-$400

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

The big pay day still isn't coming unfortunately, and the pressure I'm putting on myself to make progress is mounting. My experiences at NL$1000 have been very frustrating so far and tonight was to be my most exasperating evening yet.

I bought in for $400 and played solid poker for around an hour running it up to $850. I had a good handle on the players at the table and was dealing with just one tricky player, two rocks and the remaining players were varieties of seafood. My blind had been getting beasted all night long by a particular player and with a near full stack and 810d facing his CO raise I decided to take a flop with a view to making a stand/play. The flop didn't suit a pre-flop raiser at 5,5,7r and so I made a check-raise play. To cut a lengthy story short it was ill timed - yet again - and I chopped my stack back to the starting $400 by the time I realised I was screwed. I don't have the hand history as Pokertracker hasn't picked it up for some reason - it's the second hand in two days that I've gone looking for and haven't found so I'll have to watch for that.

My only NL$1000 mistakes so far have been constructing bluffs whereby I've usually over-valued the 'thinking' capacity of my villains largely on account of the level. I'm sure I can scope out some great bluffing potential if I ever had 50+ times the buy in for NL$1000 but for now I think I'll take anything other than standard c-bet or 2 barrel bluffs out of my game. They are just causing heartache.

Over the next half an hour there was various shifts in the table and I found myself babysitting an entire shoal of fish on what was my most lucrative table of $5/10 yet. Furthermore, one of them had $4000+ although the term 'fish' is perhaps a little unfair for him as he had some weaknesses in his game but wasn't completely daft. I proceeded to be as card and situation dead as you can possibly imagine for the next hour and a half. It was so boring, so tiring and so frustrating. If I found myself hitting on this table my bankroll could go through the roof in a short space of time.

My table stats dropped to an absolute rock like 15/14/ such that when I did get AA a few times I took no more than the $15 in blinds! My CO/BTN options were of the order of J4o, Q7o vs loose blinds that would defend a wide range of hands! With only a half stack to work with it just wasn't worth it (not that it would be full stacked!). Finally, after hours of waiting I get the following hand, the results of which I feel are self-explanatory:

Full Tilt Poker - No Limit Hold'em Cash Game - $5/$10 Blinds - 6 Players - (http://www.legopoker.com/hh)

SB: $487.50
BB: $1,052.00
UTG: $4,576.65
MP: $871.90
CO: $957.50
Hero (BTN): $359.50

Preflop: Hero is dealt Ah Kh (6 Players)

UTG calls $10.00, 2 folds,
Hero raises to $45.00, SB calls $40.00, BB folds, UTG calls $35.00

Flop: ($145) 5c Kc 5s (3 Players)

SB checks, UTG bets $65.00, Hero raises all-in to $314.50, SB raises all-in to $442.50, UTG folds Uncalled bet of $128.00 returned to SB

Turn: ($839) 9c (2 Players - 2 All-In)

River: ($839) Ts (2 Players - 2 All-In)

Pot Size: $839.00 ($3 Rake)

SB had Ad Ac (two pair, Aces and Fives) and WON (+$476.50) Hero had Ah Kh (two pair, Kings and Fives) and LOST (-$359.50)

And so I'm $400 down for the evening and will be forced to take another $200 investment onto the NL$400 or $600 tables and try to work it up again for another shot. All the while I was forced to watch fish come and go on the table with $300 cashing out $1000+ through either luck or catching some nice hands. I've played 12 hours of NL$600 and NL$1000 waiting for my chance and have still not even had so much as a double up from a full stack position.

Finally, to really chuck a spanner in the works I was told today I might not get my 2 weeks off for my annual holiday up north. Now if I was totally career minded and committed to my job I'd view that as par for the course but I'm not, and I simply can't tolerate the thought of not going away with my friends. It could be the push factor that influences me to take a dramatic plunge into poker. I just need the freaking bankroll to at least give me a fighting chance; something of the order of $15,000 would at least allow me to operate at NL$200 and $400.

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