What a day. Got my ass handed to my at all different sites, unlucky in cards no kidding. Still didn’t hold me back from playing the WWdN, aka the place where people can fold a hand. Starting table included the host, Wil, once again, but he made a quick exit when he ran AQ into AA in the third hand…the rest is kind of a blur….had KK three times, brokeback held up…played a good game…three final tables in a row….and even avoided finishing 6th for the third time in a row, finished 5th and ITM this time (a few weeks back 6th was well ITM (final table was all ITM), 6th last time was the bubble, 6th this time would have been the bubble too)….presto didn’t stand a chance against KQ s000ted…oh well…it was time to make a move and double-up or die…die I did…but still happy….as it’s early, after 5am…just a quick picture dump and I’m off…

Final table, 8-handed as Kat busted out in the last hand just at we were down to nine…

Played another short session on Stars tonight, back to the roots, mano-a-mano, headsup. Boy, did I play good in those buggers, no kidding. Despite that, I lost the first match…to a suckout, no surprise there…after all you can only be beaten by a suckout if you moved in with the best of it – correct decision, score one for me, money for the donks. In the second one I trapped and trapped and I finally got him to give me all his chips, without a suckout. Nice.

The, by far, most interesting match was the third one though. It lasted for over 80 hands, which is a rare occurance in a headsup match, after all the donks can’t wait to push their stack in with TPNK. This match was different though. It was one of the better opponents and he started to hammer away at me right from the start. Some good reads later I sit pretty with a 2,5:1 chiplead and nothing much to worry about. I get him to commit his chips with the worst of it and the only thing that can save him is hitting one of his six outs. He doesn’t hit those though, instead it goes runner runner straight, yet again. I don’t feel bad though and continue my game. We battle back and forth and we’re about even again. Then I win a big one again and I’m sitting at 2:1 in chips. Then the first big laydown of the night occurs…I turn a straight, which puts three diamonds on board though. He bets substantial and I ponder my options…I mean in a headsup match the chances that he really has the flush aren’t all that big, then again, the way I’m currently running I’m almost sure that he’s got me. I lay it down and he shows the nuts. The next big laydown is a set of sevens when the ugly four flush hits the river. Loose calls on the flop and turn by my opponent, but hey, I can’t do much more than make it incorrect to draw, the rest is up to my opponent. A few hands later I lay down yet another big hand when my spidey-sense goes “uh oh” again on a pretty concealed straight board. We battle back and forth again and my chiplead is dwindling, but I’m still almost 2:1 in chips. My opponent pushes preflop on the button…I put him on a low pair and call with my A4 s00ted…he shows presto and he’s halfway out the door as the flop comes 44J…not a bad flop for my hand, lol…turn blank…river 5. Presto! Oh well…suck and resuck, what can you do. In the next orbit I finally bust him though as he calls my reraise with a dominated KQ. My AQ holds up and I finally take down the match….nice way to end the session…and a match I truely enjoyed, not because I won, but because I made correct decisions on crucial hands which ultimately led to my victory.

That’s enough poker playing for today…and as I’m almost done with all the poker books I had on my shelf, I just ordered two new ones at Amazon…Hunting Fish…and the Professor, Banker and Suicide King, should be some interesting stuff to read…and best of all they’re free, well not literally free, but as I used my last SavvyPoints (aff) on Amazon gift-certificates, they’re payed for and I still got plenty of money left to spend at Amazon…yay, bonus hunt 🙂

Not much poker to talk about in the last few days. I was madly busy with some uni stuff, so not much poker playing. When I did play though I got ripped of royally. As you may know I started a new bonus hunt at Poker.com and every since my first deposit I get kicked in the junk, big time, every time, every single god damn time.

I think this could very well become the worst bonus hunt in history, apart from maybe my nine poker disaster. Every single time I hold a good hand, I trap someone into giving me all his chips – the bad news is that every single time, at least it seems to be that way, they catch their damn miracle card, AK vs Ax, AQ vs Ax, K10 vs K7, etc etc. On the other hand I run into cold deck after cold deck. Always nice to see AJ vs AQ headsup, Ace + two rags hits the board…hmm…QQ vs Ax…no chance….Jacks vs Kx…no chance, etc etc…I’m about to lose it…even worse: as if the junk kicking isn’t bad enough, I grinded out the HUUUUGE amount of 400 Comp Points….well….only 14600 more to go….d’oh!

Maybe I should stop reading Waffles as it seems that I caught the Waffles virus*… 😉

*Waffles Virus aka opponents’ relentless runner-runner-goodness aka 80+% equals no chance aka I can trap them all I want they will find a way to get lucky aka …

So, I finally visited the PPA-site again and yes, they finally fixed their signup site, despite never getting back to me about my email complaining about it not working for people outside of the US. So, I finally had the chance to signup – bucks well spent I think! If you didn’t join already, do so, just click the banner below (no affiliate banner!)…

After getting that out of the way I started a new bonus hunt: Poker.com it is, for the chance to get my hands on another 1000 SavvyPoints. Started the bonus hunt right on the wrong foot, forgot to enter the correct signup-bonus code to get the initial deposit bonus, great! After that I multi-tabled some low-limit HE and did fairly well…running into the eventual cold-deck, but all in all it was alright. After that I threw away some money at BJ, old habits die hard. After that I fired up some SnGs in order to build the roll. Bad idea. I’ve honestly not seen that many cold decks within such a short-amount of time, seriously.

I dominated a match, I get KK vs AA lose…get JJ vs AA some hands later…I crack the Aces, nontheless I lose the match. Next match HU…66-88…okay I had a substantial chiplead, back to even, all good. A few hands later AA vs KJ…flop KKK…thank you very much. Next match second nut-flush vs nut-flush…etc etc…hell of a start, this is going to be a short ugly ride if my luck continues that way…

On another note: the bonus requirements seem to be unreal 15.000 Comp Points, then again take a second look and see that each hand in which you’re dealt in is worth 3 Comp Points, even at NL10 which equals 5000 hands. Shouldn’t be that hard after all, I guess I’ll abstain from running in too many SnGs the next few days though and instead I’ll multi some cash games, hopefully (re)building the roll…

Entered the WWdN just before it started, not that many players…the host…missing. He made it just in time though and sat down at my table, which was cool – it’s always fun to play with Wil.

Played my usually tight game, which turned to tight aggressive once I commited to a hand and wow, I was running good, sort off. Had some crucial hands for all the marbles and yes, I went in with the best and came out with the best, all the marbles. So I’m sitting pretty in chips and just prior to the final table I win another big one (flip 10-10 vs AJ) and so I sit pretty as the final table begins.

As we were only 36 players strong though, final table isn’t ITM this time. 5 spots pay so we’re still a long way to go until the bubble bursts. After a bone-headed blind-defense, I look down at a measly stack once the second break rolls around…not a pleasant spot to be in on the bubble…

I’m 6th of 6 with 5 spots paying, so I better catch something soonish. I do as I get a free look at the flop in the BB.

Dealt to Ingoal [5c Qc]

*** FLOP *** [8c 5h 8h]

ringo6624: bets 1200 < - well, if you got the 8 I'm done, if you got an overpair and limped I'm done, but I don't think so Ingoal: raises 530 to 1730 and is all-in <- all you can eat baby o-hole-ne: calls 1730 <- uh-oh ringo6624: calls 530 <- well, that was expected *** TURN *** [8c 5h 8h] [Kd] <- hmm...not really the card I wanted to see ringo6624: checks o-hole-ne: checks *** RIVER *** [8c 5h 8h Kd] [6d] <- hmmm...if that helped anyone I might as well throw up on my keyboard *** SHOW DOWN *** ringo6624: shows [3h 6h] (two pair, Eights and Sixes) Ingoal: shows [5c Qc] (two pair, Eights and Fives) o-hole-ne: shows [4h Ah] (a pair of Eights)So indeed, I went in with the best, both were flushing, it didn't get there, but the 6 on the river was enough to kill me...ouch :(Goooo...bubble boy...

All in all, I can’t be too unhappy though, played a good game, went in with the best at all times (apart from one time where I sucked out with J9 vs J10) and everything went fine until the last hand…what can you do? Apart from that ugly finish, I witnessed some of the more brutal exits…that’s another reason why I can’t feel to bad (I was 64% to win the hand, A4 was 29%, 63 was 7%)…compare that to the hand Wil lost early on AA vs AdQ with a diamond four-flush hitting the river or the following hand…can you say runner runner ROYAL FLUSH against ACES – that’s a bad beat for the ages!!!

PokerStars Game #8091395859: Tournament #40759931, $10+$1 Hold’em No Limit – Level IV (50/100) – 2007/01/23 – 21:24:54 (ET)
Table ‘40759931 1’ 9-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: jeciimd (3784 in chips)
Seat 3: BrainMc (2070 in chips)
Seat 4: GScottW (865 in chips)
Seat 5: o-hole-ne (3125 in chips)
Seat 6: A’arab Zaraq (2456 in chips)
Seat 7: gangof9 (1170 in chips)
Seat 8: VTepes (1980 in chips)
BrainMc: posts small blind 50
GScottW: posts big blind 100
*** HOLE CARDS ***
o-hole-ne: folds
A’arab Zaraq: folds
gangof9: folds
VTepes: raises 300 to 400
jeciimd: calls 400
BrainMc: folds
GScottW: raises 465 to 865 and is all-in
VTepes: folds
jeciimd: calls 465
*** FLOP *** [Js 4s Tc]
*** TURN *** [Js 4s Tc] [Kc]
*** RIVER *** [Js 4s Tc Kc] [Jc]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
GScottW: shows [Ac Qc] (a Royal Flush)
jeciimd: shows [Ah As] (two pair, Aces and Jacks)
A’arab Zaraq said, “OH”
o-hole-ne said, “wow”
GScottW collected 2180 from pot
A’arab Zaraq said, “MY”
GScottW said, “wow!”
A’arab Zaraq said, “GOD”
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 2180 | Rake 0
Board [Js 4s Tc Kc Jc]
Seat 1: jeciimd (button) showed [Ah As] and lost with two pair, Aces and Jacks
Seat 3: BrainMc (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 4: GScottW (big blind) showed [Ac Qc] and won (2180) with a Royal Flush
Seat 5: o-hole-ne folded before Flop (didn’t bet)
Seat 6: A’arab Zaraq folded before Flop (didn’t bet)
Seat 7: gangof9 folded before Flop (didn’t bet)
Seat 8: VTepes folded before Flop

P.S. Don’t even ask me while the last part of this post is one giant link, I tried everything, even reposting this, but somehow WordPress get’s the job done to totally fuck this up…oh well…

Had a blast last weekend in Austria. Drinking, drinking and drinking with the guys. Some snow on the mountain tops, not much in the lower areas, so we mostly resorted to the local pubs most of the days and nights.

I thought I could get away from Poker completely on the trip and I almost did. I didn’t play a single hand, although some of my teammates had brought a chipset and some nice PokerStars cards…it seems that the “poker virus” is spreading fast over here in germany. People who had no interest whatsoever a while back are suddenly playing (both live and online) – tells you a little about the advertising efforts of the major players in the market (PokerStars and Party), it pays off. But back to poker, the only thing I did in relation to poker was talk a little strategy and watch a rerun of the EPT while we were waiting for the others to get ready for dinner and booze.

So, I’m totally relaxed and ready to hit the tables again. Well, tbh, I already did that and it was horrible. The only upside is that my mood isn’t influenced by this (yet). I played something in the neighborhood of 15 HU SnGs and I’ve seen it all again, from the beautiful one-outer, to the usual resuck or two-outer…I even kept track of it while playing. So what’s different? I’m relaxed after the weekend break and so all I did after those beats was type a quick, “wow one outer” or “nh” in the chat and that was that. No tilting, no swearing – well, that’s a lie…I back-trashtalked as one of the suckers goes on and tells me off after sucking out on me. This was a disturbing trend tonight – move in with the best, get sucked out on and then the donk goes ahead and tells me how he “owned me”…lol…this happened in four different matches. Really classy donks…you’ll make it far in this “business”…

Some stats:

1. Times I lost to one-outer with one card to come: I

2. Times I lost to a two-outer with one card to come: II

3. Times I lost to a two-outer with two cards to come: I

4. Times I lost to a 3-8 outer: II

5. Times I lost to a 8+ outer: not counted

6. Times I lost to a runner runner straight/flush: II

7. Times I lost with dominating hands: II

8. Times I lost to the hammer with Kings: I

Being crippled after that hand: ouch

Coming back to even and then taking the chiplead: nice

Losing to a 2 outer some hands later: Priceless 😉

Well, running bad, check. Still a token remaining? Check. Log onto FullTilt, see what’s going on…find a FTOPS satellite to event #1, 35 entrants, 1-3 ticket, 4-6 money, not bad. Register. Sit down and go card dead early on. Not bad either, at least I’m building a rock-tight image early on, this might come in handy in the middle stages. Some pots left and right and I’m hovering around the starting stack, nothing much in any direction. Sit tight, focus, wait for your spots. Prior to break one the first spot occurs, Ac10c in the BB…button makes the standard three-bet…hmm…steal? My rock-tight image should give me some resteal-fold-equity here, unless he’s really on a monster. We’ll see, I take my chances. He ponders and calls…with Kings…ouch…cold decked again? Maybe, let’s see…he doesn’t have a club, maybe there’s some life. Flop with one club, no ace to be found…turn club…river club…weeeeeee….I did what my opponents tend to do…suckout against a monster. Weeeee….so I’m 0-2 with my monsters in the last few days and 1-0 against a monster. Maybe luck comes in waves after all.

After the break the final table is approaching and I can’t help but watch my stack dwindle as I fold fold fold. Finally another shorty pushes in, I look down at A6o and decide to go with it. He shows A4o…we chop on AJ93J board…still short, but at least we got some blowups coming up, gotta love big-stack vs big-stack on a draw-heavy board, especially if both are drawing and willing to risk all…

Short, short…oh well…I’ll wait for a good spot and push…the good spot comes when I look down at my dreaded Kings…big-stack calls with Qc4c…flop only one club…I’m good, I’m good….turn is another club….I’m worried, I’m worried…river….blank…Thanks…back in business…We lose two players in the next orbit and we’re on the bubble. Two players are pretty short, another player and me and the others already expressed their feeling that they’ll sit it out and watch until the bust one of us. Nice. Implicit collusion, lol…a beautiful thing if you’re not short-stacked 😉

Long story short: The other small-stacks pushes every hand. By the time he does so for the third time in a row I look down at AK in the BB…now…do I fold here or push? I push…he got me covered by a little bit…and shows 99…is it just me or is it almost certain that he had two napkins the two prior pushes?!

Anyway…flop doesn’t help me all that much…runner runner straight or A or K it must be…turn gives me the straight draw, but the river is blank…so I exit in 7th…mr. bubble boy…oh well…can’t do much about it, once again no joy in a crucial hand and yes, I was the underdog, by some percent, so ‘s all good…just would have been nice to win this one and make a run at the ticket with some money secured…oh well…

That’s it for now…no tokens left, no real desire to play anymore tourneys in the immediate future (apart from maybe the occasional WWdN)…

Good thing: I won’t be tempted to play online at all as I’m heading to Austria, a weekend in the snow with the footie team. As I don’t ski or board, I’ll stick to enjoying the sun and partying my ass off, apres-ski, baby! See you all on the other side (sunday late evening, monday)…have a great weekend…

PokerStars Game #8006365327: Tournament #40897120, $5.00+$0.25
Hold’em No Limit – Match Round I, Level II (15/30) – 2007/01/18 – 18:10:34 (ET)
Table ‘40897120 1’ 2-max Seat #2 is the button
Seat 1: HOGIECRF888 (1360 in chips)
Seat 2: Ingoal (1640 in chips)
Ingoal: posts small blind 15
HOGIECRF888: posts big blind 30
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Ingoal [Qd Qc]
Ingoal: raises 60 to 90
HOGIECRF888: raises 60 to 150
Ingoal: raises 1490 to 1640 and is all-in
HOGIECRF888: calls 1210 and is all-in
*** FLOP *** [8d Qh Kh]
*** TURN *** [8d Qh Kh] [5h]
HOGIECRF888 said, “gg”
*** RIVER *** [8d Qh Kh 5h] [6h]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
HOGIECRF888: shows [Th Ac] (a flush, King high)
Ingoal: shows [Qd Qc] (three of a kind, Queens)
HOGIECRF888 collected 2720 from pot
Ingoal said, “or not”
HOGIECRF888 said, “wow”
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 2720 | Rake 0
Board [8d Qh Kh 5h 6h]
Seat 1: HOGIECRF888 (big blind) showed [Th Ac] and won (2720) with a flush, King high
Seat 2: Ingoal (button) (small blind) showed [Qd Qc] and lost with three of a kind, Queens

Can I get a hell yeah? Yeah. Can I get a hell no? No. Can I get a “fuck this bs”? Hell yeah!

Just one of these days, yet again, where I’m sitting here, typing this in silence and utter frustration. It’s starting to bother me so much, I can’t even begin to tell you. It’s like the odds are stacked against me, everytime, everytime the odds should be stacked in my advantage that is. I’ve written it over and over and it’s just as much part of poker, as sucking out yourself. It hurts though, especially if it comes down to one crucial hand, you got your opponent right where you want him, he’s nearly dead, making an incorrect play (bad call) and still you can’t win it. Now if that’s in a meaningless pot early on – hell, it bothers me, but I can brush it off, say “nice catch” and play continues. But in such crucial hands, it’s almost impossible to stay sane and surprisingly enough I kept my head up despite being on MAJOR steam.

The setup: Double shootout to the sunday million, we’re seven handed after I busted a player JJ vs J8 on an 8-high board. Blinds are at 15/30. I start the hand with 2925 in chips.
I get dealt [Ks Kh] in the SB. MP pops it to 90, standard preflop raise, cutoff calls, button folds. I ponder a re-raise, but hell…I’ll let the flop come down, the BB might reraise anyway as he’s an aggressive player. He just smooth-calls and we see a flop four-handed. – Side note: I layed down kings earlier today on such a setup as the Ace hit the turn. So not overcommiting might not be the worst thing.

Flop: [3c Tc 2h]

I lead out with 480 (pot 360). BB smooth calls again instantly. Now I think he’s either hit his set or he’s drawing to the flush. Pot is now at 1320.
Turn: [2d]

I ponder and decide that I’m going to go with my gut feeling and I push.

Ingoal: bets 2355 and is all-in

He ponders for around 20 seconds
fatjim: calls 1430 and is all-in

River…[4c]

Showdown:

Ingoal: shows [Ks Kh] (two pair, Kings and Deuces)
fatjim: shows [6c Jc] (a flush, Jack high)

Now I’m sitting there in disbelieve. How can you call off your whole stack when you a) had only 33% in the pot which not even remotely counts as pot-commited and if you’re looking at a paired board after the turn. For all I know he could have been dead by then…the way it was he was dead to 7 clubs (2c gives me the boat, Kc gives me the boat)…
Now remember, this is a shootout, so it’s all about winning the table, but is that a bad play on my part? What more can I do? Throw away my hand after the turn because the flush is going to come anyway? Are you nuts? What in the world is going on here..I’m starting to feel like I was Daniel Negreanu on the second season of HSP…every single time they suck out on my, not in the small pot…in the BIG ONE.

So…after that I’m sitting with 925 chips instead of with 5k chips…too bad…cry me a river, damn it. I didn’t tilt it off though and instead I played a mean short-stack. Doubled through another player when my JJ held up against the AJ, woohoo me. So I’m back with 2k, but still not sitting pretty. We lose two players and I’m kind of desperate with just over 1400. I look down at A10 in the cutoff. Three big stacks behind me, so I decide to push…sure enough, Mr. Suckout insta-pushes over the top…uh-oh…well..he shows JJ and damn sure, there’s no way in hell I’m going to resuck on him…and I’m out in 5th at the table…

“Crucial hand stats”:

Preflop: 83/17

Flop: 63/37

Turn: 84/16 – it’s were the money went in

Result: 0/100 – surprise surprise

After this bs, yet again, I’m seriously considering retirement from the (online) tourney scene, as I just can’t take it anymore, at least not atm. What good is it if I’m xx-xxx% better than the donks and I’m 7x-9x% favourite everytime a big pot evolves, when I get kicked in the balls precisely in that particular moment ALL THE TIME? Can someone answer me that? That’s not normal. It’s no temporary phenomenon. It’s the way it is, period. Or maybe it’s just me seeing the shadow on the wall, I don’t know, but seriously, I can’t remember the last time I won such a crucial hand going in the BIG favourite in the last xx tournaments* – SnGs are a bit different, I’m more to the normal variance there, but not in MTTs, not even close to normal. It’s like I’m Mike Matusow’s lost twin brother in bizarro world minus the blow-ups or something.

*I mean, the last time I can remember that a big hand held up for me was in the WWdN two weeks back, but still, that’s just a drop in a bucket. I mean, I played so many MTTs in the last few weeks and it’s creepy, really creepy. I mean, you can look at it that way: 84% means 84 out of 100, now we all know that those 100 don’t need to be consecutive, but let’s assume that for a moment. Then variance is kicking me in the balls, while cutting them right off of me. I mean seriously. An 84% ball is currently a 1 out of 15 shot for me and I’m not kidding. (And I don’t even start to count the other “usual things”, like the 15% balls which hit like precisely 15% of the time or the 50% balls which kick me in the junk 12 times in a row before winning one then losing six again, etc)

But enough of the ranting, I’m too fed up to even write anymore about this huge mountain of horse manure. I’m going to log off now and relax a little, and maybe I’ll come back online later on to play me some cash games to win some of my money back…we’ll see…

Here’s the original hand history…:
PokerStars Game #7988166388: Tournament #40508277, $10.70+$1.00
Hold’em No Limit – Match Round I, Level II (15/30) – 2007/01/17 – 18:03:49 (ET)
Table ‘40508277 9’ 10-max Seat #9 is the button
Seat 3: Ingoal (2925 in chips)
Seat 4: fatjim (2000 in chips)
Seat 5: soundshooter (2505 in chips)
Seat 6: jaap (2605 in chips)
Seat 9: mr2trout (1965 in chips)
Ingoal: posts small blind 15
fatjim: posts big blind 30
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Ingoal [Ks Kh]
soundshooter: raises 60 to 90
jaap: calls 90
mr2trout: folds
Ingoal: calls 75
fatjim: calls 60
*** FLOP *** [3c Tc 2h]
Ingoal: bets 480
fatjim: calls 480
soundshooter: folds
jaap: folds
*** TURN *** [3c Tc 2h] [2d]
Ingoal: bets 2355 and is all-in
fatjim: calls 1430 and is all-in
*** RIVER *** [3c Tc 2h 2d] [4c]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
Ingoal: shows [Ks Kh] (two pair, Kings and Deuces)
fatjim: shows [6c Jc] (a flush, Jack high)
fatjim collected 4180 from pot
Ingoal said, “oh god damn it”
Ingoal said, “what a call”
Ingoal said, “unreal”
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 4180 | Rake 0
Board [3c Tc 2h 2d 4c]
Seat 3: Ingoal (small blind) showed [Ks Kh] and lost with two pair, Kings and Deuces
Seat 4: fatjim (big blind) showed [6c Jc] and won (4180) with a flush, Jack high
Seat 5: soundshooter folded on the Flop
Seat 6: jaap folded on the Flop
Seat 9: mr2trout (button) folded before Flop (didn’t bet)

Do you have that inner feeling that something is going to happen sometimes? I do…it was just one of these days today…first off the donks bust my balls at Stars in PL 5-Card-Draw catching like crazy (yes, it’s an absolutely correct play to call 40% of your stack with a flush-draw, yes it’s also correct to draw three against my three jacks, as long as you catch your own set with it). Then they busted my real good in some 6-handed games on Full Tilt. It was about time I took a break, so I went to a friends house to play some Skat…nice little run and won my dinner 😉

Came back…sat down in a 90-person-SnG at Full Tilt…hadn’t played those before, seems like a good format – much like Stars’ 180s, but only half the size…everything went pretty good…made some tough laydowns Kings on a Ace high board…etc…then lost a flip AKs vs JJ…this crippled me…with just 600 and blinds of 100/200…I waited for the next playable hand and tripled up. Next time I look down at 9s..flop gives me trips and I’m back in the game…fold…fold…fold…I look down at Kings…table-captain calls in a hurry with AQ…flop all low…turn…low….river….Ace…thank you very much.

Oh well, can’t be too mad…just another day at the office…at least I had fun at the tables with some players chatting it up…I would have loved to go deep though…not going to happen if you lose such hands…finished 30th…better luck next time…