yikes

Just a quick update...

Ive got my desktop back now so am playing on there rather than my laptop. As a result my December results are split between the laptop and the desktop which means you'll have to wait a little while longer for stats etc as ill play 99% on my desktop again now but it'll take some time to grow some new graphs with reasonable volume.

I have just played my worst ever set of sngs hence me blogging to get away from the tables.... Just lost every flip and when i got it in good, lost as well :(
I'll post my Decemember graph from the last few days (since i got my desktop back) below. Look at my adjusted EV line and that sum up the session i just had... lol

GREEN = actual profit  RED = EV adjusted profit

And here is my sharkscope graph from Decemember 1st through to November 18th for all sngs.

Just as i slowly started clawing back some profits and moving upwards again i just have a $200 losing session. So demoralising... I guess i just need to put some more volume in really as my average games per day is pretty naff at the moment. I should be aiming to average 75 games+ a day ideally rather than my current 24/day average...

I'll leave it there for now and go get some rest instead i think.

Prop Bets, running bad and dodgy computers

I'll keep this short as im not feeling too great and its a quick update so i can moan :)

We'll start with the positives - This bit wont take long at all! Im +$495.10 so far this month (even after my $219 downswing earlier tonight) which works out at 11.5% roi. Almost 2 weeks in and thats a lot less profit than i'd planned... Im guessing a lot of the reasoning behind that is volume though.

Bad Beat

Apart from being in profit for the month so far, the last few days have been poor. My desktops gone in for repair so i've been playing on my laptop a lot with an extra monitor plugged in. This was working fine but recently its been really laggy with the tables which has caused me to time out unknowingly and misclick etc which tilts me more than any bad beats. Hopefully the desktop should be back soon and im hoping to get a new one in a few months time if i keep doing ok at the tables.

Apart from the odd small upwsing, the games seem a real grind at the moment which is damaging my motivation - theres no way i'll hit platinum now this month as my volumes been really down on what id planned. Guess ill just maintain my Goldstar this month then crack on in the new year chasing Supernova.

After my losing session i thought id try to sort out my sngwizard which i cant seem to get to work. After messing with the settings and hand history folder locations for over an hour, i got nowhere so cant even review my play and see how bad ive been playing... *sigh* and to add to my frustrations, i think ive messed up my import settings for HE Manager which just makes me even more work.

Moving up.... Then back down :(

My bankroll got upto about $2900 so i decided to start playing some $27's mixed in with the $16's and a couple of $38 ones. Having sharkscoped the 27s and 38s, there seem to be a lot more fishy/losing players in them than at the 16s even. Can anyone shed some light on why? Im not sure if that means ill get a better roi in them - i cant imagine this could be the case but im a bit confused as to why there are so many regs in the 16s when these 27s and 38s are starting up full of people taking shots and losing players.

Any ideas?

My stats in the 27s were ok untill this evening when i think i barely cashed in any of the ones i played so its plumeted back into the red now! I've played 30 $27's and am showing a loss of $45...
in the 2 $38's i played ive got 2 2nds so have a +$113 profit from those. Huge sample size i know! lol

I'll post some pics from HE Manager once i have my desktop back rather than bore you with text...

MTT SnGs?

One thing playing on my mind a lot is whether i should start playing more mtt sngs.
Im showing a 50% roi in the $12 45 seaters and have a solid idea of how to play them. Ive just avoided them in the past because of the variance but my bankroll should easily be big enough for these games so i dont see why i shouldnt play them more. I just feel like i should stick grinding the stts as ive been doing ok at them. High volume in the 45s is still a bit of an unknown!

Has anyone looked into which is more profitable at these kind of stakes? STTs v 45 seaters on stars. Would be intersting to know a solid players $/hr rate from each...
I know which is higher for me at the moment but theres no way i can maintain my current $/hr rate in the 45s over high volume.

Prop Bets...

Ive never been big into betting and gambling but with all these prop bets about on the internet at the moment, my appetite had been wetted somewhat! My friends (who's grinding a bankroll up at the $6.50s) decided to propose one to me which i took up the offer of. Starting today over the next 2 weeks, taking him upto 11:59:59 ET on December 24th, He'sgoing to grind his way to Platinum star in just the $6.50 stts.

To the big grinders that may sound fairly easy going but considering the max number of games he'd ever played in 1 day was 150 i thought it was an ok bet so with odds of 100/80 (i pay him $100 if he does it, he gives me $80 if he fails) - He basically has to average about 140 sngs a day for 2 weeks.

So far today his volumes been insane and he's winning quite steadily as well which is making me feel awful (This makes me sound super mean - I really wanna see him do well, but i also want to win! lol). Not only am i feeling like ive already lost the bet after 1 day, but he's on an upswing right when ive gone and lost about 30% of my months earnings in less than 2 hours...

Fingers crossed things pick up a bit tomorrow! *sleeps*

p.s. Apologies - This post didnt stay too short - If you read my blog, you'll soon get used to my ramblings :)

November Roundup.

November was quite a mixed month but on the whole i'm quite pleased with my progress.
My good run continued for a few days after my last post but then the last week of November was a real grind making no progress at all... Struggling to breakeven most days as you can see from my sharkscope graph below...

Sharkscope graph for the $16 & $6.50 STTs (1st November - 31st November)

 
I finished the month +$1427.80 overall in profit from all my poker activities but also released $200 worth of bonus which brought my months total to +$1627.80
 
I'm pleased with my profits for the month although i can see scope to do even better as i barely played the first week of November and the last week was a real grind as you can see....
 
Ive been multitabling sets of about 13 games, using Tableninja to auto register which makes things easier.
 
Whereas i was feeling very positive about things halfway through the month im now feeling just a little disillusioned by my breakeven run at the end of the month. Im not sure what more i can do to improve my roi% which stands at 9% for the month. I mean, i know thats quite a respectable roi for 9 seater sngs which are what make up 99.9% of the sngs tracked this month but its almost all come from the good run. If i keep running badly through December i'm worried im going to lose faith and heart. We'll battle on though so see what happens :)
 
I joined sng grinders this month and i actually think their videos are pretty good from what ive watched. Very well explained and clear. I am planning on moving into playing more mtt sngs over time because of the better rois that are possible the less regs/need to table select - not that i table select that much as you dont really need to in the $16 games. I just put off starting a new session if there are a lot of regs registered in the games. You're always going to get 1 or 2 though and even some of the regs at $16 stakes are pretty poor so theres not too much to worry about.
 
Finally, i've been reading a lot of blogs by various sng pros etc and have updated my blog list on the right hand side for anyone who happens to want some good reading material to help inspire them. Some of their profits still amaze me and give me something to really work towards.
 
Oh and as a closing note - I went from Bronzestar straight up to Goldstar fairly easily on Stars last month. I'm going to aim for Platinum star this month but its going to be very touch and go whether i'll reach it, especially with the festive activities later this month. It's something to aim for nonetheless...
 
Happy Holidays!

Blogaments

Hey ho - its a been  while again since i last posted and quite a lots changed.
Im currently feeling pretty rough with flu/cold (no changes there  then) so thought id take this opportunity to update here.

This month ive finally got over some big mental barrier ive had for ages re: multitabling and putting in volume.
For some reason i decided to start multitabling the $16 sngs - 12 or so at a time and its been going pretty well. Ive been playing for about 2 hours a day on average playing between 20-50 sngs a day... I know ill hit a downswing soon but ive been doing fairly well at them and seeing pretty consistent profits and results.

Stats for November so far...
SnGs played:  256
ROI:              17.7%
ITM%:           43%
Hours Played: 21.2
Rake:             $256
Profits:           $723.50
$/hr:               $34.07
 
small sample size i know but im still happy with the results. I dont feel ive been running amazingly well either. Ive seen my fair share of coolers over the past few, the biggest being my full house on a KQQAJ board - me holding AQ - villain has KT and hit the runner runner royal flush to scoop it.
 
Right... i typed all that earlier then never posted it. Been to the ice hockey now with its stupidly late face off time. I cant seem to get any pics to save on here atm... the laptops playing up with copy paste :( next time ill try to get some graphs etc up here

Its been a while!

I haven't updated this for months so thought I'd get back to it. Thinking i should really change the blog title too seeing as i never got going in the cash games - i was winning at a reasonable rate but playing at low stakes the rake was killing it and i just found it a grind...

May actually went downhill a bit after my last post... i actually ended the month +$735.23 in profit which isn't too shabby considering my volume. trouble is $72 of it was from a bonus i finally released and another $604.50 was from playing one of my step 4 sngs and winning a seat into a big tourney which i then unregistered from and sold the W$ online. my actual play for May only netted me about $58 profit.

I played what was quite a big live tourney for me in Aspers, Swansea on May 31st. I satellited in online for $11 to the £135 buy in tourney. It was to launch Roberto and Antoni Romanellos new poker site - 'One Way Poker'. It was quite cool to play a relatively low buy in tourney with a decent structure which had attracted a few big name pros off the UK circuit. Ive played loads of pro's in online tournies but its not the same as playing them face to face in a live environment. Played on the same table as Full Tilt Pro Andrew Feldman and Micky Wernick.
I actually played well and was among the chip leaders heading into dinner break but it was all downhill from there. Card dead and then whenever you picked up a mid pocket pair there'd be a raise from utg and a re raise before it got to you so they'd go into the muck. I ran J's into Q's then eventually shoved 78suited from the cut off, 1st into the pot only to walk straight into A's and finished just short of the cash after what was a very long day :( A good experience all the same though!

June was a reasonable month finishing +$638.72 in profit most of which came from 2 deep finishes in Plo8 and Nlo8 mtt's! Must be beginners luck as I've only just learned this game but really enjoy it! Picked up a 2nd place and a 1st place finish. Also got a bit of profit from the Nlo8 cash games on Stars...

July on the other hand wasn't so great. i played a lot more sngs which were a real grind and didn't get any tourney scores really which didn't help. Eventually finished -$101.67 for the month. Think its only my 2nd or 3rd ever losing month!

August started even worse than July... I switched to multi tabling the $12 45 seat sngs on Stars with little success... I'd previously done well in them but was obviously suffering a bit of a downswing! I was actually in quite a deep hole heading towards the end of the month but then managed to get heads up in another Nlo8 mtt where we dealt for $544 profit and then 2 days later got another 2nd place finish in a Full Tilt $8.80 mtt which meant i eventually finished the month +$176.41 - Not great but much better then the loss i was heading for before the 2 mtt scores!

And so we come to September - the start of autumn... Darker earlier in the evenings and the start of Ice Hockey season again :) 7 days into September now and Ive not been well for much of it so not put in much volume (not that i normally do when I'm well mind! lol). Think I'm slightly down for the month so far but nothing to drastic and no real scores to report just yet. Hopefully they'll come. I'm getting the impression from reviewing my last few months i should really revert back to concentrating on mtt's. I'd like to have a crack at the wcoops but cant really afford to so planning on hopefully selling part of myself or swapping % with someone - If anyone fancies a deal get in touch.

I went down to watch the final table of the GUKPT Cardiff tourney yesterday which was cool. Awesome final table line up:

1st Karl Mahrenholz £38,700
2nd Iwan Jones £24,200
3rd Craig Swotton £17,400
4th Andreas Hoivold £10,800
5th Jon Kalmar £7,800
6th Tristan McDonald £6,000
7th Andreas Papantoniou £4,800
8th James Martin £3,600
9th Daniel Nutt £2,500

Congrats to Karl - an excellent display of patience. After going to the Final table Jon calming made a pretty brutal play against him with ATos v Karls K's early on. 1st card to hit the flop was of course the A which cost Karl 2/3rds of his stack! As well as Iwan Jones and Papa - the local lads. And James Martin who seemed like a nice guy and not from too far afield.

Also, to finish, I'd like to extend a big congrats to Henry Griffiths who successfully completed the Blackbelt Poker training scheme and is now a Blackbelt Poker sponsored pro under the watchful eye of Mr Channing.

Marvellous :)

increased volume

Only a few days after my last post and I'm posting again! Somethings surely wrong! :)

Just a bit bored actually and having wasted nearly my entire trading bankroll on Betfair and my software having now expired, i decided to take a few days off from trading and revert back to what i know best... poker.

$44 profit from a few sngs on the 1st
$68 profit from a few more sngs on the 2nd
$130 profit from a PLO mtt 6th out of 405 on the 3rd
should've done better but went card dead on the final table and got it all in on the turn with the nuts against the same hand only he had a flush draw too which naturally hit on the river to send me home in 6th which was a little cruel. I'm happy to be final tabling again and oddly doing so in plo!
$80 profit from some HU and 6max PLO cash games on the 4th

had a night out on the 5th and then not played again tonight as haven't been in the right mind set but I'm pleased to be able to report 4 days of straight profits and +$321 running total from May so far...

Just waiting for the negative variance to kick in and send me running back to the trading software now. haha I'll keep whoever may possibly read this updated :)

Furious!

So... Its been over a month since i last posted and the main reason is that i haven't exactly played much! Aprils total is +$104.67 most of that is from once tourney win in a $5 mixed PLO/PLHE tourney on Full Tilt... I think its been my quietest month poker wise for the past couple of years.
A couple of reasons being i simply haven't had the drive to play and as a result, haven't been playing well when i do so I'm only playing when i feel like it and have the drive to win and not just get bored and donk out an hour in...

The other reason is I've found another type of potentially +EV betting in the shape of betting market trading on betfair using some software i bought called bet angel... http://www.betangel.com/

Inspired by this blog which Ive been reading - http://adamheathcote.blogspot.com/ i decided to give it a shot seeing as i never used my small poker bankroll on betfair. I could definitely see the potential to make good profits from trading however it's been a pretty steep learning curve and I've made quite a few mistakes which have far outweighed my profits but i see as an education and an education isn't cheap... Its the best way for me to learn though.

I feel good about my trading and potential. i just keep making some very costly errors. For example, i noticed a trend on a horse in one race where i thought the price was about to drift so intended to lay it and then back it after the price had drifted to give me my net profit... instead i unknowingly jumped on at the correct time and off at the perfect time only show a loss. it took me a few secs to work out why but I'd only gone and clicked the wrong side of the ladder and backed the horse before it drifted and then layed it after!

I kept struggling with some of the bigger odds horses with my small bankroll so took £100 out of my Cake poker bankroll and put it on betfair to trade and learn with which was going fine.

I lost about £20 on the F1 as made the mistake of chasing the odds which never came back and also a similar loss on a horse race where i let it go in play (a habit I'm slowly getting out of now which is good). I know its not +EV to let the races go in play.

Today has been quite sweet but also VERY sour. I decided to trade the Rome semi final game (which is actually still on and a very good match!) Federer v Djokovic... Tennis is awesome for trading and usually quite profitable even for me, especially a closely matched game like this! I usually end up a few £ up trading with about £50 or so which is OK however i was about £18 after the first set which felt good as i was trading well and playing it safe. I could finally see myself making strides forward and becoming profitable! Then there was a rain delay so i took some time away from the PC and came back... still no play so decided to have a look at the horse races. Made a few mistakes in the first race jumping on the price movements at the wrong end every time but managed to salvage a £1 loss then next race i was quickly a few £ up only to then throw it away again and end up a few pence in profit. THEN came the disaster race...

Goodwood 14.55, i clicked on the next race after trading punchestown thinking i had about 10 mins till the off and immediately noticed a lot of price movement on the favourite so i tried to back it. Being low odds it used up almost my entire bankroll trying to back it then i thought I'd missed it and then while trying to check, Bet angel decided to freeze for about a minute so i couldn't do anything. When it came back on i suddenly realised what had happened!

I'd not noticed that the Punchestown race and Goodwood had both started at the same time so i had basically opened my trade on the favourite while it was in play! The fact it had then frozen meant by the time i could do anything the race had finished and of course my mistake punished hard as the favourite came in 3rd and ive had to wave good bye to my £150!

My new Betfair bank balance stands at £15.99

I don't really want to put money back in, especially if I'm going to make stupid rushed trades like that and blow the lot so am not really sure what to do now. I feel frustrated as its not as if Ive lost it from making bad trades. It was just me being blind and jumping in as i was starting to get a bit too confident with it!

Horse Racing: -GBP231.74 Ice Hockey: -GBP4.97 Motor Sport: -GBP19.12 Rugby Union: -GBP10.00 Tennis: -GBP9.76 Total P&L: -GBP275.59

so far from profitable for me atm.... lol the motor sport loss was from chasing as Ive already said so was basically a punt rather than trading, the rugby was a bet on the 6 nations on wales.. the tennis should be in profit but it doesn't include today's profits, i lost £19 on one game, again chasing odds, i don't even remember the hockey bet but it would've been a punt rather than trading as the ice hockey markets don't have much liquidity.
The horse racing losses are largely from trading so admittedly i need to improve but as i say, £150 of that is from today so i don't class £81 as a bad price to pay if i can be profitable from now on.

I think it'll take me a few more months of trading before i can be consistently profitable from it and if I'm not making money by the end of the summer I'll just leave it as its eating into my poker profits...

I'm going to shut up my ramblings now and just enjoy the rest of this tennis match without the stress of trading it!

If anyone reads this and is interested in trading or currently trades please drop me a message as i could do with someone to talk over trades with, just like in poker. It should be mutually beneficial :)

Sigh all round...

I should've known that having posted a relatively positive post last time it'd all be downhill from there on and it really has been!

Pretty much every tourney Ive played Ive bubbled - put in the hours with no return :( The razz cash games have been a big grind varying from small profit sessions to big losses which overall means ive dropped a fair amount of my previous profits in the last few days!
Still in profit for the month but only just. currently standing at just +$163.12

Equally as negative is the situation with the Finnish girl i met. I am genuinely baffled. Never been so lost for words before. Everything started out so well then things went quiet which is fair enough but the total apparent lack of reason behind everything after the very positive start just baffles me. I'd been nothing but friendly and really feel like i was at least due a reason but despite asking the replies were very few and far between and not exactly explanatory... sigh. I'm not too sure how to feel. I'm a bit disappointed as thought it could've been cool to have a local to show me around when/if i visit later this year for the rally (and the reason i liked her although that doesn't bother me now as shes proved herself to be a bit false!). I almost feel bad for her because she's really done nothing good for herself or her country while over here. We discussed how we perceived the French to be a bit rude but what I've seen from her is the most rudely i think Ive ever been treated, especially considering the apparent lack of justification. Ahh well, i guess its her that'll be missing out and best of luck to anyone else who tries to 'befriend' her. hehe
Perhaps I'm being a bit sour so i apologise if i come across like that - i am a little disappointed i guess but I'm kinda happy i know where i stand now rather than being messed around. Not that anyone even reads this so i guess it doesn't matter what i write! haha

I just hope that her fellow Finns are a bit more warm than she has been when we visit!

On a slightly more positive note... The F1 starts this weekend! yay! I've just watched the 1st practice session which was nice to be able to do. It's nice to have the season underway again. Also, playoff time in the hockey now so exciting times ahead :)

Despite being messed about by the only girl I've properly let my guard down around for years and seemingly being unable to win ANYTHING at the poker tables - I'm in a surprisingly happy and positive mood.

Result :)

Razzing it up...

Sooo... another update.
Ive had yet another change of interest on the poker front in my quest to find a profitable game. I think i may have cracked it (saying this will probably trigger a huge downswing though so expect a negative post in a few days! haha) and it comes in the form of Razz. Ive always found razz to be profitable but never really put much time into it. Ive played it every night for a few hours a go for the past week now though and had pretty good results. playing anywhere between $1/2 and $3/6 (although i did take a total punt at $8/16 as there were a couple of players i had marked as fishy sat at the table) and have managed to yield some decent scores. +$205 tonight, +$153 yesterday, +$71 the day before. obviously Ive also had a few losing days but overall its proved a successful venture to begin with! All this action is over on Full Tilt as i cant stand the razz on Stars. Pokerstars use much smaller antes than Full Tilt which leads to their games being significantly tighter than those on Full Tilt which doesn't seem to suit my style of play.
Its helped my bankroll out a lot though as I'm +$572 for March so far... 95% of that is from the past few days!

Ive continued to play some tourneys on the side as well but haven't had any luck in these recently. I seem to bubble everything i play which is a bit frustrating but we'll grind on and hopefully hit form again one day :)

Devils have got their act together and strung together a pretty good run at the end of the season having won their last 5 games. Final game of the season later today and then we head into the Playoffs which are always a good watch!

I'll finish on a slightly less positive note but I've gotta keep my chin! hehe I mentioned having met 'Jutta' from Finland in my last post. We went on a 'date' down the bay and to the hockey which seemed to go OK, or at least i thought. She seems entirely uninterested in even contacting me since though - no idea what i did wrong but its been playing on my mind for ages. I'm still hoping that she sticks to her word and we get to go on a few day trips or things in the future, even if it is just as friends as I'd love to have been able to keep in touch and be on good terms. Fingers crossed that she is just busy with uni at the moment and gets in touch again but I'm not going to gold my breath :( Still interested in Finland though and seriously considering going over for Rally Finland later this year... should be a good crack. Would've been better to have my own Finnish tour guide/friend to accompany me on the trip though :) sigh... life goes on. hehe

My sleeping has been dire recently. Its 6.35am now so i really should at least start thinking about getting some sleep before the ice hockey later today!

Over and out for now.
See you at the tables!

Life, Poker & some other stuff...

Evening,

Coming upto a month since i last posted and not a lot has changed! Pokers still proving a grind and nowhere near as profitable as it used to be... I think it's a combination of the games getting tougher and my boredom of it and as a result, not sticking at one format which is having a negative effect on my game. I really hope the US change their legislation on online gaming soon to bring some new players to the game again which may help reignite my interest! I have to be honest - i only like the game if i can win - i only play for the money and at the moment, my hourly rate isn't great so its not really worth my effort. I dont have much else to do in the middle of the night though apart from sleep and that'd just be dull! :)

I finished Feb +42.22 (yep showing a tiny profit)... Better than a loss though so i guess i cant complain too much. I havent seen nice profits since i stopped playing the MTT's but i really dont have the time or interest to play them anymore. Dilemma! I thought id found the route to a steady income the other week with the double or nothing sngs. i could easily multitable upto 12 and was showing consistent profits of about $20 p/hour then suddenly went on a nasty downswing over a few sessions which just disheartened me and i havent returned since. *sigh*

Ice hockey hasn't been much better recently. Devils can't seem to win anything! well... maybe thats a bit of an exageration but they cant win the important games! I feel like want to get on the ice and play for them! haha But as you may have guessed, im still no closer to playing. I should have a bit more spare cash next month though so will go out and buy some kit hopefully!
Another crazy idea ive just gotten is about taking up some Mixed Martial Arts or Jujitsu. Not sure why as im not the fighting type but it'd be nice to know i could stand up for myself if need be. Not that i dont think i could now ofcourse... i'd like to learn some submission holds though! lol

I've also got a new found interest in Scandinavia and Finland in particular! Ive always loved that part of the world for its nature, forest lakes and ofcourse rallying but always been put off by the language barrier. I met a girl the other night on one of my rare outing to Cardiff while i was a tad drunk who's from Finland and i instantly got on with her well! It's so interesting to get to know about her culture and language and also to teach her and show her Wales as she seems pretty interested. I think im going to enjoy the coming months! Should be fun and educational. Im seriously considering going over there at the start of August for Rally Finland if things go well which'd be awesome. We'll see how things work out :)

Really bored at the moment, hence typing here! Pokers boring, Maple Leafs are losing so i cant be bothered wiith watching that either and UFC doesnt start till 3am and ive got to be up by midday tomorrow so i think i may be having a short nights sleep :)

ok so i didnt post this ages ago as i was thinking perhpas Jutta would read it but i guess ive probably written very little that she doesnt already know so i'll post it anyway. UFC's well underway now. Not too bad so far...

Back on topic

Welcome to Feb... Another new month already here! Time just seems to fly by these days!
I hadn't played a huge amount of poker again so far this year. Started out just playing some smaller tourneys for fun in Jan and actually picked up a few nice results, albeit with small prize money as they were only low stakes.

Final tabled a smaller $11 tourney on Full Tilt on Jan 2nd paying about $90 profit
1st/199 in a $5 mtt on pkr on jan 12th giving about $250 profit
6/130 in a $16.50 mtt again on pkr on jan 19th giving about $80 profit
1st/36 in a $3 rebuy PLO mtt on jan 30th on pkr giving about $100 profit

These scores helped me to a profitable month showing + $358.41 in Jan
Far from a lot but considering the stakes and amount i played its not too bad.

Feb so far has seen me move back on topic a bit more with this blogs title as Ive started working on my heads up game and been playing (and actually enjoying!) HU cash on a few different sites.

I had quite a bad couple of days recently which got me down a bit as i lost $86 (not a lot considering i was playing $50NL but still a fair bit for me as i am not playing brilliant bankroll management seeing as i only have about 10 buy ins) and this was made even worse by the fact i was almost $100 up then just went on tilt i think, coupled with tiredness made me quite a annoyed with myself! I took a few days off over the weekend as i was quite busy with rallying and ice hockey on the Saturday and away in Coventry for an ice hockey away game on Sunday!
played when i got home the sunday evening though and played quite well i think but ended up down another $85 which was pretty disheartening while my confidence is pretty low seeing as I'm still learning through card runners vids.

Came back to the tables this evening for a couple hours and had a pretty good evening, played a total of 8 different tables and ended each of them in profit! ending the night $156.94 in profit which was nice considering the previous few days results. It was made sweeter by the fact i lost an all in with a full stack in one of my latter matches vs a very aggressive opponent who was 4 betting me 75% of the time i 3bet! i decided AJ suited was well ahead of his 4betting range but got unlucky to run into K's which stood up. I then battled back though as i thought i could outplay him and profit from his aggressiveness which was a good plan as i ended up sitting with $165 in front of me by the time he'd left the table...

I know its only low stakes and not a huge amount of money but as Ive mentioned before, my bankroll is a bit fragile at the moment as i cashed out quite a bit towards the end of last year so having any size able amount of cash at the tables is a bit frightening. lol

The weathers been quite interesting recently with all the snow and ice. Been out skidding plenty of times through the lanes recently and had plenty of dodgy moments where we almost disappeared through the hedges! lol Managed to hang on to it most the times bar one where i was properly messing about and just could get the front end to bite again after a big power slide and we ironically collected an Ice warning sign! lol Was pretty funny but caused quite a bit of damage to the front end so i had to buy a new headlight and spent about 3 days hammering out the huge dents so the cracked bumper and radiator mounts all lines up properly again and so i could shut the bonnet! The cars still looking a bit dented but i bought it for rallying so I'm sure it'll see plenty more in the way of ditches etc before its days are up! lol

Anyway, regarding my new years resolutions:

• Guitars coming on OK... can play a bit and starting to feel a bit more relaxed while playing now which makes it easier.
• No big wins in the poker just yet as Ive already reported, hopefully my steady Jan will be the start of some steady profits this year! The HU games certainly seem pretty profitable, if a little volatile! lol
• MPH Motor sport has made some progress but the previous plans have been put on hold for the time being and we've got some pretty exciting plans on the media side of things though which should hopefully build our profile and make some nice cash on the side.
• Haven't competed in any more rallies yet this year so obviously haven't made any progress here
• Not got any closer to starting up in the hockey
• Done a bit of extra exercise around the house etc but there's still room for improvement! lol

Think that's about all for now.

Merry Xmas & a Happy New Year!

It's 2009 already! crazy... Seems like only a year ago it was the new Millennium.

I'm not a huge fan of the New Year to be honest. I don't really get it... It's an excuse for a party as far as i can see so its not really my scene but you cant really avoid it so may as well join in. lol

I haven't posted in a while, main reason being, i haven't had much to post about! I haven't played much at all over the festive period. Decembers been another flat month in general and continues my dull end to the year. I end December in profit which is one thing i guess, even if it is just +$56.07... the last few days weren't very kind to say the least. I've been playing well i think in the multi table tourneys, as Ive said before, i really feel at home playing them! Just don't have a sensible enough bankroll to be able to realistically play them within my limits! I have my age old problem though still which I'm not quite sure how to fix! I'll be grinding away, playing really solid poker when about 2 hours in I'll just go insane with a random hand. usually having around average chips, I'll pick up say a small pocket pair and then go mad and somehow get all my chips in on 'safe' flop convincing myself the other guy is trying to bully me off the hand. I naturally get it all in, usually V's A's or similar and deservedly lose, often near the bubble. I'm then left thinking how badly i played the hand and not understanding why i did it. lol If anyone can shed some light on why i do this please feel free to tell me as you'll be able to win me a lot of cash! lol

I've had a better time playing the steps on Stars, which i was playing mainly to build my fpp's. i think Ive kinda given in with my attempts of trying to get my bonus which expires end of Jan... i need to find about 2000 fpp's before then which really isn't going to happen at the limits i play and given my current very dented bankroll! I do however have 2 step 4 tickets which i need to play hoping i can get at least 1 step 6 ticket out of it which i plan to hang on to and use to sat into a wsop event in the summer. that's the plan - long way to go yet mind!

So... New Years resolutions, I'll make some up just for fun then see if i can hit them. Not necessarily poker related, just things i want to achieve in 2009.

• Learn to play acoustic guitar to a 'reasonable' standard... I've already started working towards this having bought myself a nice one to learn on for £190 in the sales just after xmas.
• Win over $1000 again in a poker tourney which should be doable.. and I'm going to aim to win over $5000 from one tourney although i think ill struggle to achieve that one!
• Continue to study poker and consistently win online again - i need some help from the poker gods on this one!
• Build MPH Motor sport Ltd into a professional company and hopefully have a turnover in excess of £10,000 by the end of 2009 working on it part time... (My hobby company on the side)
• Compete in a National B status Rally as a driver and win a class as a navigator on a Road event!
• Actually get around to buying some ice hockey equipment and start learning to play.
• Get fitter, kinda tied in with the above, but something i need to do!

Finally, kinda tied in with some of the above, I'd like to become self sufficient! I want to earn my own income as opposed to relying on the company with dad as it's not going to be around forever! Especially given the current economic climate which is hitting us quite hard at the moment!

Anyway, enough of the doom and gloom and apologies for getting a bit personal, i had to type my resolutions somewhere though so where better than the poker blog! lol

Best of Luck to you all in 2009!

See you at the Tables!