changed my mind, no more grinding for now, I'm just too tired and can't play my A game. I guess I'll watch some videos and read some articles until my shift is done.
Cheers,
Georg
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After some good quality sleep and recovering from the 2 back to back all nighters I've played another 4 hour session. It's almost the end of July, and I'm currently trying to win a leaderboard promotion that is just based on the amount of points I can accumulate. 1st place prize is 500$ and second is 300$. I'm currently tied for 1st with another guy and we're a ways from 3rd.
Because of this promotion, the last 2 sessions i've been 9 tabling (instead of 6) NL25 SH to go for the 500$. It was a little crazy to start with, but now that I've gotten comfortable with it I think it's doable, although probably brings down my earnings in each session a bit due to misclicks and timeouts (I timed out and folded a hand after being reraised with the nuts because I was trying to play aces on another table at the same time). Other than mistakes like this my 9tabling sessions have gone pretty well, and I feel that I'm playing really solid poker, because with 9tables I don't waste my money as often with more advanced plays that I shouldn't be trying to run on dumb opponents. I'm up another +55$.
For the next 3 days I'm pretty busy with other stuff (painting a house mostly) but will be 9 tabling every extra moment I've got to see if I can win that leaderboard...we'll see how it goes 
BR-1030$
I played quite a bit today, as planned, and finished +95$ which is good I think. I had a lot of bad beats at the beginning of my session, the river was really killing me for a while, but then thinks started to pick up and at the end and I finished with a couple well payed off sets ♦. I'd like to post some stats and graphs etc. but my pokertracker monthly trial just ended so i no longer have any for now...
I haven't been doing much studying over the past couple of days because of this promotion leaderboard race, but I've been saving a lot hand histories to get feedback on. (I'll post them in the strategy section when I get a chance) Next month I'll definitely put a lot more focus back on learning, not just playing, although playing is definitely one of the best ways to learn by trying to actually applying all the concepts. It's amazing how much easier it is to understand something, but still have trouble applying it in a game situation!
I'm tired...time to sleep
Cheers,
BR-1125$
I finished playing my last little session of July today and with 1 day to go in the leaderboard race I am a ways ahead of second so I think I will win the 500$. (will find out for sure tomorrow) I want to look back at my goals as see how I've progressed, especially since this is the first month I've even taken poker semi 'seriously'. Here's my poker review of July.
My goals at the beginning of the month:
-clear AP bonus (was a 50$ bonus + I wanted to get top5 on the leaderboard at the end of the month) --- I cleared the 50$ bonus and either came 1st/2nd in leaderboard race (probably first) =achieved
-play solid while clearing bonus --- I think I did this 90% of the time, caught myself 'asleep at the wheel' a couple of times but tried to fix it or take a break =achieved
-study at least 50% time --- achieved this for first 2/3 of month, then mostly just played to try to win the leaderboard so I can't say I achieved this, but I'll make up for it next month ♦ = failed
- +ROI in 10$ SNG's --- decided to focus on NL SH, didn't play a single SNG so this goal kinda disappeared during the month = changed goal
- +winrate at NL25 SH --- played about 30k hands at 4-5BB/100 hands (didn't have pokertracker after about 20k hands, so probably actually played closer to 35k hands, but the win rate should be about right since I was at 5-6BB/100 over 20k hands but slowed down a bit after this, although I kept steadily winning) = achieved
So all in all, I achieved 3/5 but only really failed 1 so I'm pretty happy with that. Also my bankroll finished at 1115$ + 500$ (should get tomorrow if I win) = 1615$. At the start of July my bankroll was 250$ so thats +1365$ (550$ of bonuses and 815$ playing profit) for the month of July.
I'm pretty proud of this achievement, mostly because I did it sticking to BRM and not taking any big risks with my roll. This is a lot more than I can say for any other month of poker I've played (if you've read my first post you know that I've had a roll up to 1000$, but definitely didn't make it with BRM, and only kept it a week or so) I think that I finally have the discipline to make a BR stick, but I guess we'll just have to wait and see...everyone can laugh at me in a couple of weeks/months if I'm busto I guess 
I'm going on vacation for the next week, so I won't be playing or updating this blog, but when I get back I'll throw down some new goals and hit the tables!
Until then, best of luck to everyone,
Cheers,
Georg
Also I'd like to say thanks to everyone/anyone who is reading this and most of all to the great people at this site that give us all the chance to improve our game!
Great month for you. VERY well done and I hope you came 1st as well - you deserve it ♦
I appreciate the comment punta
I’m back from my short vacation (an awesome 5 day backbacking trip in the Canadian rocky mountains) and in a couple of days I’ll be back to playing quite a bit of poker again. I did end up winning that leaderboard for July, so I should be getting the 500$ bonus any day now and my bankroll numbers in my July wrap-up were correct.
Here is my next set of goals for august:
-come top3 in august leaderboard (this month 1st is 700, 2nd 500, 3rd 300) ideally I’d like to win again, but I realize that this will be difficult this month because I only have time to start playing around the 10th so I would need to play the same volume as others in 2/3 of the time.
-play at least 30k hands, to achieve the above goal I’d need to do this anyways. (I don’t know if I’ll be able to track this because I don’t currently have any poker tracker software)
- get comfortable playing NL50 SH and have +BB/100 hands with a decent sample size.
-post at least 30 hands for analysis in august, and read/comment on many others (lets say comment on another 30)
-try to identify then fix leaks in my game and post them on this log to keep me actively thinking about ways to improve my game (this shouldn’t be hard since I’m sure there are plenty of huge leaks still in my game 
)
-handle down swings well if they come and not lose much to tilt. I know it could be easy for me to get frustrated if I start off on a downswing because I had such a good July.
-My only kinda money oriented goal is to be suitably rolled for NL100 SH at the end of the month, so something like 25-30 buy-ins (with bonuses of course) I don’t want to put any real $ goals because I find it can lead to tilt during the month when you are in unavoidable downswings and feel like you aren’t going to make your goals.
I’ve also decided to stay with AP another month due to the nice leaderboard bonus I can get there (500/700$ extra is just too nice a bonus to resist). I do plan on leaving AP either at the end of this month or the next month, and move my entire roll over to either Ladbrokes or Betfair. This way when I move my roll I’ll hopefully be playing NL100 by then and will be able to take full advantage of the hefty deposit bonuses and get solid rakeback at these sites. I’ll also finally be tracked to PS then, so that I can really take advantage of this site as a gold/platinum/diamond member!
I think that’s about it, so GL to everyone at the tables this month
Cheers,
Georg
Ok, I finally got to play my first session of NL50. I've been dying to try out the knew limit but just haven't had time till now. The good news is that I should have quite a bit of time to play in the next couple of weeks
As for this session I finished -90$. I started and quite quickly went like -$200, which wasn't the way I wanted to start, but most of it was bad beats and coolers, I lost KK/AA all in preflop, fullhouse / fullhouse, and an open ended straight flushdraw all in on the flop with 2 players calling the all in! All 3 of these were for full stacks and I don't think I made any errors in these hands. I do think that I made some errors in other hands, and I have a ton of hands that I'll be posting in the coaching forum tommorow for feedback on.
The main thing that I was trying to do was up aggression a bit, especially raising and reraising more preflop (I almost never steal reraised at NL25, and i definitely should be). This made for more tough decisions postflop, which I like, because its one of my main goals to become more proficient postflop although right now its causing a lot of errors on my part.What I found is that all the aggression really adds to the varience (although it should make for me profits in the long term). In this session I was at one point up a buying, down 5 buyins and finished down almost 2 buyins. For me this quite a bit, but I think I'll get used to it.
Hopefully I can get back out of the red in the next couple sessions!
Cheers,
BR $1525
Played another Nl50 SH session today. Was +95$ which puts me back to even for this limit, which I'm happy about. I think my play was quite a bit better today as well, and I've gotten pretty comfortable at this limit. I'll add a couple of points to my leaks ever changing 'list of leaks to improve':
-value betting on turn/river. I've noticed lately that I had been missing a lot of value bets with hands like TPGK, because I play as if the other guy is a pro and won't call me down with second pair or plenty of other crap. I know that there are times to control the potsize with hands like this, but there are definitely times where I'll get called down by much worse players. (I was really pleasantly surprised today when I held AQ with a ragged Q high board and had bet every street, and made a big bet on the river that was called by Q4!)
-playing after my cbet is called- In the past my play (assuming my hand hasn't improved) is just to check fold once my cbet's been called. I'm realizing that this just isnt good enough because I make a lot of cbets and when people start picking up on this, they start to float me. I'm starting to try and find spots where I can second barrel or maybe check call after a cbet.
I'll just end this post with a nice hand:
Stack sizes:
UTG: $25.50
UTG+1: $54.70
CO: $24.90
Hero: $91.66
SB: $14.75
BB: $33.40
Pre-flop: (6 players) Hero is Button with A♠ A♥
UTG calls, 2 folds, Hero raises to $2.5, 2 folds, UTG calls.
Flop: J♣ K♦ A♦ ($5.75, 2 players)
UTG checks, Hero bets $4, UTG calls.
Turn: J♦ ($13.75, 2 players)
UTG checks, Hero bets $8, UTG calls.
River: A♣ ($29.75, 2 players)
UTG checks, Hero bets $12, UTG calls all-in $11.
Uncalled bets: $1 returned to Hero.
Results:
Final pot: $51.75
Hero Shows As Ah
UTG mucks Ks Qc
This was on a Bad Beat Jackpot table. Its the first time I've ever prayed that the other player turn over the nuts! lol
BR $1620
I played another good sized session yesterday, and then had just started playing today. I'm currently taking a mental break after suffering a couple tough beats... I'm not complaining because I know it's normal, but it's still tough to deal with especially when I moved up limits recently, within a half hour I lost nutflush/straightflush, top set/straight, AA/KK that hit K on flop. (all three were for minimum 1 buyin the top set hand was for almost 2)
I was playing pretty well at least, and I'm still confident that I have the skill to beat NL50 (although if I lose a couple more buying I'll have to move down to NL25). At the end of my session yesterday I definitely spewed a couple of times, making bad calls on the river, which I'm very frustrated with, I didn't lose too much with these, but I definitely need to identify when I'm on a small tilt and take a break sooner. What I consider tilt is a lot better now that it ever has been but there's still lots of room to improve! (instead of losing staking on bluffs when tilting now I tend to make smaller mistakes like bad calldowns with TP etc)
From now till the end of the weekend I have a ton of time to play poker, so I'm gonna play some sick sessions and see if I can keep improving at Nl50.
Hopefully next update Ill have some good news!
BR- $1380
I went on the grind for most of the day today after writing the post this morning. I'm really happy with it because I played the most focused poker I've ever played (mostly because I desperately didn't want to move down limits). I finished +350$, which puts me +115$ for Nl50 which isn't much considering the amount of hands I've played, buts its a step in the right direction.
I played against a huge fish for a couple of hours who was sitting on a stack of up to 300$ at one point. Thanks to him I raked in by far my biggest pot up until now ♦ ♦ ♦
Here it is-
Stack sizes:
UTG: $83.75
UTG+1: $263.36
CO: $47.50
Hero: $124.07
SB: $35.35
BB: $23.70
Pre-flop: (6 players) Hero is Button with 7♣ 5♣
UTG folds, UTG+1 raises to $2.25, CO folds, Hero calls, SB calls, BB calls.
I would normally insta fold this preflop, but the big fish either didn't play a pot, or was willing to play for all his chips so I knew my implied odds were ridiculous if I hit anything
Flop: K♥ 5♦ 5♥ ($9, 4 players)
SB checks, BB checks, UTG+1 bets $4.5, Hero raises to $14, 2 folds, UTG+1 calls.
Turn: 2♣ ($37, 2 players)
UTG+1 bets $9.5, Hero raises to $35, UTG+1 calls.
River: 3♦ ($107, 2 players)
UTG+1 checks, Hero is all-in $72.82, UTG+1 calls.
Results:
Final pot: $252.64
Hero Shows 7c 5c
I put him on a king for sure, but the craziest part of this hand is that he actually had JJ!! calling me down for 2.5buyins...unbelievable
BR-$1730
George, nice post. Congratz with your success, you seem to be doing well. I've played a lot on Party Poker the last few days, with their BB Jackpot getting so big, and there are a lot of Canadians playing there. Generally, they seem to be aggressive, and can throw money about pretty liberally. Sort of like you describe yourself in the past in a way, having a BR but not seeming to value it a great deal, so I wonder if the impulsiveness is a Canadian trait? Anyway, you are bringing it under control, and are flying, so congrats and well done.
Hi Aciddrop,
Thanks for the congratz! I don't know if impulsiveness/aggressiveness is a Canadian trait, but I can definitely say that I don't have a problem with playing too passively or playing with scared money :tongue:.
I grinded quite a while today and feel like I played pretty solidly for the most part although I'm still seeing lots of places that I need improving on. The only really bad hand I played was one where I got stacked with Aces against a set when I should have folded because I had a read on my opponent and I knew I was beat but still called... I had to take a break after that because I was so mad at myself. Overall I finished +150$.
I've got a ton of hands that I'm going to post on the hand evaluation forum to get some feedback on! I don't know if the hand judges read this post, but I'd really like to thank them for evaluating all the hands I post (especially Katz who's been answering most of them)
BR- $1880
thanks finchybg
I'm taking a quick break right now, because I just got a little frustrated...I don't think I made any major mistakes, but I doubled up the same person (who is a complete fish) 3 times within 5 minutes. So ya....break time 
. I know bad beats are normal and I'm not really pissed or anything, just though I'd share this funny sequence of hands.
HAND1-
Stack sizes:
UTG: $36.45
UTG+1: $159.78
CO: $9.90
Button: $76.93
SB: $99.38
Hero: $52.16
Pre-flop: (6 players) Hero is BB with Q♥ Q♠
UTG calls, UTG+1 folds, CO raises all-in $9.9, 2 folds, Hero calls, UTG folds.
Flop: 7♦ T♣ 8♦ ($20.55, 1 player + 1 all-in - Main pot: $20.55)
Turn: 3♣ ($20.55, 1 player + 1 all-in - Main pot: $20.55)
River: 7♣ ($20.55, 1 player + 1 all-in - Main pot: $20.55)
Results:
Final pot: $20.55
Hero Shows Qh Qs
CO Shows Qc 2c
Not much commentary necessary...
HAND2- 2 hands later
Stack sizes:
UTG: $19.05
UTG+1: $78.13
CO: $99.13
Hero: $52.01
SB: $35.45
BB: $159.78
Pre-flop: (6 players) Hero is Button with J♥ A♣
UTG calls, 2 folds, Hero raises to $2.5, 2 folds, UTG calls.
Flop: J♠ 4♦ 8♠ ($5.75, 2 players)
UTG checks, Hero bets $4, UTG calls.
Turn: 6♥ ($13.75, 2 players)
UTG bets $6.87, Hero raises to $15, UTG calls all-in $5.68.
Uncalled bets: $2.45 returned to Hero.
River: 9♠ ($38.85, 1 player + 1 all-in - Main pot: $38.85)
Results:
Final pot: $38.85
Hero Shows Jh Ac
UTG Shows Kd Kc
Not a bad beat or anything, just nothing I could do I think (I'm not laying down TPTK to a fish that just pushed Q2s)
HAND3- 4 hands later
b]Stack sizes:
UTG: $35.20
UTG+1: $159.03
CO: $36.95
Button: $69.51
SB: $107.20
Hero: $52.96
Pre-flop: (6 players) Hero is BB with A♥ K♣
2 folds, CO raises to $1, Button calls, SB folds, Hero raises to $5, CO calls, Button calls.
Flop: 5♦ J♦ K♠ ($15.25, 3 players)
Hero bets $14, CO calls, Button folds.
Turn: 9♣ ($43.25, 2 players)
Hero bets $20, CO calls all-in $17.95.
Uncalled bets: $2.05 returned to Hero.
River: T♠ ($79.15, 1 player + 1 all-in - Main pot: $79.15)
Results:
Final pot: $79.15
Hero Shows Ah Kc
CO Shows Jc Kd
Also not a bad beat, although he shouldn't have called preflop, but again I don't think I made a mistake.
Anyways, just to finish this story, 2 hands after the last one he double through another player putting his stack close to 150$ (5 min after pushing 10$ with Q2s) I guess this is a prime example of why loosing players don't quit...I'm sure he'll never forget this little run!
I played quite a bit again yesterday and today, so I'll do a quick recap of each session, as they were very different.
Yesterday was a tough day. I took a lot of bad beats and went on tilt quite a few times. I'm actually pretty happy with it though because I think I played pretty solid and also had the discipline to stop every time I started tilting so I can honestly say that I never lost any big pots due to tilt. At the end of the day I finished somewhere around -200$.
I also played a 25$ 6k guaranteed mtt with 250ish people. I went deep and finished 13th for like 50$ profit. I had a slightly below average stack (blinds were very large so I only had like 8x the blind) When I picked up KK I was delighted to pushin and get called by 77 from another midsize stack...delighted until the 7 fell on the river and I got knocked out of the tourney 
Oh well I did the most I could I think and didn't make any major errors, a big bankroll boost would have been nice though!
Enough about yesterday, today I played another couple of long sessions and it went really well. I played focused and solid for the whole time and finished about +$300. In terms of playing progression, I'm working on loosening my 3betting/4betting to regulars and starting to see good squeeze/resteal situations. I'm also starting to see some of the postflop adjustments that I need to make against different kinds of opponents like TAG's, calling stations etc. I'm also very comfortable playing 9 SH tables now, which I used to find way too rushed.
Cheers,
BR- $1980
It's been a couple of days since my last post, so here's a little update. I haven't been playing too much lately because of work/school, but when I have played it's been pretty hard. At the worst I had lost 10 buyins and I'm currently down 6 which is frustrating, but I don't think I made any big tilting mistakes, which is good.
Because of the down, I've been trying to focusing extra hard on my play and make sure I'm continuously identifying and eliminating leaks. I'm also working on keeping a very positive outlook. I think looking for leaks helps me stay positive because then when I lose a big pot unluckily I can look at it and be confident that I didn't make a mistake. This way I can try to classify each lost pot into either errors on my part or just plain old bad luck.
On to more positive news: In 1 week of play I'm up to 1st place in that leaderboard for august, so this means that I should easily win it and get a nice 700$ bonus at the end of the month. This definitely also helps keep me positive while I'm playing!
BR- 1685$
Just played a 5 hour + session 9tabling Nl50 Sh, because I wanted to stay up to see some of the Olympic events live. It was a good idea! My small downswing has been completely erased after finishing this session +7 buy-ins.
The past couple of days I had been playing in the morning/mid-day, and I must
say that It's just so much better at night. The difference in player quality is really unbelievable. In the mid-day there is on average maybe half of each table that are playing really tight, if not TAG. Tonight there were a couple of tables that I was the only real TAG, and the average was maybe 1 or 2 decent players per table... I guess it helps that I ran super hot as well ♦
My main goals are still far from being reached (I think my goal of 'mastering' poker will take a while ) but I can't help but brag and say that I hit the 2k mark for the first time ever!
BR- $2030
Played another couple of sessions yesterday, finishing down 1.5 buy-ins. I've got a couple more points to add to my list of leaks to improve on as well:
Blind vs Blind play: Sometimes I definitely overplay hands because I'm in the blind battle. I'm working on finding a good balance between loosening up and not playing like an idiot 
.
Adjusting to calling station fish: Yesterday was Sunday and I had a couple of tables that every time I bet after raising preflop someone at least called or pushed. Obviously this isn't a good time to cbet, but yet I still tried to way too much, which cost me a lot of wasted $.
Playing deep stack: I think I'm actually pretty good at this, but it still needs a lot of work. The part I find hard is playing say TPTK when you know the other guy is a fish and you each are 300bb's deep. I don't like the pot control line so much, because I'm loosing value from the fish, but at the same time getting it all in for 300bb with 1 pair isn't definitely an uncomfortable situation.
I'll be playing a lot again today, so I'll have tons of time to try and improve!
BR- $1970
Didn't get to play nearly as much as I planned to, but still maybe 3-4 hours. In the end I made back a stack from when I started, but it was a swingy day. At the worst I had lost 8 stacks in an hour and a bit. I'm pretty frustrated with myself because after getting a good amount of bad beats, and a guy calling down my river bluff with a pair of 2's I went on tilt. I lost a little less than a stack to tilt, and then took an hour break before starting up again. After that I played really good poker I think and had some good luck as well.
Here's the hand where the guy called me down at the end. I had played a couple of times before with him, but I had never bluffed him or anything. I think I needed to raise more on the flop, because if I had a made hand I would have raised 3-3.5x his raise, so I should have done the same here. I could also have checked behind on the turn, but I like bluffing more there because he'll often old I think. Other then that I think my bets were ok, it seemed to me that he was very weak...just didn't think he'd call the river...oh well, my guess is that he was probably on tilt or something.
Stack sizes:
UTG: $43.36
UTG+1: $53.60
CO: $98.43
Button: $79.27
SB: $99.95
Hero: $50
Pre-flop: (6 players) Hero is BB with A♦ 4♦
4 folds, SB raises to $1.5, Hero calls.
Flop: 2♦ 6♣ 5♦ ($3, 2 players)
SB bets $3, Hero raises to $8, SB calls.
Turn: K♠ ($19, 2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $13, SB calls.
River: J♥ ($45, 2 players)
SB checks, Hero is all-in $27.5, SB calls.
Results:
Final pot: $100
Hero Shows Ad 4d
SB Shows 2s 3s
I would be very interested in anybody else's opinion on this hand.
BR- $2020
It's been a while since I posted last, mostly because I've been grinding like a maniac for the past three days. Honestly, I'm completely burnt out, I didn't sleep enough, wasn't able to focus while playing, and all in all wasted my time. The reason I was doing this was to try and play enough this month, so that next month I'll get 9% interest on my money in my poker account. I gave up today because I was just playing so brain dead that I though I might lose much more then I stood to gain from the 9% interest. All in all I grinded a ton or 3 days and finished somewhere around -3buyins at Nl50 and a -$150ish in tourneys (I think I actually played the tourneys well compared to the cash game, but couldn't avoid the suck outs when it counted).
After all this I was feeling pretty frustrated, although I did learn a good lesson about where my limits are. Today I entered in one last tourney of 99 person $50+5. I just played it by itself and watched some TV at the same time to relax (as opposed to simultaneously playing 4-8 cash tables like I normally do). The tourney went amazingly well, I only had 1 time where I was all-in holding 99 vs AK and the rest was pretty much smooth sailing. When it got down to the final table I picked up QQ then JJ back to back and almost tripled my stack putting me with the second largest chipstack. After that I had a pretty tight image, which I abused a bit when it got down to 4 handed. In the end I got to heads-up down 1:2 in chips. The other guy offered to split the winnings (1500$ for first 1000$ for second), which I was happy to take considering his chip edge, so I walked away with $1250.
In the end I had 3 frustrating days, finished with some great luck in a tourney to pump by BR up to $2985.
I'm done playing for the month as I'm working over the weekend, so tomorrow I'll write up my monthly recap.
Cheers,
Georg