Well that sucked.

I played in the Sebok Twitter tourney on UB yesterday. Here is how it went.

1. Had 99 UTG....just limped. Had 4 callers.....flopped quads and had no action (even with straight and flush draws on board).
2. Had a couple of decent starting hands...raised and everyone folded.
3. Had pocket 3's....called in the blinds from an MP raiser. Flopped a set, checked with intention to check-raise...raiser checked behind....turn brought king....eventually money went in.....he had pocket kings.

Sigh...ah well...was hoping for a better result. Back to grinding cash games....tournaments are for the birds.....

Still grinding for Seeb's tourney.

I originally made my $10 deposit on UB for 2 reasons.

1. To get an automatic $10 bonus to add to my bankroll.
2. To take a shot at Joe Sebok's tournament this weekend.

After a couple of down sessions, I've been tightening up a little bit and am now showing some positive results. My goal is to try to grind up the buy-in for this tournament ($5.50) so I can play it without compromising my small UB bankroll.

So far, playing .01/.02, I've been able to grind out 1/2 my buyin.

The tournament has a lot of overlay with bounties plus other prizes so I have to take a shot at it. Wish me luck. Hell, one bounty is $500 bucks....

And then things turn around.....

Of course, after that blog of nothing going right...now things are going well. This game is a weird one.

One guy decided to slow play his aces last night and got caught when I made trip deuces on the turn. Classic example of aces winning a small pot or losing a big one. He doubled my stack at the time. Add a couple more sessions previously where things went okay and now I'm happy.

I've been alternating back and forth between playing one game at a time or playing two at a time. I may continue to play just one game concentrating on that one or go down one level to multi-table...just a thought.

Going to try to grind some more money on UB for that Sebok tourney next weekend which I really want to play. The cost would be a quarter of my money on that site...but there is a lot of overlay with the bounties and such.....so I think I should take a shot.

WSOP Academy Test Results.

In an effort to cheer myself up after my last few sessions and my overall trend this year, I decided to revisit my Academy test results from the Canadian Poker Expo last month. Here is my overall results both in the categories and weaknesses identified.

Overall score: 132 (better than 93% of people who took test..average score is 70 to 130)
Preflop: 158
Flop: 113
Turn: 121
River: 87
Bet Size: 114
Level of Aggression: Slightly less than average
Ability to Adjust to opponents: 125
Pot Odds: 143
Respecting Previous Action: 130
Strategic Move Timing: 160
Position: 160
Bluffing: 112

Specific skill areas that require more training:
1. Passive play (not betting often enough)
2. Many of your bets were too small
3. Playing too aggressively at the wrong time

So what do I think based on this?

I think that the areas I need help with are correct. I know I'm not betting enough and that my bets are too small based on their stack sizes...should probably bet more to get them commited if they want to chase their draws and such.

In looking at the numbers in general, it seems I could use some work on my post-flop play. I think the best way to do this is not to multi-table on my cash games....or just play 2 tables max.

Time to review my post-flop play....

Negative results for this year.....sort of.

Well I just reviewed my results for the year....and I'm about 1% in the red.

Really pisses me off too. Lately, I've been getting my money in with the best hand and lose....or get a cooler (e.g. turn two pair with Q5 in the blinds and a guy on button limped with Q6 and flopped two pair). Bloody hell......

I say negative results "sort of" because I've actually put a fair amount into my bankroll via bonuses, rakeback (thank god I got that on Full Tilt), and promotions (that doubled my bankroll on Full tilt).

Seems that lately that anything I do results in losing the pot. Limp and I'm outflopped....bet big, guy calls with garbage hand and sucks out...list is endless. May be time to really tighten up my hands and see if that helps even if it means I don't play much.

Poker isn't much fun when you are losing in terms of your play. I always try to tell myself that good things are around the corner...but I'm not sure there is. Here I am playing microstakes and I can't even beat that game consistently. Fuck fuck fuck.....I don't want to have to go back to limit poker but I might have to if I can't start beating micro NL. Very fucking depressing. I even use pokertableratings.com to find good tables and I STILL can't win. I have to be doing something fundamentally wrong (too small preflop raises?...not betting big enough postflop.....quite frankly I'm stuck at what to try next).

My only saving grace is my bankroll management skills. That keeps me in action and prevents spewing it all over the place. I dropped down in limits on FTP (yep back in the .01/.02 games).....haven't been winning consistently.

I think I'll have to tighten up preflop and drop things like suited connectors and such and just stick with pocket pairs and AK to AJ and maybe KQ depending on position....and play nothing else. Raise decently preflop and bet big postflop. Might be the only way to go until things turn around.