Good, Bad, Ugly

   Live Tournament. In early position I have K Q. As the table is pretty passive I decide to limp and see what the flop brings. In late position, player R raises. If it was anyone else I would fold but R is a notoriously aggressive player. She could have anything. So I call. I flop a full house: K Q Q. I check and R immediately puts in a big bet. Trying to look reluctant, I call. I check the turn, hoping that R will continue to bet. When she does I put in my best Oscar winning performance and then call. I have no interest in what comes on the river. I'm just wondering whether she will bet again if I check. Rather than take the risk of it being checked back, I put in a minimum bet. I figure she must be getting suspicious by now. She instantly calls and shows Q x. After seeing my monster hand she says she thought I might have A K. As she had trips I guess I could have bet a lot more on the river. After this the other players enter into an analysis of the size of my river bet. Everyone's an expert after the fact.

   Live Tournament. At a very passive table I limp in with K Q again (no, I don't usually make a habit of this but when the play is so passive, it's hard to resist). The flop is K x x. Player T checks, as do I.  Player G bets and we both call. The turn is an Ace. Now T, who is usually more passive than a jellyfish, puts up a decent-sized bet. I figure if he's betting, he must have the Ace, so I fold. G calls. After the river T shows down K Q and G has K 4! I guess T is not as predictable as I thought.

   Online SitnGo. With A K suited, I put in a standard 3x raise and get 3 callers. The flop is A A 7. I check my trips, not wishing to scare anyone off, and they all do likewise. The turn is another 7, giving me a full house. I check again, hoping that one of the others hits a decent hand on the river so I can extract some chips from them. I get my wish. The river is an Ace, putting a full house on the board and giving me quads. Player 1 bets half the pot. He's obviously trying to steal the pot by representing the other Ace. This is a dream result for me. The other two players both now fold, which is quite surprising. I re-raise and p1, who obviously thinks I'm trying to re-steal, calls with 8 9s. The only way this could have worked out better would have been if his bluff had been an all-in push.

   Online ring game (10c/20c). I'm in the big blind with 4 2. There is one limper in the pot. The flop is 3 5 7. I bet at it, assuming that the other player also missed a flop like that. They call. The turn is a King. I decide that this might be a scare card for my opposition, so I bet about 3/4 pot and get called again. With bets being called twice, you'd think I'd get the message by now, but when a 2 comes on the river I decide to bet at it again. After all, in the big blind, I could have anything: 2 2, K 5, 4 6. So I bet about half the pot and get re-raised. So I do what I should have done two betting rounds ago; fold.

   Online ring game (10c/20c). With A J in the BB there are several limpers and I just check it. I don't want to be raising with this hand from such a poor position and am looking for a pretty flop. The flop is about as pretty as it can get; T Q K, giving me the nuts. I figure it's time to go fishing and check. One player puts in a small bet and I call. The turn is an Ace, which is not great for me; anyone with a Jack now also has an Ace high straight and anyone without a Jack is going to be pretty wary of a bet. Player 1 checks, p2 bets $1.60 and I immediately re-raise them. To my surprise I get two callers.  The river is a 7, and now there are 3 hearts on the board. P1 checks, p2 bets and, wary of a possible flush, I just call. P1 then check-raises to $25. Even though I know I have the best possible hand short of a flush, I just can't bring myself to call such a huge bet. Getting drawn out on when the river hits is pretty routine for me, so I reluctantly fold. P2 calls and shows 2 pair. P1 has J 2 for an Ace high straight. A very bad fold. I guess I should have raised pre-flop after all. Coulda, woulda, shoulda.

   Online ring game (10c/20c). With J 9 in the BB I call a minimum raise from one other player. The flop is 5 8 J. With top pair I put in a bet of 3/4 pot and get called. The 9 on the turn gives me top 2 pair, so I bet again. My opponent now puts in a big re-raise. This player had just recently suffered a bad beat from a worse hand and now had a short stack. I figure he's on tilt so I push hard. He calls me all-in and shows 6 7; he has a straight. Oops. The river is another 9, giving me a full house. I collect a very healthy-sized pot and the other player has another bad beat tale to tell.

   Online SitnGo. Early in the tournament I have A Q in the small blind. One player raises x3 and I call. I miss the flop completely; 3 4 8. Noting that the other player is short-stacked, I decide to take a stab at it and push all-in. I figure it will be very hard for him to call without something really good. He calls with K J. He hits nothing and, just to cap it off, I hit an Ace on the river. I love it when a plan comes together.

   Live tournament. Mid-way through the tournament, with the blinds at 1200 (they started at 200), I look down at A 2. I limp in and so does player B. The flop is A K 2.  I check it and B bets 2400. So I re-raise to 4800 with my 2 pair and get called. The turn is a 9. I figure B must have an Ace, so as long as it's not A K or A 9 I should be OK. I bet 4800 again and he calls. The river is a 2, giving me a full house. Trying to disguise the strength of my hand, I bet the same amount again. B has a good long think about this, staring at me and muttering about what I might have, but eventually he calls. I declare that I have a full house and throw my cards down. To my horror I see that I have A 3, not A 2. Oh no! Then, to my amazement, B turns over K 5. I still win with my baby Ace. I can't believe that B would keep calling those bets with second pair. I also can't believe that I mis-read my hand. It could have been a disaster. In fact, it should have been.

   Live tournament. 2 1/2 hours into the tournament and I'm short-stacked. At this stage I'm just looking for a good hand to go all-in with. I push all-in with about 13 BBs left with pocket sixes. I get called by an even shorter stack with T 6. So my opponent has only 3 outs. They hit one of those tens and I'm left with only a handful of chips. A few hands later I go all-in again with 9 9. I get called by A 5 (only one over-card again).  There's an Ace in the window (first card exposed on the flop) and I lose again. My last desperate move with just 5 BBs left and I push again with pocket fours. This time my opponent has 6 outs with K 9. There's a 9 on the flop, then another on the turn and that's it. So my pocket pairs lose three times in a row within 30 minutes. Oh well. That's poker.

  

  

  

Summer Days

   Now I'm sitting here,
   Sipping at my ice  cold beer,
   Lazing on a sunny afternoon                  The Kinks

WARM-UP
   With the beginning of summer comes a change of game. I start playing No Limit Texas Holdem Tournaments online. When I can find them I play in tournaments with fields that are limited to a few hundred players. But most of the time I'm playing in $7 27 player SitnGo tournaments on Pokerstars, because these are readily available. I do OK in two of the larger tournaments that I enter in this period. I come 24/267 in one, just getting my money back, and 6/116 in the other, getting 5 times my buy-in back. But there are several others that I enter where I come nowhere, leaving me slightly ahead overall. All these tournaments are played on 888.
   Meanwhile, I'm also playing in the Pokerstars on-demand tourneys. These turn out to be tough nuts to crack. During the period leading up to Christmas I play in 6 of these and my best result is a 7th place finish (only the top 5 get paid). The play in these games is generally tighter than that on 888 and definitely less 'fishy'. Nevertheless, I'm just getting started in this game type and figure that I'll improve with time.
   As for the live Friday night tournaments, my recent poor form continues and I finish the last game of the year, on the 21st December, without cashing. This one is the 'Champion of Champions' game, where the top points-scorers from the previous year's tourneys play off for a trophy (and cash prizes of course).  On the positive side, after getting knocked out early in one of these games I enter a cash game with some of the other tournament casualties and leave with about $50 in my pocket.

HOLIDAYS
   With Christmas day on a Wednesday this year the holidays start late for me. Work doesn't finish until Christmas Eve, but then I can look forward to about 2 1/2 weeks off. Just to prove how much poker is taking over my life, my wife and I go over to her mate's place for a cash game on Christmas Day. It may be the season of giving, but I take about $70 home. Then on New Year's Eve the Workingmens Club holds another tournament. I go deep in this one, making it to 7th place out of 24, but still out of the money.
   Typically for this time of year the weather is patchy. We have some nice sunny days, but also quite a lot of wind, so I have some opportunity to play some online poker. I continue to play in the 27 player SitnGos but my results are very poor. Things are going so badly that I have to reload my Pokerstars account, the first time that I've had to do this. I fail to cash in 12 of these tourneys before finally getting a 1st place on the 11th of January, just before I'm due to go back to work. Then I get a 3rd place on the following Wednesday. Is this the start of a new trend?
   On Friday 10th I do something that I'd been meaning to do for a while. I get up early in the morning and start playing in Single Table SitnGos on 888. This is the start of my SitnGo Marathon All Day Session. The level I'm playing at means that I'd have to lose 7 games straight before I went over my buy-in limit. I play 7 games straight without winning a thing. Doh! So much for that idea.
   On the second Sunday of January my wife and I go to the Inter-club poker tournament. Although I'd previously decided not to play in these, my wife has joined the RSA team and intends to play every month. So I figure I'll go along too and just play it as a social game, not using my precious poker bankroll dollars. After getting knocked out I get into a cash game and come out of it with money in my pocket. So I'm hoping that there are more cash games going at these events in future.

SALAD DAYS
   As usual, the weather gets really good once everyone's back at work. At least with daylight savings there's plenty of daylight time after work. Despite all this, I still find time to play a fair bit of poker. I keep plugging away at the 27 player SitnGos on Pokerstars but my results are dismal. After playing a total of 18 games I have one win and one 4th place to show for all that effort. I'm doing so badly that I have to top up the cash in my Pokerstars account twice. These results may seem odd considering that my last post claimed that I'd figured out a good strategy for tournament play. But I still stick by my plan, which is based on pre-flop action. The trouble is, on Pokerstars at least, I'm getting out-played post-flop.
   By this stage I've settled into a routine of playing the small-field tourneys on Wednesday night and the larger 888 games on the weekend. I only manage to play three 888 tourneys in this period as the weekends are getting busy, finishing 64/118, 34/104 and 63/360.
   I do much better in the live Friday night tourneys, which have re-started by mid-January. In the first game of the year, in a small field of 22 players, I make 2nd place. Then in week two I come 1st out of 27, making for a nice collect. It looks like I've got my mojo back. Then I come 17/32, 12/33 and 28/30 in the following weeks. In this last result the following happens (just another bad beat story):
I push hard pre-flop with KK and get one caller. The flop is J T x and I bet 3/4 of the pot. My opponent pushes all-in and I call. He shows AJ. Then a Jack hits the turn and I'm crippled. The next hand, with 8 big blinds left I pick up AK and go all-in. I  get called by J9, a 9 hits the turn and it's goodbye and thanks for coming. That's poker. I'm still very happy with the results so far and hope to get some more deep runs in this tournament.

COOLER
   The mornings are getting cooler but during the day there's usually a choice between blazing sunshine or dark heat-cloud and energy-sapping humidity. Meanwhile, I continue to struggle with the online tournaments. Out of 27 players I reach the following places: 22, 11, 2, 7, 13, 13, 11, 19. I have one more Wednesday night session before the end of my summer season so I'm not too confident of a brilliant finish in this game type. On the other hand, on Friday night I make 1st place again in a field of 30. I have no business finishing well in this game but somehow manage to struggle onto the final table, limp across the bubble and drag myself into the big money.
   Overall, it's been a pretty enjoyable summer season. Online tournaments have left a lot to be desired but live tourneys and cash games have worked out very well. So it's swings and roundabouts, but my bankroll is still looking better now than it did at the beginning of the season. Now I wonder what Autumn will bring?


  
  

Tourney Plan

    The plan that you make,
    that's the one that you rely on,
    The bed that you make,
    that's the one you gotta lie on             Dire Straits

   I've played little else but tournament poker since the beginning of December, and prior to that I played in at least one live tourney every week for the last half of the year. This may be a guaranteed way to jinx my results but I'm beginning to have the feeling that I'm learning how to play effectively in poker tournaments. Although there are a lot of important factors involved in deciding how to play, I believe that the most important thing of all is stack size. By stack size I mean the ratio between my chip stack and the size of the big blind. In other words, the number of big blinds (BBs) in my stack.
   I always think in terms of the number of big blinds when I consider the starting stack in a tournament. It doesn't matter to me whether the starting stack is 2,000 or 50,000; what matters is how this number compares to the size of the blinds. So a 50K stack may look like a lot, but not if the starting BB is 1000; that amounts to a starting stack of just 50BB. In comparison, a starting stack of 2K with blinds at 20 gives you 100BB to start with. This should be blindingly obvious to anyone but I am constantly amazed by how often people in live games simply can't see the connection. I always prefer to play in a tourney with at least a starting stack of 100BB, preferably more.

   I think of tournaments in terms of stages, which are defined almost entirely by the number of big blinds that I have. In the early stages, when I am deep stacked and the blinds are low, I play pretty tight. I'll fold a lot and only play premium hands, or drawing hands if I can limp in with them from late position. In other words, what is generally considered to be 'ABC poker' ; a basic cash game strategy. With the big cards or big pairs I'll generally raise, but not too much, and be prepared to fold if the flop doesn't help me. With small or medium pairs, suited connectors or Ax suited I'll try to limp in, hoping to hit trips, a straight or a flush. I will even call a small raise with one of these types of hands, although I'm becoming increasingly disenchanted with the winning potential of suited connectors.
  Another important part of my strategy involves  adjusting my play to the type of table. If the table is populated by loose passive players (typical of the Friday night live tournament) then I'll limp in with more marginal hands and from earlier position than normal, hoping to flop a monster. If I hit AA or KK then I'll push hard, very hard (see 'The OMG Hand'). I'll do this for the first couple of levels, while the blinds are still low, then tighten up a bit. If I'm at a tight table, with players who are capable of folding, then I'll look out for opportunities to steal the blinds by raising from late position. But I won't take this too far, the idea being to maintain a reasonably tight table image.
   This is essentially the way I'll play for much of the tournament, as long as I've got 20BB or more. If I end up with a big stack then I'll generally tighten up even more. I'm well aware of the possibility of getting too cocky with a big stack and blowing off a lot of chips unnecessarily. If I get down to 20BB, that's when I'll look to get more active, especially if I'm approaching a big increase in the blinds. The idea is to stay above my 'red line' stack size of  12BB. So I'll try to limp in more, try to steal more, and be more inclined to push big hands from late position  depending, of course, on the circumstances.
   If I get down to 12BB, that's my 'all-in or fold' level. At that stack size, I'm folding everything until I hit a pre-flop hand good enough to go all-in with. Which hands I'm willing to push with depends on the circumstances; how many blinds I have left, my position, how many players are already in the pot, whether the pot has been raised and so on. As a general rule of thumb, in good circumstances I'll push all-in with any Ace and any pair. Obviously, if the situation gets more desperate then my pushing range will get wider. I've noticed that, especially in the live games, many players will try to hang on towards the end even though their stacks are getting shorter and shorter. Although it's tempting to try and limp in and see a flop, I don't do this for one simple reason; fold equity. If you have, say 4BB left and go all-in, you have no fold equity; medium to large stacks are not going to be afraid of calling 4BB. But with a larger stack, you have a much better chance of winning the pot uncontested.
   The exception to my 12BB rule is when everyone is short stacked. Sometimes as you approach the end of a tournament the average stack size can actually be 12BB or less. If I'm still above the average despite my short stack  and we are near the end then I'm inclined to just play a tight game, try and limp in to a few big pots, maybe even steal the blinds from late position if I think I can get away with it. In general I'll try to pick up a few chips here and there and let the other short stacks fight it out.
   If I make it into the money then I tend to just wing it. Or to put it more correctly, I don't play with a set plan; I let the circumstances dictate my style of play. Nevertheless I keep in mind my position regarding stack size compared to other players and also in terms of the number of big blinds that I have. I am also constantly aware of the way that the value of starting hands change as the number of players at the table reduces.
   Essentially, I approach tournaments in the same way that I approach cash games, and if I end up with a short stack then I adjust to that circumstance as far as it's possible to do so. I'm not inclined to panic if my stack size drops below the critical level. In fact, at that point the pressure comes off because the all-in-or-fold stage is pretty simple to navigate. And if I manage to double up then it puts me well and truly back in the game. One thing that I found particularly relevant from my recent tournament strategy study was the idea that you can't win the tournament in the first hour, but you can lose it. Another was the principal that you are not playing the whole field, but the players at your table. So that's the way I look at my position in a tournament these days. It's not about where you stand in relation to the whole field, it's about the table you're sitting at and how many big blinds you have to play with. In other words, keep it simple.
  

Avoiding the Rake

     If I count up their percentages
     I know they're getting rich
     But they haven't taken everything
     Those paybacks are a bitch                      Billy Joel

    The surest way to make money from a poker game is to run the game and take a cut (or rake ) from the players. People have been doing this probably ever since the game was invented. As we all know,  when it comes to gambling, the house always wins. OK, so poker is not strictly a gambling activity, but even the best players have bad runs, and the only one guaranteed a payout is the house. Of course the bigger the rake, the harder it is for the players to get a winning edge: yet another reason why game selection is of vital importance.

The vast majority of the games I've played in have involved some kind of cut for the house, although some have been less expensive than others. Most of the games I've been playing in recently have been tournaments of one kind or another and the commission charged on these types of games is pretty standard. In online SitNGos and tournaments there is generally a 10% charge on top of the entry price, so a $5.00 game costs $5.50 and a $50 game costs $55. I play in a live tournament on Friday nights where the structure is slightly different: 10% comes out of the entry fee, so the $20 game fee is actually the equivalent of an $18 + $2 tournament. This makes the fee slightly higher than 10%, but not by much. The great thing about tournament fees is that the money comes out up front, before you even sit down at a table, and you know exactly how much you're paying.
   Not counting freerolls or pub games where the prizes are bar tabs, I have played in a few cash tournaments where there was no house commission. There used to be a Friday night tourney at a pub in Otahuhu where the organisers were the bar managers, and the game was run in order to attract customers and increase the bar take. So there was no extra charge on the entry price and the entire prize pool was paid out. There was a similar tourney at a different pub in Three Kings around the same time, on Wednesday nights, but I only played in a couple of those because of transport difficulties. Neither of these events are going anymore, which is too bad because un-raked games are hard to come by.
   The other tournaments that are available to me are the local casino games. However the cheapest tournaments available at Skycity Casino (if you include the cost of rebuys and add-ons) is the $60 Sunday game, and this is way beyond my buy-in limits. But there is a much more compelling reason for not playing Skycity Casino tournaments and that is the tournament fees. The Sunday Game is actually $45 + $15, which amounts to a 33%  fee. That's just ridiculous. I see that they are advertising some other tourneys in the lead-up to the Anniversary Weekend Tournament, but the cheapest fee I can see is the 20% charged in the 50+10 game. It's still a pretty big chunk out of any potential winnings. Even though I like the idea of playing in casino tournaments, if I was ever to reach the point of being able to afford to play in a $60 game it would make a lot more sense for me to play in a 50+5 online tournament. Ten percent I can live with.
   When it comes to cash games, I've been involved in quite a few different types. The earliest poker games I played in had a minimum bet of $2 and the blind bet for each hand went into the 'kitty' . This money went to the host at the end of the session and each time when we played a different person took a turn at being the designated host. I don't know what this cut amounted to in terms of percentages, but I know that the host always ended up with a pretty healthy payout. As a result, it was hard to come out of these games with money in your pocket unless you were the host.  There was a similar game type that I played in at a local pool club. The difference was that this game was always run by the pool club managers, so they always got the kitty. They must have made a healthy profit from running these games.
   It was around the time that I was playing in these games that I also started playing occasional cash games at the Skycity Casino. There is a 10% rake taken out of each pot in these games. I don't know enough maths to figure out how much money is coming off the table but it must amount to a fair bit. I guess it means that you'd have to be the best player at the table (rather than say, in the top three) to have a reasonable chance of winning. But I stopped playing in these games anyway; not because of the rake, but because I realised that the buy-in was well above my comfort level.
   I also ran a few cash games of my own at the ORSS club that had a different type of rake system. In these games the players were charged a 10% commission on top of their buy-in (this money was donated to charity, as required by law). So with a minimum $60 buy-in, players would pay $66 and get $60 worth of chips, and the same would apply to any top-ups. This is the same as the system commonly used for tournaments and works out much cheaper than raking the pot.
   Of course you occasionally get to play in games where no money comes out of the pot. I've managed to run a couple of home games of this type, and on both occasions I still made a profit just from playing poker. The home games run by the group from Poker Meetup ( www.meetup.com/poker-333 ) are also rake-less and I played in one of these a while back. This was an Omaha game and playing in this game finally helped me to realise that I can't play Omaha to save myself, so I didn't go back. This group of home game players also have some Texas Holdem games going but they are run at an inconvenient time for me to play in.
   I've been able to play in a number of  rake-less cash games recently. These are organised by K, one of the players at the Friday night tournament. If he gets knocked out of the tournament early he will usually try to organise a cash game among the other tournament casualties. So if I've exited the tournament early as well, then I'll play in this cash game. K also occasionally runs a home game at his sister's house and this game usually has no rake. So I play in these games whenever I get the chance. K sets these games up with a weird structure, where everyone buys in for $20 each, even though the big blind is $1, giving the players an ultra-short starting stack of just 20 big blinds. But it's just a matter of adjusting to the odd blind structure and being glad you have a cash game to play in.
  As for online cash games, I must confess that I haven't been paying much attention to the size of the rake. I've played in Omaha Pot Limit, Texas Holdem Fixed Limit and Seven Card Stud Fixed Limit cash games online but in each case I've had little choice over where I play, so the size of the rake hasn't come into consideration. Looking back at it now, I see that the Stud games on Pokerstars were raked at 4.5% and the Holdem games on 888 were raked at 5%. In both cases that's much cheaper than any live game I've played in where a rake has been involved.
   It's my intention to play in online No Limit Texas Holdem cash games later this year, so I thought I'd better compare the rakes on 888 and Pokerstars, as there are plenty of games of this type available on both sites. It turns out that the Pokerstars fees are much lower than 888. Pokerstars charges 3.5% rake for the lowest level games of 1c/2c and 4.15% for the levels above that. The 888 site charges 6% for all lower level games. What's more, both sites have a cap on the fees charged for any one hand. For 888 the maximum rake per hand is $4 across the board, but on Pokerstars it starts at just 30c and goes up to $1.50 at the lower levels. Clearly, if I want to pay the lowest possible rake, then I should play on Pokerstars. However there is a complicating factor. Another aspect of game selection is choosing the loosest or 'fishiest' games where inexperienced players are calling with all sorts of rubbish hands. This sort of game is the easiest to beat and therefore the most profitable. 888 has the reputation of being the loosest, fishiest site around, largely because of the number of players who have drifted across from the online casino. Pokerstars, on the other hand, generally has more solid poker players and has tougher games. So the question is: does the fishiness of 888 make up for its comparatively high rake? This is something I'll have to consider seriously before I decide which site to play cash games on in the coming year.
   For the moment at least, I'm pretty happy with the level of fees in the games I'm involved in. The 10% fee on both the online and live tournaments is pretty much standard across the board, and on the odd occasion when I get to play in a live cash game, it's usually rake-free. In the past I've played in some pretty expensive games and ended up contributing to some-one else's pocket but I believe I've learned my lesson now. When I play poker now I try to ensure that I have the best possible edge by not paying any more than I have to. Having done that, all I have to do is play well enough to come out a winner. That's all.
  
  

  

The Year That Was

    To every thing, turn, turn, turn,
    There is a season, turn, turn, turn,
    And a time for every purpose under heaven       The Byrds

   It's the end of another poker year, and time to take a look back and analyse my results. Although I previously vowed to concentrate less on results and more on just enjoying the games, a little end-of-year analysis can't be a bad thing. OK, so the calendar year hasn't ended yet, but for reasons I need not go into here, my poker playing year ends on 30th November. Furthermore, for convenience I divide the year into 4 seasons: Dec-Feb (Summer season), Mar-May, June-Aug, Sep-Nov.
   I started this year in a poor situation. After a disastrous Winter/Autumn 2012 I was showing an overall loss. During the 2013 Summer season I was playing online SitnGos only and, fortunately for my bankroll, came up with some good results, achieving a return on investment (ROI) of 29% for the period. Then in the Autumn season I started playing 7 Card Stud cash games as well as SitnGos. This period started out OK but then I went into a bit of decline. By the end of May my results were looking so bad that I decided to take a month off from poker playing altogether. Nevertheless, this period did show a very small overall profit (about $40).
   I started the Winter season with a new attitude, and a new game. I started playing live Texas Holdem Tournaments in this period, as well as the other two previously mentioned online games. Although I played only about 9 weeks of poker in this period I clocked up a 65% ROI. This was almost entirely due to a couple of live tournament cashes. Then came the Spring season. I managed to show a net loss in every game type in this period, amounting to a total -12% ROI. So not a good way to end the year, but I'm still showing a net profit for 3 out of 4 periods, which is encouraging.

   As far as the different game types go, it's been a bit of a bumpy ride. This has been especially true of online SitnGos. Although I haven't been keeping records of the number of hours played for each game type, I'm sure that I've played far more hours at SitnGos than any other game type this year. It is certainly true that this game type accounts for most of the money I've spent this year. My SitnGo year started out really well, then went into a bit of a decline as the year progressed, showing negative results in the last two quarters. Oddly enough, the Autumn season showed a small profit but it was my awful April results that drove me to take a break from poker for a month in this period. That frustration has not returned, even though the 2nd half of the year has shown a net loss. Overall, the Summer season has saved my SitnGo results and I finished the year with an overall 7% ROI for this game type.
   As for 7 Card Stud, things have not gone well. My ROI for the 3 quarters I played this game are as follows: -27%, 14%, -29%. It's a surprise to me that I actually managed a period where I showed a profit in this game. I just could not get a handle on how to play 7 Card Stud. I tried playing tight, I tried playing super-tight, I tried playing like everyone else and just calling, calling, calling in the early stages, and I tried playing make-it-up-as-you-go poker but nothing seemed to work. The Winter season profit appears to be just due to variance and is not related to any particular playing style. Maybe I just didn't give it enough time to work it out; it's certainly true that by the end of the year I was looking for excuses not to play any more 7 Card Stud. In the end I showed an overall 17% loss for this game type. This may sound bad but I had the good sense to play this game at very low buy-in levels, so this loss amounts to only about $20.
   The live Texas Holdem tournaments have given me my best results for the year, although I've only been playing them since the middle of the calendar year. I started out in this game type with some very good results, although the cashes dried up a bit towards the end of the year. But I'm still reasonably confident that that I'll be able to keep up a good win rate going forward to the new year. I'm still refining my tournament play as much as I can by studying strategy articles from various sources. I've just played in the last game of the series for this year, although the organisers are now considering setting up a game for New Year's Eve. My ROI for live tourneys was 39% this year. Nice.
   Despite the ups and downs, it's been a pretty good year, both in terms of results and of the degree of satisfaction I get from playing poker. Going on tilt halfway through the year and taking a break as a result led to me developing a much better attitude towards my poker games. Apart from that, I'm very pleased with the fact that I'm now back to playing in regular live games. I started the year with a net loss but ended up seriously back in black, although I've dropped back down a bit since hitting my all-time high August bankroll level. Over all games, for the 12 months to 30th November my ROI was 23%. I'm pretty happy with that.
   Heading into the new year I've already started playing my Summer season game. This year it's online Texas Holdem tournaments: no rebuys, no add-ons, no turbos. Just straight-up tournaments. I've also worked out how to get around the problem that I had the last time I played tournaments as my only game. Previously I couldn't always find suitable tournaments at convenient times. But now that I play on PokerStars as well as 888poker, I have access to a wide variety of Multi-table SitnGo tournaments, usually involving 18 or 27 players. These on-demand tournaments are available pretty much all the time. So I'm launching myself into a new season of excitement, adventure and really wild things. Or something.
  

Blinds Up!

  It's eleven fifty-seven
  And I'm running out of time     (Who sings this?)

At my regular Friday night tournament the blind structure is always the same, but the organisers sometimes change the time between levels and/or the starting stack size and/or the opening blinds. The blind levels usually go 100/200, 200/400, 300/600, 400/800, 500/1000, 1000/2000. This means that your stack loses half its value at the first level, then changes much more slowly for the next 3 levels before halving in value again. But last Friday the organiser, B, decided to change the blind structure, but only for the later levels. So the blinds increased more gradually after the 500/1000 level but the earlier 2nd level jump stayed the same. He also increased the starting stack from 25k to 30k, which I thought was a bit odd because both measures were likely to increase the duration of the tournament.

  However you've got to roll with the punches and adjust to these things so I went ahead and paid in along with the 32 other players. As usual, the play was loose and passive but the increased starting stack suited my tight early-stage playing style. I just bided my time, raising my big hands (but not too much) and limping in with drawing hands and the occasional marginal hand from late position. It didn't take long to identify the loosest out of a very loose bunch: two chronic calling station on either side of me. Over the course of two hours I saw one of these two, M, limp in with AA, KK and AK, and somehow win with these hands by calling to the river in multi-way pots. In fact M hit quad Aces at one stage, which should have won her the 'monster hand' jackpot but not long after that someone on another table hit a 5-high straight flush.
   I got into an interesting hand with the other calling station, U, when I raised pre-flop with AQ and he called me. I missed the flop, but it was paired, so I bet at it and he called. I missed the turn as well so I checked and so did he. After missing the river I bet at it again and he called, turning over AJ. My Ace high beat his. Mostly I just stayed out of trouble and managed to pull in a few pots, which kept me above the average stack. Hands that have got me into trouble in the past seemed to be coming through. With pocket Jacks I bet on what seemed a pretty safe board and dragged in some chips from a player who flopped top pair. Then with KK I re-raised a fairly solid player pre-flop then when I bet the flop she folded.
   With the big starting stacks there were only a few players knocked out in the first couple of hours. I managed to chip up a bit and was actually the big stack at my table going into the middle stages. However, I guess I got 'big stack fever' and got a little too active, missing some draws and losing some chips. By the time we were down to a couple of tables the stacks were getting short and players started getting knocked out pretty regularly. At this stage I had around the average stack, but this amounted to just 12 big blinds! But I wasn't prepared to do what many others tend to do in this situation and play conservatively with a short stack. So I waited for my chance and when I picked up pocket Jacks I called an all-in bet from R. She turned over 55 and when a Jack hit the flop it was all over. Just to rub it in, the river was another Jack. So that made my stack size a bit healthier as we approached the final table.
   My wife and I both made the final table (the top 10). D came onto the table with an enormous stack of chips, at least three times the size of the next highest stack. The shortest stacks started to drop out fairly quickly. With 7 players left I found myself in a hand with my wife (P) and B. With K9 in the hand, the flop gave me middle pair (nines). The flop was all clubs and my King was a club, giving me a draw to the King high flush. When I bet, B pushed all-in. I seriously considered calling with my flush draw, but eventually decided to fold.  P however did call with the Ace of clubs and B showed his flopped flush. With no clubs on the turn or river my wife went out in 7th place and I breathed a sigh of relief over my decision to fold. It was not long before the 6th player was eliminated and I was in the money. The short stack who had limped across the bubble then exited, leaving just four of us.
   By now it was approaching midnight and we all had at least 20 big blinds each. The band had long since stopped playing and the bar was about to close. B shouted the three of us a drink, perhaps in recognition of our stamina, and we carried on. By this stage we had a volunteer to do the dealing for us, which made things easier, and faster. At this point I was enjoying playing my natural end-game and felt reasonably confident that I had a good shot at first place. I was bluffing at a few pots, raising any decent hand, and chipping up bit by bit. I showed a couple of my bluffs, just to keep them guessing. One in particular, was an attempt to steal with 72 that didn't work out. I figured that this would keep them calling when I actually had a hand. Fortunately for us, B is not only the poker tourney organiser but also the club president, so he arranged to have the club stay open to allow the game to go on. Meanwhile my wife, who was sitting behind me, was starting to fall asleep.
   I managed to chip up a bit with the following hand. I raised with AQ pre-flop and was called by D. The flop came K J * . He checked so I bet half the pot. He called. I missed the turn as well but put in a bet and he called again. When the Ace hit the flop I bet again and he called with his King. I took a nice chunk of his stack with this hand, and also managed to tilt him a bit. So I was the big stack for a while, until I picked up pocket Kings. By this stage B had started pushing all-in a lot. When he pushed this time I called him and he turned over JJ. Jacks had been good to me so far and this time they were good to B. He hit a Jack on the turn and I lost the hand. I thought that was it for me but when we matched our stacks up I still had about 5 big blinds left.
   So I struggled on as the short stack, but with some careful play and some good all-in pushes, gradually built my stack back up, knocking out P in the process. By 1am D was the small stack and B and I had around 15 big blinds each. As it was getting so late, B suggested that we split the prize money but I was determined to at least try and eliminate D. So I suggested that we play till 1.30 and then split if there was no result. By 1.15 D was out and B and I split the remaining prize money; probably the best result I could have hoped for in the circumstances. Then we played our hands all-in to determine who would get the extra point for the challenge points table. In terms of points at least, I came first.
   After that marathon session I hope that B adjusts his blind structure and/or starting stacks for next Friday. After all, if you're running a cash tournament, you should ensure that it's structured in such a way that it is able to be played out to the end. While I'm happy to finally break my losing streak in this most recent series of games, it's disappointing to not have the opportunity to win the first prize outright. I've come in the top two on three occasions so far but in two of these I've split the prize pool because it was getting late, and I came second in the only game where I actually got to play to the end. Nevertheless, with only one more round to go before the end of the year, this result means that I'm no longer in danger of barely breaking even in live tourneys and should come out with a nice little profit. Heading into the Christmas season, it's not a bad position to be in.

November Notes

       Money, get back,
       I'm all right Jack
       keep your hands off o' my stack           Pink Floyd


 INTER-CLUB
   In previous posts I've mentioned the Inter-Club poker tournament. This is  a $20 tournament that is held every 4th Sunday at various club venues. There are six clubs involved in this (I think) and each club enters a team of eight players. The idea is that, apart from the prize money,  players are awarded points according to their finishing position in each game. These points accumulate through the year and at the end of the year there is a prize-giving event where both individuals and teams are awarded cash prizes according to their over-all places on the points table. Each month a proportion of the prize pool is set aside and this is used for the end-of-year awards. I'm not sure how much this is but it is somewhere between 1/4 and 1/3 of the total.
   I've played in a couple of these events and I even finished in the top three once, but the fact that a big chunk of the prize pool is 'raked' puts me off making it a regular thing. I know that there is a chance of getting some of that back by either finishing well in a number of games, or by getting into a strong team that usually finishes well. But of course that means you'd have to commit yourself to playing every month. And of course if you play in a team, you're dependant on your team-mates' results, and if you don't (you can play as an individual) then you're at a disadvantage because you're up against people playing as teams.
   So I've decided not to play in this tourney as a rule. However my wife enjoys it and has ended up playing regularly for the Onehunga RSA team, so I guess I'll go along for the ride occasionally. There's one coming up that will be held at a club I've never been to before, so I guess I'll go along to that one. The only question is whether I'll play using my poker stake or just take the entry fee out of my spending money. I shouldn't use my poker stake because I only want to use that money to play in games that have a good pay-out structure (i.e. have a low rake). On the other hand, a good win would boost my bankroll, and it needs that at the moment.
   The thing I don't get about the way this tourney works is how you reconcile playing for a team with playing for yourself. Are you really supposed to take it easy on a fellow team member sitting at your table? So if a team-mate raises pre-flop when you have, say JJ or AQ, what are you supposed to do? Fold? Re-raise to let them know you have a hand? And what if you fold some good holdings to help your team-mate out and then they get eliminated, leaving you short-stacked? After all, the higher you finish in the rankings the better for your team, right? It's essentially a game that is based on collusion, something that is strictly prohibited in 'normal' poker. So on the odd occasion when I play in this, it will always be as an individual player. It's less confusing that way.

WITHDRAWAL
   I've always been a little nervous about the notion of withdrawing money from a poker site. The conventional wisdom seems to be that it's dead easy to deposit money with poker sites, but devilishly hard to make withdrawals. Once the sites have your money, they don't want to let it go. But I've always figured that if I accumulate funds at a site, more than I need to play, then I'm better off to have it earning interest in my bank account than to have it earning interest for them. So a few months ago I decided I had more than enough in my 888poker account and should take some out. Almost immediately, the US government started fighting with itself, triggering a cash flow crisis and causing the US dollar to plummet in value against the New Zealand dollar. This strengthening of the $NZ might have been good for anyone planning an overseas trip, but it was bad news for me. So I figured I'd better wait for a bit, and when the $US reached the point of buying NZ$1.20, then I'd take my chances.
   I had previously made a sort of withdrawal from Fulltilt Poker, by transferring my funds to Pokerstars but it's not really the same thing. Coincidentally, a couple of weeks ago one of my work-mates, who plays poker on Pokerstars, decided to make a withdrawal. Apparently it was a bit of a hassle and it took him more than a week of e-mailing back and forth before he finally got his money. Also, because I'd made my deposits using a Visa debit card, I wasn't sure how a withdrawal would work. I thought I might have to use Skrill or Neteller, or some other e-transaction site.
   In the end, here's what happened. I went to the 888poker cashier, selected withdrawal, and entered the amount. The cash money disappeared from my account almost immediately and the 'history' tab listed my withdrawal as 'processing'. A couple of days later it was listed as confirmed. I checked my bank account, but the money wasn't there. However it was the weekend so I waited until Monday and checked it again. The money was in my bank account. It turned out to be a painless, ridiculously easy process. So much for all the horror stories.

FRIDAY TOURNAMENT
   I've been playing regularly in the Friday night $20 tournament at the 'Workies' since early July. I started out with a hiss and a roar, making the top two twice, cashing several other times and often finishing in the top ten. But my results have dropped off a bit in recent weeks. In the last nine games I've cashed just once, and that was a 5th place money-back situation. In fact, in the last seven games five of my finishes have been between 10th and 14th. I seem to be specialising in finishing just outside the final table.
   After winning the previous 'ten week challenge', I decided to try and improve my game further by checking out some strategy websites. One of these was by 'Serial EPT Qualifier' Pierre Neuville on www.pokerlistings.com.  He advocates a strategy based on relative chip stack size. The idea is to stay at or above the average stack size by adjusting the amount of acceptable risk vs likely reward. Although this strategy is specifically aimed at online qualifying tournaments, I decided to give it a go and spent a few weeks constantly monitoring relative stack sizes and trying to keep above the average stack size.
   Then I came across a series of strategy lessons available on You Tube that seemed quite useful. These are by someone called 'Gripsed' and can be found by searching for 'poker tournament strategy' on You Tube. These are divided into different stages and, although I think the later stage videos are less applicable to the loose live game I'm playing in, the early stage advice seems to be much more useful. This strategy focuses more on actual stack size rather than relative stack size. The idea is to play tight in the early stages and look for opportunities to draw to a big hand in multi-way pots. Apart from that, there are different strategies outlined for different stack sizes. The essential message for the early stages is: don't panic, look for the right spots to make a move.
   So I've been more or less following this strategy for the last few weeks. Even though my results so far have been pretty poor, I intend to persevere and see where the"'Gripsed plan' takes me. It has occurred to me that deviating from the way that I was playing before may not be too clever. After all, I was winning when I first started playing this tourney. But I've been playing poker long enough to realise that my initial success could have been a lucky streak, just as my recent losses could be the result of an unlucky patch. I haven't been playing in these tourneys long enough to know one way or the other. There's also the fact that the number of entrants in these tourneys has been increasing. When I first started there was typically 18 to 25 players in the game. Now there is usually 30 to 40. That has to make some difference. So for now I'll be following my new strategy and when the series ends in a few weeks I'll review my progress and decide how to proceed when the tourneys start up again next year.
   I've also decided that I'll be playing primarily in online Texas Holdem tournaments during the summer period, so that will give me a chance to tinker with my playing style and hopefully find out what works for me. That's the theory anyway.