[Closed] Saxemephone's NL50 blog --> 2k in 2 weeks?

i cant remember what the program is called now.. but once you have downloaded it you can attach it to your poker table that you are playing at.. and it will give you all the information you need to have an edge over your opponents such as how much to bet.. and the chances you have of winning the hand.. it will also let you know how many outs you have.. and stuff like that .. i think that would be a worthwhile program to download mate

i saw it just the other day somewhere .. cant remember exactly where now but i was in an internet cafe and couldnt download it otherwise i would have ♦

Yeah I use PokerTracker3 for stats, but there's also HoldemManager and the pokerstrategy elephant. I use to use something that gave me the probabilities of the hands I'd have by the river, outs etc. but it wasn't very good.

So the last couple days have been a little rough pokerwise, although on the bright side I'm platinum now and my exam which was expected to be brutal went pretty well.

I'm pretty frustrated at the moment. I just played a session where I started out really well, making good notes on fishies and their tendencies and adapting to them, and even got a little lucky and got paid with some of my monsters. Towards the end though, this one fish kept donk-potting and pot-raising every cbet, so I waited for a hand and when I finally get aces he flops his janky 2pair and stacks me...then I flop an ace with AQ and of course once again he flopped 2pair...

I don't think I should be folding top pair or overpairs once I see someone play ~50% of hands and donk/raise pot every time...I also had a note on him that he likes to pot the river with complete air, but it's still really painful to see the fish take away all my hard work.

I'm now almost exactly break-even on NL50 over 10k hands, but with rakeback I'm up a bit. I'd like not to have to move down to NL25 if I can help it, as I think I learn more quickly when challenged, but if I lose just a couple more stacks I'm going to have to for BRM reasons. For now I think I might just cut down to 2 tables and really focus on all the players and actions.

I have about a week before my next final, and I was wondering if anyone wanted to do a sweat session sometime soon. If anyone's interested let me know.

Just like whatever bad logic drunk French players use when playing at 4:00AM thier time...

So today went quite well. I've been sticking to full ring for now, as I'm currently at -2.8bb/100 on SH
I think I'm a bit too spewy on SH. It worked well on NL10 and NL25 where other players were even more spewy, but not so much anymore.

I'm starting to get a much better feel for full ring. If I treat it as an exercise in patience it helps, as it can take quite a while before I get to play a big pot with a fish.

I listen to music when I play - usually either classical or techno/trance. I'm not sure which is better for my game. I'm definitely more relaxed and don't spew at all listening to classical, but an energetic beat gets me looking for spots which I might miss otherwise and paying more attention to who's sitting at what tables.

Anywho long story short is that I'm now at 14bb/100 on NL50 FR games over 6.5k hands (played almost half of those today ♠_biggrin: )

Quick update:

Yesterday wasn't great, ended up down just half a buy-in after a terrible start over 3k hands. The NL50 FR tables on Everest are full of French shortstackers during my morning (their evening) so I withdrew $500 from Everest to put on Stars where I played a bit of NL25 FR (gotta love the 50bb min tables!) to get used to the software again. It seems like there aren't nearly as many fish but most players seem kinda weak-tight, and there are lots of multitablers who don't care if you steal their blinds every round with 32o. I definitely prefer playing on Everest where you get real 60/30/45/0.8 VPIP/pfr/WTSD/AF fish, along with mostly predictable uber-tight regs with 1% 3bet and 85% fold-to-3bet.

Today has been a good day. I re-watched a couple Hasenbraten vids this morning and then went through hand histories of one of the Everest regs (gonna try to do one opponent per day) just to find out their ranges and any possible bet-sizing tells they might have. Only played a couple short sessions totaling 1k hands (my parents are moving so I had to help with some stuff) but ended up +3 buyins running at 33bb/100 ♠_cool:

An interesting hand:

b]SB: $60.65
BB: $9.25
Hero (UTG): $67.05
MP: $53.75
CO: $45.75
BTN: $42.85

Pre Flop: ($0.75) Hero is UTG with 6 5
Hero raises to $2.00, 2 folds, BTN raises to $5.00, SB calls $5, 1 fold, Hero calls $3

Flop: ($15.75) 7 A 8 (3 players)
SB bets $5.00, Hero raises to $17.00, BTN folds, SB calls $12

Turn: ($49.75) 9 (2 players)
SB bets $13.25, Hero raises to $45.05 all in, SB calls $25.40 all in

River: ($127.05) J (2 players - 2 are all in)

Final Pot: $127.05
SB shows A Q
Hero shows 6 5
Hero wins $123.80
(Rake: $3.25)

Things to know and my thought process:
BTN was a super-tight reg with 1% 3bet over ~1.5k hands or something, and I'm pretty sure his range is KK+ but maybe QQ+. SB was a huge fish and I had seen him stack off with trash.
Preflop: I pretty much have to call the small 3bet given both BTN and SB are likely to stack off if I hit something good (2pair+).
Flop: This was questionable, but I figured BTN has KK or QQ way more often than AA and will almost surely fold to my raise. If BTN had AA I'm pretty sure he would have just called, as he plays quite passively and would maybe put me on a smaller set or AK. If BTN did call and the fish called I could just try to hit one of my many outs and play passively and by odds if I missed the turn. If BTN 3bet or BTN called and the fish shoved it would be ugly though as I pretty much put BTN on AA 100%.
If BTN folded and the fish went over the top I can get it in with plenty of equity vs. his range, and if BTN folds and the fish calls as above, I have position on the fish and can hopefully see a free river card unimproved.

Not sure if anyone reads this but if you have comments about the hand I'd be glad to hear them!

So I've played 2k hands so far today and it has gone well as I'm up almost 3 stacks. I just want to post this hand because I was 95% sure I should have folded my KK yet I had never noted this guy limp/raising aces over 2k hands (something I always note if I see) so I convinced myself that maybe he just got annoyed of me isoraising him and cbetting him off his low pocket pairs and decided his QQ or JJ was good...

The reasons why I should have folded were that he 3bet 1% over 2k hands (KK+, maybe QQ or AK occasionally) and obviously that he limp/raised. Obviously if I'm folding KK to a limp raise vs. every opponent this is extremely exploitable, but against him I think I should have folded. I also don't know why I just called pre...I was just stunned by his limp/raise and sad that I "had" to face the "cooler" of KK vs. AA.

BB: $79.90
UTG: $27.50
UTG+1: $47.70
UTG+2: $49.50
Hero (MP1): $52.45
MP2: $48.82
CO: $8.50
BTN: $8.50
SB: $49.05

Pre Flop: ($0.75) Hero is MP1 with K K
2 folds, UTG+2 calls $0.50, Hero raises to $2.50, 5 folds, UTG+2 raises to $9.69, Hero calls $7.19

Flop: ($20.13) 4 6 4 (2 players)
UTG+2 bets $5.00, Hero raises to $20.00, UTG+2 raises to $39.81 all in, Hero calls $19.81

Turn: ($99.75) 9 (2 players - 1 is all in)

River: ($99.75) Q (2 players - 1 is all in)

Final Pot: $99.75
UTG+2 shows A A
Hero shows K K
UTG+2 wins $96.75
(Rake: $3.00)

The problem now is that he knows I know he limp/raises aces and I'm worried he's gonna limp/raise bluff me. He seems way to straight forward and passive for this but if I start folding everything to his limp/raises he'll probably catch on.

Any advice? Just take the hit each time and say nice hand, nothing I could do?

Running hot today, another awesome session. So far today I've played almost 3k hands, up ~5 buy-ins.

Almost folded kings vs. aces again...this time I 3bet and villain cold 4bet. Hmmm...what could he have? I wasn't gonna fold there though since villain was unknown and might be a fish.

I was 10-tabling for the first time on NL50 for a bit, but once I was involved in 4 pots at once and scrambling to click between them I realized the software just isn't set up for multitabling, but I can handle 8 tables as I can tile them.

Getting hungry so I'll eat and then GGGGGGRIND some more hands.

So yesterday I didn't have access to the computer I normally use with all my stats, so I decided to play some MTTs on Stars for fun. I played the $2-$5 large MTTs with guaranteed payouts and did okay - busted in a few, barely cashed in a few (~3x buy-in on one) and got ~30th or something in a $2 6-max tourney which unfortunately was the only non-turbo tourney I played so it took ~7hrs for ~$50 or something.

It sucks that I did the best in the lowest buy-in and slowest game, but oh well. Once all the others stopped I thought about just shoving every hand to try to lose, but I decided to try to go for the final table spots where I could win something meaningful (1.2k for 1st). At my last table the players were uber-fish and I was just-over-min-raising 50% or something and they would just fold preflop or fold to a cbet. Then they started getting really lucky which tilted me a bit and I stacked off a bit too lightly with 9 outs on the flop...oh well.

I find non-turbo MTTs way more fun than the turbos as you actually get to play postflop for more than the first 30min of the tourney. I think I might use my Stars account for MTTs every once in a while, but I'm still sticking to cash games as my main focus.

I probably won't play much today as I have a quantum mechanics final tomorrow and I haven't started studying. It shouldn't be too hard but the final's worth quite a bit of my grade so I want to do really well.

Didn't play much since my last post...I actually thought I might quit since I was getting tired of grinding all day. I withdrew most of my BR, but today I decided to play a bit with what was left and I doubled my roll playing NL25!
Of course I ran like god, but $30+/hr for 3k hands on NL25 felt good

Anyway I think I'll just play when I feel like it so that I don't feel sick of grinding. I actually enjoyed today, probably because I was winning but also because I haven't played in a while. Hopefully if I only play one or two days per week I'll continue to enjoy myself. With school starting I won't have time for more than that.

Originally posted by saxemephone
So I've played 2k hands so far today and it has gone well as I'm up almost 3 stacks. I just want to post this hand because I was 95% sure I should have folded my KK yet I had never noted this guy limp/raising aces over 2k hands (something I always note if I see) so I convinced myself that maybe he just got annoyed of me isoraising him and cbetting him off his low pocket pairs and decided his QQ or JJ was good...

The reasons why I should have folded were that he 3bet 1% over 2k hands (KK+, maybe QQ or AK occasionally) and obviously that he limp/raised. Obviously if I'm folding KK to a limp raise vs. every opponent this is extremely exploitable, but against him I think I should have folded. I also don't know why I just called pre...I was just stunned by his limp/raise and sad that I "had" to face the "cooler" of KK vs. AA.

BB: $79.90
UTG: $27.50
UTG+1: $47.70
UTG+2: $49.50
Hero (MP1): $52.45
MP2: $48.82
CO: $8.50
BTN: $8.50
SB: $49.05

Pre Flop: ($0.75) Hero is MP1 with K K
2 folds, UTG+2 calls $0.50, Hero raises to $2.50, 5 folds, UTG+2 raises to $9.69, Hero calls $7.19

Flop: ($20.13) 4 6 4 (2 players)
UTG+2 bets $5.00, Hero raises to $20.00, UTG+2 raises to $39.81 all in, Hero calls $19.81

Turn: ($99.75) 9 (2 players - 1 is all in)

River: ($99.75) Q (2 players - 1 is all in)

Final Pot: $99.75
UTG+2 shows A A
Hero shows K K
UTG+2 wins $96.75
(Rake: $3.00)

The problem now is that he knows I know he limp/raises aces and I'm worried he's gonna limp/raise bluff me. He seems way to straight forward and passive for this but if I start folding everything to his limp/raises he'll probably catch on.

Any advice? Just take the hit each time and say nice hand, nothing I could do?

hi, out there, nice blog, have just glimpsed, but actually reminds me a lot of old days back when i started so will post sth:

if u ever start contemplating folding KK in FR u re already reasonalby good, coz most ppl dont even consider it ever. So good job, keep it up.. first time i learned to fold KK was actually even on NL2 ♦ but it was sickyl deep /2500bb+ both and i just couldnt do it coz all shc at that time i was using said KK/AA re/re/re/re-ai or sth ♦ .. which is a complete bs! as u go up u ll rly make confident folds with KK either even pf on flop or on turn with no A on board coz of just rangevise equities vs nits..

this is actually kinda the right spot also coz 1.0% is not AA,KK,AK,QQ as u said, its just: AA,KK /-AA,KK alone is 0.9% and just SOMETIMES AKs.. it doesnt have AKo or QQ at all or close to never.

his betsizing is very untraditional for this limit /1st time i met 1/4potsize betting by reasonable plrs was on NL600 afair/, i guess he is never balanced here, but is deffo a good play by him too.. u are not scared of rly anythining here coz u re up against KK,AA, AK so u dont have to protect, if he has the rare AK he has at most 3 outs anyway so calling and getting more info is better here. As said, i doubt NL50 plr is ever balanced here, esp such nit, so if u call once u can possibly fold to turn coz he is not barelling AK anymore if he doesnt have a fd to go with it. that said..

that said its pretty "sad" that turn is 9d which makes it virtually impossible for u to get away there if he does indeed continue betting.

however if it was a blank, it would be prolly the best play to just fold on turn then coz he is absolutely NOT betting AK most often, so u re calling either just for split with KK /unlikely/ or beat by AA u save yourself almost 40bb where your equity is rly just below 10%

gl

well.. this would be pretty sick what i add now, but just for completeness:

if u have the completmentary reads u can do this:

u can fold turn also on 9d which appears to be the card that makes it impossible for u to escape, but in actuality:

if the pot is 30$ on turn and he bets again say 5-10$ this speaks for him having Ad a ton, he cannot have AdKd tho, and since his pf stat we then can easily conclude AA with Ad overwhelming majority of the time /it has to be around that 1.0% tho.. if its more to 1.5% or more then this is a crucial difference coz now there many more AKo in his range/

with KK/AA wihtout diamond he would bet bigger for protection, most prolly just shove coz he has 35$ left into 30$ pot .. this u can rly confidently fold then also coz u just have fd outs + 2K so at most ~24% equity not at all 35%+ u would need.

so afterall i think its almost always a fold on turn if he continues, but u rly have to be confident in your read and that he is never bluffing here, which i rly sb like him would, but u have your database so u can look it up..

basically ppl dont do such plays coz its pretty marginal and if u are multitabling which i think u are, u have pretty much no chance of figuring out all this within couple of seconds, apart from: "i got gut feeling he s got AA but i cant fold, i have fd also" so w/e if i lose its a cooler and stuff.. in this time curiosity always wins and we call, while in theory when u look at his range u re completely *ucked up on turn also

Thanks for the advice! Yeah now I realize that raising the flop was pointless, and I could get away from it more easilly if he fires the turn.

Wow, both of you being 2500bb deep is pretty ridiculous, even if it's NL2. I don't think I've ever been more than 400bb deep. I don't play many monster sessions...I'm assuming you were sitting at that table for a while?

yea, it was one of those sth like 13h nonstop session

u can imagine how it hurt when i lost 50$ back then in 1 hand when my whole br was sth around 150 or sth ♦.. well.. i got to view KK much more conservatively to say the least

I haven't had much time to play due to a huge course load, but I still managed to play 18k so far this month. It was going well and steadily until yesterday when I ran way below EV but still had a nice winning session, and today when I also ran way under EV but lost yesterday's winnings and then some.

I was playing NL25 for ~10k hands just to get my bankroll back up to a healthy amount for NL50.

I think today's loss was mainly just variance, but there were a couple spots where I seemed to forget how to fold a good made hand vs. passive (but fishy) opponents raising...I probably could have saved myself $30-$50 if I had been thinking a bit more.

There was one huge pot where I shoved AKs for just over pot with nut flush draw on a low board in a 4way 3bet pot and got called by pair+FD (short) and a crappy pair (had me covered). I didn't hit and ended up losing ~150bb for $94 under EV in one hand

I had a ton of equity and I guess I should just be happy that fish still limp/call3bet with suited connectors from EP and stack off with a low midpair vs. a very narrow range consisting solely of hands with greater equity than their hands...

I'll have a 2 week break during the Olympics since people won't be able to get anywhere, and I'm not sure what I'll be doing in that time. Possibilities include:

-Vegas road trip with friends
-Grinding/giving myself a challenge
-Train for a marathon (haven't done one yet but want to, did a half last summer)
-Party every day
-Get started on the background reading I need for the summer research project I'll (likely) be doing

but I'll most likely do a combination of them all. I don't really want to pay a ton of money to go watch an Olympic event when I'll get a better view of the action by just watching it on TV. Also the only events I would want to see are the big hockey games (= ridiculously expensive) or some snowboarding (= super crowded and next to impossible to get to, especially the events at Whistler)

Played another short session last night and then a 3hr session today, playing 12 tables for 3hrs. Up 4.5 buy-ins from those two sessions, running about at EV.

I think I might take a shot at NL100 once I get a few more buy-ins...it'll be somewhat aggressive BRM wise, but I've heard aggression is the key to NLHE

If I lose a few stacks at Nl100 right off the bat I can just move back down, and if I don't run bad I'll stay. It'd be nice to be solidly at NL100 during the Olympics in case I decide to grind, although my hourly at NL50 is better than any job I could get atm so if I'm still at NL50 it wouldn't be terrible. Maybe if I'm not at Nl100 I'll give myself a NL50 volume challenge...12 tabling 8+ hrs a day seems like it might get boring but I could give it a shot.

Whenever I play a lot of tables I have issues with going to the washroom or getting food. If I'm playing 6 tables then I can easily run to the washroom and get back before timing out, but if I'm playing 12 when I get back I usually have many decisions, and I basically just look for premium hands I don't want to fold. It's also more of a problem since I drink coffee & lots of water, leading to frequent pit stops. Maybe I should play on my laptop in the washroom ♦

Last week = 6 assignments, 3 15km runs + various short workouts, 3 nights of partying and 0 poker. I'm still behind on school work so I probably won't play this week either, but I watched the two latest vids which were excellent and can't wait to start playing again.

Fridays are great. +8 stacks in 2k hands ftw.

Would have been +9 if I folded a set when I was 95% sure I was beat.

Nit raises from EP, decided not to 3bet JJ from SB, c/r KJT flop (which I now think is bad) and he 3bets 50% of the rest of his stack. If he shoved I think I'd have an easy call but it looked SOOOO strong I struggled to give him anything but KK and AQ, and was leaning more towards AQ. Eventually I decided that if he opens AQ from EP he opens TT, although the 1/2 stack 3bet still looks mighty suspicious for TT, and I didn't have a ton of hands on him so I didn't know for sure that he wasn't spewy postflop and convinced myself he sometimes has AK.
Obviously he flipped AQ.

I made a ton of other mistakes from being a bit out of practice, but the schools of fish just kept coming in.

I might add in a few NL100 tables if they seem fishy next session. I don't really have the BR to switch completely but I'll take a stab at it, and if it goes well I'll make the switch.

So I took a little shot at NL100 on Saturday, playing a few tables along with some NL50 tables. It didn't go too well - lost a couple stacks over fairly standard spots I guess and decided to cut my losses and switched back to purely NL50 tables.

I think I played a bit tighter on the NL100 tables since I didn't have stats on the regs and I wasn't used to the table dynamics...it seemed a little more aggressive both pre and postflop but not too much of a difference.

Anyway the NL50 tables didn't treat me kindly either, but today I managed to recover my losses.

I need to get my platinum status back so that I can finish Jonathan Little's MTT series!!! I was enjoying those weekly treats. Oh well, I think I'm only like 100pts away or something.

The olympics happen after this week --> 2 week (very needed) break from school! I had a somewhat brutal differential geometry midterm today and am really looking forward to some relaxation. I think I might put in some serious volume...maybe get diamond + maybe try NL100 again?

Had a nice session today, +$200 in just over 1k hands. I was playing a couple shorthanded tables since the full ring tables were dying down, and the shorthanded fish are SOOOO spewy! I may have to mix in some SH tables more often. Won a 300bb pot vs ridiculous maniac fish

NL Holdem $0.50(BB) Replayer
SB ($32.20)
BB ($51.45)
UTG ($156) <---- 95/60/35 3b/0 Ft3b
Hero ($75.15)
CO ($88.55)
BTN ($49.50)

Dealt to Hero J♣ J♦

UTG raises to $1.75, Hero calls $1.75, fold, fold, SB raises to $7.50, fold, UTG calls $5.75, Hero calls $5.75

FLOP ($23) Q♦ J♥ Q♠

SB checks, UTG bets $23, Hero calls $23, SB folds

TURN ($69) Q♦ J♥ Q♠ T♠

UTG bets $69, Hero calls $44.65 (AI)

RIVER ($158) Q♦ J♥ Q♠ T♠ 4♠

UTG shows J♠ 2♠
(Pre 12%, Flop 4.4%, Turn 2.3%)

Hero shows J♣ J♦
(Pre 88%, Flop 95.6%, Turn 97.7%)

Hero wins $155

Didn't want to 3bet because the fish calls 100% and then c/minraises a lot, sometimes then folding and sometimes going broke and I didn't want to have to bluffcatch for 150bb with 2nd pair or something. SB seemed like an aggressive TAG who had 3bet a couple times (very small sample size so not conclusive, also midstack so probably bad). I almost have the odds to call purely for set value vs. fish if I assume he stacks off most of the time he hits something, but also have absolute position and have a relatively easy decision if SB shoves so I think calling is fine...I was thinking of 4betting to get it in vs. SB but that could lead to really ugly spots if the fish calls.

Anyway I'm glad I flop well ♦

I also tried owning the FR regs a bit more. They fold sooo much and some play 11/3 and fold to cbet a lot so I started isoraising them with very marginal hands and taking down lots of small pots. I feel fairly comfortable at NL50 now and want to move up but I'll let my BR grow just a bit more.