lines/ hand combos to play the fish or softer players and you need to be 'thinking' when approaching the regs - I have a few things already that I do which they despise and have no defense to = FUN!!!



Should there be any BRoll problems I have a spare bedroom in my house, and I will rent it out Mon-Fri to a local professional, in Milton Keynes this isn't too hard.. for approx £400/450 per month bankroll only money.

Also, we have a Super 50 seat for free from the DTD cash promotions... (so sick if I can bink another for £3k to give me a 'proper' start!)


And failing all of the above I will discuss any live/ online staking deals that I am offerred (if) and go from there.

I am now a member of TPE (tournament poker edge) and am loving all their vids.. and with my job taking me abroad often, I will be spending a regular 5-10 hours/ week studying and working on my MTT and Cash games maybe more as I need to watch a series a couple of times to really absorb the info/ ideas.  DC member ship yet to be sorted.... on the way - honest.


And then I guess its just to the 2012 winning. yes please.




Right, I've done it... time for sleep.  Been here since 7pm when I got home - 6 hours of typing. FML!

[jgcblack]

Tonight grind..

Went to the gym first, so was feeling a little pumped and healthy but I think the pumped meant a few random spazzy bluffs, nothing major.. I gave up on 3 pots I remember that I was right to... which in the past I might not have and would've lost a lot on the last bullet.

101.3 minutes
870 hands
Results               -$26.70
Ev adjusted         -$20.61
VPIP                   27.7
PFR                    21.3
3bt%                    9.0
Agg Fact            1.74
WTSD%             31.8
W$SD%             48.2


Nothing special really... didnt play my best.. maybe 7.5/10.  Need to properly focus, I had the tv on a programe rather than the music channels.  I had to stop early as a mate came over who's having trouble with his ex and the soon to be mother of his child, so we sat and had a grown up discussion about what we know about women - hmmmmm....

Think I officially made friends with Pleno today, I'm looking forward to picking his brains about some HU stuff.. but mainly making friends with people that are good and active in poker is good networking and as he is into discussion and study groups I hope I can help him too.

night all.

x

[WotRTheChances]

Got half-way through and felt I had to continue as i'd already read a small book.

Certainly seems like you are making some improvements on your game from some of the early PHA posts. Although still notice quite a few thoughts being aired about spots you want to turn hands into bluffs etc, which are just so rarely required live I would probably look to cut this out of your game almost completely. I would challenge you to find me more than 1 live player at Dusk who thinks they have made profit lifetime from bluffing live players.

In particular the thoughts of bluffing on that 76554 board vs TomK and the other guy are nasty... i know you didnt, but dont even think about it in that spot.

Very much dislike leading the turn with your TT in a 4-way pot on an AK high board.

From what I can remember the rest was all standard/fine/good so good job.

p.s. having read the bankroll breakdown, I hope I don't see any more 1/2 PHA posts... seems kinda suicidal to be playing in those games, which player more like 2/5.... with the roll you have. I would advise to collate your BR and play 50/1 more live or remove most/all of this 'live roll' and move up to 25NL minimum... really want to be playing 100NL for something like meaningful money (and to test your game out a bit against some semi-competant regs).... i would do that and maybe keep some on the DTD site for satellites to live events etc.

GL

p.p.s please don't write 5000 words next time, compact HHs with concise thought-process breakdowns are fine for these kinds of spots/posts. By all means be yourself and word it how you want, but no-one (few) will read these kind of posts if they become regular

[cambridgealex]

Lol tom high. Played any 5knl recently?!

[pleno1]

The problem is, you are obviously a good player, but if you're playing NL10 there must be something wrong with your game that you haven't found out yet. If you can't currently beat NL10 or you can't afford a bigger bankroll then you should not be even thinking about playing NL100+ or Tournaments live at all. Pool all the money into one bankroll and use it for online. Study,play,play, study, post pha, study, play,move up, study, post on pha, play, play, study.

Aim to play 40k hands per month and spend 1 hour a day learning, yes you have a job and its hard but if you really want to do well in poker then that's what you have to do. If you don't want to sacrifice alot of time and effort and just want to play the odd tournament here and there and play a few side cash games in the tournament then do that and don't waste your time on NL10. You're definitely +ev in live games and you most likely will be for a long time, so if you just want to have fun and splash about then that's cool.

[tikay]

Good morning.

We get to the table and sigh... We have probably one of the toughest overall first table draws in the entire competition. 

37    1    Dean Morris -
Seen him before, understand he's a solid 'regular' player but might not be playing optimal poker.

Mixed read, that. He's not "solid", so you got that wrong, but you were right about him "not playing optimal poker".

1-1.

Fine Diary, keep it up.   

[the sicilian]

LOL

of course i'm solid..u seen the size of my shoulders ?

lol at less than optimal..i suppose that means trying early to twice bluff off 1 pair hands on paired and flushing boards

I suppose telling the bloke his got AK who then  still calls , laying QQ on a J high dry board and then getting some knob limp with 6 4 and call off a 10bb shove is playing less than optimal then i'm pretty guilty