Target 1 achieved

Well, I've just reached my first target in this new double up schedule by reaching the $4000 mark and so, as promised we've got a nice new 42" Plasma and home cinema system coming next Wednesday. I'm really looking forward to that and it's nice to have something to show for it. I've still got $1000 + rakeback due at the end of the month so I'm pretty pleased at the moment and I'm just hoping this doesn't tail off.

It's funny how things work out. Up until this year live poker has always been most successful for me with my online poker providing a lot of satellite entries and a couple of direct buy ins to festival events and the cruise tournament buy ins but no regular withdrawals.

However, this year the live poker, whilst less regular due mainly to the bankroll issues with a large chunk of my live poker winnings having been put into the extension and overdraft, has resulted in a loss - again due to the cruise entries.

I'm just keeping everything crossed that I can maintain this current return from the double up tournaments and take it from there.

Anyway, with the first goal achieved it's time for a relatively early night to keep me fresh for tomorrow.

Not sure how many have qualified so far as the website is out of date showing 41 qualifiers and £52k prize pool but I'm not on the list so I am guessing that when Bluesq ut in a few players to try to recoup some of the £25k they are adding then could will be up to 100 runners.

Ok, so bed now.

Here's my double up bankroll graph from my spreadsheet:

Grand Prix

While Lewis Hamilton is hopefully winning the final grand prix of the season and the World Championship on Saturday week, I will be trying to take down the Grosvenor Grand Prix in Walsall.

I cashed in this event last year finishing 12th for £3000 and I will be hoping to improve this year.

It all happened tonight when the final table of the Grand Prix satellite was taken over by people from the Northwest with me, Jimmy Morgan, Charlie Denton, Terry Owens and Mick Fletcher plus also maybe Rob Sherwood (I'm not certain on him as he was getting called Rob and I think he was from Manchester) joining Mick McCool and a couple others. There were two seats to be won and luckily enough Charlie and I got them.

I did survive a couple of spots near the end and on one occasion when I semi bluffed into a set of five but the flush draw arrived to save me but that only made up for a couple of spots early when I had two big outdraws that made me need a couple of rebuys.

Anyway, elsewhere I have been off for a couple of days and decided to have a couple of hours on the tables during the daytime to see what the competition is like.

In all I played 29 double up tournaments this afternoon and tonight, winning 21 out of 28 for a profit of $1,043 so I was really happy with that and the new TV I promised my wife if I could make £500 whilst off looks like it's going to become a reality.

Off to bed for now....

Reality Check

I've had a bit of a reality check over the last couple of days.

As you can see from the table below I was up to $2958 last week but a couple of bad days has seen that drop drastically.

Date ROI Bankroll
16/09/2008 182% 27
22/09/2008 182% 72
25/09/2008 182% 180
26/09/2008 6% 19.5
28/09/2008 144% 251.5
29/09/2008 117% 382.5
30/09/2008 133% 579.5
01/10/2008 107% 737.5
02/10/2008 143% 1280.5
04/10/2008 86% 1056.5
06/10/2008 127% 1329.5
08/10/2008 108% 1454.5
09/10/2008 107% 1702.5
10/10/2008 122% 1738.5
13/10/2008 101% 1747.5
15/10/2008 97% 1578.5
16/10/2008 113% 2099.5
17/10/2008 144% 2958.5
18/10/2008 76% 2248.5
19/10/2008 85% 1654.5
20/10/2008 106% 1866.5


The reason for this, I think is that with my new found confidence I've been playing $100 and $200 tourneys and my ROI has dropped into the 5% range over all tournaments as you can see below.

6 Seat 10 seat All tables No of tournaments
$30 182% 182% 182% 6
$50 117% 112% 115% 68
$100 109% 112% 110% 120
$200 97% 109% 99% 92
Total 102% 112% 105% 286

I don't know whether it is a blip that was caused by me losing quite a few $200 tournaments in a row yesterday when either people were getting lucky at the right time or I was getting KK beaten by A rag or I was getting AK when someone else had AA at the bubble end of the tournaments.

Anyway, I decided to listen to the numbers yesterday and the last 11 tournaments I played were all $100 affairs and I won 8 so I'm going to stick to the $100 tournaments until my bankroll is over $4000 (assuming it gets there!)

I'm not maybe some of the regulars at the $200 level have sussed out what I'm up to or not but we'll see hopefully.

The good news is I've now reached General status on Paddy Power which gives me $500 bonus at the end of the month and if I can keep that up each month by the middle of the month I might even look at trying to get 2 ipoker skins up to the same level so that I can get two of these bonuses a month rather than having to cash in the points to get the extra few $100 worth of loyalty bonuses.

Anyway, I'm going to try to keep recording my progress here so that I can see in future months where I have been going.

Going to Leos tonight for a change since I'm off for the rest of the week whilst the kids are off.

I haven't been for a while and judging by Cashbiatch's post about a cash game, it hasn't changed much.

Nearly there

Just finished 3rd in the GUKPT satellite on blue square, 2 seats and $1100 for third.
Thought it was about time to get back on the satellite trail and came very close.
A couple of double ups after they add on break and I got through to the final table relatively untroubled. Then picked off a couple of bluffs to become chip leader with 3 to go.
My demise came up through this hand:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?3306263

difficult to get away from that one I suppose.

Never mind, another little boost to the bankroll, and more importantly it is on Bluesq so I can play a few more satellites for Blackpool so here's hoping.

Finally.....

At last a significant win in a live tourney!

I got a bit of help along the way a couple of times when I picked up AA and KK after there had been 2 all ins before.

Unfortunately the casino closes at 4 and we were still 4 handed so we they did a chip count but I still got slightly more than 2nd place even though I was 3rd in chips!

So, in the hope of making it a streak I played again last night and got as far as 17th with £1500 for the winner but unfortunately when i raised to 11000 (blinds were 1500/3000) with QQ in early position I got reraised all in for another 18000 by someone holding AA.

I did have to think about this one since the same guy had folded JJ to a reraise a few hands earlier but in the end almost half my stack was already in and he must have had a wide range than QQ.

Anyway, back to the double up tourneys tonight. I played a few on Friday and made $130 loss on the session after playing some $200 games so I'm still hopeful this will continue to work out.

I also identified a new buddy on the $200 table when I sharkscoped one of the players on the table after a couple of plays he made and sharkscope told me he has lost $35,000 playing $50, $100 and $200 tournaments. So needless to say I kept my eye out for where he was playing.

So far so good...

I thought I might have hit a reality check last night after I had played another 10 double ups, after I only won 5 of them for a small loss whilst watching Liverpool.

Although I did make a huge mistake in a $100 6 seater when there was 4 left with the blinds at 100/200. Stacks were roughly CL 4000 on the button, me on 2300 in the SB, BB with 1800 and the small stack on 800 I made up the small blind for 100 with A3 after CL limped.

Flop came down A 2 3 rainbow and I checked, SB bet 200 and CL called, I raised the pot to 1700.

Turn was a 7 or some other brick, CL checked and I put my last 200 in which he called with AA.

I really should not have been involved in the pot with the chip leader in this sort of tournament when the small stack only had 4 bb left.

If I had cashed in that tournament I would have still been on track for 16% return.

I supposed that's what happens when you are watching football and playing 4 tables, poor concentration and bad decisions.

I played another 17 or so games later and up until the last 4 I had won exactly half of them for a small loss until the final 4 all came good and I ended up $260 ish up for the night.

I'm closely monitoring these games to work out what sort of return I am getting and I've now played 70 (including 1 PLO version that I played by mistake - but still cashed)

So far I have won 45 and lost 25 for a total buy in of $4532.5 and winnings of $5270 for a profit of $737.5 which equates to a ROI of 16%.

What i haven't got time to do is to record how long each one is taking but they seem to be averaging 30-40 mins so I am putting 40 mins for each one. On that basis I am making £10 per table per hour at the moment which would be lovely to maintain long term.

What I don't know is how many I need to play before I can be statistically sure of my return.

I know if this was a normal tournament I would need a much larger sample size but because these are either win or lose the sample size doesn't need to be as big.

Anyway, I'm going to keep recording my results on here so I can chart my progess.