Poker Forum > Member Blogs

My name is VBlue and I'm a Pokerholic.

<< < (7/8) > >>

VBlue:
If it"ll get more readers Paulie then sure.  I just linked it as I link it on more than just the APAT forum.

I"ll cut and paste the blog posts into the relevant sections and see how that goes.

Thanks for looking in.

VBlue:
It"s My Party And I"ll Cry If I Want To

March has been a four-letter expletive of a month.

The STT grind has become much less enjoyable, with a 30 BI downswing currently a work still in progress. I decided that, upon doubling my reload bankroll to $400, that I would step-up to the $10 plate and 4-6 table in a bid to double up again. After noticing a single turbo table registering at any one time on ipoker during my evening playing-time slot I decided to seek out a rival site, look for a good deposit bonus, focus on the stock-filled fishing holes rather than the bigger brands, and continue in a nice upward curve.

Party seemed to be a good place to down-rod, so I found a 100% match bonus and calculated that in the required period I would be able to clear around $300-$350 worth of that bonus. Unfortunately, it seems that I then made a mistake and got caught between two bonus offers, ending up using a code which gave me $25 in my account from day one, with another $25 to follow from points earned, with a one month subscription to UK Poker News"s video training site - which would be a nice benefit had I not just bought a one month subscription to Decues Cracked with a token through belt points earned from Black Belt Poker.

I then proceeded to smash my way through the typical, though none-the-less sickening, STT downswing, made only more bearable by Kevin Williams sharing some results he had over 2k games on Stars with those who took his excellent Dojo session, entitled "Winning STTs One Hand at a Time". For those who haven"t and are playing their poker on Black Belt Poker"s skin, I highly recommend using some of your points to access one of these live skype sessions. Kevin in particular is first-class in his delivery, subject knowledge, and providing answers to questions. The main point was that a 50BI downswing over a larger winning sample of games is not to be unexpected.

Dilemnas then began to present themselves to me in spades. Would I continue to play the $10 games to try and access my bonus (at this stage I had not discovered my bonus code error) and ride out the downswing, as dropping to the $5 games on Party is not an option with their rake at that level being double that of ipoker"s? Would I ignore my lost bonus opportunity and take my roll back to Black Belt, qualify for Orange belt status again, and spin up again from the $5 levels and manage my STT bankroll as I should be? Or, would I use some of my MTT winnings to give my STT roll a boost, ride out the downswing, and with continued work on my game through ICM analysis have the heart to continue with my original plan for 2011 and put 3k STTs on the board?

Sometimes the best advice is the most simple; Sam Razavi gave this line in response to a query I raised on the Black Belt forum boards "My advice in general would be to find the game that you make most money at and focus your efforts on that. GL" Food for thought indeed, but of course the paradox is that to win at STTs you have to be prepared to lose, on occassions at least as much as 50 BIs.

The one thing that I think the Dojo session confirmed is that since this time last year the work I have put in away from the tabels and the game-time I have put in at the tables has gained me a good understanding of ICM and the low-level STT games. The focus should always be on volume first, rather than targetting results or income. As long as I continue to play well and refine my ICM game there is definitely money to be made, but with a continuing set of positive results at the low-stakes MTTs and a few near misses at adding to my win in the $1k GP I am considering switching to these and away from the STT grind, although I have to consider I am probably on the good side of variance over my small sample size.

To finish the month off I played the Orange belt freeroll last night on Black Belt; two seats available, worth £150 each, at an Academy day at London"s Victoria Casino and an opportunity to finally meet some of the team and fellow players. I raised a lot of pots early and took them down, in the main unchallenged, to slowly grow my stack and take up 2nd spot. With only sixteen players, includign four sit-outs, I started to think about winning a seat. When I found a flush draw with an over-card to the flop and doubled-up when putting my opponent all-in I held the chip lead and I regained it in time for the 2nd break. However, after missing an earlier similar spot, I finally fell in 5th place when getting it in with A9 vs an utg raise with K9from the loosest player at the tournament and seeing two kings hit the board.

My volume has suffered throughout March, probably due to my downswing and not feeling comfortable playing on Party (it"s hard to settle in when you"re just losing) and I need to clear my mind, re-focus my efforts, make some decisions after dwelling on them sufficiently, and kick-start things back into action. A curve-ball has just been thrown my way in the last few days, but I"ll discuss that in a future blog.

VBlue:
Always the Bridesmaid, Never The Bride

Long summer days in the sun, drawn out evenings having drinks in the park, weekends in the Lakes, the local festival scene - just a few things that I can look forward to missing out on again this Summer as I grind a 60 hour week at the bookies, earning a living - of sorts.

Of course, it is times like this that you look around you and think "why am I doing this" and "how do I do less and make more money" and playing online poker may offer some alternative to the bad beat of a minimum wage employed existence.

I wanted to continue to refine and define my focus this month and after an attempt to get something going with some of the community members on Black Belt Poker playing MTTs, I decided, after a short break, to put a post on their boards calling out to the low-stakes STT players. Inspired by boyhood TV heros the A-Team, I set out to form a crack-unit of STT commandos, to work alongside to smash a return over the coming months.

I put in some time thinking about the purpose of the exercise (to maximise returns), how we could benefit from working with each other (pooled learning, different views and experience, software knowledge, game and opponent knowledge) and I also wanted to take a look at whether we could find a mentor. The mentor route is something I feel we could do as a group and I have some ideas which I will detail next time.

Initially, take up has been good and five serious players showed an interest in taking this forward. With Hannibal already bagsied by me, someone is going to have to be the girl who Face sex-pests each week, as we can"t handle having two B.As.

I laid out a few very detailed messages asking for a commitment from all the players involved; to commit to playing time and learning time each week and a regular skype session - to share resources, ideas, notes, strategy, hand reviews, etc.

With work taking an increasing part of my week over the Summer, I have to look at when I can fit in 8 hours of playing time and a couple of hours studying/hand reviewing each week. This now involves sitting down with The Piranah, getting Google Calendar up on screen, and booking in the sessions for the week ahead. Family time and the joy of household tasks (which I actually find quite thereaputic at times) are also discussed and planned.

Our first skype session completed last Sunday, with Rod Hall and Adam Saunders present and some plans made. We also have a BBP pro interested in joining us, who confessed that his sleeping hours may differ to the rest of us and hence fell of my online radar for a few days, and a fifth community member who offerd his apologies for missing our opening session. More on them if they do join our next session.

Following, Rod Hall and I then decided to exchange some hand histories and set about tearing each others game apart, looking for missed edges, exploitable opponents, and hoping that two minds can achieve more than one. I have to give this experience the highest praise, it"s simply the best work I have ever done in looking at my game. We both put in several hours of work, utilising SnGWiz too, and it was insightful to see how we both have different strengths: Rod brings a more detailed approach to his game using HEM and SngWiz to a greater extent than I. I hope I have given him some food for thought in return.

There is much more to discuss in our skype sessions and I can see some parts of a clear path of progression over the coming weeks and months.

To close with STTs for now, I had two very productive sessions during this last week and am now hitting ~20% ROI, although I know only too well that my sample size of 100games means this is not to say that my long-term figure will be as impressive.

Going back to my original attempts to get something going along a similar line for MTTs, I reviewed my post as I had been less specific about what I wanted from players. Without wanting to take on too mcuh much at once, I will likely come back to this in the not too distant future.

However, I have continued to play at least one afternoon per week of MTTs, usually starting at 10:30am on ipoker and playing a few elsewhere. And again I hit a 2nd place finish from a field of just over 100 runners. I just can"t win a heads-up battle, and am rueing not having enough points to take the Heads-Up Dojo session, with Black Belt player "Werrrrd". However, Chris "Jesus" Ferguson made a big noise about his free-rolling $1k challenge. That"s nowt! From a total outlay of $0 I have now spun that into $1k since February.

Back to the day job; I am looking at how I can start to realise some different income streams with a goal to build enough to be able to quit my job, so poker aside for a moment I am looking at other online opportunities.

I have been reading a book by a guy who has realised his own "Plan B", which is to make money for himself, providing his targetted income in as little time spent as possible thus freeing up more time to spend with his family and doing the more fulfilling things in life. Some of what I am looking into includes affiliate programmes, which will no doubt include some poker affiliates. I have also been inspired to overhaul my blog into something much more remarakable than it is in its current format and hope to be able to present something to you in May or June.

At time of writing, I also received notification by text of a job opportunity which I hope to be interviewed for next week, which would mean a "normal" working week after two years in this crappy job.

I continue to work closely with the owner of a poker club in Cumbria and have some exciting news regarding a partnership we have struck with my favourite online poker site. I will hold back on further details until I get the OK. Through perserverance over a 12 month period I instigated the deal and now hope through my continued involvement with the club we can grow our membership, increase the quality of our, already first-class, poker offering to to our members, make a noise in the UK live poker scene, and perhaps get another income stream working for me.

Just to set a few things straight, you can put your violins away now. I have got a festival booked for my upcoming 35th birthday, a stag party at Chester Races for a friend in May and the wedding follwing in June, and a few other social occassions booked throughout the Summer. My life is not all poker-work-poker.

I"d like to sign-off with some very exciting news, quite probably the biggest of my 35 years so far. In November, I"m going to become a Dad for the first time. I already have a beautiful 13 year old step-daughter, who this year will be getting a little Brother or Sister on her birthday - if our estimated due date proves to be accurate.

duke3016:
Congratulations on the impending arrival and good luck with the rest of your efforts

VBlue:
I posted this at the end of May and wasn"t sure anybody would be interested in it.  Someone might want to pass five minutes though...

Do I Look Bothered

I"ve been thinking, again - dangerous, I know. Sometimes I wonder whether it would be easier not to, but then I think of another thing. Stupid brain.

There is/has been much going on in the worlds of online and live poker. There was lots going on in the last month or so, there is a lot going throughout June and July and I dare say, there is more stuff about to happen right after that. As an extremely vague reference, it reminds me of a quote someone took (perhaps it was Stewart Lee"s stand-up routine on "toilet books") where Jordan, or perhaps Jade Goody, said on the cover of their autobiography "her life was just a series of one thing after another".

Some of these events both past, present, and future have been commented on as being somewhere between not good at all and not so good, whilst others are in the range of good to very good. Apparently, a lot of it depends.

What all of these things have in common, when I read about them is that almost all of what has happened or is going to happen has virtually no effect on me whatsoever.

For those who are interested you will have already found many other blogs covering the details, some of which I have read and found interesting none-the-less.

I don"t play poker on Full Tilt or Stars.

I have not made any attempt to qualify via any satellites for the WSOP - now in full swing. Neither did I have any intentions to get out there this Year (although that is not to say I won"t in future years). I"m probably not bothered who wins what either; certainly anyone outside of the Black Belt team anyway.

I do not follow live or online pros much, the NVG thread on 2P2 proving particularly uninteresting mostly. It"s all a bit Hollyoaks to me. Someone said something to someone else and they didn"t like what was said. Am I bothered?

When you spend a lot of your spare time on forums or other internet sites (to pass a very uninspiring and quiet working day) you are presented with a mass of information. We are very much living in the Information Age. The downside is, much of the information has no benefit to me other than giving me something to do other than listening to the racing tannoy all day.

So, back to the thinking bit. I have been considering all that goes on in the worlds of poker and how many other players are like me? Perhaps, I am a sort of Everyman of poker?

I like to play online mainly, due to the accessibility of games at stakes I like and the low-cost, when compared to live poker. I don"t play home games much any more. I don"t go to the casino, as my nearest one is often too far, as I have little spare time/spare cash to play there. I do like to play the odd live game, although the nearest decent monthly games are 50+ miles and £100 day out. The local pub poker scene is quiet and I prefer the fast-pace of online to these games anyway. If I do play it is more for the social occassion than the poker.

I put in a concerted and focused effort to improve my game and I want o get better and win more often and more money. It"s probably quite a lot more than a lot of the lads I know locally who play pub poker and a bit of online poker. It will also be a lot less than plenty of other players who I talk with on forums, who are not professional poker players.

I play NLH. I don"t play any variants. I play STTs and MTTs online at low-stakes; no cash poker. So I focus on a game that I think is beatable and I can get better at and I practice table selection, insofar as I play at sites and in games where I think I have an edge.

I am keen to look out for promotions and to climb the belt levels at Black Belt Poker, but working 60 hours per week and not returning home until 10pm 4 or 5 days puts paid to participating in many.

My poker goals remain fairly modest. In an alternative reality I would be a poker superstar. In reality I would be more than happy to make enough to take the family on a fabulous holiday every year or put a few grand away for some other purpose. As long as my time vs reward is decent, I tick along. Somewhere in-between I would like poker to form one of a number of income streams providing enough so I don"t have to continue the day job anymore.

To this end, and to give this blog some purpose, I refer back to the ideas I have been having to start up those other income streams (currently, the online MTTs I have been playing have provided an acceptable time vs profit reward).

I"m certain that there are is a mass-market of poker players who just like to play some poker and there it ends. They don"t care about the global online poker market. They don"t follow any of the poker pros. They don"t have any concerted aspirations to go to Las Vegas for the WSOP each year. They are not hugely driven by rakeback deals or poker promotions.

Of course, there is so much competition for online players, so many promotions, sign-up offers, leagues, leaderboards, satellites, rakeback deals, training options, etc. Many players have little time or inclination to sift through and find what is good for them.

Too much information can paralyse people when it comes to having to make a choice. In many cases, choice does not make people happy.

Some-what paradoxically, I am talking about delivering something that those players who don"t care, do care about. I think that when I look at myself and my approach to online poker I may have an answer to that. More paradioxically, the hard part will be getting people to choose it.

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page

[*] Previous page