Life, Love, and Poker

NEW WEBSITE

2008-12-19T10:16:00.002-06:00

I decided to upgrade to a better website with an actual .com, so...

My new blog, "Cain Is Abel" is now located at http://www.cainisabel.com/!

If you were not automatically redirected, please click here to be forwarded to the new site.

SNE Quest - Dec 16: Head Above Water

2008-12-16T05:04:00.008-06:00

VPP COUNT: 956505

My head is above water in a couple different ways.

1) As of last night, I am ahead of the linear SNE pace for the first time in months! This brings the average number of points I need to earn per day down to about 2.8k, which is chump change.

I'll be continuing the hellgrind, which has consisted of a minimum of 6 hours a day for the past week. I need to do this for 1 more week, and I'll be close enough to finished that I can spend the 24th and 25th with family.

2) I am finally above the incredibly massive soul-crushing breakeven stretch I was experiencing. In $, the stretch lasted somewhere in the ballpark of 800k hands. This sounds incredibly terrible, seeing as most players wouldn't play close to 800k hands of poker in their lifetime. I may post a graph at some point, but I'm not too enthused about that. In BB, the graph is not nearly as harsh, which just means I ran really bad at higher stakes.

The year is coming to an end and I've barely had time to reflect. I'm glad I kept this blog.

SNE Quest - Dec 11: Looking Up

2008-12-11T20:50:00.004-06:00

VPP COUNT: 940621

Since my last post, I've worked out a coaching deal with WCGRider. He is teaching me to play better and make money, since I haven't really been able to do that very well for the past couple months. His blog is at http://dougkpolk.blogspot.com/, and I have included a link on the left.

The results have initially been very good, and I think I'm doing a pretty good job of adapting to the style. Since I am playing so many more hands, and firing at so many more pots, it has been a much more intense experience playing 24 tables.

"On pace" tonight is 945345. I'm closing that gap quickly. The hellgrind has been successful so far.

Sophy is walking for her first times. She's also talking/mimicking quite a bit. Smart baby.

SNE QUEST - Dec 8: 2-Week Hell Grind

2008-12-08T08:44:00.005-06:00

VPP COUNT: 920005

I had to take some time away from the quest at the beginning of this month to take care of some other things, so I am moving slightly slower than I would have liked.

I am going to be busting my ass for the next 2 weeks, in attempt to finish, or be close enough, to take the 24th and 25th off.

To get the remaining 80k VPPs in 14 days would require averaging about 8-9h per day. This is incredibly difficult to do for a 2 week period, and would require me to take no days off. I think my average will be closer to 7h/day, hypothetically leaving me at about 990k vpps on the 21st. This is the pace I'd like to maintain.

I call it the "Hell Grind" also because I've been painfully breakeven at 200NL lately, and it really has become a chore to put in the hours. Looking forward to not having my nose to the grindstone.

Off to the tables!

SNE QUEST - Dec 02: Slow Start

2008-12-02T21:04:00.003-06:00

VPP COUNT: 908435

I have averaged about 4.2k points per day for the last 2 days, which is a good enough pace to finish by Christmas.

Unfortunately, I stopped running well in DoNs, and have been only making a little at FRNL.

I'll be trying to put in some late night sessions, as there are supposed to be more vpps/hr, and more fish. Tonights' session was a terrible nightmare of 2 outers and under-boats, and I ended the day even.

I think I'll be able to keep up this pace fairly comfortably...but would really like to run better for the last month of the year.

SNE QUEST - Nov 30: The Final Stretch

2008-11-30T16:56:00.003-06:00

VPP COUNT: 900005

The results in November were MUCH better than October. Oddly enough, I put in more hours in November, but earned slightly less points. This is mostly due to experimenting with different games.

Assuming I complete the last 100K VPPs while breaking even at the tables, I will reach my earnings goal for the year. I could even lose some in December and reach my goal. Despite how frustrating poker can be sometimes, completing this quest has really REALLY boosted my bankroll.

So now there is just 1 more month to go. In the last 2 months I have earned about 108k and 104k VPPs. In December I just need 99995. This thing is in the bag.

I am still undecided as far as next years' plans. It is not TOO incredibly difficult to maintain SNE pace, especially if there aren't any holidays or trips to worry about. I am still very interested in building a nice MTT resume, and the DoNs that I've been crushing are also a nice option. I am very glad to have as many choices as I do, since this past year has pretty much been decided upon, leaving me very restricted.

Hopefully, I'll have a huge energy rush during the first few weeks of December, and finish this thing off before Christmas. I also may just get myself to 999999 vpps, and host a new years party or something where I get that final point... We'll see :)

SNE Quest - Nov 24: Bouncing around

2008-11-24T15:28:00.002-06:00

VPP COUNT: 877061

Well, i've been exploring my other options in DoNs and ShortStacking for the past few days. It has been interesting, and fairly difficult to transition to multitabling in each of these styles.

DoNs might actually end up being the most profitable of the 3 for me, but I only make about 400-500 VPPs/hr depending on how many are running.
FRNL is probably my second best option as far as table winnings, and brings me about 600-650 VPPs/hr.
Shortstacking is my last resort, with the lowest expected return, but about 900-950 VPPs/hr.

It really has been discouraging seeing the diminishing returns as the year has gone on. It makes me not want to do SNE next year, because to get the amount of VPPs/hr needed, you need to play either very high stakes, or mass table. All of the mass tabling options are being exhausted by other players, because of how easy it is to make a high $/hr income with a simple strategy. So all of these games will be extremely overrun by competent players, and it will only be worse in 2009.

My game will need to evolve again in 2009 if I want to advance. While SNE is an amazing 110k over the year (and about 135k if I were to repeat in 09) it really hinders my ability to experiment, play less tables, and increase my win rate.

Next year, that is what i'll be focusing on. If it doesnt work out so well, I can always take another shot at SNE, because I know I could do it again. I'll know by February if it is worth it to me.

I expect to be over 900k points by the end of November. I'd love to finish before christmas.

SNE Quest - Nov 13: A short detour, and other options!

2008-11-13T11:38:00.004-06:00

VPP COUNT: 834371

I moved down to 100NL for a short period of time, just because of how awful the table selection always was at 200NL. Though I ran a bit better at 100NL, it just did not give as many vpps/hand as I need to be able to finish this thing. Back to 200NL it is for me.

I was extremely happy with my play today, and hope I can keep it up. My spirits are still fairly high even though I run so bad.

I've also discovered these "Double or Nothing" tournaments, which are barely even poker. They're a pretty good way for me to boost the number of VPPs I bring in, and can be done much more casually than FRNL. Essentially, they're just elaborate coin flips (with an edge of course), but they bring in some OK vpps.

This will also be a nice backup option if FRNL just gets too unbearably tight. The 52$ buyin DoNs arent high enough, but the 104$ ones could turn into a pretty significant VPP rate. Not sure if it's a good idea yet, but it is nice to have a backup plan....besides shortstacking that is.

I'll be getting in a whole bunch of hours today, and hopefully tomorrow as well, because I'll be gone most of Saturday.

Closer and closer every day...

SNE Quest - Nov 5: Slow and steady

2008-11-05T18:17:00.002-06:00

VPP COUNT: 812784

I'm feeling fairly overwhelmed this week, but still steadily getting in those sessions.

Between Thanksgiving, Christmas, and a few other days that have already been taken off, i've got probably 50 working days ahead of me. Not much time to relax.

Less than 2 months to go and its over!!

I am really wanting to devote more time to MTTs and other games after this all is over. I think MTTs are much softer, and will stay much softer than FRNL. I'll probably need to mix FRNL games into my schedule, but more MTTs will be good to mix things up.

SNE Quest - 800k MILESTONE

2008-11-03T08:47:00.002-06:00

VPP COUNT: 800025

Just a short update while I get started on a session.

I've gone back to playing only 200NL tables, as the table selection and swings at the higher stakes have been terrible for me.

Also, I'm beginning to work on my videos for Cardrunners.com, where I'll be contributing in the near future! I'll be doing a series on multitabling. I'm very excited! This was the "big news" I mentioned in an earlier post.

Haven't had time to do the Galapagos TR yet, my plate is pretty full. It is on the way though!

Back to the grind!

SNE Quest - Oct 29: October blows

2008-10-29T08:37:00.002-05:00

VPP COUNT: 783892

Just a short update as I am starting a session.

I have been breaking even for most of October. It really has been rough. I've still been getting in the time though, and as of yesterday have broken 100k vpps earned this month. So even with my awful run at the tables, I'm up significantly in bonuses.

So hopefully I can finish these last few days strong, but either way I'll just keep grinding out those points.

Ecuador & Galapagos Part I

2008-10-23T03:42:00.007-05:00

The trip to Ecuador went very smoothly. Mary and I have recently discovered the secret to being comfortable while traveling. Beer. Going through an airport sucks. Waiting in an airport sucks. Being on a plane pretty much sucks. Beer makes all of these things much more awesome. We tried some "Sweet Water 420" while we were waiting in the Atlanta airport for about five hours. It made the time fly by.

(I like this picture because you can see Mary and I in the reflections)

Ecuador was a culture shock. We had a honeymoon suite at the Cafe Cultura in Quito. It was a very nice room, but not by American standards at all. The water was very unreliable, and during certain times of the day you could not get running water. Heating was also a bit of an issue, but it was the colder season. Very few people spoke English, so we were forced to learn and try Spanish - and I think we did a pretty damn good job of it.

What Cafe Cultura lacked in American amenities, they made up for in quality. Their service was amazing, and the food was even better. Every morning we had fresh squeezed blackberry juice, coffee with hand whipped sweet cream, water with mint/lemon, and that was just the beverages. Despite the amazing food, the altitude must have been doing something to mess with our stomachs, because we could barely finish our meals.

The markets were somewhat disappointing. It was pretty much the same 5 or 6 stores over and over, and 90% of the things you saw for sale were extremely mass-produced. This may be because we visited during the down season. We did find a few gems, and were able to find gifts for most of our relatives.

On our 3rd day, which was a Sunday, we visited "Old Town" in Quito. Ecuador is a very Catholic nation, and their mass was in progress while we were visiting. There were quite a few bands playing, and people in the street, so we definitely picked the right day to visit. The markets there were...more of the same. We did get to eat in a nice little place in the center square, where we had some Pilsener. (Ecuador's beer brand)

After staying 3 nights at Cafe Cultura, and basically being forced to immerse ourselves, our trip got easier. We met our guide, Roberto, who took us through Ecuador for 2 days before we left for Galapagos. We stayed at the JW Marriott the night before.

The Marriott was awesome. They upgraded us to a honeymoon suite, which included access to the executive lounge. The executive lounge meant free food, and 1 free drink! Very awesome. We also got to see a little Ecuadorian TV. Like most TV...nothin' special.

Our first day with Roberto was a long drive towards Otavalo, the "Largest indigenous street market in the world!!". One of our stops was Cayambe, a small town that is known for their "biscochos". The biscochos are basically buttery biscuits that you generally eat with cheese. Mary and I each had some, and were incredibly sleepy during the remainder of the car ride.

At one point, Roberto had mentioned that eucalyptus is used in the biscochos. I knew that eucalyptus had a narcotic effect, so I asked if that effect stayed in the biscochos. Apparently in that town, they also have saunas where eucalyptus is used as well, and it is supposed to "enhance your relaxation". I'm pretty sure we had an experience with a true opiate of the masses!

We stayed in Hacienda Pinsaqui, outside of Otavalo. It was a lavish, hidden Hacienda, which was almost empty because it was the off-season. As soon as we arrived, a band started playing just for us, people came and took our bags, etc. We are not used to that kind of treatment, so it was just a little awkward. The room was a bit more modern than Cafe Cultura, and had a sweet wood-burning fireplace. That night, the band played for the handful of guests at the bar. They served us tea, and some sweet liquor that I've never had before. It was a good stay.

Otavalo market was pretty disappointing. Sure, it was the off-season, but they were selling all of the same mass-produced stuff that the other markets were. Almost nothing was unique to Otavalo at all. Oh well.

After Otavalo, we started our trip back to Quito. We stopped in the national park, and walked down a little hiking trail next to "Guinea Pig Lake". Apparently they eat guinea pigs in Ecuador. The scenery was beautiful - a lake at the base of a volcano. We made use of Mary's new camera and the panoramic setting.

The drive to and from Otavalo was also noteworthy. Their roads are filled with 1) Diesel trucks that cant go more than 15mph, 2) Small cars trying their best to weave between traffic on 1-lane streets, and 3) INSANE buses that would literally run other cars off the road. Also, cows are just wandering along the sides of streets. They obviously are owned by somebody, but they just chill on the side of the highway.

We stayed in the Marriott again that night in Quito. No suite upgrade that night. We just swam in the pool and relaxed before tomorrow mornings' trip to the Galapagos...

Stay tuned for tales of dragons, pirates, and Ecuadorian moonshine. Part II and the Galapagos TR are coming soon!

SNE Quest - Oct 23: Breaking ANOTHER downswing

2008-10-23T03:11:00.002-05:00

VPP COUNT: 764185

After another pretty significant downswing which left my October earnings pretty scarce, I'm finally bouncing back into a solid profit. I'm putting in 6 and 7 hour days repeatedly, and still pretty damn motivated. As of last night, I was within 44k points of being "on pace" and closing the gap quickly.

The 800k milestone will be a great confidence boost, and I'd like to hit it before Oct 31st. This would leave me with 2 months and 200k VPPs to go - a very attainable pace, even with the Christmas season.

Also...big news is coming...
Big BIG news
I'll give an update on this as soon as I can :)

SNE QUEST - Oct 9: Focused and Moving Forward

2008-10-09T03:44:00.002-05:00

VPP COUNT: 719428

I've been focusing much more than usual, taking a ton of notes, and really working on advancing my game as opposed to just putting in the time. I am 100% sure I am playing better, and taking down more of those uncontested pots than I was previously.

I have also been putting in a solid 5+ hours per day since Oct 1, so I'm well on my way to being in good VPP shape.

The next blog entry was supposed to be a Galapagos/Ecuador trip report, but I literally have not had the ~2-3 hours necessary to throw it together. Once I have regained some more ground, I'll be more comfortable about skipping/postponing a daily session to do side projects like this. Luckily, I woke up at 1am and couldn't get back to sleep, so I had plenty of time to put this one up.

Back to the grind :)

PokerStars Concierge is Awesome

2008-09-18T09:56:00.009-05:00

Before I leave, I'd like to give a public "Thank You" to William and Scotty from PokerStars.

The Stars Concierge has taken care of this entire wedding for me, and every single step has gone smoothly on their end. William and Scotty have made the SNE challenge much more enjoyable - it really is a VIP service.

Thanks again!

Married!

2008-09-18T09:56:00.006-05:00

VPP COUNT: 679833

There has been a big lack of updates lately...mostly because I have been busy getting married. I've also been using every hour of free time to get back into reasonable condition to achieve SNE. The blog hasn't exactly been a priority :)

After today, I should be around 682-685k VPPs, and will be returning from the honeymoon on October 1st. This means I'll have to average a bit more than 100k points per month. It won't be easy, but I'm extremely confident.

As of 9/12/08, I am a married man!

We will be leaving tomorrow (Friday) morning for our honeymoon in Ecuador, and the Galapagos. We are both extremely excited

Yes, that is a pineapple-upside-down-wedding-cake in the picture above. We are that awesome.

I don't have time to write much more... ~6h of play and lots of packing/preparation before I can sleep tonight.

I'll be back in October to rock the tables on my way to SNE!

Another Funk, Another Recovery

2008-08-07T08:26:00.002-05:00

VPP COUNT: 576968

I basically burned myself out in the beginning of July with the 2xVPP promotion. After that, pretty much every (rare) session I played was a minor loss, and it became harder and harder to sit down and work. By the time July was over, I was about 20k points BEHIND pace, after having built a 30k cushion after the 2x promotion. Pretty bad.

August became yet another "do or die" month, as September will be mostly devoted to the wedding and honeymoon. I've gotten back in gear once again, and the last 3 days have been very solid. I'm still trying to stick more to the 400+ tables, but the game quality is still rough.

Our trip to the Galapagos is booked and paid for by Stars Concierge :) The wedding is a bit more than 1 month away. Not enough time in the days.

SNE QUEST - July 15: Sporadic Sessions

2008-07-16T13:10:00.003-05:00

VPP COUNT: 550815

I've only put in a few sessions this week. They have been damn successful, but I haven't put in enough time. Mary's classes are ending tomorrow, so that will free up my Wed-Thurs work days.

The wedding is less than 2 months away, and I need to have quite a bit of cushion before then. I currently have a 10k point lead, and should probably have about 40-50k lead by the 10th of Sept. That gives me a max of 56 days to do it, requiring an average of 5 hours per day. That should not be difficult at all. If I can get in another big couple of months, I'll be at 750k+ points and 3 full months to finish.

Sophy is almost 8 months old... I guess time seems to fly by so much because our days are just jammed full of things to do.

Life will calm down much more after Friday.

SNE QUEST - July 13: That break went a bit long...

2008-07-13T07:02:00.003-05:00

VPP COUNT: 544824

So I took a total of 5 days off, from Mon-Fri. My breaks always tend to go longer than I plan, but at least I still have a significant cushion on SNE pace.

Table winnings have been pretty boring and small this month, but July is looking to be my biggest bonus month.

Sophy has figured out crawling, and has been crawling to, and propping herself up against pretty much anything she can get near. The more she can move on her own, the more difficult taking care of her is going to get. She also figured out how to chuck her toys out of her crib...oh boy.

The wedding is less than 2 months away!

SNE Quest - July 8: Taking a little break

2008-07-08T09:54:00.003-05:00

VPP COUNT: 538016
Just a short update today.

I took Monday off, and will be taking today off as well. The first week of July was way too freaking stressful, and the break has been amazing.

I earned a total of 51,523VPPs for the 6 day 2X event. Not bad at all. I went from 10k points behind pace to 25k points ahead. It was a very significant boost.

I'll be back at the tables tomorrow, possibly this evening.

2X VPP WEEK - HELLLL YEAH!

2008-07-05T17:39:00.002-05:00

VPP COUNT: 525847

So the week actually did fall on a pretty bad time for me. Mary is still in her summer classes, 4th of July, other random time-consuming things that could have been rescheduled if I had more warning. It really would be nice if Stars would just give me...say 24h notice before an event like this so that I could prepare accordingly.

I've put in about 30.5h in the past 5 days, and will be putting in another 2 or 3 tonight. This brings me to just above 6h/day avg, and is pretty pathetic considering how rare these events are. Oh well, by the end of the night, i'll be near 20k points ahead of pace and will have 1 2x-day left before the next part of the promotion starts.

I get the strong feeling that the next 3 weeks of 2X promotions wont be near as profitable as the first 6 days. If they were, I'm pretty sure stars would be losing $$ to me in rake... In fact, I think they already are.

So I'm psyching myself up for my last 2-3h session tonight. Including the 5k milestone bonus I cleared this morning, I am very close to having the biggest cash gain day of all time. I'll be playing 90%+ of my hands at 400NL+ and will be table selecting at 1000NL. With some luck, I'll break my record :) If I do, I'll come back and give an update tonight or tomorrow with my good hands.

Cross your fingers for me. If you happen to sit with me in the next few hours, just dump a few stacks my way, it's for a good cause.

I'm a wild man

2008-07-04T14:38:00.002-05:00

http://www.pokerhand.org/?2844285

What got into me?

SNE QUEST - July 2: Halfway there

2008-07-02T04:43:00.002-05:00

VPP COUNT: 500067

Well, July 1 marks the half-way point in the year (less days in Feb), and it is also the first day since late March that I am ahead of pace! Pretty nice to know that I can hit the halfway point after taking a vacation, taking care of a baby, and all of the other random distractions of new-family-hood.

The 2xVPP promotion has been kind of a mixed experience. During the early hours, the tables are absolutely awful. The average stats at almost all of my tables just hovered around 15/10 and the fish were scarce. I really think that my win rate suffered more than the 2xVPPs helped. The tables were so significantly tighter, the VPP rate actually decreased drastically. I generally average about 750-800vpps/hr when 24tabling, so I assumed I'd be getting about 1500/hr today. It was more like 1200 though, because so few hands even went to the flop.

Oh well, I'm just a little bitter that I ran badly. It is very good that I am back ahead of pace, and the remainder of this promotion will help me get a nice lead. Ideally, I'd like to get about 40 hours in the next 5 days.

It's hitting me how easy this challenge really is, if poker is your full time job. The # of elites will probably grow significantly in the next few years as everybody starts to find out how easy it is to make a huge amount of $ and travel the world.

I'm predicting July to be my best month ever. Between the 2xVPP promotion, the fact that i'll hit the 5k and 6k milestones within this month, and just the sheer volume of hands I plan on putting in, it would take a hell of a dry run to have a bad July.

SNE JUNE: Tilt Control

2008-07-01T06:03:00.002-05:00

VPPS EARNED: 95022
VPPS TOTAL: 486493
HOURS: 122

This month, I even surprised myself. The first half of June, I was in a downswing that was about 30% bigger than I've ever had. I kept putting in the hours, and finally, during the last week of the month, it paid off big. I ended the month with a MAJOR upswing, which left me completely satisfied with the month as a whole.

I have stopped with my .xx bets for a short period of time, just to see what kind of difference it makes. I think I will randomly switch back at some point in the future as well...just gotta keep everybody on their toes.

I also stopped the preflop minraise. I'm starting to believe that as long as your bets aren't overly large and exploitable, it really doesn't matter what amount between 2-4xBB. This is actually a very interesting piece of information, which I may be able to use to my advantage in the future.

Great month.

In the May recap post, I mentioned the 2x promo, and how it would probably come at around 20billion hands. Well, apparently it is the first week of July instead.

WOOOOOOOOOOOO

I'll be out of my cave in a week.

The Girls

2008-06-24T10:04:00.002-05:00

Cute, huh?

SNE Quest - June 23: Fighting Downswings

2008-06-23T05:49:00.003-05:00

VPP COUNT: 459815

A while ago, someone wrote, "Eventually, everyone runs worse than they ever expected." This is incredibly true. After playing professionally for years at a time, you are bound to have that one month where things just never work out.

I had an anonymous request in the previous post to give more detail about my recent downswing. Since he called the blog "inspirational", my ego urged me to fulfill his request.

The downswing from this month lasted 65k hands and totaled 22 buyins (from highest point to lowest point), evenly spread through the 600-200NL level. This is probably about 50% more than any previous downswing, as I have a pretty low-variance style. Eventually you just have a month where nothing works out, and much of June was like that for me. I still technically haven't fully recovered. I'm up a bit for the month, but am still about 5-10 buyins away from my previous peak.

SNE has really made it easier to get through downswings. Even when I get repeatedly cold-decked, at least I'm accumulating VPPs and getting closer to my goal. If it weren't for that alternative encouragement, those big downswings would be much more devastating, and would kill my drive to play.

The best advice I can give someone who is currently getting cold-decked: Just step back and look at it from a long-term perspective. If you have lost enough that it has significantly damaged your bankroll(I'd call 50% significant, if you are properly rolled), it may be time to move down or completely re-assess your game, because something is not working. In my case, though the amount of money lost was extremely significant, it worked out to less than 10% of what I've made this year.

So I ended yesterday at about 15k points behind schedule. I'm still on a solid pace to hit 500k by June 30. Unfortunately, this is not going to leave much room for a day off, as my Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays are all pretty much limited to a 3hr session each day. Life is busy.

Hopefully I'll be able to end this month the way I ended May.

SNE Quest - June 17: Almost in the black.

2008-06-17T09:12:00.002-05:00

VPP COUNT: 441374

I put in about 15k hands yesterday, and had the kind of day I've been waiting for all month. It is in my top 3 all time cash days easily. Even after the huge upswing, I'm still slightly down for the month. I am in fine shape after VPPs and bonuses though. It is nice to know that I can have the biggest downswing of my life and still have my monthly nut more than covered after 16 days. Poker is awesome.

Sophy is learning to crawl. It is fun watching her figure it out.

SNE Quest June 16: Took a well-deserved break.

2008-06-16T13:09:00.002-05:00

VPP COUNT: 435347

I have taken the last 4 days completely off of poker. I think the last day off I took before that was in mid-May. I had a vacation coming to me.

I bought myself a new 20" HP laptop, and will be concierging that ASAP. This giant beast isn't exactly the most mobile computer, but it will be perfect for my media/poker uses with 1-2 trips a week to my dads house.

Speaking of Concierge and Vacation, we are getting to the time where we need to book our honeymoon, and it ain't gonna be cheap. I would have already booked the damn thing if June hadn't been such a crappy month in terms of winnings. Fortunately, I have about 850k fpps to spend, and it will cover the trip completely. In the next couple weeks I will be putting that all together and getting it booked. Maybe if the rest of June goes better, we'll do the combination Galapagos/Machu Pichu trip. I'd have to run pretty damn good though. The next couple weeks will tell if that kind of upgrade is possible.

So I would really like to be at 500k points by the end of June. I would have to average something like 4.3-4.5k points per day, which is fairly hard to maintain. I may come up slightly short, but I will be very close to SNE pace by the half-way mark.

I've put in 3 hours so far today, and have set aside time for another 7. Hopefully a big day.

SNE Quest - June 8: The day after

2008-06-08T07:46:00.002-05:00

VPP COUNT: 420092

I put in a solid 9 hours yesterday, and had a decent profit. Nothing astronomical like I was shooting for, but still a solid day. I cleared the 400k milestone bonus like I had planned, and am now within 14k points of being on pace for SNE.

I'll only be putting 3 hours in today, which will keep me at ~14500 from pace. In 1 or 2 more weeks, I should be back ahead of schedule! Nearly half-way through the challenge and I'm going strong.

This was my favorite hand from yesterday.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?2725936
He must have been wasted.

SNE Quest - June 7: Gonna be a big day

2008-06-07T07:08:00.003-05:00

VPP COUNT: 412563

I ended yesterday at about 19k points away from being on pace. I only put in a 2 hour session, because I ended up having the worst 1-day downswing of my career. This is only 2 days after having the previous "worst 1-day downswing" which was just a few hundred dollars shorter. So I am down overall for June, and more than a bit frustrated with the way the cards have been falling.

So this morning I was up at about 5am, which has become usual for me lately. I took Nala for a walk, had my coffee, and decided that I'm going to put in a ton of time today and take advantage of the weekend fish. I'd like to clear my 400kVPP milestone bonus by tonight - should take about 9-10 hours. This would give me a big bankroll boost to make up for the downswing. With a little luck, and including the milestone bonus, today could very well be my biggest earning day of all time.

If I am not a zombie by the end of the day, I may come back and update.

SNE MAY - Smashing the records

2008-06-01T08:15:00.003-05:00

VPPS EARNED: 115932 *record month*
VPPS TOTAL: 391515
HOURS: 152
$$$ EARNED: *record month*

I ended the month only about 25k VPPs behind pace, and slowly but surely closing the gap. I wont have much time to play today (6/1) because we are having Sophy's half-birthday party for most of the afternoon and evening.

March and April really threatened to knock me out of the SNE race. I only played a total of 121 hours for both of those months combined, and really did not put in enough effort. I knew I needed to make May a killer month or my chances of finishing would drop dramatically.

My earnings for May beat my previous record by about 30%. I attribute this to finally moving up to 400 and 600 buyin games as my regular level. I really only fully made the move up on the 22nd, and almost half of my earnings from the month came in the last 10 days. If I can maintain my play at this level for all of June, I expect another record month on the way.

So with only 25k points behind, I will be back ahead of pace before the end of June.

PokerStars is about at 17.8 billion hands. I still highly suspect that the double points promotion will be at 20bil. As long as that doesn't happen around Sept 12th, I'll be happy.

AMAZING month. Lets keep it rolling!

SNE Quest - May 28: More Upswongs

2008-05-28T13:50:00.004-05:00

VPP COUNT: 377152

As long as I don't go on a massive downswing during my last session, today will be my 6th winning day in a row! This brings my total profits for the month way beyond my previous record, and there are still 3 days left.

My hourly rate just continues to go up, and I'm very confident I'll hit my target profit for the year.

Mary and I decided that instead of going to Maui for our honeymoon, we want to go to Ecuador + The Galapagos. We had just assumed we were going to Maui this whole time, but since we had already been there, felt like we should explore our options more. Last night, somehow The Galapagos came up in a conversation, and both of us instantly came to the same conclusion at the same time before a word was spoken. It was definitely a great choice. To prepare, we downloaded the HD Discovery Galapagos series, and will be watching those sporadically over the next months.

Sophys half-birthday is tomorrow. The past 6 months have just flown by.

May, especially, has been an amazing month.

SNE Quest - May 24: Best month ever.

2008-05-24T13:23:00.004-05:00

VPP COUNT: 365106

I've been doing extremely well this past week, and even with 1 week left in the month, May '08 is already the best month I've ever had.

On Thursday, I decided to look over my stats for the year at 400$ buyin and above. I had ~115k hands worth of data, and it was very clear that I am ahead of those games. For whatever reason, I've been playing primarily $200 buyin for the majority of the year. I guess it is just easy to get comfortable when you are at a level you are 100% sure you can beat, and moving up can be a bit more intimidating. Not any more.

So, from Thursday until today, more than 80% of my played hands were at NL400 or above. I still had 20% NL200 because in the mornings you cant always get 24 tables at higher stakes.

I've been on a very nice upswing since I moved up as well, with about 30k hands logged in the past 3 days. Despite quite a few large+disappointing hands, I've just been blowing these tables away. This means more VPPs and more $ per hour of work.

Lately, I've been making more "outside the box" plays as well, and fighting harder in more marginal situations. I've actually been caught bluffing a few times, which rarely used to happen before. This has been helping my image, and helping me get looser calls.

I'm only ~30k VPPs away from being on pace now. Really making progress. By the end of June, I should easily be back ahead of schedule, barring any burnout episodes.

On top of being extra-productive at the tables, Mary and I have fixed up our yard big-time. Thanks to Stars' concierge service for "paying" for the supplies. It has also been much easier for me to balance family with work lately. It is probably easy because I don't have many other distractions at the moment.

I'd like to end this blog post with some words of praise for the PokerStars Concierge Service. They have been extremely flexible and prompt with all of my requests. Having intelligent and helpful customer service has been such a breath of fresh air (compared to -many- other sites), and has made the SNE challenge more enjoyable. Kudos.

24-Tabling Like a Pro: Part III

2008-05-23T13:58:00.003-05:00

Autohotkey is a free program that helps you automate tasks on your computer. You can get it at http://www.autohotkey.com/. There is plenty of reference material on the website if you want to tinker around with the programming language. It is pretty simple and easy to learn the basics, and I would suggest any serious online poker player (or anybody who uses their computer for a large portion of their day) to become acquainted with it. A little AHK knowledge can go a long long way.

I'll be discussing some of the pre-made scripts that you can use to speed up your actions. I did not have anything to do with the creation of these scripts, I just mooch them :) The talented guys at overcards.com are the ones who put these together.

BetPot
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showthread.php?t=379
This is a script that you can use to automate all of your table actions - including your bet sizing. There is plenty of how-to explanation in the thread, but the important thing to remember is that you can customize all of your actions to basically anything you want. I've heard of people even using video game controllers. Being the computer nerd that I am, I was most efficient with all of my table actions programmed to my mouse.

MY SETUP
Logitech G9 Mouse
I chose this mouse because it was quick, efficient, customizable (2 "body" choices, and the option to add/remove weight). Betpot works with the mouse very well.
Left Click: Standard
Right Click: Fold
Side Button1: Call
Side Button2: Raise
Scroll Wheel Up/Down: Increase/Decrease bet size
Scroll Wheel Press: Pot size raise

With this configuration, I really only ever need to use my right hand to play all 24 tables. I don't even need to aim. I just need to have my mouse over the table. This leaves your left hand free to take care of other things.

Stars Planner
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showthread.php?t=398
This is a great script that helps you save LOTS of clicks while playing. You can set it to automatically buy in for you, to keep the Stars lobby activated at all times (most multitablers know how much of a pain it is to have to reactivate stars every time you join a table), and quite a few other options. It increases multitabling efficiency dramatically, and I'd suggest giving it a try. I use version 0.4d, which has always been extremely stable for me.

I personally do not like the autoreloader scripts, as they interfere with a stacked table layout. With Stars Planner, all you need to do is click Options...>Add more chips, and the script takes care of the rest. Very easy.

*LEARN AHK*
The possibilities are endless for making poker and other computer related tasks more efficient. A very basic understanding of the language will be all you need to be able to customize other scripts, or make your own.
Here's just a small example of a simple one I use, which has helped very much.

SetTitleMatchMode, 2

Home::
WinGetActiveTitle, Title1
WinMove, %Title1%,, 0, 0
return

End::
WinGetActiveTitle, Title1
WinMove, %Title1%,, 0, 600
return

PgUp::
WinGetActiveTitle, Title1
WinMove, %Title1%,, 800, 0
return

PgDn::
WinGetActiveTitle, Title1
WinMove, %Title1%,, 800, 600
return

You can change the X and Y coordinates to whatever works for you. This is a script that simply moves the active window to 1 of 4 spots on your screen, using the Home, End, PgUp, and PgDn keys.

I use this script constantly. When I have my stack of 24 tables going, and I get a hand where I need to pay more attention, or want to see the results of, I can just hit 1 key and move it to an open area of the screen. 23 tables stay in the normal spot, and the 1 important table is visible without being interrupted. Once the hand is over, 1 keystroke brings it back.

There are tons of other various pre-made scripts in the 2+2 software forums. The ability to customize them, or to use bits and pieces of them with other scripts is a great asset.

Some other suggestions of poker-related scripts one might write:
-A "Startup" script that runs PT and starts an auto-import, PAHud, Poker Lobby, 2+2, etc
-A script to block you from looking at your cashier or PT stats, which is a nasty counter-productive habit we tend to develop.

The specifics of AHK really can't be covered in this article, though. There are hundreds of pages of documentation on autohotkey.com, which are what I used to learn the language. The purpose of this part of the article is more to stress the importance of learning AHK, and show what is possible when it is used correctly. You don't need to be good enough to write all of the scripts yourself - you just need to be good enough to mooch other peoples work and adapt it to fit your own style.

24-Tabling Like A Pro: Part II

2008-05-10T08:12:00.007-05:00

Pretty much everybody who plays online poker seriously is at least aware of HUDs, if not using them already. To get a reasonable read on a high volume of tables, you NEED to be able to make your observations and decisions in a matter of seconds. Setting up an efficient personalized HUD is a key weapon in any multitabler's arsenal. I only use PAHud, but the ideas should be able to be applied to any working HUD.

Most people generally stick with the basic VPIP/PFR/AAF/#Hands default HUD statistics. If I had to pick only 4 stats, I would stick with these as well. For people who are playing ~12 tables or less, you are able to just click on the players name for a more detailed set of statistics. Mega-tablers don't have time for this. We need all of our information to be a glance away.

CHOOSING YOUR STATISTICS
Now, I wouldn't recommend increasing the number of statistics you use too quickly. It is very easy to "information overload" yourself if you are not used to looking at more numbers. When adding statistics, go for 1 or 2 at a time - practice with it - and stick with it if it makes a positive difference in your game.

Valuable non-default statistics:
Each of these categories has a multitude of related statistics that you can use.
Blind Stealing/Defense%- Not only does it let you know how likely the player is to steal, when compared with the players vpip/pfr, you can quickly learn how position-conscious the player is, and size him up accordingly.
Street-by-Street Aggression/Action%- Self-explanatory.
CBetting% - There are quite a few stats involving c-bets that you can use. Both on the offensive and the defensive. Since c-betting is such a large part of holdem, these stats are great to have on hand.
Showdown% - While valuable, showdown statistics do not converge until you have a decent sample size on the individual. Even 5k+ hand samples can be very skewed, as a low % of hands actually go to showdown. This stat, however, can be a big factor in your decision to value-bet that river.

Of course there are plenty of other statistics to choose from, and quite frankly, MOST of them can be valuable. There is no "best" HUD setup, it is a tool that you need to completely customize to fit your personal play style.

COLORS:
This is not nearly as important as the statistics you choose, but it is a very important factor in speeding up your player-reading. The 2 seconds it takes you to process a players data can very easily be reduced to 1 second or less with a good intuitive color scheme. I'm not going into very much detail about this, because it needs to be personalized to fit your play. I will say, however, that the standard Red=LAG Green=NIT with shades in between worked very well for me.

DATABASE:
For those of us who have been doing this a long time, some of us have millions of hands worth of data on our opponents. And as valuable as this data is, how many of your opponents do you think have been playing the exact same way for the last 6 months? The last year? Maybe some of the nitty regulars will keep the same style for this long, but most players constantly change their game. Starting a new database every 1/2year or more helps your stats to reflect your opponents more current style.

GENERAL TIPS:
- The more stats you use, the more CPU it takes to load them. Combined with PT imports, 24 stars tables, music, and whatever else you are running, this is definitely something you want to keep in mind while playing. Alt+Ctrl+Del gives you a pretty decent idea of how bad of a resource hog it is.
- When PAHud first loads the stats of a table, it activates the table, popping it up. This can be a pain in the ass when stacking - especially when loading new tables. Be ready for some table-hunting if your HUD ever crashes.
- Generally be aware of how long it takes for stats to converge. Preflop stats converge quickly, gradually requiring more and more hands as you get to river statistics. You can't make a decision based on a player whose river AF is 0 when you only have a few hundred hands on him.

It's all about efficiency. Every stat you add contributes to your ability to read an opponent, but takes a bit more time to process. Find yourself a happy medium. Before long, your screen will look like The Matrix, but all you'll really see is "Blonde"..."Brunette"..."Red Head"... Ok I'm a nerd.

Next Section: AHK

24-Tabling Like A Pro: Part I

2008-05-08T20:23:00.009-05:00

I've been multi-tabling since the beginning of my poker career, ~4 years ago. It really has been a gradual progress from 1 - 4 - 12 - 18 - 24. I remember how mind-boggling it seemed when I watched RainKhan's YouTube video where he was playing 32 tables or whatever. If you aren't used to making decisions that quickly, it really can seem impossible - but it is a learned skill.

There are a few very important tools necessary to maximize your efficiency and play that many tables. I'll be covering Table Layout, PAHud, and AutoHotkey Scripts.

TABLE LAYOUT
There are 3 general ways to set up your tables. Tiled, Cascaded, or Stacked. Pokerstars has automatic Tile/Cascade settings, but I suggest fully personalizing your setup. Keep in mind, these layout options are all assuming that you play on PokerStars, where they have an efficient way of popping up tables that require action.

TILE
Benefits:
- Table Action is constantly available to see.
- Less tables = better table selection.
- Better reads and player dependant plays.
Drawbacks:
- More time spent moving/aiming mouse
- Significantly more head/neck/eye movement
- Generally need 2+ good monitors

Ideal for 2-8 tables. Now that table-resizing is a normal feature, you can usually fit 9 tables on a good 1600x1200 monitor. I was tiling 18 tables at one point. This layout works until your tables just start to take up too much room and the head/neck movement gets to be a problem. 18 tables was the most I could tile.

CASCADE
Benefits:
- Can fit 24 tables on a single 1600x1200 monitor
- Reduced mouse movement time
- Much less head/neck/eye movement
- A small cure for results-oriented thinking!
Drawbacks:
- Difficult to impossible to follow action on tables where you are not in a hand.
- Even in the hands where you are involved, you often do not see the action until it is your turn to act.
I had to switch to cascaded mode simply because my 2 monitors could not fit more than 18 tables. A cascade is where the tables are lined up diagonally across your desktop. 24 is basically the maximum I could fit in 1 cascade, but there is plenty of blank space left on the monitor. The thing you really need to get used to, though, is the fact that you will often not see the results of your hands. It really only took me a day to get used to that drawback, but in the long run I think it could actually be helpful. You no-longer have the option of spending 5-10 seconds watching for the results of a hand. And by the time that table pops up, whatever emotion you would have wasted on that beat/win will be very diminished.

STACK
Benefits:
- Nearly no mouse movement or aiming required
- All decisions and information is within the same small square
Drawbacks:
- In addition to the drawbacks of the cascade, the stack is just a bit more difficult to review and follow previous hands.
In my opinion, the stack is the most efficient table layout you can have. All of your tables are stacked on the same position, and the table with the most urgent action is always on top. You barely need to move your mouse or your eyes at all. All of your energy and attention is focused on making the correct decisions.

An important change that I make when I stack is moving my start bar to the left side of the screen. This allows all 24+ tables to be listed, instead of grouping them all together into "Pokerstars (24)" or whatever. In addition, I believe Windows Vista users have the feature where you can hold your mouse over each table name in the start bar, and get a small preview of that table. I use XP though, and do not use this feature.

With the start bar on the left, and all of your tables stacked in one spot - it is easier to make quick accurate decisions with minor mouse movement. When you do happen to miss some action or need to hop to a different table, it is just 1 click away on your start bar.

RESULTS
I would say that for most people, a Tiled layout is the most efficient if you are planning on playing 12 tables or less.

If you want to learn to play more than 12 tables, I highly suggest finding a stack layout that will work for you. It does not take long to get used to, and it can really increase your hands/hr.

Check back soon for parts II and III, where I will explain:
-How to optimize your HUD for quicker, more detailed reads.
-How to use AHK to immensely speed up your clicking process, and make all of your actions and bet sizing with your mouse alone (I do all of my 24 tabling with 1 hand).

SNE QUEST - May 7: 300k VPP Milestone!

2008-05-07T07:00:00.003-05:00

VPP COUNT: 300031

I hit this milestone about a month late, but it's all good.

For the past 10 days or so, I have been back to my usual routine, and have averaged about 5h/day. After the 6th full day of May, I've put in 30 hours, and that is including a day-off.

The results for May have been pretty solid so far as well. My "Kelisitaan Style" (which mostly just consists of open min-raising and stealing more) had proven to be pretty effective so far. I'm seeing about a 30% increase in my win rate. This is even after the fact that I have been running bad at the 400+ buyin games, but good at the 200$ games. I also only have a 43k sample size - which is maybe half of what I'd like to have a comfortable estimate.

24-tabling has already become the norm for me, and quite frankly, I feel like I could play more tables. 24 is a good number though, because to make another significant increase in vpps/hr would require enough tables that I would not be able to concentrate nearly as well. So the ~750vpps/hr range is a great place to stay for a while.

SNE Quest - May 2: I wanna be like Kelisitaan

2008-05-02T08:00:00.006-05:00

VPP COUNT: 283998

I have been playing a very solid amount of poker these past 4 days. Still 24 tabling, still pulling in a nice pile of green, still pulling in about 750vpps per hour.

"Kelisitaan" is a player who arguably has one of the highest sustainable $/hr win rates of any online poker player. This guy posts his graphs at the end of the month in the Stars Regulars thread on 2+2, and has proved that he can break 100k$ 5 months in a row. He will also more than likely be a SNE by the end of the year.

The interesting thing is, Keli uses a style that was pretty much considered bad play until a few months ago. He min-raises a lot preflop, which allows him to be more aggressive when stealing blinds, and gives him more maneuverability because the initial pot size starts much smaller. I decided to "adopt" his strategy, and mix it in with my own. I'll probably be using this hybrid min-raising strategy for at least the first week of May, and comparing results.

If May 1st was an indicator of how effective this strategy will be - I may make it a permanent piece of my game.

Thank you, Kelisitaan! By coming out and showing us your success, you've undoubtedly inspired dozens of future copycats :).

Yeesh... I let this challenge get away from me

2008-04-18T15:17:00.002-05:00

VPP COUNT: 251202

I went from my peak of about 20k points ahead of schedule...to about 45k behind schedule.

There have been plenty of distractions and reasons for the decrease in play, but in the end, I have the time and ability and have not been using it. I have also deviated pretty far from the original plan, and it will need to be revamped.

APRIL
To be on pace by the end of April, I would need to have about 333k VPPs by the end of the 30th. This would require ~10h per day for the rest of the month, which definitely cannot fit in my schedule.
My target for the end of April will be 300k points, which requires ~6h per day. This is definitely within my means, and I am confident I can reach it. This would also put me in great position to get back ahead of schedule in May...

MAY
If I begin may with 300k points, and if PokerStars follows through with the double point promotion, I will almost definitely be back ahead of schedule by the end of the month.

In the end, it all boils down to whether or not I can maintain my focus. I know I have the ability. I know I have the time. I just need to use them.

Vancouver Trip - Day 5

2008-03-26T11:30:00.002-05:00

Once again, a usual Vancouver morning at a cafe for breakfast/blogging.

Our plan for the day was to bike to the Capilano Suspension Bridge - but luckily we found out that it was a good 15 mile bike up a hill before we went to the rental store. Instead, we took the SeaBus to North Vancouver, and took a bus from there to Capilano. Public transportation in Vancouver is extremely reasonable as far as pricing goes. Interestingly enough, they dont even have a place to check your tickets on the SeaBus. Seems like it would be pretty easy to just walk through and get on without paying.

The Capilano Suspension Bridge was very fun. We took some good pictures, which I'll be able to upload as soon as we're home. I also bought a pretty sweet hoodie for myself as a souvenir, which is good because I don't usually buy too many souvenirs.

We got on the bus going the wrong direction as we were leaving Capilano. We were planning to get back on the SeaBus, but it brought us up to Grousse Mountain. We just shrugged it off and figured we just need to sit on the bus until it turns back to the SeaBus. It wasnt until we had already turned around that we realized that Grousse Mountain would have been pretty sweet and we should have just rolled with it. Ah well - something to see next time.

We went to a British Pub called Chester Cheese's for lunch. Sampled a few more local brews, and this big 500ml bottle of "Monty Python's Holy Grail", all of which were excellent. We shopped a bit before getting on the SeaBus to return to greater Vancouver.

This will need to be a 2-part blog, because the battery is running down on the laptop and I will need to turn it off soon. So until next time...

Vancouver Trip - Day 4

2008-03-25T12:10:00.002-05:00

Started out this day the usual Vancouver way, by walking to a coffee shop and just chilling out with a delicious cup of coffee and a giant muffin. This is always a very nice time to get in a blog post. After reading over my first few blogs, I would definitely like to include some more pictures to spice them up a bit. They are pretty text-heavy and could use some sprucing up.

After the coffee shop, we headed to the Vancouver Art Gallery, or VAG. The VAG was very unique in the way it was set up. The lower level was completely dedicated to early photography from different regions. Mostly from about 1890-1920. The second floor was dedicated to trees, and their role in art. Tree-art is especially prominant in Canada, and this was probably my favorite floor in the VAG. The third floor was extremely unique. It was divided into 2 sections. Each section had dozens of televisions set up, all playing interviews from people from the same "utopian" city. The exhibit was designed to highlight the argument that utopia is different to each individual, even if they are all living in the same utopian city.

After the VAG, we returned to the area near the New Amsterdam Cafe, where they have an upstairs Vapor Lounge. In the Vapor Lounge, you just pay 5$ and sit around a table that has a Volcano Vaporizor on it. You pack the vaporizer, it inflates a huge bag, and you pass it around. Oddly enough, we were probably amongst the oldest people in the room. We chilled there for an hour or so, and then walked back to our hotel to relax before dinner.

Dinner was truly the highlight of this vacation day. We walked along the seawall to a restaurant called Cardero's. We had been looking forward to some good west-coast fish since before our vacation even started. I ordered the West Coast Salmon, which was the house special. Mary had the Halibut, which had just come into season. Both meals were absolutely amazing - I really can not say which I liked more.

To compliment our great seafood, Cardero's also had a variety of local brews on tap. I can't remember the names, but we each had 1 light lager and 1 medium cream beer. All 4 beers were excellent, and went very well with the fish.

Cardero's is definitely among my top 5 meals of all time. The service was quick and polite without being too in-your-face. The food was easily a 9+/10. The beer was a 9+/10. I would reommend this restaurant to anybody in the Vancouver area.

Only 2 full days of vacation left! We will be cramming in the Capilano Suspension Bridge, UBC trip, Conservatory, and looking through a few open houses in the next 2 days.

We don't want to leave.

Vancouver Trip - Day 3

2008-03-24T12:19:00.003-05:00

We started the day off with a buffet breakfast in the downstairs of our hotel. It was very good, but pretty damn pricey for a breakfast. After breakfast, we took a walk to Stanley Park. Along the way, we found ourselves about 20 ft from two Vancouver Police officers who were walking as well. We also happened to be enjoying some of the goods we had acquired the night before - so that was a bit of a close call.

We decided to go to the Aquarium today, which was only about a 2-3mile walk from our hotel. I guess everybody else had the great idea of going to the Aquarium on Easter Sunday, because that place was extremely crowded. It was still a very good time, and we were both glad we had lifted our spirits shortly before entering. That really made handling the crowd of tourists much easier.

After going through the Aquarium, we walked back into town, and went to a Mongolian BBQ for lunch. I've got to say it was pretty relieving to have a 7$/person meal as opposed to 15-25. The food was exactly what you'd suspect a mongolian BBQ to be.

Mary needed some decent walking shoes, so we stopped at a store on our way back to the hotel so she could get some.

Both of us are definitely not used to walking for extended periods of time, because as soon as we were back in our room, we passed out from about 5pm-11pm. There really isn't much to do in Vancouver at 11pm on Easter Sunday, so we spent a few hours watching canadian TV before we fell back asleep

Vancouver Trip - Day 2

2008-03-23T09:08:00.003-05:00

It's amazing how much difference a full night of sleep can make.

It is also pretty amazing just how many coffee shops a big city really needs. Yesterday morning at Cafe Artigiano, we were facing the outside window, and noticed that there was a coffee shop on all 4 corners of that intersection.

We spent most of the morning doing some light shopping, and further exploring the city. There was a very nice dog park along the water that we wished we could bring Nala to. It is unfortunate that we don't have any kind of off-leash dog park in Evansville. Nala could use some practice being loose in public.

We continued walking along the water, and made it about 1/4th of the way around Stanley Park before we decided to return. A bike or rollerblades would make that trek much nicer. We may rent some and explore the park a bit deeper. Hopefully the weather gets a bit nicer before we have to leave.

The plan for today was to go to the Capilano Suspension Bridge, but we'll see how the weather treats us this afternoon. It is very gloomy and has been raining a bit. The weather is actually supposed to stay pretty gloomy until we leave, but we definitely don't want it to be raining when we go to Capilano.

During our walks around the city, we were constantly keeping an eye out for one of the "smoke-friendly bars" that are around the city. We must have walked 6-7 miles without finding what we were looking for. On top of that, our connection did not follow through. We were a bit bummed out by the evening. Luckily, I decided to get on the internet and look up the location of the New Amsterdam Cafe. We were only 6 freaking blocks away from it! And our walks through the city left us less than 1 block away multiple times without ever seeing it!

The NA Cafe is pretty much exactly what you would expect it to be. A pot bar. About 20-30 people sitting around and constantly rolling/smoking joints. Twice on the way to the bar, we heard "need some bud?" from some very sketchy looking characters, and we decided not to buy anything on the street. We were lucky enough to meet a couple college kids at the Cafe who were leaving tomorrow morning, and had more than they needed. They invited us to join them for a little while, and sold us what they had left over. Lucky us. The whole experience was very new and exciting.

We left the Cafe at about 10pm fried out of our minds. A few more homeless-looking guys asked us if we needed some bud, and one definitely-homeless guy said, "Got any bud? I got a lighter!!"

Back at the hotel, we finally indulged in the Jose Quervo we had bought the night before. It did not take long to fall asleep that night.

Vancouver Trip - Day 1

2008-03-22T20:51:00.001-05:00

I'm writing this from a corner coffee shop called Cafe Artigiano. The hotel we are staying in is obviously used to catering to businessmen who are only in town for a day or two - because they tried to charge me 16$ PER DAY of internet access. No thanks. Free internet at Cafe Artigiano!

Our flight out of Evansville was supposed to leave at 8:40am, but there was heavy snow in Chicago so we had to take an earlier flight at 6:00am. Everything went pretty smoothly, aside from having to kill about 4 hours in the extremely busy Chicago airport. The Chicago>Seattle flight was about 4.5hours, and the Seattle airport was a breath of fresh air compared to Chicago. Much more calm.

We reached Vancouver at about 5pm, and took a taxi to our hotel. We have a very nice room on the 23rd floor of the Marriot Pinnacle, with a panoramic view of the water, mountains, and city. The room isn't especially big, but we only really plan on "sleeping" and cleaning up there. With a king-sized bed, the room is well equipped for our needs.

For dinner, we went to a resteraunt called "The Keg" which was just a few blocks from our hotel. You'd expect a place called The Keg to have a good beer selection, but their menu didn't even have a beer list. Their highlighted beers were Heineken, Molson, and Coors light... neato. The Keg made up for their small beer selection with some amazing steak. I ordered the largest size, because it was about 4 bucks more and I always enjoy leftovers. This steak must have been 2lbs. I'd estimate it was 2.5-3in thick and cooked evenly. Marbalized fat throughout the cut. The leftovers are sitting in the fridge and will make a great steak sandwich.

We decided to end the night by getting some liquor and relaxing in our room (we had slept about 2 of the last 48 hours). Apparently in Canada, there is some rule restricting the sales of alcohol on Easter Weekend. We probably walked 2 miles and followed 2 sets of bad directions to find a liquor store that was actually open.

Finally, we were about to give up our search, and stopped into a grocery store to get some random supplies for our vacation. We were greeted by a bitch security guard who was probably on her period. She gave us some very blatant attitude, and started making fun of us to one of the cashiers as we were walking away. Luckily for me, Mary didn't put up with her bullshit and called her out while we were paying for our groceries. The cashier was extremely nice, gave us a 50% discount on our groceries, and directions to one of the only open liquor stores in the city! The whole time, that bitch security guard just stood there quietly avoiding eye contact. Thats what you get, you stupid bitch.

Alcohol is about 2x as expensive as it is in the states. After going as far as we had to find alcohol, we felt obligated to follow through, and now we have a 45$ bottle of Jose Quervo.

We finally arrived back at the hotel, and were so tired we couldn't even enjoy the spoils of our journey. Regardless, it was definitely a great experience that we will remember.

I'll be back tomorrow morning with more updates!

Happy St. Patty's Day!

2008-03-18T08:33:00.002-05:00

Got Guinness?

SNE Quest - March 15: Hard work paying off

2008-03-15T23:14:00.004-05:00

VPP COUNT: 219540

I put in 10 hours today, and pulled in nearly 8k VPPs! The first 4 hours threatened to continue my ugly downswing, but I stuck with it and ended the day with a nice profit.

Very satisfying.

I have 5 days before my vacation, and probably will fall a bit short of the 250k goal. If I average about 8h/day for the next 5 days, I'll still be around 245-250, which I am fine with. I'll have 4 more work days after the vacation is over, and as long as I am over 250k by the end of the month, I'll still be ahead of pace.

SNE Quest - March 14: Ouch

2008-03-14T07:42:00.002-05:00

VPP COUNT: 211593

Well, my motivation has been fairly low this past week, and have been running absolutely terribly.

On March 12th, I had a session that lasted exactly 1 hand.

I was loading up my tables, and after about 5 tables were up I got my first hand. Pocket aces in the big blind. There was a raise and re-raise preflop. Long story short, I lose a 400$ pot to QJs. Session over.

Yesterday, I finally toughed it out and put in 9 solid hours of play. Nearly 14k hands. Unfortunately, I had a huge downswing and felt like crap all day. On the other hand, I did clear over 6.5k VPPs and unlocked my 2000$ milestone bonus.

So I'm currently in the middle of a ~10-15 buyin downswing and pretty pissed at poker. I am not able to take a break either. I'm still about 12k points ahead of schedule, but with my Vancouver trip on the way, I've got to average about 6 hours per day for the next week. No time to grieve over a downswing.

1 week until I go to Vancouver!

I am the birthday boy

2008-03-10T07:49:00.000-05:00

And I will be not playing poker today

Weeeee

SNE QUEST - March 8: It has been a while

2008-03-08T18:52:00.002-06:00

VPP COUNT: 204984

Well it has been quite some time since I've updated my blog. I've been fairly lazy about my poker play. I took March 1st off, but went back to work the 2nd-5th. I also took the 6th and 7th off. I definitely could have put in 4-6 hours each of these days, but just didn't want to at the time.

Today was my first losing day of the month. I had some pretty major winning days earlier in the month, and was pretty much expecting a downswing some time soon. I'm still doing great for the month, and still have a solid lead on the pace for SNE. On-pace right now is about 185k, and I'm at 205, so I'm fairly comfortable.

I'd like a 25k cushion before my vacation.

It was warm outside for a few days in a row, and we were pretty hopeful that winter was finally over... nope. The weather got crappy some time around the 6th, which is also the first day I just didn't feel like working. I think I'm seeing a pattern.

I do need to get better at posting regularly, but this is pretty normal for me. As long as I'm writing something once a week, I don't think the blog will die out.

Until next time

SNE FEBRUARY

2008-03-02T07:31:00.002-06:00

Hours: 120.4
Hands: 148859
VPPS: 187795

February started out pretty slow, but ended strong. I have definitely honed my game even more, and learned a few more tricks that will up my hourly rate and help me reach SNE.

SHORTSTACKING
I put in about 80k hands at 6max this month. I ended up with a very nice hourly rate, and a good VPP rate. It also gives pretty much 0 satisfaction and does very little to further your game. Plus, everybody hates you. If something comes up and I cannot cut it at the full ring tables, I would fall back on this. Otherwise, you wont be seeing me shorting much any more.

24-TABLING
Just when I thought I wouldn't play more than 18 tables, I upped my max again. I'm really happy with my ability to maintain my solid game while playing all of these tables. This upped my VPP rate, and I'll probably be doing it for the rest of the year.

LEAP DAY
PokerStars did a double VPP promotion on Leap Day, and did not give much notice. I learned about it at about 7am on the day of. As soon as I learned, I decided to devote the entire day to earning as many VPPs as possible. After 13 hours of play, I put in over 20k hands, and earned over 18k VPPs before the 24h period was up. This was a tremendous boost to my quest, and gave me some much needed cushion. I'll be going to Vancouver in less than 3 weeks, and would like to have at least a 20k point cushion - which I do!

CONCIERGE
I already purchased my Vancouver trip via concierge, and in the next week or so, I think I'll be doing the same for my Maui Honeymoon in September. I've been working up some major FPPs lately. At the end of April, I should have the FPPs to cover the wedding as well :)

Not the best month, but still a very very good one.

Now in March, I have 3 weeks to make 4 weeks worth of profit. Bring it on.

SNE Quest - Feb 25: An odd week

2008-02-25T21:15:00.002-06:00

VPP COUNT: 159447

I've been slacking on my blog posts, and have skipped a few pretty significant poker days.

I had an extremely large upswing on Thursday, making my second largest cash day ever.

Unfortunately, the following Friday and Saturday took away about 3/4ths of that.

I'm getting pretty sick of short-stacking. In the long run my hourly still is higher than when I play my normal game, but my normal game is more satisfying.

So today, I put in a session of 24-tabling full-ring NL. 200 and 400 buyin tables only. To make up for the lack of screen space, I switched to cascaded tables instead of tiled. This caused a surprising change in my play. The way the tables are laid out when cascaded, they are overlapping, and pop up when you need to make a decision. This way, I am not using the automatic "check-fold" boxes so habitually.

My stats went from a super-nitty 13/11 to a solid 16/13. I was very happy with my ability to play more tables, and possibly taking advantage of some more mediocre spots that I overlook when I play my normal 18-table tiled setting.

Unfortunately, I ran like hell. Just one of those days where you can't win nomatter how well you play. By the end of the day, my AA, KK, and JJ hands had lost for me overall. Not very easy to overcome an ugly run like that. Despite the bad streak, I continued to maintain my 16/13 style over 24 tables - resulting in about 25% more hands per hour.

Despite running like hell, I'm somewhat looking forward to playing tomorrow. Every time I mix my game up, it boosts my motivation for a while. 24-tabling is a nice mix up.

SNE Quest - FEB 20: On an upswing

2008-02-20T07:55:00.002-06:00

VPP COUNT: 143041

I've put in quite a few hands these past few days. The results have been very nice. I played full ring again this weekend, and did alright. When I returned to 6max, I went on a massive heater. This strategy of only full-stacking the good tables is absolutely great. It will probably take a month or so before I know my true hourly, but I am almost certain it is higher than I can get playing full-ring games.

I used the concierge service for the first time ever, and purchased the tickets for our Vancouver trip. Concierge was very quick and easy. I will be using this service frequently throughout the year.

In other news, ING Direct does not accept international wire transfers, and a chunk of my money is currently lost in space. Tied up since 2/2. Yuck.

Creepy Waiter

2008-02-18T20:22:00.003-06:00

I haven't done a non-SNE post in a while, and this is definitely a story that should be blogged about.

Mary and I had an Olive Garden gift card from who-knows-when, and we decided to go out to dinner and use it tonight. After someone gave us the finger for jacking his parking spot, we took our seat and started to decide on our order. Our waiter, Joe, came up to the table, offered us a sample of wine, etc. He had a bit of a speech impediment, but nothing too out of the ordinary.

After taking our drink orders, he started talking to us about how he was the writer for many of the Hannah Montana songs... yup. He walked away, and we all just assumed maybe he was an intern or something. Maybe he had something to do with the production of the songs, who knows. He was working at the Olive Garden, after all.

Joe returns to the table, and continues talking about how he wrote the Hannah Montana (Miley Cyrus?) songs, and that he doesn't get any royalties for whatever stupid reason. He also told us that when Billy Ray Cyrus came to town, he went up and talked to him about how its funny that his daughter is more famous than him... And that Miley Cyrus was there, and he gave her hell about not being able to hit a high F note. He was very obviously full of shit, but whatever. I don't give half a damn about Hannah Montana and if he wants to fantasize about writing her songs, who cares.

He asked me what I did for a living, and I told him that I play poker. Instantly, he started talking about how he used to be a Magician down in Atlantic City, and that he could count cards at blackjack. Oh, and he was friends with David Copperfield.

I'll try to recreate this next quote as best I can: "So yeah, when you have a 16, you have 40 to 1 odds to win. But when you have a 17, you're 60 to 1 odds to lose."

I laughed and responded "Dude, that doesn't make any sense at all."

He said "Yes it does!" and walked away.

After he returned, Mary asked him if he would do a magic trick for us. He said that his manager wouldn't let him do tricks any more...but he would do one for us anyway. He picked up a nickel, had me hold out my hand, and told me to catch the nickel when he dropped it. He then tossed the nickel to the floor, pretended to put a nickel in my hand, and stared at me.

"...it's right there"

He said, "Yeah, it works better with chips," and left.

Randomly during the course of the meal, he also let us know that he was 23 years old, had a heart-attack at 18, and lives every day like it's his last.

Maybe this actually did happen, and he recreated his past to be something more glamorous...

Or maybe he was entirely full of shit.

Who knows.

All I know is he had the pedo-smile.

You know the pedo-smile.

Anybody with this creepy fucking smile needs to be kept away from children and small animals.

At least he has Hannah Montana and David Copperfield to keep him company.

Yeesh.

SNE Quest - FEB 13: A nice heater

2008-02-14T07:39:00.003-06:00

VPP COUNT: 125880

Played a solid 6 hours, and had a very nice streak of luck. Currently, this is the best day of the month. Now, my hourly rate is even better than it was in January. However, I've still only logged 42 hours, for 25756 vpps this month.

At the pace I set for myself in January, I should be at about 150k total vpps by the end of Feb 14th. I'll be a bit more than 20k vpps short of this goal. The necessary pace for completing the challenge, though, is about 125k vpps. I will be just slightly above that pace. This basically means that I can't screw around for the rest of this month. I'd like to finish Feb off with 185k+ total vpps.

By the end of this month, I'll also be quickly approaching the special milestone bonuses that come at certain VPP marks during the year. The milestones are as follows:
* $2,000 at 200,000 VPP
* $3,000 at 300,000 VPP
* $4,000 at 400,000 VPP
* $5,000 at 500,000 VPP
* $6,000 at 600,000 VPP
* $8,000 at 800,000 VPP

These will be a MAJOR boost to my motivation. Thus far, I haven't even spent my FPPs, as I've been waiting to book my trips to Vancouver and Maui this year. I'm getting very close to the point that I can buy both of them entirely through the Pokerstars Concierge service. Quite a perk :)

Another little update that I had not noticed until today - PokerStars has altered the tournaments that they send their Supernova Elite players to. Their website now reads:
Option A: Any two packages from PokerStars Caribbean Adventure, WSOP Main Event, EPT Monte Carlo, APPT Sydney.
Option B: Any one of the above packages plus $10,000.

They have added the APPT Sydney(Asian Pacific Poker Tour), and also have added the option of replacing one of the events with 10k cash. I've always wanted to visit Australia, and this would be a great opportunity to do so.

SNE Quest - Day 41-42: Snow day

2008-02-13T10:04:00.004-06:00

VPP COUNT: 122590

Most of the rest of Evansville was stuck in their house, as the road conditions have been terrible these past few days. We are actually trapped in our backyard, because the gates to the fence have frozen to the ground. During poker breaks, it is pretty fun to just stare out the window and watch cars fumble down the street.

I put in about 6 hours yesterday, and 2 the day before. I am still thoroughly enjoying the 6max game, and continue to get ridiculous plays out of the premium tables. Here are a couple funny hands...

http://www.pokerhand.org/?2095470 - OMG OVERPAIR
http://www.pokerhand.org/?2095473 - Gutshot with 1 card to come...NUTS!

Unfortunately, I am still running at about 13/12, which is very very weak-tight for 6max games. I'd love to be about 16/14, but with the # of hands I play, it is more difficult to find those more marginal situations to act on.

I also only have 36 hours logged in February, and I should be around 60-70. February has ALWAYS been a slow month for me, even before I started playing poker. Something about the cold weather I guess slows me down. I'm still doing alright, and am still on pace for SNE, but I definitely can't expect to achieve my goal if i repeat these last couple weeks.

In personal news, Sophy is sick for the first time. She has been in good spirits for the most part, but occasionally has a bad coughing fit which makes it hard to keep down food. Having a sick baby in the house makes just about everything a little more difficult.

SNE Quest - Day 39-40: Back on track

2008-02-10T08:24:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 118971

I've been slacking a bit on the blog, but that does not mean that I've been slacking in poker.

I put in 14 hours in the past 2 days, and had some very solid results.

I've also been playing at the 400$ level and above for this entire time. It is pretty clear that I am ahead of the field, and can probably keep this win rate up long-term. I have 70k hands of 6max in since I started my short-stacking experiment, and my win rate is actually above what I thought it would be. This is largely due to the fact that I am full-stacking the premium tables and short-stacking the bad ones.

I have very high expectations for this style of play. It results in more VPPs/hour, more $/hr, and eventually even more opportunity for profit.

In other news, Leatherass (the guy who hit supernova elite last year, and made 1mil+ in the process) posted his stats for the last 1/2 year. He moved from full ring to 6max last year as well, and this is further encouragement for me to continue pursuing that style.

I went through my "Bartender's Guide" to make a new bitch-drink the other day. A "Georgia Spritzer". Rum, Peach Schnapps, Sprite, Lime. It was just ok. I have pretty much 0 tolerance to liquor, so the drink did its job quickly.

That's it for now!

SNE Quest - Day 37: BURNOUT

2008-02-07T17:09:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 110985

Well I knew it wouldn't be too long before my motivation got stale and I started having trouble pushing myself to put in the necessary hours. Fortunately, I recognized the problem fairly early, and can start working on the solution.

First and foremost - I need to get back on a regular exercise schedule. The first 2 months of January, I ended nearly every session with a ~10min floor routine. This did a very good of "resetting my brain" and getting my mind off of whatever beats/frustration I may have experienced during my time at the tables. This made starting the next session much easier, as well as just being all-around better for me.

Second - I need to start waking up at a regular time every day. I've been fairly good about this, and I am rarely in bed past 9am. Having a ~8am wakeup every day will help a whole lot with...

Third - Putting in a session before 12pm daily will really improve the overall hours I spend playing. Starting the day out right really is half the battle.

Fourth - Eating actual breakfast. Coffee is not breakfast. Even cereal would be better than 2 cups of coffee and occasionally a granola bar.

Putting all of the pieces to this puzzle together, it is becoming increasingly clear why my drive has slowed. Waking up at 9, drinking 2 cups of coffee, and lazing around until 11-12 when I have a caffeine crash is pretty much the worst way to start a productive day.

Caffeine restricts the blood-flow to the brain, and in turn will worsen the poker thought-process.

Exercise, however, increases the blood flow to the brain. On top of this, morning exercise gives your mind "practice" with overall willpower, which is basically the #1 trait needed by poker players.

In theory, this all sounds good. In practice...we'll see how it works out.

I already did a floor-routine this evening, and almost instantly felt better. I was in a pretty major funk this morning.

In SNE news, I put in 1 hour today and it was nothing special. Now that I'm feeling better, I am feeling much better about putting in a few more hours tonight. There may be a Day 37 part 2 up later.

Wedding Plans

2008-02-06T11:41:00.000-06:00

In personal news, Mary has been more seriously planning our wedding, and started wanting it to be more traditional. She called a planning service, and they told her that their traditional weddings generally range from 8k-20k, and that they charge 10% to help plan/coordinate everything. The 8k plan is the bare-bones plan.

I do consider it an extremely special occasion. I do think it is important for friends and family to be there. I do think it is an occasion that we will remember forever, and should be done the way we want it. But 8k+? I think I speak for most guys when I say "fuck that".

Do weddings with 1000$ cakes and multi-thousand-dollar-dresses produce more successful marriages? Are these things necessary to announce your love for another person? Why are most American marriages so incredibly similar? There is no way that the image of a white blushing bride and her tuxedo-ed groom walking out of a church can be the dream of every person in America. The traditional wedding is a freaking religious ceremony, and a big business.

As the one paying for the occasion, I set a limit to 5k$ for wedding expenses. I honestly thought that it was a pretty generous budget. How ridiculous is it to spend 8k+ on a wedding? Compared to most people in my town, I am pretty damn well off, and I still consider spending 8k+ on a wedding outrageous. I'm too lazy to check the source, but I'm fairly sure the #1 cause of divorce is financial problems. Unaffordable weddings, rings, etc. just seem like a formula for failure...which eventually would lead to another wedding (or 2). And so the American business of marriage and divorce keeps churning. Ok, rant over.

I'm still strongly pushing for a non-traditional wedding. Nice, but modest. Get married. Eat dinner. Get our friends and family wasted. Enjoy the night.

As an interesting side note, we are ordaining Dan Berry (friend, and my namesake) and he will be doing the ceremony. Apparently you can ordain anybody, including animals. I really like this idea :)

SNE Quest - Day 36: Winning usually doesn't feel this crappy

2008-02-06T11:23:00.001-06:00

VPP COUNT: 109459

I put in 7 hours yesterday (the 5th) and ended up with a modest win. Unfortunately, the modest win was a very large win before I played my last 2 hour session.

I mostly shortstacked, as Sophy was in a pretty grumpy mood and it was starting to get frustrating. The full-stacked tables really made the day for me though. There are some SERIOUSLY bad players at 6max, nomatter what level. They can be fairly hard to find though. I buy in for the full amount at about 1/10 of the tables I open up. These tables always have some big-time fish on them, and have been very nice so far.

I think at some point, I'll need to change my weekends to Mon/Tues, instead of the standard Sat/Fri. Monday and Tuesday are Marys most busy days as far as school goes, and they generally aren't the best times of the week to find fishy tables. Saturday, however, is when the Supernova Freeroll is (value appx 50$), and also when many of the fish are out swimming.

I used to pretty much be done working by 8pm every night. Those days are over.

SNE Quest - Day 33-35: First long weekend

2008-02-05T10:21:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 104668

I only put in 2 hours worth of poker during these past few days. Feels pretty decent to have some real time off. The 2 hours I played were pretty solid. Earned a little bit and made a few vpps. I should have put in more time on Monday, but just wasn't feeling it. Sophy has been much more whiny lately, and it has just been putting the household on edge. Half of the time, we really don't know why she's crying. It can really wear down the one thing you need to play good poker.

Pretty behind pace this month, so I'll be stepping it up the next few days.

SNE Quest - Day 32: Decent start

2008-02-01T22:49:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 103554

I got in a bit less than 6 hours today. My last session was cut short when the stars client completely crashed while I was in the middle of playing AA and AK on 2 tables. Between the crash and my lack of cards in that last session, I decided to call it a night with a mediocre profit.

In other news, Sophy had a doctors appointment today. Apparently she is in the top 95 percentile in length, but 50th percentile in weight. Probably means she got my skinny Wallace genes. The doctor also talked about how most babies aren't nearly as active and engaging as Sophy is at her age. Looks like she turned out pretty good :)

My hours will be cut back this weekend due to the superbowl, and a couple birthdays. I'll be back with a vengeance on Monday.

SNE JANUARY

2008-01-31T23:57:00.000-06:00

Hours: 178.92 - record month
Hands: 199,318 - record month
VPPS: 100,126 - ahead of schedule
Earnings: Satisfactory :)
Biggest 1-day upswing
Biggest 1-day downswing
followed by an 80k breakeven (from previous peak)

This is probably the most satisfying month of poker I have ever had. I kept myself more focused and disciplined than ever before in my life. I think that becoming a father has really inspired me to get serious about my profession.

If I could repeat this month 12 more times, I would be ecstatic. Quite frankly, I think I will only get better, and my $/hr will increase. This past week of shortstacking the 6max tables has really opened my eyes to the opportunity there. Shortstacking the bad tables, and fullstacking the good ones is probably going to end up being my most profitable game plan. With the right conditions, I'm completely comfortable multitabling fullstack NL400 and 600. The $/hr should be much nicer once I've got my strategy down.

Very happy with the way the month went. It was just a bit difficult to get in all of the hands, and I think it will get slightly easier as the year continues. It really was not that difficult to get in as much time as I did, and I am fairly sure I'll be able to keep it up. As far as burnout, I really don't know if I have experienced it yet and fought through, or if the worst is yet to come. There is a very busy year ahead of me.

Sophy is 9 weeks old today. Time is flying.

This will be a big year.

SNE Quest - Day 30-31: Finishing Strong

2008-01-31T12:05:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 100126

I put in a total of 10 hours between yesterday and today, and the results were extremely great. Depending on how you calculate the value of the VPPs I accumulated, this could be a record month for me. In terms of pure cash, though, it is just my 2nd best month.

I spent the last hour of my session tonight with a full stack at 8 of the 12 shorthanded 400NL tables I was playing. There were just so many poor players sitting that I could not help myself. 6max is not even my regular game, and I was confident enough to put a full stack in 75% of my tables. I ran pretty well, and it really boosted my 6max stats for this past week.

So my shortstacking experiment ended with 45k hands. I ended up with 1.4bb/100, which is higher than I expected to be able to earn. According to PokerEV, I also ran above expectation (especially during this past day) and if my all-in luck had run even, I'd be at about 1ptbb/100, which is still quite solid.

Not counting this last day (because about 60% of the profits were from fullstacking) I figured that while shortstacking I earn about 75% of my normal hourly rate. This is not bad at all, considering I could practically play this style in my sleep. I never really even optimized my game either, just pounded in as many hands as I could.

I may write some kind of reflection on this first month, with updated goals and ideas. I think I will be playing more 6max regularly, as the fishy tables are WAY more profitable than a fishy full ring table.

10% of the way to my goal! Yeah!

SNE Quest - Day 29: Getting old...

2008-01-29T23:04:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 94193

Well, I knew it wouldn't be long before I was just plain tired of shortstacking. This time is quickly approaching. I've put in about 35k hands at various levels of 6max, and while my results are positive, I was much more satisfied when I was playing full-ring.

My graph in PokerEV makes it pretty clear that I can gradually win playing this cheap strategy. Not bad for only taking it half-way seriously and playing an average of 10+ tables at a time.

I plan on continuing my shortstack play tomorrow and Thursday, and going back to my normal game in Febuary.

SNE Quest - Day 27-28: A Fumble, and a Recovery

2008-01-28T23:08:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 90027

Yesterday was my first full day off of poker this year, and it was probably not all that helpful. It was nice having a break, but I eventually just felt sluggish and lazy.

I started today off just terribly. I had a bit of a headache, and did not have a great feeling about the day, but I forced through it and decided to put in some time. I made a big dumbass move after about 30 minutes of starting. Check out this brilliant hand.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?2013974

My play on the turn was just awful.
1) Even though it was a blind battle, even AA doesn't fight this hard for this kind of board.
2) The only way he calls my push on the turn is if I'm beat, so I'm just burning money
3) Even a call would be incorrect, as I've still got 1 card to fall, and I don't like most of them.
Though I do support my flop bet/call. That was fine. The turn should have been a clear fold.

Ah well, 400$ torched.

Despite the awful first session, I followed it up with 6 solid hours of cheapass shortstacking. I ended the day in the positive, and passed the 90k vpp mark that I had set for myself. Things are going pretty well.

SNE Quest - Day 26: At least I have VPPs

2008-01-26T23:29:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 86803

This day was extremely boring. I'm sure shortstacking will make the swings much less swingy.

I just finished my 9th hour of play today, and I still have 1 400NL 6max table open, so I can hopefully stack one of the 2 massive fish who are sitting there. So far it has lost me a bit though.

The shortstacking is still going well. I'm probably around 18k hands logged, and doing pretty well. I had a bit of a downswing today, and pokerEV confirmed for me that my all-ins ran well below expectation. My "Sklansky Bucks" have just been a nice steady upwards line.

I am still a bit concerned that I am 1) Not stealing enough, and 2)not fighting hard enough for small pots.

Another issue is that I am getting close to my limit in terms of decisions/minute. I still average about 1200 hands per hour, and it is pretty clear that my play will decrease quite a bit if I try to push that any harder.

Ah well, I'll continue to piss away my money at this 400NL table until the fish either bust, or I decide to sleep.

Oh, and in other news, I placed for 70$ in the 50k VIP tourney on Stars. I shared action with a friend, so it turned out to be 35$...goodie

SNE Quest - Day 25: Damn Short-Stacker

2008-01-25T21:41:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 81548

So this morning, after studying up on the bit of shortstacking information, I decided I wanted to get a decent sample of SS poker. This will ultimately serve a few good purposes.

1) I'll learn the shortstacking strategy myself, giving me another (easier) option to pull in a decent income.
2) I will know how to better defend against shortstacks, even though most of them have their heads up their asses anyway.
3) I'll have a means of earning more VPPs/hr than I currently am, which will be great for a double vpp promo, or if I happen to fall behind at some point.

I also add my own little spin to the shortstacking strategy. If one of my tables happens to be extremely soft, I just buy in for the full stack and play it accordingly. My results today were amazing, and much of it was due to the fact that I was willing to full-stack against the weaker players.

I'll be putting in pretty long hours tomorrow and Sunday, so I should hopefully be over 90k vpps by Monday.

Later, when I'm back at my computer, I'll post up some of the ridiculous hands I participated in.

SNE Quest - Day 24: Shortstacking like a chump

2008-01-24T23:22:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 77708

The first 6 hours I played today were just normal full-ring, full-stack poker. It all went pretty well, and I ended with a solid profit. I decided to shortstack 6max tables for the last 2 hours today, just to see what it's like and start to develop a strategy. I definitely ran bad, but also need to learn to play better shortstack.

I only ran at about 14/13, which probably isn't too bad, but could definitely do to improve. I am not used to being a shortstack postflop AT ALL. This is a major drawback right now, considering the shortstack is nearly unbluffable.

So I'll occasionally put in a session or two of shortstacking, and just keep working on my game there. It will be more of an extra-curricular activity than anything.

SNE Quest - Day 23: A New High

2008-01-24T08:17:00.001-06:00

VPP COUNT: 73256

Finally back up into "uncharted territory" as my overall winnings are above any point they've been before. As exciting as this is, I'm still a little disappointed with the hours (or lack thereof) that I've put in lately. Only 2 hours yesterday, and 7 the day before. Sure, life has been busy. Life will always be busy. I've got to start doing a better job of working around it.

I'll be going out to dinner tonight (24th), so ideally I will have in 6 hours before dinner, and another 2 hours after. Today will be a little bit of a catch-up day.

SNE Quest - Day 20-22: Breaking through the break-even

2008-01-23T11:02:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 72022
Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday were all pretty rough. According to PokerEV, I'm quite a few buyins below expectation. This is obviously giving me a big hit to my overall winnings. Fortunately, I am gradually working my way back up, and above that stupid break-even line that I've been below for the past couple weeks. It sure is a good thing my first week of SNE pursuit went so incredibly well.

I am now above 130 hours for the month, which is nearly a (monthly) record by itself. There are 9 days left in the month, and I should be well over my goal of 160. I expect to hit about 180 by the time all is said and done.

At the very minimum, I will need about 15k more VPPs to stay on pace for Supernova. My goal is to reach 100k by the end of Jan, and give myself a decent little cushion. 100k VPPs per month would be a perfect pace. This would leave me enough padding for my upcoming vacation/honeymoon, and give me the option of reaching 1.25m vpps by the end of the year for an extra bonus.

Mary has been back in school for a week now, and we've been adjusting decently. It is pretty much impossible for me to play poker while I'm babysitting though, because Sophy's naps are rarely more than 2 hours. Mary is also in need of some kind of job, which would cause even more disruption in my SNE schedule. So many adjustments to be made... Ah well, we'll work through it.

This hand is actually from this mornings session (Wednesday, 23rd) but I wanted to post it now, because it was pretty cool.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?1983347
The other player in this hand lost a 1200+ pot during the previous hand, and I decided he was tilt-pushing. This is a very tricky situation, though. If I am in his situation, I like to fake a tilt-push if I happen to get a monster after losing a big pot. So it is difficult to tell if his play is real tilt, or faked tilt. Fortunately, my read was correct and I took down a major pot.

Rahr!

Tilt-Blocker

2008-01-21T12:48:00.000-06:00

SNE Quest - Day 18-19: Fighting through

2008-01-20T23:27:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 67946

I didn't update yesterday because I only put in 3 hours, and they weren't all that exciting. I ended the day down a bit.

Today started absolutely horribly. I dropped quite a bit of money within a short period of time when I began my session. The rest of the day was just grinding it back. Still ended the day down, but in much better shape than I was before. The VPPs toward elite are nice too.

So far this year, I've averaged about 3.4k vpps per day including weekends. If I continue at this rate, I'll be around 105k by the end of January. 100k/month was my target rate, and I'm happy with the way things have been going so far.

I have been putting in a very solid amount of time, balancing the household/family, and really not stressing out too much about getting in the hours. I started my SNE training on Dec. 19th, so I've been keeping up this lifestyle for a full month now - even through the holidays - I'm feeling pretty good!

In other news, I checked my year-long graph, and it looks like I'm in about a 80k hand breakeven streak. Oddly enough, I haven't really been too effected by it. I had 2 massive downswing days last week, resulting in my biggest extended downswing ever. That downswing lasted until the 10th or so, and it has just been a gradual increase since then.

I'm going to my Dad's for dinner tomorrow, so I'll probably only be able to get about 6 hours in.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1970783
This is my biggest losing hand of the night. RobHunt1 was the table mark, running at about 60/20 over a short period of time. We both built up a decent stack, and this hand was the result.

The only really debatable move is the river. His play pretty much indicated that he had spades, or QT, or some other hand that got there. I could not make myself fold though. I figure he shows up with A7/AJ/A9, maybe even KJ/K9 a decent % of the time, and I'm getting 5:1 on my call. Just unfortunate that he hit his backdoor.

Ah well, that's it for tonight.

SNE Quest - Day 17-18: Getting back on pace

2008-01-19T10:21:00.001-06:00

VPP COUNT: 63039

Well, I didn't do an update for Thursdays' play... mostly because I only put in 2 hours and it was not a great experience. I dropped a coke on my surge protector in the afternoon, and had to shut everything down for a couple hours while I figured out what to do. I eventually bought a new one and put in one session late at night. It did not go well.

Friday, however, was a great day. I put in all 8 hours and had some very nice results. I am still only at 29 hours for the week, which should hopefully be 36-38 by the end of today (Saturday). At my current VPP rate, I'll probably need to put in a full workday today, Sunday, and Monday to keep up with my 25kVPP/week pace. At that rate, I should have over 75k vpps by Monday, the 21st. 100k vpps per month would be a great rate, and would keep me on pace for 1 milestone bonus per month starting February. Not bad at all.

I watched a full-ring 18-tabling video by "loosefer" yesterday, and was fairly surprised at his play. For the most part I agree with his overall strategy and betting style, but in general I found nothing spectacular. There were quite a few situations where I would have tried to steal with any 2 cards (tight players to the left) and he passed on the opportunity. He did take advantage of limpers better than I generally do though, and I'll be taking that as a lesson and trying to apply it to my game.

That's about it for me today.

SNE Quest - Day 16: Finding Time

2008-01-17T08:43:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 57141

It is starting to become much more difficult to find enough free hours in the day to keep up this challenge. I only put in 3.5h yesterday (the 16th). Mary is going to class now, and there are still the many obligations of having a baby. I've still only cleared about 20 hours this week, and need to really pick it up if I want to be at 40+ by the end of Saturday.

Overall for the year, I have a total of 113k hands played. This is a pretty damn solid sample size, and also a pretty accurate indicator of what my hourly rate will be (assuming my play does not improve).

Fortunately, even over these 113k hands, I have already noticed a big improvement in my game. At first, I wasn't nearly as comfortable 18-tabling, and was much more tight than I needed to be. I ran at about 13/10-14/10 for the first week while I was getting situated. This past week, I've been running at about 16/12 with much more aggression and much more steal attempts. The more aggression, the better.

Mary is busy again today (the 17th), and once again it will be a challenge to get in a full 8 hours. By Saturday night, I would like to break 70k total vpps, but I expect to be closer to around 68k. At this pace, I will be well over 100k by the end of January - which is an amazing start.

SNE Quest - Day 15: I bet 7.95

2008-01-16T07:32:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 55593

So my little script is a big hit. I'm surprised nobody has done this before, because it is definitely effective at tilting the people who are paying attention. At the very least, it makes everyone look twice at my bet size before calculating odds, evaluating my hand, etc. Though I can't exactly prove any difference in win rate because of this change, I am fairly confident that this quirk is helpful.

My game has been doing better and better lately. Yesterday, for about 9.5k hands I ran at 17/13 with 45% to steal! At the nitty stars tables, this is a great way to maximize your value from the CO and Button. I would still like to continue improving my post-flop game. I especially need to start upping my river bluff %. Until lately I pretty much never bluffed a river. I've been doing it more frequently, and it works much more than I expected.

I now have enough FPPs to fully fund my trip to Vancouver, and will be booking that soon.

945k vpps to go! This will be cake :)

SNE Quest - Day 13-14: Short and Sweet

2008-01-14T22:47:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 51054

Yesterday and today were shortened days for me. I put in a total of 7.5h over the past couple days, leaving me at 87 hours for the year. Very solid, IMO. My results have been very solid, and I'd love nothing more than to repeat these past 2 weeks 20 more times throughout the year.

So, I'm officially 5% through with the challenge. Instead of cashing in bonuses every time I have 100k fpps, I decided plan on paying for my wedding on Sept. 12th completely with FPPs. Over the year, I'll be finding the best ways to spend my fpps, so this is a great start.

Nothing else major to update. I changed my BetPot.ahk script to make all of my bets have .95 after them, making it look like more chips, and annoying the crap out of regulars. I think its a pretty sweet change, and I plan on keeping it :)

That's about it for now.

SNE Quest - Day 12: Eighteen Dollhairs

2008-01-13T10:30:00.000-06:00

For now, I have decided not to take weekends completely off, and to just put in a session or two to keep myself sane/sharp. When you make each day revolve around putting in 8+ hours of poker, it can leave you pretty antsy when you take a day completely off. So on Saturday, I put in about 4-5 hours. The first 3 hour session went amazingly well, and the second small session went amazingly crappy - leaving me with 18$ after all was said and done. This isn't counting vpps/fpps and whatnot, so it was definitely still worth the work. It is always just a little discouraging to go from a big winning day to pretty much even.

On a related note, I've been thinking about more ways to maximize my earn from the SNE challenge, and stumbled across a pretty good opportunity on the 2+2 forums. Apparently, when you buy the Porsche from the PokerStars FPP store, you get a MUCH better $/fpp rate than any other option. This difference could be worth 5-10k$ in bonus money over a years time. My idea is essentially to save up the FPPs over the whole year, buy the Porsche, and sell it right back to the dealership. I'm not sure what kind of discount I'd have to give, but it could very well be a big bonus.

In addition to the $ is the recognition from the poker community, and bragging rights to friends and family. Once I do a bit more research about reselling new cars to dealers, I can make a decision about whether or not to save up that many FPPs.

If it does turn out to be a good deal, I may try to recruit some other SNE hopefuls and make it somewhat of an event. 5-10 players all buying a Porsche with FPPs on the same day would definitely make the news in this little poker world.

I plan on putting in a few hours today (Sunday) and getting back to the full-blown grind tomorrow. I'm nearing 5% done with the challenge! Makin' progress!

SNE Quest - Day 11: The Low-Hanging Fruit

2008-01-11T22:09:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 43623

Yesterday pretty much woke me up to the fact that I moved up much faster than I probably should have, and really was not table-selecting enough to compensate for it. I am still game for a 3/6 table, but unless it is especially juicy, I wont be sitting.

I decided to somewhat-copy another regular, studboy1. Studboy table selects games between 100 and 600 buyin, and is constantly looking for a better seat. I've got a lot of respect for that guy, and he is definitely someone worth imitating. So, today about 3k of my 9.5k hands were 100NL, and those tables basically made up for the losses at NL200+.

At the end of this massive cooler of a day (I ran real bad) I was still up just a bit. My Won$SD was 46% overall, which is ridiculously low. Even more than that, most of that low W$SD came from my 400$ tables, where I pretty much experienced nothing but coolers.

The only hand that I probably should have laid down was...
http://www.pokerhand.org/?1927941

Opponent was running at something like 25/3/1, and he called PFRs about 13% of the time. I had pegged him as a passive donk. When he pushed the turn, I talked myself into a call by saying "K9s-KJs are in his range". I neglected the fact that he is extremely passive, and probably would have just called my turn bet with those hands. AK, 55, and 44 are the only hands that make much sense for him - and I didn't beat any of those. Ah well - I *definitely* had to bet the turn, so the remaining 250 was all I could have saved.

Aside from the coolers and lack of solid hands, I thought I played amazingly well. I ran at 16/12 with 38% steal and aggression of 4.7/3.3/1.6. River aggression always goes up when I get better cards as well. If I keep playing the way I did today, I will do extremely well over the long haul.

I also gave someone the nickel of shame today. I posted it in BBV on 2+2, but didn't get much love - My sense of humor is probably a bit off for the general public :)

P.S. 100NL is cake compared to 200

SNE Quest - Day 10: Why God. Why.

2008-01-10T19:35:00.001-06:00

VPP COUNT: 38908

Today is the biggest losing day of my poker career.

My first 2hr session left me just slightly down. I played well, and the cards just didn't come my way.

The second session went MUCH worse. My play decreased slightly, but I think I was still playing a decent game. Nevertheless, by the end of the session, I was down quite a bit and not feeling so hot.

I only got about 20 minutes into my third session. Check out my first playable hand after sitting down: http://www.pokerhand.org/?1922710 Basically one of the most miserably played QQ's I've ever seen. I would almost prefer an open push preflop to the way he played it. Either way, he lucked out and I tilted for about 10 minutes before deciding to call it quits for the day.

So I learned my lesson - fold all pairs preflop. We'll see how that works out tomorrow.

SNE Quest - Day 9: Decent results for a bad day

2008-01-09T23:03:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 36101

Well, I was in a pretty crappy mood today, and did not play as well as I usually do - though I held my game down pretty decently. Ended the day at about 14/10 with solid river aggression to compensate for yesterdays weak play.

I may be coming down with a cold or something, because I just haven't been focusing as well the past couple days. Maybe I'm just spoiled by godly cards and haven't been used to running below average. I think my play could stand to improve a bit though, and as usual, that means working on more steals/aggression.

In other news, Mary and I are planning a week-long trip to Vancouver during her spring break. If I'm lucky, I'll be able to convince Stars Concierge to let me "order" the trip through them, and then just reimburse me for the purchases. Unfortunately, I expect them to refer me to the travel vouchers...

SNE Quest - Day 8: Tilt

2008-01-08T22:34:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 32118

I was running pretty badly all day today, and playing fairly badly because of it. At the end of the night, I ran about 13/10 over 7685 hands. My attempt to steal was only 27. I wasn't being nearly aggressive enough, and probably could have picked up a lot more small pots as well.

My river aggression is fairly low, which is often indicative of my hands not making it there on the river. Won $ SD is also almost 48%, which is low for me.

Generally when I go on downswings like this, I search frantically for the reason. I played my last hand like a complete idiot and ended my session promptly after.

Check out this brilliant move.
http://www.pokerhand.org/?1914313
In my defense, I put the guy on a JJ-55 type hand, and assumed he'd insta-fold. Of course I was wrong, and I never make this stupid play on most days.

Ah well, worst day of the year so far - but there are many many more days to come.

SNE Quest - Day 7: Boomswitch

2008-01-08T08:45:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 27982

Once again, I find myself running way above expectation at the NL400 and 600 games. It seems like every time I decide to load a table above NL200, there is always some megadonk who feels obligated to hand me a full stack. A few examples...

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1911040
AA v J9o... Who says NL600 is hard?

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1911044
After he got to the turn, he's gotta push. Calling that flop raise was just suicide though.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1911052
AQo is good for teh 3bets.

I keep expecting a massive downswing, but if people keep making plays like these against me, I'll have trouble losing money. I'm not sure what it is that inspires all of these suicidal plays from the donks at the table. Maybe it's my "f u idiot" jerk attitude. Maybe its my stupid avatar. Maybe variance has been smiling at me. Whatever it is, I've been getting more than my fair share of donkey stacks, and I'd like to keep it that way :)

Yesterday was the end of the first full week of my SNE quest, and I am advancing rapidly. With nearly 28k VPPs, I am FAR ahead of schedule, and am still extremely confident that I will accomplish my goals.

Mojito anyone? (I was planning on using this picture for my Jan 1 post, but was too excited/hungover to really remember. No need to let it go to waste. Mojitos are good.)

A picture of Sophy

2008-01-06T19:45:00.001-06:00

I haven't posted a pic of my daughter yet, so now that I'm putting more pictures in my blogs, I figure now would be a good time to put one up.

Here's my favorite so far...

SNE Quest - Day 6: A resting day

2008-01-06T19:33:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 23321

Instead of taking weekends completely off (because I just wouldn't know what to do with myself for 16 hours) I plan on playing limited amounts. After putting in 8h/day, it is pretty much cake to put in 2-4.

So I played for about 2 hours today, and had an insane 900$ pot where I won with A high. http://www.pokerhand.org/?1903200

Despite the big win, I ended the day slightly down. I planned on putting in a couple more hours, but decided to relax and spend time with the family before returning to the grind tomorrow.

I was reading over some of my previous blog posts, and noticed how I used many more pictures back then. I'd like to keep my blogs very visual and entertaining, so I'll start adding more pictures.

So here is Nala in a hat while I 18-table in the background.

SNE Quest - Day 5: The first half-day

2008-01-05T17:05:00.001-06:00

VPP COUNT: 21818

I only put in 4 hours today, which was about 5.3k hands. I'm going to my Dads house this evening, so I won't be putting in a full work day.

This is the end of the first week of my challenge! I've done quite well, considering it was only a 5-day week.

Hands Played: 44,312
Hours Played: 37.12
VPPs Accumulated: 21,818

I have decided not to post the $ amounts of my results on this blog. This week went extremely well, and I would love nothing more than to brag about how much money I have made. Unfortunately, I don't think its a great idea to broadcast my bankroll to the world.

I'd absolutely love to repeat this week for the rest of the year. I think my win rate will drop down a little bit, but I really haven't been running incredibly well this week.

Looking forward to next week!

SNE Quest - Day 4: I didn't know I was this good.

2008-01-05T09:28:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 19140

For the past 4 days, I've been running hot as fire at NL400. However, I've been running extremely mediocre at NL200. This makes my overall stats look like I've been running bad, despite my results.

To be quite honest, before I started training, I didn't even know if I'd be much better than breakeven at stars 200NL+. I made most of my winnings at Bodog before I moved to Stars, where the competition is so weak that it would be difficult to lose. I'm extremely confident now.

I've been getting the beginnings of a cold lately, so hopefully that doesn't turn out to be anything. I'm feeling good enough today to put in my 8 hours, finishing off my first full work week. I should have something close to 24k VPPs at the end of the day, which will keep me on schedule to clear SNE in about 42 weeks.

Yayayaya!

SNE Quest - Day 2-3: Doing pretty good

2008-01-03T23:27:00.000-06:00

VPP COUNT: 14352

I have a total of 24.5 hours, and about 14.3k vpps earned so far this year. Looking forward to getting the first full week under my belt.

Yesterday was a pretty ugly downswing, but I learned a lesson from it. Fighting for those small uninteresting pots can effect your win rate drastically, and I practiced quite a bit today. My Won$WSF% usually hovers around 34, because I am lazy and just check/fold in small pots where I missed the flop. Well today I went after those pots very aggressively and definitely found huge value in stabbing at these pots. My W$WSF% today is just above 40 for nearly 10k hands.

The challenge has encouraged me to learn and get much better than I was before. I guess without a big goal, it is easy to lose your drive to get better, but I am gradually finding it back.

That's it for tonight.

SNE Quest - Day 1: Insane Heater

2008-01-01T23:27:00.000-06:00

This was by far my best cash-game day I've ever played. I think I had 4 AA v KK where I stacked the KK.
Unfortunately, I expect this to cause me to be a bit more vulnerable to burnout. I plan on experiencing a big downswing over the next week. The only important thing is that I keep up the pace for SNE. With 5.5k vpps today, I should be pulling about 27500 per week, but I'll expect that to be closer to 25000. At that pace, I should have SNE after 40 weeks, and possibly have a shot for the first 10k milestone bonus.

Very optimistic for the year. Glad it started out so well.

Let us gogogogogo

SNE Prep: 10 hours before the end of 2007!

2007-12-30T10:42:00.001-06:00

I was only able to put in 5 hours yesterday, and the session went extremely well.

Despite the 2 biggest hands of the day being bad beats or coolers, I ended the day with a very nice profit.

I had Q9s vs ATs on a Q9x board. ATs was played by a reg, who absolutely butchered the hand. It was 3-way on the flop. Random donk lead out about 25 into a 40$ pot. Reg calls, I raise it to about 125 with my top 2. Donk folds, and Reg just pushes his bare A high flush draw. I was about 66% to win when the money went in, but he caught his flush and won the 850$ pot. If anything, this hand gives me more confidence that the 400$ games are more beatable than I originally thought.

I played EXCELLENT poker yesterday. If I could keep playing that well for all of 2008, I will be a very rich man by the end of the year. I didn't skip a beat. Layed down my overpairs at the perfect times. Took down many more uncontested small pots than usual. My attempt to steal was about 42% by the end of the day, which is great for FR tables. What a great day.

I will be playing about 10 more hours of poker before the new year, and I am already significantly ahead of my year-end goal. Barring a massive downswing over the next day, I would say that this year has been a great success.

SNE Prep: Still doing great

2007-12-28T16:12:00.000-06:00

I'm maintaining a great income with my SNE training. Today, I reached my secondary goal for the year, and hopefully will be able to pass it even further by the end of the year.

I've put in 8 hours per day on Wednesday, Thursday, and Today, bringing me to 24 for the week, despite the 3-day Christmas break. I plan on doing a session tomorrow and Sunday, and taking New Years Eve off.

I've got about 70k hands of 18-tabling now, and if my results continue like this, I could make upwards of 200k next year. For now, I am going to set this as my goal, but I may modify it at the end of January.

Adjusting to the schedule is getting easier every day. It really isn't very difficult to put in 8 hours worth of poker if you divide it into 4 2-hour sessions. I've also been maintaining a decent little floor exercise routine that I do after each session, so I'm getting healthier as well.

Sophy is getting noticeably bigger and more aware of her surroundings every day. We've really started to connect this week, and I am getting much better at keeping her calm and occupied when Mary is busy or tired.

Life is going pretty well :)

SNE Prep: Running Well

2007-12-26T23:04:00.000-06:00

Had a very solid day today. A total of 8.5 hours and 9.2k hands. Nearly 5000 vpps for the day.

I played much more 200NL tables instead of 100s, in an attempt to up my VPP rate. After an hour of my last session, I didn't have a single 100 table up. If the current results continue, I will probably make the move to 200NL+ by Jan 1.

Still extremely excited about SNE. I have to keep myself in check, because generally when I get a surge of motivation like this, it only lasts a month before some serious burnout. Not allowing myself to exceed 9 hours in a day.

Looking over my 2007 results, I've fallen about 15% short of my goal for this year. Considering the ridiculous number of life-changing events that have occurred in my life this year, I don't feel very bad about missing my target. I've probably matured more in this past year than any other. It's amazing how suddenly your adult instincts kick in after having a baby.

Gonna be trying for a few more of these days before the end of the year :)

Bah, Humbug

2007-12-25T10:38:00.000-06:00

Christmas is absolutely insane.

I am about to go to my 5th (of 6) Christmas gatherings. I'm more enthusiastic about getting back to my SNE training schedule than I am about presents.

I've been reading up on the forums occasionally the past few days, and it looks like there may be some good changes to the SNE program in 2008. Looking forward to any news on the updates.

In my preparation for SNE, I didn't take the (rare) double VPP days into account. Just estimating here, but if there are 2 double VPP days in 2008, I should be able to get in ~15-20 hours within the 24h period. That would amount to ~4% of the yearly goal taken care of in 2 exhausting days.

Back to training tomorrow - and starting the real thing in less than a week!

Let us gogogogogo!

SNE Prep: Stars is one rough game.

2007-12-22T00:17:00.000-06:00

I put in 8 hours on Thursday, and another 9 hours on Friday. Bringing my week total to 36hrs. I'll probably have a bit more time tomorrow to keep up the routine and bring myself above 40h for the week. A total of 41k hands. I started the challenge off very strong, but the deck has been against me the past couple days. Currently at 1.68bb/100. I'd really like to be around 3-4, and probably will be when the deck starts working a little better in my favor. After the FPPs and the bonus I cashed in, it will be a pretty solid week.

I am pretty sure I will need to take Sunday -> Tuesday off as well. Christmas is on its way...

I am currently at a measly 163k VPPs for the year. This leaves me 37k VPPs away from the milestone bonus. Including Saturday, I have 6 more working days before the end of the year. At 500vpps/hr, it would take 74 hours worth of work to finish. About 13 hours per day average... No.

Something along the lines of 40 more hours by the end of the year sounds more reasonable. It wont be enough for a milestone, but it will be enough to get me another big bonus.

So this week is not over yet, and I have accumulated 20k VPPs. If I repeat this week all next year, I would reach my goal. This week really wasn't hard either. I am more confident that I'll be able to pull it off.

Now, a moment of silence as we all pray for my doomswitch to be lifted.

Later.

Pretty sick hand from tonight

2007-12-20T20:04:00.001-06:00

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1835498

Either the guy with 22 read my soul, or he played it real bad.

Oh well, all 20 outs whiffed.

SNE Prep: Lost a little momentum, still diong well

2007-12-20T08:54:00.000-06:00

I was only able to get 5 hours in yesterday. It still added up to about 6k hands, but I was intending on putting in 10 hours to make up for the 2 I missed on Tuesday. So far, my preparation for the SNE challenge has consisted of:

Monday: 8 hrs
Tuesday: 6 hrs
Wednesday: 5 hrs

...for a total of just over 21K hands.

I'm probably going to have to figure out a more efficient system. I should be pulling in hands at a rate of 40k/week every week if I want to reach SNE next year. Ideally, I would like to put in 50k/week to give myself some room for emergencies, vacation, etc. To reach this, I'd need to put in something like 45 hours, which should be very doable. If all goes according to plan, I could have Sat/Sun free, which should hopefully be enough.

I'm still anticipating some major burnout, loss of motivation, maybe even depression before this thing is over. When it comes down to it, I put in about 1200 hours in 2007, and I didn't even push myself very hard. I fully think I'm capable of pulling this off.

When this crazy Christmas season is over, it will be much easier to find time to put in those hours. Christmas has become a ridiculous monstrosity, and having a baby makes everything 10x more hectic.

We are having 4 Christmases this year. 4. We might as well convert to Judaism with my sister and do the Hanukkah thing.

Sophy is doing better about falling asleep for longer periods of time at night. We had to start doing it the hard way and letting her cry it out (when there was nothing actually wrong).

That's it for me today. Will probably be able to sneak ~4-6 hours in after Christmas shopping.

BODOG: Letting the cat out of the bag.

2007-12-19T10:09:00.001-06:00

Well, I kept this secret mostly to myself throughout the year. Now that Bodog has decided to willingly screw up their software, lose their PT support, and randomly crash while I'm in a hand - I have decided to leave the site.

The information included in this post could be used by many of you new grinders to increase your $/hr in a very big way. Of my close friends who I let in on this little secret, ALL of them saw an extreme increase in their earn over a large sample.

For those of you who play 8+ tables and are reliant on HUDs, this probably won't effect you very much.

**Bodog has the absolute best table selection at mid-high stakes that I have ever seen.**

Over a sample of ~400k hands on PokerStars 100NL(mostly) and 200NL, my earn was about 3.2ptbb/100. Pretty decent considering the toughness of the tables.

My 109k hand sample at Bodog showed returns of a whopping 7.1ptbb/100. This win-rate is pretty much unheard of for long term FR players. About 60% of my play was at 200NL and the rest was played higher. I even played a few thousand hands at 1000NL, which went very well. The 200NL game on Bodog plays like the 50NL tables on PokerStars. That is how extreme the difference is.

For most of you multi-tabling grinders, this wont make a difference. If you can 12+ table for 2+ptbbs, you're better off staying where you are.

For the mid-level players who aren't pulling a great win rate, or don't play very many tables (or for all of the tuff_fish's out there) There is absolutely no reason for you to stay with Stars/FTP. Non-Americans would probably have the same result with iPoker, Boss, etc. Even if you can't get rakeback on the smaller sites, in the long run it will probably be worth it for you to make the move.

I wish someone had given me this advice around the time of the UIGEA. My bankroll would be much bigger right now.

18-tabling aint so hard...

2007-12-19T08:59:00.000-06:00

Well, I was planning on doing 18 tables, 8 hours a day, 5 days a week until the end of the year (excluding chrismas/eve).

The way that has worked best for me has been to limit every session to 2 hours, and give myself a mandatory 1-hour break in between each one. With this system, each session pretty much flies by. I was only able to put in 3 sessions yesterday though, as Sophy was especially needy and by the time all of my other obligations were taken care of, it was 11pm. I still got about 6.5k hands in, but I plan on making up for the lost session today, by extending each session to 2.5hours.

Not sure if I will be releasing graphs or results in actual $ amounts yet. If I continue with the SNE challenge I will definitely be updating VPPs and hands though. I may even write a little graphical web page script to make my progress easier to follow.

Goals for the day:
1) 4 separate 2.5hour sessions of 18-tabling. Estimated 11k hands (new personal record)
2) Generate lifetime Bodog graph and do a spoiler/writeup on the site. Those of you who have been milking that site will hate me.
3) Continue healthy living schedule in between sessions/obligations.

I am currently just under 150k total VPPs for the year. I may not be able to reach the 200k milestone by Jan 1, but I'm sure as hell going to try.

Supernova Elite - Considering taking the challenge

2007-12-18T13:15:00.000-06:00

After Bodog got rid of PT support and screwed their software up something awful, I have made PokerStars my primary site.

I've been 18-tabling NL100-NL400, and it really hasn't been very difficult. The swings are a bit more crazy due to my lower win-rate, but the mass amount of FPPs accumulated helps to keep the edge off.

I accumulate ~500VPPs and >1000 hands per hour at my current rate. To reach SNE, I will need to put in a full 2000hr work year.

Considering my newborn baby girl is still extremely demanding, this will be a very challenging feat.

The end of December will be my testing period for whether or not I want to seriously pursue the SNE status. Will continue updating as my progress continues.

Bodog updates, dogwatcher worthless, exploring options

2007-12-11T20:24:00.000-06:00

Well, Bodog is officially forcing everyone to update to their new crappy software. Unfortunately, the only handgrabber available has basically been discontinued for the last 1/2 year, and it seems unlikely that they will have an update in the near future.

So without hand histories, HUDs, rakeback, or tolerable software, it is time for me to say goodbye to Bodog. Since I wont be playing there any longer, I think I might include my lifetime Bodog graph in another post, just to show how profitable it was in its prime.

As usual, I'll have PokerStars to fall back on. They are easily the most reputable, have the highest traffic, and a very solid VPP program. The games are really rough, but I have ~1/2mil hands there as a solid winner, so I'm not concerned. Plus the recent ability to 18-table has been pretty sweet.

Sophy is nearly 2 weeks old now... This parenting thing is much easier than I expected... Nothing exciting aside from an endless wave of soiled diapers and the occasional diaper-change-while-multi-tabling.

I have also applied to prop at a couple of smaller poker sites. They don't support HUDs or PT either, but if I'm being paid 100%+ rakeback, I don't really care.

Lifetime Bodog graph, and propping updates to follow!

Picked up a decent domain...

2007-12-09T09:51:00.000-06:00

I was just fooling around with my web hosting service the other day, trying to think of a good .com to put this blog on. After randomly typing in a handful of names that had already been taken, I stumbled upon www.pokertechie.com, which I now own :)

My first child, Sophy Jade Wallace, was born on Nov. 29th, and I'm still adapting to a regular poker schedule as a parent. I just recently learned that it IS possible to 12-table and change a diaper simultaneously. I wouldn't suggest trying unless you have to...but it can be done.

Yesterday, I also 18-tabled for the first time ever. It was surprisingly easy, and the results were definitely worth the effort. I had been keeping away from PokerStars for the most part lately, mostly because the tables are not nearly as exploitable as many other sites out there... Fortunately, I can still beat the stars 100 and 200NL for 2+ptbb/100 very reliably. I haven't checked my overall stats on stars for the year, but if my memory serves me correctly, I should be at either 2.7 or 3.7ptbb/100 over about 300k+ hands.

That's about it for today.