Half-time

So 2008 is half over. If I look back at the start of this blog and review what I wanted to get done, I can be pretty happy. My objective was to be ready to take a shot at $200nl right about now, having 20ish buyins after playing a WSOP event. Well, we never went to Vegas but I've easily met my goal of playing 200nl and I've played 20k hands there already and have closer to 60 buyins in the tank so all good in that respect.

In fact as I have 30 buyins for 400nl, I'm thinking about moving up and taking some shots at those games when they look good. Everest doesn't always have nice 400nl games running so I'm going to maybe put some money in an ipoker skin and mix it up between the two. I think I have the ability to win there, though maybe not straight off the bat, as I'll admit I'm still not aggressive enough to deal with the regulars but I'm getting there and my game is still steadily improving!

So for the 2nd half of the year, I want to become a regular at the midstakes and increase the bankroll so that I'm rolled for all the mid-stakes games and I can pick and choose the best ones. So if I was to settle on a goal it would be to have played 1000nl (with the proper bankroll) by Christmas. I'm sure this won't be easy, but I don't want to take my foot off the gas and I'm going to keep studying hard (when I'm in work!) to try and get good enough.

I'm going back to Ireland in November which I'm looking forward to and it'd be sweet if I could grind out a deposit for a house in 2009, but that's a long way away yet and I'm sure the games will be much tougher by then, but another distant goal of mine. Obviously all of this may be a pipe dream which I'll be crying over on my next downswing, but whatever!

Quick update on June:

Played good...Talk most of my money from the fishes but certainly started to try and push the regulars around where I could. The challenge of trying to find ways to beat each individual regular in a short space of time is fun.

Winnings: $4214

Bonus and rakeback: ~$600

Total Profit: $4814

Mid June Update

Bleagh...played 2k hands earlier and I'm seriously pokered out after it. I got off to a good start to June and I've split my 11k hands evenly between 100nl and 200nl, mostly because I wanted to clear a bonus so I multi-tabled a lot. Now I'm back to playing 200nl and some 100nl if there are no good games. I was off to a $2k start but the last few days have been horrible. Firstly I was one-outered in a $500 pot. Then the following two abominations from today which resulted in me being stuck for $650 early on. Truly awful stuff:

http://weaktight.com/233539
http://weaktight.com/233538

I somehow stuck at it and ended the day up a small amount, so overall I'm up around $2.4k now for June which is ok, but its been rough. The aggression is much more notable at 200nl and I'm getting 3bet left right and centre, but I've picked a few decent spots for 4b bluffs and CRAI on some flops that has worked out ok. I'll have to have a look at some filters in holdem manager and make sure I'm not wasting money by folding to 3bets to often, and it's probably something I'll need to do a coaching session or two on.
I was going to play the Stars 200 seat WSOP guaranteed tomorrow night, but it's on very late and will likely run all night, and I know I won't be able to concentrate coz I'm useless at staying up late....(great trait for a poker player!) so I'll see what to do. These updates are pretty dull, but such is the life of the small stakes grinder.
No stats or graphs...

Adios.

May Update

Its been a while since I updated last, so here's a quick May summary. It went good! I played pretty solid and ran well...Still v.tight but whatever works is good with me. At the end of the month I was getting bored with $100nl and was getting a bit robotic so with about $6.7k I decided to have a go at $200nl. I got off to a bad start as usual when moving up, but I've managed to turn it around since and I'm in profit for 200nl. It's good because I'm concentrating a lot harder on every hand and I've only been playing 2-4 tables to begin with.
So I hope I can make it stick this time. I think I'm good enough to at least be a small winner in the games by picking on the fish and trying to find the leaks in the regs. So far I've noticed the games are more aggressive, but the aggression seems mindless and I've managed to get the better of a lot of the spewy 27/23 type regs. I've been playing even tighter since moving up which is hard to imagine. I've been running at about 17/13 as opposed to my usual 18/15.
For June I wanna make it stick at $200nl and keep building the bankroll. I probably won't get too many hands in as I'm only gonna play 4 tables max for a while.

Stats for June:

Hands: 16833
VPIP: 17.9%
PFR: 13.7%
Att. to Steal: 27.7%
W$WSF: 39%

Total won: $2046.92

RB and Bonus: ~$300

Total: ~$2347