A Real Grind

Well I have finally experienced the real grind. I left myself 40k hands to hit for the 100k prop bet in a little over a week. Problem is, I don't have a week, I have five days. I need to get the hands out of the way by Friday so I can take a couple of days off before i head out to the WSOP. Meaning 8k hands a day is needed. Now I only 12 table so it becomes a huge amount of hands. On Monday I managed to play 9700 and yesterday I logged 8k. Ive settled into a routine of waking up at 4am, playing until noon, sleeping until 4pm and then playing from 5pm - 11pm and then heading back to bed. Not much of a life but it works and for five days I can do anything. Monday was a complete nightmare, I got into a $260 hole early, managed to grind my way back out of the hole to be up a small amount before plummeting back down and ending the day -$223. Nothing more demoralizing than playing that many hands and ending in the negative. Surprisingly, all it did was provide me with the motivation to crush on Tuesday. I managed to win $412 yesterday, which brings a smile to anyone's face. Day 3 is about to start now, updates to follow.

Also an intriguing question to close, If you knew someone was multi accounting but they were a 90/3 fish down $6k and the biggest whale you know, would you report them ? (Think Guy Laliberte of the micros.) For obvious reasons the name of the person wont be revealed, just interested in the responses

Random Updates

Going to just throw down a quick update of the past week as it has been super busy, which has left me with little time to update. Poker, touch wood, has been going well. I think that the shock of last month's poor performance made me really focus on my months results and thankfully for me it seems to have paid off. I'm winning at a rate that I think is acceptable and my confidence in my game is coming back. Its amazing how much of a confidence game poker is. I should manage to hit 100k hands for the month which will enable me to win my piece of the 100k prop bets.

I managed to sell off all 80% of my WSOP shares on 2+2 in about 16 hours and am now committed to playing events #8, 23 and 45. Event #8 and #45 will be on my stake and then I will pay for event #23 myself. I sent off my pre-registration form for event #8 today, as it is on June 2nd and I only arrive in Vegas June 1st. The last thing that I want to do is arrive and find out the event is sold out. I can see myself being more organized than I was last year and I think that I will reap the benefits of it. My schedule is set and gives me a couple of days off between events so that I can recover and always be at 100%. As I'm a huge soccer fan I won't play on any day that England is playing because I expect to be drinking in a bar and to be honest watching soccer is more important to me than poker. Its a way of life almost.

I've still got a little bit more money to earn before I have my monetary goal to take out to Vegas with me but I expect that to be hit with a few days to spare. This will allow me to take a few days off and recharge before the 18 hour drive!!! Really looking forward to meeting the guys that are staying in the house, I speak to most of them daily on AIM/Skype and I know I will learn so much from them during my stay. They are some of the biggest winners at the micros, so being around them can't be anything but good for my game.

I swapped 10% with Flippn Corner on 2+2 in the miniFTOPS main event and he gave me as good of a sweat as Ready2Win. After min-cashing myself, I watched FC end up finishing 90th. Such a sick result in a field of 14k and was a nice $1k score for him. With $150k for first though, I wont lie to you and say that I didn't think about what I could do with my share of such a huge score.

Off to play live tonight in a very juicy game. Good luck me.

So Close to a Bink

I wanted to use this as a shout out to a fellow grinder that went so close to binking a huge score last night. I was approached by Ready2Win earlier this month about the possibility of buying a small percentage of him in a couple of the upcoming miniFTOPS. I think he has a great understanding of the game, so I jumped at the chance to get on board. I shipped him the agreed % and didnt think much about it. Being the guy that he is, he jumped on AIM before the event and told me it was starting and that he would update me at the end.

The tournament was a 4x Shootout, where the winner of each table advances to another table against the winners of the previous round. Well he won his first table quickly and advanced to his second table and again swept aside his opponents to be in the final 81. This is a solid achievement already as it started with 2200 runners. Sadly at this point, I had to leave and couldnt follow the rest of the sweat. Turns out R2W finished a hugely respectable 35th place, losing a flip when 4 handed at his 3rd table. I picked up a tremendous return on my investment and certainly will be looking to be on board the next time he is looking to get rid of a %.

Hopefully I can return the favor to him when i play the WSOP events this summer as he has a % of me in those.

Busy with Poker

Seems that I have so much poker related stuff on my plate lately. Got a podcast to do with Mal and Gareth today, which will be fun as usual. I've got to get some coaching out of the way as I'm busy this weekend with moving and then I've got to get my hands in for my prop bets and also Vegas money. I'm on pace to hit the goals I set for May so I'm happy.

On a stake note I have sold 33% of my 2 WSOP events so far in less than a day so I'm hopeful I will manage to sell the 70-80% I need to play it.

WSOP Stake

With Vegas rapidly approaching I have committed to a tournament schedule that should give me a good chance at making a deep run once or twice.

June:

5th Golden Nugget $135

10th Venetian $350

12th Golden Nugget $135

13th WSOP $1000

17th Venetian $350

19th Golden Nugget $135

22nd Venetian $350

26th Golden Nugget $135

27th GN Sat to ME $135

28th GN Sat to ME $135

July:

1st Venetian $350

Im also looking to sell off shares to a couple of $1500 WSOP events that I have made a thread about on 2+2. If anyone has any interest in buying a piece of me, let me know by posting in the thread.

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/163/staking-selling-shares/selling-shares-wsop-event-8-event-45-1500-a-780869/#post18815407

April Review

April Goals: -
[ ] 100k hands (less bc im in Cleveland with Nfeugo20 and Vizer02 watching the Rangers v Indians)
[x] Continue with more 100pl if the games are good
[ ] Final Table MTT .... one time
[ ] Focus on playing A game at all times
[x] More coaching
[ ] Exercise and get mentally ready for 6 weeks in Vegas

Results : -

Online: +$698

Live: +$1070

Rakeback: +$768

Coaching: +$225

Staking: +$343

Total: +$3110

I don't think I've ever been more embarrassed to post a PT 3 graph in my life. Words don't express how upset I am at myself for the performance I put up in April. If I was a major leaguer I'd of gotten demoted to AAA. For 30 days, I turned into one of the people that I make money from. I was an absolute station, if there was a bet to be called, I was in there raising my hand and volunteering. Half pot bet on the river, I call, pot bet on the river, I call, overbet shove (must be a bluff), i call. Simply put if there was a call to make I made it and the results show that it was an epic fail.

There were some bright spots in the month too though. Staking went a lot better than I expected. We managed to find a grinder that has a real talent for the game and if it were not for outside influences, he certainly wouldn't need to be staked. Luckily for us though, we have an agreement that is suitable to both parties and the extra money earned really came in handy. Live poker was also a success, managed to score a few cashes in my local Wednesday night game which helped to pad the coffers. I also played my first live casino session in 2010 and although after an hour I was bored out of my mind, I managed to book a nice profit. Need to play some more in May to get myself ready for Vegas in June and July.

Coaching is continuing to go from strength to strength and I can see my students really getting a grasp of what I have been telling them. To see students come to me and be happy with the sessions we are having is really rewarding. I think there is a big month around the corner for a few of them and hopefully one of them will be ready to move up to a higher limit pretty soon. Once a couple of students have completed the intensive side of our coaching then I will post some testimonials from them on here. Nothing is better for new students than satisfied old students.

I've really began to focus so much more on my game in the first two days of May and it has really shown in the results. I'm assigning ranges better, betting in the correct spots and also, most importantly, finding that fold button.

May will be pretty busy with preparing for Vegas and also some other things on the personal front but I want to hit 120k hands this month and really put in the hours. I'm in Ready 2 Win's 100k prop bet so I don't want to have to ship him $100 at the end of the month.

May Goals: -
[ ] 120k hands
[ ] Continue with more 100pl if the games are good
[ ] Final Table MTT .... one time
[ ] Focus on playing A game at all times
[ ] More coaching / staking
[ ] Exercise and get mentally ready for 6 weeks in Vegas