Welcome

Hello all, welcome to my online poker blog.

I've been playing on and off for a decade after being introduced by a friend.

I played regularly for a few years during the poker boom and had a decent record at the micros, particularly Rush and Zoom No Limit Hold'em games (here's one of my graphs).

Around 2012 I began a new career which involved immersing myself completely in study in my spare time, so I had little to no time for poker. However recently this burden has eased and so I have been gradually dipping back in.

I'm an amateur player who still hopes to some day beat the rake.





Monday 2 August 2010

Buy-in Won

Just finished play for the day, managed to claw back a buy-in; I had managed to almost clear the deficit but then things started going badly again. Despite this though I think I played another great session, and the only hand that I played poorly was a bit of a cooler. I think I should have got away from my hand but at the time I could not. Let me explain... I flatted an unknown players UTG raise with AKo, and a 30/26 player flatted in late position. On a KK9dd board the original raiser checked and I put out a pot sized bet. LP raised pot - but then UTG flatted. At this point, I think that I should have folded but I somehow convinced myself that there was enough flush draws and kings in LP player's range (a player who was very loose and aggressive) that I could stack off. In spots where there are so few combinations of hands that beat me I'm very reluctant to fold... Often correctly so. But this is the exception I think. Anyway, I'll continue to try and play my best and hopefully beat the break even stretch I'm experiencing and be back at 25NL in the next few weeks.

4 comments:

  1. How did you get on with StoxEV? I've been thinking lately that I'm still not thinking in terms of ranges properly (in fact I'm probably fooling myself entirely and still putting opponents on exact hands and thinking 'oh that's in his range' as though that's the way to do it).

    Just wondering if stoxEV helped at all in this regard, or whether you gave up on it?

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  2. btw, it was this 2p2 post that is making me relook at ranges again; http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/33/books-publications/secrets-short-handed-no-limit-holdem-danny-ashman-turned-my-world-upside-down-409512/

    (RedJoker's posts)

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  3. Hey, thanks for the link RedJoker's posts were very insightful. I've bookmarked the thread.
    About StoxEV - I haven't got around to buying it yet although it's something high on my list of purchases. I have used a free alternative called pokerazor (discontinued but I found someone who posted the installer on 2+2) - to analyse a few spots. But unfortunately the hands have to be programmed in so it takes time. StoxEV allows us to load hands so I think it could be a lot more helpful. In so far as it helps to think about ranges, I want the software so that I can try and achieve some insight into optimal play given a hand versus a villain range; so that if I struggle in a hand such as the one above I can put in some realistic ranges and find out if I am better off getting the money in, folding or I'm indifferent between the two. But unfortunately I haven't bought it yet! The most helpful thing with ranges for me so far in my learning has been combo counting. I don't know if you've done any of this but on the board KK9 there are (subtracting my AK cards) 3 combs of AK and 3 combs of 99 so I'm 50% to be up against the same hand so my equity is actually much better than I used to guess it was (assuming he'll get it in with AK on this board). If you'd like to discuss any hands at all maybe we can do some range analysis in your forum? I'm very new to thinking about ranges also so I'd really find this beneficial

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