Predator314's Poker Journal

I'm getting very addicted to the heads up games on Ultimate Bet. I just finished cleaning some donkey's account out.

I also played in that monthly Moose tournament today. I didn't last long. Twice I had top 2 pair and ran into a set. It doesn't take long to hit the rail like that.

I've played quite a bit of $3/6 6 max and $2/4 6 max today on Ultimate Bet and Full Tilt. I've cleared about $50 of my $300 bonus on Tilt. I'm also racking up some nice FPPs to use in their store. I want a Baseball Jersey. A good ways to go for that one though.

Ahhh, back to the cash games. After playing all sit n goes the past few days, it felt good to take some bad beats in a cash game. I've got 2 big bonuses to clear, so I clocked in and was ready for some action. I pulled up Ultimate Bet and saw a heads up table with one guy sitting at it, so I sat down. I also pulled up 2 tables of $3/6 6 max on Full Tilt.

Needless to say, all 3 tables were a donkfest. Let's start out with the heads up match. At the beginning of the match, he kept folding to everyone of my bets and I figured this wasn't going to be such a good game. Then all of the sudden, the full moon came uncovered and the guy turned into a turbo donkey. However, I kept pushing my leading hands, but he kept catching miracle cards on the river to take huge pots on me. It seemed like every time he went for a turn bluff, he would catch his 2 outter on the river. We both started with $150 stacks and it wasn't no time before I was down to $30.

However, I kept plugging along and clawed my way back up to even. I may have even took a small lead. Then he started catching again and put me down to the felt again. I got back to even and repeated the cycle 2 more times. Then something happened. His river cards quit coming and I T-Totally fucked this guy up. He ended up rebuying twice and I was willing to take that money too. I had the guy on major tilt.

I'm still not completely comfortable with heads up play. I need to keep practicing at it. Right now, I'm just pushing the 60/40 edges and staying aggressive. Against a donk like the one I just played, it looks like they tend to fall into a pattern. I was able to pick up on his patterns and take advantage. I realized his patterns and also made sure I mixed things up so that he would not be able to do the same to me.

Also, on my Full Tilt tables, I had one table where I was a very small loser. I was way down on the table, but won a huge pot with aces. Then I had KK beat twice in two big pots where both times aces come on the river to beat me.

On the other table, I dominated from the get go. I took a few beats that kept me from tripling up, but I more than doubled up on that table to make a nice profit for the day.

Fuck sit n go's!

During my session, I managed to clear almost $15 of my $300 Full tilt bonus and about $15 of my Ultimate Bet bonus. I forgot that UB sucks and forgot to have the hand history window up while playing, so I didn't get the stats of that session. However, on my Full Tilt session, I ended up paying $34 in rake. So if you consider the $15 as rakeback instead of a bonus, that's like 43% rakeback. Which is not bad. If they run these reloads every month, Full Tilt may be my new home. The games are really good right now.

Sit N Go Challenge: Final Results

Summary: Play 100 Sit n Goes and check results
Games: 100
Buy Ins: $2458.00
Amount Won: $2443.50
Net Amount: -$14.50
ROI%: -0.59%
Finish ITM%: 38.00%
1st Place: 10
2nd Place: 15
3rd Place: 13

Umm... what a waste of time. More of the same today. Losing every coin flip, losing most of my 60/40 favorites. Kings losing every time (and I had them alot).

Oh well...that sucked, back to cash games and bonus hunting.

Sit N Go Challenge Stats (To Date)

Summary: Play 100 Sit n Goes and check results
Games: 84
Buy Ins: $2026.00
Amount Won: $2173.50
Net Amount: $147.50
ROI%: 7.28%
Finish ITM%: 40.48%
1st Place: 9
2nd Place: 14
3rd Place: 11

I played a bunch of sit n goes today and continued to run badly. Somehow I made a small profit, but I took some hideous beats today to put me out of a bunch of tournaments where I should have made the money.

I figure I'll finish the sit n go challenge tomorrow and then head back to the cash games and try to actually make some money this month.

Sit N Go Challenge Stats (To Date)

Summary: Play 100 Sit n Goes and check results
Games: 59
Buy Ins: $1351.00
Amount Won: $1453.50
Net Amount: $102.50
ROI%: 7.59%
Finish ITM%: 38.98%
1st Place: 8
2nd Place: 9
3rd Place: 6

I'm running poorly in these things lately. Last night, I bubbled out in 4th place twice with horrible beats. Both times with healthy chipstacks, both times with dominating hands on the turn. Both times, burnt by the river. Oh well. If these hands start holding up, then I'm making some money on this challenge.

I think I have an uncanny nack for putting weak tighties on Tilt. I do tend to pick on them alot. Sometimes they snap and do crazy crap like this:

Ultimate Bet 3/6 Hold'em (5 handed) FTR converter on zerodivide.cx


Preflop: Hero is MP with As, Jd.

1 fold, Hero raises, Button 3-bets, 1 fold, BB calls, Hero calls.


Flop: (9.33 SB) 7d, 7h, 2c (3 players)

BB checks, Hero checks, Button bets, BB folds, Hero calls.


Turn: (5.66 BB) Ts (2 players)

Hero checks, Button bets, Hero calls.


River: (7.66 BB) 2h (2 players)

Hero checks, Button bets, Hero calls.


Final Pot: 9.66 BB


Results in white below:

Hero has As Jd (two pair, sevens and twos).

Button has 8h 5h (two pair, sevens and twos).

Outcome: Hero wins 9.66 BB.

I just called this guy down because I had a hunch he was pissed at me always raising his blinds or something like that. I also wanted to show him that I will call his bluffs down. He played some sort of insane bluff a few hands earlier on another guy and ended up hitting a 2 outter on the river to win anyway.

I've finished my old bonus with Full Tilt. I've cashed out and as soon as the money hits Neteller, I'm re-depositing back to Full Tilt for the $300 reload bonus. In the meantime, I'm working on Sit N Goes and Ultimate Bet.

Sit N Go Challenge Stats (To Date): Half Way Home!

I've played 8 so far tonight, so now I'm up to 50.

Summary: Play 100 Sit n Goes and check results
Games: 50
Buy Ins: $1108.00
Amount Won: $1273.50
Net Amount: $165.50
ROI%: 14.94%
Finish ITM%: 42.0%
Avg Finish: 4.46
1st Place: 7
2nd Place: 8
3rd Place: 6
Other Place: 29

I might play a few more later if wrestling sucks. Right now the divas are on and I'm out!

This sit n go challenge is pretty hellish. These things are so mind numbingly boring. It's awful! I guess I'm going to go ahead and finish out my challenge. However, after going about half way through the challenge, of come to this conclusion: CASH GAMES KICK SIT N GO'S ASS!

The competition is pretty soft in these sit n go's, but the bottom line is they just aren't very fun for me. I guess I'll go ahead and finish the challenge though just to say that I did it. It should only take a couple days to complete anyway.

As soon as I finish the 100 sit n goes, I'm going back to short handed hold 'em. Short handed play is just so fun for me. It's an action game, and I guess I'm an action junkie.

I'm kind of at a cross-roads in my poker playing right now. I know the games that I want to play, but not sure where to play them.

Party is on my shit list right now for various reasons. 1.) They should spread 6 max tables at all limits. 2.) Their customer service is down-right horrid. Email them, they send some sort of canned response the doesn't remotely answer your question, phone them... well good luck trying to understand the Jibberese they are speaking. 3.) After venturing into some of the other sites, I don't think that their games are the best online anymore.

As bad as I hate to, I think I'm going to be playing Party all the time when I move up to $3/6 full time. The only reason for that is rakeback. I have a new username set up on Party for rakeback (25%), but I'm still trying to resolve the small problem of getting money into the account. Neteller claims they can do something on their end, but I gotta get my butt into gear to square that situation away.

All that being said, I really don't have a home right now. I guess Poker Stars is as close as it gets, but as you all know, they hate me. In all seriousness, Stars is the best site I've ever played on. They do so many things right. Good, but ugly software and great customer service.

Once I finish my 100 sit n goes, I'm going exploring. There are quite a few online sites that I haven't played at. I haven't played any Prima Sites, The Gaming Club, Any Crypto site with the exception of Interpoker, Noble, Titan, and probably many more.

I can use this adventure to clear a bunch of bonuses as well. Bonuses (bonii??) make being homeless more fun. Here's my gameplan:

1.) Finish my last $20 in bonus on Full Tilt, then re-deposit before the end of the month to take advantage of the $300 reload they currently have going.

2.) Clear my Ultimate Bet bonus.

Note: Full Tilt and Ultimate Bet bonuses pay more like a rakeback program would, so if they keep offering monthly reloads, I wouldn't have to worry as much about rakeback.

3.) Open an account with a new site (under a reputable rakeback affiliate if possible), clear the bonus and evaluate the competition.

4.) Repeat step 3.

I'm excited to see the details of the Poker Stars VIP club that's coming soon. Hopefully that will give me some nice incentive to stay.

Full Tilt is growing on me. The have got great software and seem to have pretty good customer service (even though I haven't really dealt with them). They have good stuff in their FPP store, the action is soft, and they have some pretty decent tournaments. Plus I've made quite a few final tables on their site. They don't seem to hate me as bad.

Bottom line is that Poker Stars has the best chance of being my #1 site as long as they can do something to keep me away from the competition (reload bonus, rakeback, some sort of incentives). Full Tilt comes in a close 2nd, and Ultimate Bet a distand 3rd (FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, MAKE THE COMMUNITY CARDS BIGGER!).

My ultimate goal is to have a good conservative bankroll for $3/6 and $5/10 fairly soon. My bankroll is actually above the 300BBs suggested for $5/10, but I'm being VERY conservative with it because of the monthly cashouts for expenses and I seem to go through very swingy times, where I'll lose 300BBs, then make them all back up with one ginourmous heater (haven't had one of those in a while). But what it all comes down to is that I honestly play better when I don't have to worry about the money.

Enough babbling. I expect to play quite a bit this evening. Hopefully I can get get a good chunk of those sit n goes knocked out before I fall asleep. I've been 4 tabling them. I think I'm going to try 6 or 8 tabling them to see if things get a little more exciting. I'll try to take time to call Neteller this evening as well, so I can go ahead and bite the bullet and start the dance you have to do to sign up with a new Party account.

Sit N Go Challenge Stats (To Date):

Summary: Play 100 Sit n Goes and check results
Games: 40
Buy Ins: $838.00
Amount Won: $1003.50
Net Amount: $165.50
ROI%: 19.75%
Finish ITM%: 42.5%
Avg Finish: 4.43
1st Place: 6
2nd Place: 7
3rd Place: 4
Other Place: 23

Found a bit of a downturn in my last 10 sit n goes. My finishes are 9th (with a wicked beat), 8th with KK running into AA, 4th, 6th, 5th with another bad beat, 2nd, 5th with a bad beat, 4th with a bad beat, 3rd with a bad beat, and 2nd with a bad beat (this one was my QQ vs his 10-7 suited which he seemed happy to donk off 2/3 of his stack with... of course, he rivered his flush... all the money went in before the flop).

I've already lost count of my hours, so bleh on that. I think I'm gonna use a little time clock program I wrote for our Payroll system at work to log my hours. It keeps histories for ytd, mtd, qtd, etc.