November 30th 2011 Update

Wow, sorry for the infrequency of these posts.  Life has gotten busy- midterms, extra hours at work (+ev), etc.  My hours at the tables have been less than ideal.  It wasn't until the past few days that I really got to put in some decent volume considering the lack of free time I've had.  I had another pretty tilting session.  I was on my way back from my last spill, and I decided again to shoot for some higher games.  I ended up losing $277 I think in 23's and 34's.  My ev had me at about -$25, so variance was somewhat on my side.  Still, it was no excuse to take foolish risks while trying to rebuild.

Since that day, I've spoken to jackstack and straightened myself out a bit.  I started using my HUD.  I've used it before, but never really understood how to fully apply it.  I still don't, but I'm learning not to let all of the data overwhelm me and take my focus off the game at hand.  I've crawled back the past few days with some decent sessions only at the $11.50's.  I'm still down a healthy amount, but I seem to be on the right track.

I've been trying to immerse myself in poker as much as I can.  I put videos on my phone from husng.com so I can watch during breaks at work and/or just listen to the coaches while I'm driving.  

I have another midterm tomorrow, a big project due in almost two weeks, and a final after that.  With all this on my plate, getting some games in might be tough.  If I can squeeze some games in here and there I can.  

Some quick numbers before I go (from HEM):

Loss as of 11/20/2011-  -$581.95

Loss as of 11/30/2011-  -$406.70

It's important to note that these numbers don't include my 35% rakeback, and even more importantly, when I got my new laptop and imported all the data from my previous computer, HEM was all screwed up and had my wins/losses incorrect.  I couldn't figure out how to get it to be accurate, so I just left it.  On my carbon account, I'm -$315, so HEM is off by about $100.  

That's all for tonight.  Good luck at the tables!

One of those days

Just a couple of hands to show how my entire session went today...

***** Hand History for Game 4328895366 ***** (Merge)
Tourney Hand NL Texas Hold'em - Wednesday, November 09, 08:12:08 ET 2011
Table Cougar Room  Turbo Heads Up (43288170) (Real Money)
Seat 1 is the button
Seat 1: MrJorge7 ( $1825.00 USD )
Seat 2: AreDubz ( $1175.00 USD )
MrJorge7 posts small blind [$25.00 USD].
AreDubz posts big blind [$50.00 USD].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to AreDubz [  Ah As ]
MrJorge7 calls [$25.00 USD]
AreDubz raises [$100.00 USD]
MrJorge7 raises [$1775.00 USD]
AreDubz calls [$1025.00 USD]
MrJorge7 shows [Kd, 3d ]
AreDubz shows [Ah, As ]
** Dealing Flop ** [ Td, 7d, 9s ]
** Dealing Turn ** [ Jd ]
** Dealing River ** [ Th ]
MrJorge7 wins $650.00 USD
MrJorge7 wins $2350.00 USD from main pot

***** Hand History for Game 4328816021 ***** (Merge)
Tourney Hand NL Texas Hold'em - Wednesday, November 09, 07:49:37 ET 2011
Table Cougar Room  Turbo Heads Up (43287802) (Real Money)
Seat 1 is the button
Seat 1: AreDubz ( $2445.00 USD )
Seat 2: waldie191 ( $555.00 USD )
AreDubz posts small blind [$10.00 USD].
waldie191 posts big blind [$20.00 USD].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to AreDubz [  Kc Ad ]
AreDubz raises [$30.00 USD]
waldie191 raises [$535.00 USD]
AreDubz calls [$515.00 USD]
AreDubz shows [Kc, Ad ]
waldie191 shows [As, 6d ]
** Dealing Flop ** [ 9h, Ah, 7h ]
** Dealing Turn ** [ 3d ]
** Dealing River ** [ 6c ]
waldie191 wins $1110.00 USD from main pot

***** Hand History for Game 4328601735 ***** (Merge)
Tourney Hand NL Texas Hold'em - Wednesday, November 09, 07:11:10 ET 2011
Table Cougar Room  Turbo Heads Up (43286003) (Real Money)
Seat 1 is the button
Seat 1: resultsoriented ( $1936.00 USD )
Seat 2: AreDubz ( $1064.00 USD )
resultsoriented posts small blind [$15.00 USD].
AreDubz posts big blind [$30.00 USD].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to AreDubz [  Ks Kc ]
resultsoriented raises [$55.00 USD]
AreDubz raises [$180.00 USD]
resultsoriented raises [$1866.00 USD]
AreDubz calls [$854.00 USD]
resultsoriented shows [5c, 5d ]
AreDubz shows [Ks, Kc ]
** Dealing Flop ** [ Ts, Qc, 5s ]
** Dealing Turn ** [ 3s ]
** Dealing River ** [ 3h ]
resultsoriented wins $872.00 USD
resultsoriented wins $2128.00 USD from main pot

I don't want to go on a rant with the dozen or so other hands that are nearly identical to those.  I'll just leave it where it is.

It's just one of those days.

11/6/2011 Update

Hey guys.  I'm not too good at keeping up on blog updates, it's still not a part of my routine lol.  At the moment, I am watching the WSOP final table.  I've been sitting here for four hours watching the action (or lack thereof).  While watching, I also took the time to finish setting up my new laptop that my fiancee got me as an early Christmas gift.  She's the best.  And by set it up, I basically mean install Carbon poker and spend 5 hours cursing at Hold 'em Manager to fucking work already!  That whole process totally put me on life tilt, but now that it's finally working, I feel much better.  If it doesnt work again for any reason, it's gona really annoy me.  Anyway, now that all of that is out of the way, I can update my poker news.

Ever since that big downswing, I really haven't put in the volume that I would like to.  I've played here and there, but my work schedule has been absolutely crazy the past few weeks and I didn't really want to play tired or feel rushed to squeeze games in.  I have, however, been doing a ton of studying almost every moment I can.  I've been reading The Mental Game of Poker, practicing 3-bet shove theory, and watching HokieGreg vids and taking notes, and then studying the notes I take.  My head is much more clear now (finally) after the downswing, and I've been playing the 11's until I feel comfortable again at the 23s.  My game has still been swingy, like I'll be up 50 for the day, then even, or up 100 over 2-3 days, then down 10.  My most recent few sessions I'm up like 80 so I hope I stabilize my game.  I'm going to schedule my session with PHMERC again soon, I just have to find a time where it won't interfere with school or work.  This semester is more frustrating than I thought, but it's almost over.  

That's it for now.  Thanks for checking in!

Update, 10 Days Later

So its been 10 days since my last post.  Since then I haven't played as much as I would've liked to.  I had my coaching session with PHMERC the day after my downswing and I feel it went well.  I was introduced to some brand new concepts/tools and reintroduced to things I should have known already.  Definitely money well spent.  I bought three more sessions with him to be scheduled sometime in the future after I learn the stuff that was taught to me in the first session.  I've been doing a lot of poker studying lately and I'm slowly memorizing stuff that I need to memorize.  It's hard to squeeze in study time with work and grad school, but I'm managing.  He also mailed me a copy of The Mental Game of Poker by Jared Tendler (props PHMERC).  Awesome book so far, I'm so pumped that I got it.  

My poker playing has been unstable since my downswing.  It really rattled my confidence.  Aside from that, with the studying I've been doing I haven't been able to put in good time on the felt.  The times that I have played, I've played mostly $8 super turbos just because I'm short on time.  I'm not going to play much of them, the variance is crazy high.  I find myself in a rush to get back to where I was before my downswing.  That's a leak that has to get fixed up quick.  I'm slowly getting back into the swing of it, so let's see what the next couple of weeks bring.  I'll try to update within the next few days if I'm able to get some decent volume in.  

Good luck at the tables

1 Step Forward, 5 Steps Back

As the title suggests, things haven't gone too well since my last update.  My Carbon bankroll was up to a high of $809 (+$179) and thinks were looking great.  I was playing well, making good decisions, and felt confident.  But today I took a nasty spill that I don't even want to think about.  However, this blog can't just be about when times are good, it has to capture the whole journey.  I went from $809 to $504.  A $305 downswing.  I could go on and on about the bad beats I took, the countless 95/5 favorites that I got in and lost, but I'll just leave it at this-  I lost $305 over a course of 41 games.  A lot of the time variance got the best of me, and other times I tilted away.  Either way, I have to straighten a lot of shit out with my game. 

Tomorrow I have a coaching session with PHMERC.  It's coming at a great time because right now the confidence I have in my game is a bit rattled.  I felt like I was being push around today.  Every cbet was repopped, every draw an opponent had hit, and my big hands somehow became meaningless by the river.  I'm hoping to do 1 session a week with him and really work on plugging leaks I have.

I'm trying my best to stay positive.  This is the biggest downswing I've had in online poker.  I've lost more in single sessions live, but that can happen in just 1 big hand.  To lose $300 playing games 11-34s, that means I got my ass handed to me time, after time, after time.  Not just 1 hand. 

Important things to take away from today's experience:  I am definitely susceptible to some mean tilt.  I used to brush off losses because the money didn't matter when I used to play the 5s, but since I'm trying to take this more serious it is taking a toll on me when I lose.  I have to set guidelines or rules to follow to prevent another session like this happening.  For now, these are-  if I lose 3 games in a row, get up and leave the room for a few minutes.  Walk outside, take my mind off it.  Even if I'm not feeling angry, just do it.  Another rule is related to winning- if I'm on a win streak, once the streak is broken, get up and follow rule number 1.  Moving around to clear the mind will be a good thing even after a series of wins. 

Sorry this was a long post, but it was a long day.  I remember being down $40 thinking "man, I have to get back on track", and next thing I know I'm stuck $300 wondering how did I let myself dig a hole this deep.  I'll get back up, that I'm sure.  Stay tuned guys, the comeback is about to begin.

Here's a fun little graph that shows how my day was.  Exciting, exciting... lol

10.10.2011 Update

What's up everybody.  It's been a few days since my last update, and I finally got to get a lot of games in today and yesterday.  It's been pretty roller coaster-ish, but I'm working on being more steady.  I beat myself more than anything.  Some pretty bad suckouts that really got into my head and messed me up for a few games.  It's really hard to put in the amount of volume I want to with the limited number of people on Carbon, so I started playing basically everything from the 6s up to the 23s.  The only thing I don't play in there are the supers.  

Four times in the past 2 days I accidentally joined an 11.50 omaha game.  I get so mad at myself when I do that.  It's not a strong game of mine at all.  Every time I joined one, it forced me to really be on my A game, which is a good thing, because I don't really have a grasp on omaha.  Guess what?  As luck would have it, I won all four of the mistaken omaha games I entered!  lmao.  Maybe I should change games? lol.  Hopefully I don't make that mistake again.  Carbon really needs to add an option to the filter for holdem only.  

Yesterday was a losing session.  I lost around 30-35.  My bankroll was down to 636 I think, but after today's session its up to 727.03.  Not bad for 7.5 hours lol.

Slow Couple of Days

Since my last update I haven't had much time to put in any games.  I played two games while I was on a break at work two days ago, but that ended up in two pretty bad shoves and I lost both.  I wasn't really focused on the games.  I was too distracted and felt rushed since I only had half an hour free to play.  Lesson learned- no more poker during half hour breaks.  

Later that evening, I went on to Carbon to figure out why my deposits were getting declined.  It turns out that for some reason they combined the information from my debit card and my credit card, so they had the card # for my credit card, but the expiration for the debit.  Once I corrected that, everything went smoothly.  I deposited another maximum of $300 and used a bonus code to get 10% instant cash up to $30.  Easy way to make thirty bucks.  I'll reload another $300 every month if they keep having that monthly promotion.  It will cover the currency exchange fees (which are around $10).  

I'm hoping to get some games in today.  I worked 15 hours yesterday so I'm pretty tired.  The money I made was great though because I didn't expect to pick up all those extra training sessions (I work at a gym).  

So with my recent $330 added and my two losses from the other day, my current Carbon bankroll is $665.23.  

Here are some numbers so far for the month of October:
Games=  41, ROI= 9.7%, ITM= 58.5%


Just for comparison, here are Septembers numbers:
Games= 39, ROI= -0.2%, ITM= 56.4%


I'm still trying to figure out all the HEM stuff, but that's what I've got for now.

That's all for now guys.  I'll put up another post tonight about the session (if I get to play it).  Good luck!