So…this is post 500 on this little corner of the interweb and I thought long and hard about something (special) to write about for this “anniversary post”, then again why should this post be any different than the other posts and more importantly, what would be the special thing to write about? The WSOP? I don’t think so, there’s people out there that do that much better than I could…cough…Dr. Pauly and Dr. Pauly at Pokernews. Some strategy? Nah.

So…after some deliberation I decided that post 500 would be just like any other post, a post about my daily adventures in the (live and online) poker world.

Since my last post I switch to six handed SnGs almost exclusively. They’re a little less swingy than the HU matches and although I took some sick beats, some in rapid succession, I’m still doing okay. That being said, the results could be better. But honestly, how many wins or what win percentage is (good) enough? Coming back to one of the points I already made in numerous posts: Fact #1 – I want to win every match I play. Fact #2 – That’s impossible. So for the time being, I’ll settle for more wins (or cashes) than losses and that’s exactly what happened over the last few days. Win one, bubble, bust out early, second place, bubble, win, bust out early, bubble, etc…

But enough of online play. Tonight we had a nice little bbq and afterwards we talked poker for nearly two hours. Inspired by all the strategy talk (mixed with some bad beat and crazy hand stories), we decided to play a little SnG. Things looked grim early as I got ugly cards and even uglier flops when I had the chance to look at one. Soon enough my stack was dwindling and I had to make a move – good thing that my AQ held up against AJ and I could double up. After that I made some pressure plays in position and soon enough I had a nice chip cushion. As the blinds escalated, luck seemed to be still on my side, but that changed quickly. Four handed, cutoff folds, button raises 3BB (which are substantial at that point), SB folds, I look down at 88 in the BB and decide to call. Flop comes down 965 with two spades. I check…button pushes…decision time. A call would cost me roughly 40% of my stack and I start to figure out what he could have. Raise on the button could lead to a discount of his hand, but I’m not too sure. After some deliberation I put him on the following range: A9o, AK to AJ (maybe two spades), AA to TT and A5/A6 with the Ace of spades…against that range my pure outs would be two eights and three sevens (and I’m probably dead if another spade falls). So…I think a little more and I decide to let it go, we talk and we both show our hands…he had 66 and got lucky on my ass.

Fast forward a few orbits and “lovely” 62o, 74o, etc etc later and I’m the shortest stack three handed. I look down at presto on the button and push…SB thinks and thinks and finally calls…BB folds. SB 77…flop J57 two hearts, yuck, turn heart….river heart…bad news…neither of us has a heart…so I bubble in third. Oh well…firstly I was short, secondly even if we see a flop the money will go in…thirdly…better luck next time…I’m out…time to catch some sleep before we, hopefully, claim the football championship tomorrow…booze galore…cya on the other side (probably later monday or tuesday ;-))

Yesterday, TripJax tagged me with the 7 Things Meme, but I was too tilted to even think about what I could write about…one good night’s sleep later and here it goes: A few days ago TripJax tagged me with the 7 Things… Meme…as I was a little tilted that night and went off to Cologne the following day, I didn’t have the time to do it…but now it’s done…so without further ado…7 (random) things…

1. Once upon a time, more than ten years ago, I was really into martial arts, Karate to be precise. I was pretty good too and I had some even better training partners – one of them has won numerous german and international titles by now. I had training instruction by the then reigning european champion. My specialty were Katas and although I liked Kumite it was the reason I finally quit, after breaking my wrist and almost missing some important stuff at school. I quit with the blue belt (5th Kyu). Karate taught me a lot about patience and self-control.

2. I’m always interested in learning new things. Because of that I’m considered “an expert” (aka the dude who knows something about that) in many areas, particularly in “the geek zone” (everything computer and gadget). That can be a blessing and a curse…if I had a dollar (euro) for every time someone starts a sentence with “Du wie ist denn das mit…” (Hey, do you know how …) I would be mighty rich…

3. Although my written english is considered fair to good by most people, my conversation skills aren’t up to par. The explanation is simple: written – plenty of practice via blogging and working as a mod (sitepoint.com, etc), spoken – no practice. The only time I had to speak english in the last few years was when I had to confirm my address and stuff with Neteller, lol. Oh well, I guess I’ll have the chance to do some brushing up once I finally hit Vegas in the future (after finishing my uni degree, see 6.), hopefully during a WPBT classic and/or the WSOP…

4. I’m a sucker for tv shows and original movies (not translated into german). My favourite tv shows (past and present) include amongst others: Charmed, Buffy, Angel, Dark Angel, er, Las Vegas, Heroes, High Stakes Poker, Simpsons, Family Guy, American Dad, Cops, Pimp My Ride, “reality shows” (Hogan Knows Best, Osbournes, Runs House)…movies are too many to mention. Why do I like to watch the original version of shows/movies? Because most nuances and (inside) jokes are not translatable and so they’re usually translated with the german (language area) equivalent and tbh that takes away from the movies, a lot, at least if you are able to watch and understand the original (e.g. Die Hard “Yippee-ki-yay, motherfucker.” – Stirb langsam “Yippee-ka-jee, Schweinebacke” = “Yippee-ki-yay, pig’s cheeck”…errm doesn’t have quite the same ring to it, now does it. There are many more examples, especially when there are references to current or recent events or persons and they’re totally replace with a german/european equivilant….not good…). …and by just looking at the number of shows I used to watch or watch now, it’s obvious I spend quite some time on the lazy boy, lol…

5. After quitting Karate (and table tennis before that), I picked up football (that’s soccer for the americans). It’s a pretty good way to clear your head after spending most of the day infront of some sort of screen and it’s a really good excercise (as you try to build enough stamina to play 90 minutes). While I’m only involved as a reserve these days (which means pretty rare appearances on sunday’s squad), I still train twice a week (Wed, Fri) and score my goals in training. Football is where my screen name came from, too. It consist of my real life first name (Ingo) and the word goal (Ingo(+)goal ), that’s why I don’t like it when people write about InGoal (as in goal keeper) as that’s not my position, I’m a forward/striker, damn it 😉
As for my team, I’m part of the second team of a club called FC Marbach and after dropping down to the lowest german league a few years ago, we managed to built our team back up. We finished third in the first year. Then second in the second year after the rebuild – we won the relegation match against the higher leagued team and moved up to the next higher league. Then we finished second again last year (we had the same amount of points, but score three goals less, so we didn’t win the championship) and lost the relegation match so we remained in the same league. This year, we’re fighting for the championship again (which would bring us close to our first team, which currently plays two leagues above us). There are two matches left and we’re one point clear in first position. Two Ws will secure us the championship, I just hope that we can pull it of this year as last year was such a disappointment (on top all year, than blowing it in the last three matches). Boy that would/will be a party…

6. Just like many other (poker) bloggers, I’m a software guy. I’m about to finish my university degree (my diploma thesis is about to start and after that I’ll have my degree) at the university of Stuttgart – yes, education at a german university is really lengthy thorough and rarely does anyone do it in less than 5-5 1/2 years. That being said, I really don’t like “coding” all that much, I know how to do it and I can do it, I just don’t like it. I rather do the whole conceptual (architectural) parts and client interaction and let some code monkey do his thing afterwards. Oh well, I’ve spent numerous stints in interesting companies during and prior to studying at university (DaimlerBenz, DaimlerChrysler, Bosch, etc) and started my own little computer (service) business seven years ago…combine that with my grades (which are in the 1.x level (1.0 = best) so far with only the diploma thesis to go) and I should have all the opportunities in the world…at least I hope so…

7. I drive a 1993 VW Golf III, 1.8GL (90hp) and while I like my car and it get’s me from A to B, I’ll probably get a new one once I’m (finally) done with uni. I’m thinking something with a Daimler-star on it (aka Mercedes)…oh well, maybe not, we’ll see…after all gas is getting more and more expensive over here (1l super (95 octane) = 1,4 Euro; 1 gallon = 3.785 liters; 1 gallon = 5,29 Euro ~ 7.12$) and public transportation is a good way to beat traffic and horrendous gas bills, at least during the day…then again, an old car with a bad exhaust gas rating is getting more and more expensive too (yes apart from car insurance and horrendous amounts of gas tax, you also pay horrendous amounts of taxes based on environmental impact your car has and you won’t be able to drive into most inner cities with a bad exhaust gas rating starting next year…), so I’ll need a new(er) car sometime in the near future anyway…

So, there you have it. I guess I should tag some other bloggers, but after looking through most of my blogroll, I couldn’t find anyone not tagged already…so I’m ending the tag-chain here, shame on me…if you’re reading this and you haven’t been tagged with this meme, consider yourself tagged and tell us your 7 Things (we might not know about you)…thank you 🙂

…or tomorrow, or the day after that.

Reason for tonight’s abstinence:

Reason for extended abstinence (Sa-Mo): Drinking and partying heavily in Cologne, Germany. Trip with my footie team…drink drink drink…fun times…cya on tuesday…

…of being shit out of luck, then puzzled, then tilted, then mega-tilted:

1. Being coolered the good old fashioned way: nut flush vs straight flush, boat vs boat, boat vs quads, flush vs higher flush, overpair vs higher overpair
2. Getting chased down the old fashioned way: runner runner straight, runner runner flush

3. Winning 1 of 5 coinflips

4. Losing to a guy that couldn’t even spell poker, but had the luck to turn me (catching the perfect card on the turn) 5 times in a single match before rivering me to put me out for good.

5. Not winning a single hand when AK-AT vs Ax…always a nice little chop or suckout coming (A10 vs A2…ace on the flop, 2 on the turn; AK vs A2…double paired board; AK vs AQ…chop…; AQ vs AJ…chop…;)…at least I won 0 with Ax vs A-biggerX to really make my day…
6. Winning exactly 0 hands with higher pair vs pair…the best one was on the bubble in a six handed SnG…he pushes with sixes vs my eights…I got him covered…spikes the two outer right on the flop…next hand I push in with A7 from the button…he holds A8…ty…

7. Be so tilted after yet another bs hand that you push your remaining stack in with K7 s00ted on the button just to see your opponent wake up with the real BB special (AA)…busto…

So…after that last bs six handed SnG, I finally quit, before I start to shit on the keyboard, I mean seriously, I thought I’ve seen it all and indeed I have, but seeing it all again in such a compressed format isn’t any less painful than it was the first time, or the second time, or the x-th time…good god…

Here’s a random pic dump of some lovely hands…

Better luck tomorrow…or whatever 😉

Well, well…no poker content this time, just some random -ev gambling.

After a rather quick 120km drive to Baden-Baden, we, that’s a group of friends and yours truely, arrived right at the casino. Instead of going in right away, we first had a nice dinner in the inner city. After that it was time to gamb00l in the Casino Baden-Baden. Although they got some poker tables, I wasn’t really interested in playing, so it was all about the -ev gambling. Because most tables were really crowded placing your bets wasn’t all that much fun and playing BlackJack was next to impossible. So, in the end I settled on playing roulette for most of the night, only interrupted by some beer drinking at the bar, lol.

Really sick how much money is thrown on the table in general, but even sicker how much money some experts errm system players errrm degenerates place at any given time, sick sick sick. Oh well…I guess they know what they’re doing, or maybe not. In the end, some of my mates scored some nice bets (hitting single numbers like it was nothing), no such luck for me, but hey, I knew that playing total -ev roulette wasn’t a good idea anyway, so I already had the amount I played for in the losing column of my virtual sheet tracking my results…in the end I lost a measly 70 Euro…add to that a nice dinner and some money for gas and you’ve got a nice evening with friends for 100 Euro….not a bad investment at all… 🙂

That being said, I’m more than happy to jump back into poker where the minus in front of the ev isn’t set in stone 😉

Boooooring. Nothing much going on poker wise, played a small session yesterday (3/3 HU Ws) and another session today. Got my ass handed to me for the most part, not much I could do, just the nasty little thing called short term variance in headsup play. What can you do when your kings get cracked by the mighty 52o, nines by the mighty 105o, jacks by 67o…etc etc…?! Nothing much, curse the bad run of cards and that’s that.

So…tonight I scored two NL Hold’em headsup victories, one second in a six handed SnG and one W in a PLO8 HU SnG. All in all, down something along the lines of 20 bucks…oh well…

In (not really poker related) news, I’ll be heading to Casino Baden Baden on saturday. Woohoo…casino…the excitement. Why? Because it’s going to be the first time I’m going to a real b&m casino. Surprised? You shouldn’t be…as casinos over here are nothing like Vegas or AC, it’s all about the -ev games (slots, BJ, roulette, etc). They do have a few poker tables, but I’m not really sure about the limits they’re playing and if there’s a game going on, so I’ll probably abstain from batting heads with the regulars (and why should I, when I’ve got all the games I want at my disposal – online poker + regular home game) and donk around in the -ev games a little. I guess I better check the closet tomorrow to see if my suit still fits, lol, haven’t worn one in ages and in Baden Baden it’s all James Bond style, no suit/tux with shirt and TIE, no gamb00l…

…I didn’t really need any more money in PokerStars, but hey, I’m greedy, so how can I pass the opportunity to get one of the (rare) PokerStars reload bonuses?! (Read more about it here – you’ve got until May 22nd to get your money in)

So…with the bankroll at an all-time high, lol, I decided to play some donk HU…won 5 of 5. After that I jumped into the higher level again and played a six handed SnG, bubble boy. Then a HU…freezing to death…card that gives me the nutflush gives him the boat, etc etc…so…I’m done for the day…slightly up (less than a buck)…but I don’t complain…only 728FPP to get my free 50 bucks…wheeeeeeeeeeee….

Well, well…I’m back from my expedition to cold deck mountain and boy, it was a fun ride (and nope, there’s no rant following ;))

Played a shorthanded turbo SnG, played patiently…ran queens into aces. Played a HU match…won it in two hands. Played another headsup match, freezing cold out there. It was probably the sickest match I’ve ever played. Boats, boats and more boats, two pair over two pair, runner runner flushes, runner runner boats, the whole shebang. My opponent finally put me out in the 133rd hand when he flops a straight and my flush (and chop) outs don’t come through.
After that match I’m sitting here and all that’s left to say about tonight’s play: gg, better luck next time.

As for the poker movie(s): I guess I’m reaching the saturation point when it comes to poker movies/tv shows. I’m still a big fan of HSP and I even watch the HU championship, poker after dark (once they finally get to some new tables again) and the occasional WPT, but all in all, it’s just not THAT exciting anymore. Tonight, I had a sneak peak at “Lucky You” and I’m not going to spoil it (so everyone that’s looking forward to watch it: you’re save), but come on…it’s all the usual stuff and the “climax” aka end game…yeah….right…this one isn’t going to make it into my “top poker movie/show” list, which would be…

1. Rounders

2. HSP

3. WPT

4. Cincinnati Kid

5. WSOP coverage

6. NBC stuff (HU, PAD)

or (Rounders/Cincinnati Kid), (HSP, WPT, WSOP, NBC)…atm…

Well, well…wouldn’t you know it…today is the blogfather‘s birthday. Head over to Al’s post for the birthday wishes and some (not work-safe pictures) 😉

With that out of the way, let’s get back to the daily poker donkport errm report. I played my usual stuff today, although at first a level higher than normal, then I dropped back to the normal (donk) level. Why? Not because I was on tilt or anything, I just didn’t feel too good about my play tonight. I started of with some 6 handed action at the higher level and the donkey ratio at my first table was basically 6:0…(6 regular players: 0 donkeys) no donkeys at all….nice! I bubbled when I ran A7 s00ted into AK s00ted…not funny three handed, but what can you do. In the next one, the donkey ratio was higher, but not all that high either…it was 5:1…and I got into some nice hands against the one donk, surprise surprise. He starts of like a madman and bluffs off two thirds of his stack in the first ten hands. In one of the next hands I look down at AsKs and when he does the squeeze from the cutoff, there’s no way I’m folding. He calls with the mighty 57 s00ted. Errm yeah…nicely played…flop 689…gin! So there goes one third of my stack. Win some lose some and I get involved in a hand with him again. He sucks out on the river (K8 s00ted vs my JJ) and I’m crippled…and he sits out. Nicely done sir. I win some small pots, but I can’t get any action and once the blinds hit 50/100 I’m left with less than 5BB…so the next time in the BB I push with Q9…get called by Kx…and the King holds up, I’m busto in fifth. Grrrr. Oh well…only two played so far, didn’t work out the way I hoped it would, but I’ll be back at it.

After that I played some headsup, again, one level above my normal (donk) level and I split the first two matches. After that I didn’t feel like playing anymore, but I decided to crush some morons at the donklevel to win some of my money back – that worked out pretty nicely…2 out of 3…so I’m quitting for tonight down, but not out.

As for the WWdN tonight: I won’t be playing. Yes, it’s only another 30 minutes until it starts, but I got an appointment at uni tomorrow and I don’t want to be all that messed up by playing until 5am or what not…so gl…and nn…

…that’s the realization of the night. I played in my usual donk level shorthanded SnGs and if the cards, and maybe even more important the patience to wait for real monsters, are with me, there’s no way I’m losing – apart from the (usual) hands where you push in with 85-95% edges and get outdrawn. I’m so comfortable at these (micro/low) levels now that it’s not a real challenge anymore – well, tbh there is a challenge, a big one, and that’s to stay sane amongst the biggest donkeys in the game 😉

So…I guess I’ll do what I promised myself, time and time again, and that is moving up at least one level. I’m really patient and careful and all, especially when it comes to bankroll concerns, but the bottom line is that I either gotta pump more money into the roll (which I don’t feel like doing atm) or take “the plunge” on a medium bankroll and see where that leads me. The upside of it is that this should not only help my game (moving out of the comfort zone, at least a little), but it should also help me to stay sane – assuming that the donkey ratio is more like 2:1 instead of 5:1…we’ll see…I’ll probably have the first results soonish, although I’ll take my time, so I won’t jump to any quick conclusions…wish me luck…

…oh I almost forgot…the results for tonight’s quick session: 1W, 1x 4th…