A little something for the doubters

Hey Guys

most reading this know the game but there will be an still is people reading who think they are unlucky, online pokers rigged, its impossible to beat that many fish etc etc so am gonna stick my neck on the line an admit up until 4th jan 2010 I knew a little about this game maybe a bit more than a little but this graph will show me I didnt know how to make money, so really I knew nothing because thats what this game is about

The arrow is a little out but it basically indicates when I met Nick an his team and before that was about the 3200 game mark and at -$1.5k in 18 months, after it well you can see for yourself, 2500 games at +$4.5k in just over 3 months but yeah pokers about luck, online pokers rigged an I was the unluckiest person alive until I actually learned the game an all that chaged!!

back officially as a poker pro and 2010 goals

Hey Guys

Sorry it's been a while with no post but only really hit the tables again full time on monday night. This week has been my most enjoyable yet to date were poker is concerned and made me realise its what I want to do. I managed a total of just under 400 games an a profit of $2k since monday. Yesterday I managed 111 $12/180 turbos in a day an believe me it was exhausting but enjoyable. Nick has also given me alot of his time on skype this week which has been good. He is watching my final tables live an giving me advice after them and going over tough spots with me. He believes in and ecnourages me which is nice and it gives you the confidence to keep going. He is worker and a half an its excellent to have him taking time like he has this week to help me. The mentality part of my game is improving vastly to. I believe if I keep working at my game and improving I can get to a minumum of $3 per game profit at the $12s but could achieve up to $5 and my aim is to play 2k per month minumum. I will no longer be playing the $2s an will be playing $12s and above only.

Goals:
Since I am going to be doing this shiz for a living from now on I have looked more into the stars rakeback system. Well tbh I never, Pud from over at Betfair did and told cogs who emailed me it all over but its not bad. My aim is to get platinum star next month which should be easy as I only need to play 1364 (less if mixin the $36s) games an its then the equivalent of 23.5% and at the moment I am getting an equivalent of 21% as gold star however my main goal is to make supernova by 31/12/2010 and I am goin to do it no matter what and I will be earning 33%

I also plan on playing alot more MTT's, preferably turbos an hopefully learning Nicks strategys behind them as well as my own game. I managed a deep run in the stars $11/7.5k this week, it got 1100+ runners but I couldnt win a flip for a top 5 pot with 29 left when my JJ was not match for QK/AK all in preflop, sigh but I feel an MTT score is around the corner as I have come close so many times. No one is willing to work harder than me this year so hopefully I will be rewarded.

Lastly but not least I want to make a top 20 appearance in the shakrscope leaderboard for 54>180 man sometime this year and a top 10 in the stars TLB 1 month would be amazin. I know these are tough goals but I am now surrounded in a team with, not only, some of the best players and most succesful proven online poker players in the world but also alot of players that are gonna be the future of this game we all love to hate so if David can go against Goliath with a stone???

I am not gonna be one of these poker players who sits infront of a PC 100 hours per week and hopefully I'll be that good I wont have to. I enjoy life an the good things it brings which is why I am doing this and I am a very sociable person so I am goin to work out some sort of schedule. Its gonna be hard tho because the games run better at nights. However its could involve simply hammering nights sun night - thurs night an havin fri-sat off but we'll see. The other side to coin is that the games are soooooooooo softer during the day so maybe I could play a little less but win as much. I will do some proper experiments over the coming weeks an see. I do know 12 tablin you can get 100 games in 7 hours using only the sync breaks. I have no qualms playing 12 hours a day 4 days a week though.

I will leave you with my graph to date since starting the course as its 7.30pm and I have 100 games to play. I will be blogging alot more. This graph is frustrating as if the personal problems that I had didnt come this would be so much better and I would be so much further.

badcallthat is back

Hey Guys


The situation is resloved an basically pokers what I want to do. I will be back at the tables pretty soon. I have emailed Nick and asked him can I come back on the course and hopefully he will accept me back. If not I will still be back at the tables from monday. I will be re rolling at the bottom so will start grinding the $2.20/180 and $3.40/45 on stars and will be lookin to play a bare minimum of 600 games per week

I am coming back more focused and more determined to crush this game beyond belief

Good Luck an stay out my way

Badcalllthat

Leaving the programme an poker to

Hey Guys


I have had to make a tough decision to leave the course. Its nothing to do with the game itself but basically I have problems and situations in my private life which require 100% attention and I cant give 100% to the course so I felt it would be unfair on both Nick & Allan to continue coaching me.

They are great guys and I felt confident enought to tell them my situation and their response opitmises what they're about. They basically wished me all the luck in the future and they hoped I got everything sorted. They also told me they would welcome me back on the programme at any time an that I was well on my way to earning a very good living off poker. So really its a shame but it doesnt even come close to being as important as what I need to do

People do say 'never say never' so who knows but I very much doubt I will pursue poker as a career in the forseeable future. I do have a message to anyone out there who has aspirations of being a professional poker player though. You really need to understand that the game takesover in the early run. You have to put so much dedication into it its unbelievable. Dont think these players who are winning thousand make an easy living. The likes of the Rainman programme can teach you everything except the psycology of the game. This is something you have to master yourself and belive me it isnt easy, 200 buy in dowswings hurt. You sit there grinding for 10 hours an just receive beat after beat after beat. It aint rigged, you aint unlucky its called variace and will always be there and if you cant handle it you cant win, period. If you let the beats affect your game, you miss +EV spots, you shove in -EV spots and just generally be all over the place. If there was no such thing as a river card we would all be millionaiires quick so shut the fuck up moaning about them cos they are there. Maybe we should invent a new game infact take the 'R' for river of then end of poker an call it poke, same no river, simplessss

Despite all the above I believe I could have beat this game an a 48% roi over my 1st 1500 game aint bad so who knows, but for now its being put to bed. Thanks to everyone who followed and a big thanks to cogs who really helped me get my head round the psycology of the game. I doubt I would have done well over the 1500 games without him helping me with that part all day everyday and we have had some laughs. Only really met him through this an RTR but spoke millions of times on skype an he's a good lad. I will continue to blog about any odd MTT's I play or just general poker an sport. I enjoy it.

Good Luck at the tables fish
Garry

Week 7 - Game Selection

Hey Guys

Hows it goin, sorry for missin week 6 out but I just all mixed up with the weeks by posting mid week. Week 7 has continued well $$$ wise so am happy with that but my move to the $12s has seen me learn a very valuable lesson in game selection. The best time for me to play would be of a night around 6pm-2am because the games run faster which obvs means a bigger $$ per hour/game. I havent really done calculations around hourly rate because for some reason HEM is only picking up 80% of my games and PT3 wants me to manually input all my results, why that is I dont know but the faster the games fill means more games an more money. However this is when I seem to be coming accross alot more regs which is without doubt -EV. Last night for instance I have luvmywife chip210 johnnyhildo and jphillips EeeTee2008 and I GRIND THIS all at the same table of a $12/180 wtf, and all other names I recognised popping up all over the show like 1bigacehole, jbrown877, vertek, longy11 an of course MI_Turtle, plus plenty more even gavin griffin keeps poppin up, I am shocked at how many top players play the 12s tbh, basically all are solid winning players so why would I want to surround myself with them when I have the luxury of being english and able to play say a 9am-5pm schedule when all these guys are tucked up in bed or doing whatever. I really need to do some calculations as to how many games I can play in each 4 hour session etc but I certainly dont mind playing xtra hours to get the same amount of games in if the games are softer at certain times which they undoubtedly are so its time to research the games at each times an see what I come up with. I am no were near as good or experienced as alot of the regs on stars and I dont need to beat the best to flatter my ego, all I need to do is make money.

Its so funny when you hear people talk about 'moving up to were they respect my raises' or 'I cant win with all them donks about' or 'I think its easier to play against the best players' what a load of bull. Anyone who says that again might aswell never player poker again and the funny thing is I used to say the same. The fact is you find the softest easiest game around an play in it cause no matter what the donks throw at you, you play well make the right moves an you'll come out on top.

I squeezed an MTT in this week just the small field $8.80 [500 cap] on stars an managed a final table but the sickness of what happened to me was just sick sick sick. I had 300k in chips an there were 2 short stacks if I remember, I may post the hand history but basically a guy made this like weird shove of 25k, half his stack (or so i thought) but leavin the other 30k chips behind, I misread the shove for like 25k instead of the 250k it was an over shoved with 99 to isolate the shorty, only he werent a shorty an was another big stack with 250k in the middle. I dont know what happened it was pretty weird an quite clever on his part if he meant it but I had been playing about 10 hours an my concentration slipped when I really needed it hold and I ened up out in 5th, I did have 180s up to but it was so sick. I felt by far the best player at the final yet I blew it.

Reviews with nick are still getting better everytime but I am really starting to struggle with the times they're held. I have a 1-2-1 review with him soon which will be my first one and I am really looking forward to it with all sorts of questions on the ready. As mentioned in my previous post the reviews have been going into more around pre an post flop hand reading based on the actions in the hand etc and it really is interesting and I think I am takin alot out of it. We then obviously use stove to measure our hand against their assigned range an make the correct decision accordingly. This isnt to realistic when 15 tablin turbos but will help alot. Yes alot of our decisions are going to be pre flop but you still find yourself in post flop situations, especially if you've chipped up early an people start defending their blind light in the mid stages, on final tables or in MTT's so its important we get to grasp this concept fast. Plus I dont think I want to be on 180 man turbos forever so the course getting more advanced can only be a good thing

Anyway along with the above final which paid $224 I have managed to get lucky an ship 3 12s so far an an a good few finals which has kept my role intact but I am expecting a big downswing soon. Infact I am in a 35 buyin downswing as we speak which is nothing in 180s so I expect it to continue lol. I havent played at all today for the 1st time in weeks. I had 2 seperate universal replayer sessions a 2 hour session with cogs then a 1 hour session on my own then got some hand historys over to nick and basically just chilled as I have played for like 20 days straight in feb.

here is my current graph to date since I started

Moving up to $12/180

Hey Guys

Things have been going ok since saturday I ended up finishing on the $2s this week an starting on the $12s. My total figures for the $2s were:

Played 989
ROI 56%
Profit $1217

I ended up gettin lucky in the sense that after droppin 15 buyins at the $12s I went an took one down just as I was about to hit the drop back down in buy in amount so that has helped me. After paying paying Nick back his 25% profits etc my roll now stands at $1376 which is ample amount to hit the $12s. I am under no illusions that I may have to drop back down and there will be no shame in doing so, hopefully though, that wont happen. I win at least 1 / 180 manner everyday and hopefully today will be no different

I think I may have done enough to get on the sharkscope leader board for the $2s but I dont seem to be on there yet and I am currently lying 700th in the Feb TLB on stars so hopefully I will maintain that an get in the nice 20k freeroll at the end of the month. I have aslo set a plan to get to gold star by the end of the month, not because I want the 3 shitty lil gold stars next to my name but it means I will have played 400 $12s in the next 2 weeks, acheivable but tough. Also Nick asked me to dabble in the sunday quarter mill on stars which I did this week an min cashed but the encouraging thing is that hopefully I will eventually move towards learning to beat MTT's which we all know is where the big money is.

The reviews are just gettin better an better. Last nights went in depth about pre an post flop hand reading and assigning oppos a range etc. Nick really wont give up once he starts and even gets himself all tangled up sometimes when going really in depth. I mean we all know the genral poker maths but sometimes your talkin mathematics that 98% of poker players simply wont get but he wont stop until we all understand. The more I get to know him the more I get to like him tbh and he is a funny guy when he's not pickin on you. However the thing I like is the whole professionalism about the guy. There is no way I could have done this with anyone else an believe me when I tell you the work he is puttin into this course is phenomanal and if you'e lucky enough to get on it, then lucky you!!! Big thanks Nick if your reading this.

Come on the Everton tonight. This is a massive game for us against Lisbon and I think we will progress to the next round. We are playing well and confidence is high, it should also be the perfect game for Arteta to show his skills after a lengthy period out.

Here is my total graph for the programme and good luck at the tables fish!!!

$1k mark reached

Hey Guys

I know I said I werent playing again this weekend but about 1am last when I was going to bed an email came thourgh on the blackberry about a rview w/ Nick but at 5am GMT. Anyway Doris was tired an ready for bed and I felt ok so thought Id stay up for the review and ended up firing 20 tables up an winnin about $200 to put me on the $1k profit mark so it ended up being a good choice even if I am really tired now. My coach told me to let him know when I had reached the $1k mark so I have just sent him an email now and will await his reply before playing anythng else, hopefully he will want me to now move up to the $7s but we'll see

Winning 500 buyins in under 1000 games is a real sense of achievement for me and I am not gonna lie... I am really pleased. However I know its only the begining of a very long road so I am just going to keep focused and keep grinding and hopefully good things are about to happen for me. Febuary so far is whats done it for me, since the 1/2/10 I have played 502 games with a 71% ROI an total profit of $781, all this when I felt I was running bad an seein more bad beats in a month than I have in my life so this just goes to show that discipline an making the right moves will profit over luck when you stay disciplined and put the volume in

Also I am in 909 spot off the stars monthly TLB of playin the $2s so my aim is to stay in the top 1000 which again will be another lil acheivement for me not to mention the $20k freeroll which comes with it

here's my new updated week 5 graph