End o' year stats

I lied and played a session tonight and basically bricked out.

My end of the year stats are as follows:

198 cashes in 1326 tourneys with 34 final tables and an ending ROI of 96.65%.

Here's to another successful year in 2010!

Boring New Year's Eve

I took the car in to get its 15k mile tune-up and when I made the appointment the guy told me that they would drive me home so I could wait comfortably until they finished it. Of course when I actually got there they were like, "well the shuttle just left and we think we can finish it pretty quick so why don't you just wait?"

If they had said this when I made the appointment I would have brought my laptop and been fine. Sine they didn't, all I got to do was read the paper and wait, and wait, and wait... for 4 fricking hours!! Argh, it was definitely aggravating but what else could I do? Anyhoo, errands are done, and I was thinking of actually playing tonight, but I realize that I just don't have the mojo. So instead I'll just lock up a positive year and a positive month and start the new year off fresh.

As far as big new year's plans - come on, let's face it, I am a big poker playing dork who doesn't get out much so my plans include me, my remote, and my dog Chula. My wife is on call tonight so she will likely deliver the first baby of the new year, so I'll probably just try and steal her coolness by living vicariously through her.

Random Thoughts

I finished reading The Professor, The Banker, and the Suicide King which is a book about Andy Beal, a biliionaire banker, who basically decides that he wants to play super high stakes heads up limit poker against some of the best poker players around. He had so much money that the poker players were required to pool their money together and play him as a conglomerate - it helped them in many respects because they could rotate players in and pounce on him when he got tired. I really enjoyed the book because it delved much more into the mindsets and backgrounds of the players rather than getting into strategy (which I deal with on a daily basis through playing and through pokerpwnage). I have also played with, and even busted, the author of the book which made it an added plus. Reading about the amount of risk these players were willing to take was both a little mind boggling and also made me realize that if I really want to move up and make tons of cash I am probably going to have to delve more and more into cash games.

On the poker front, I put in a session this afternoon and felt that I played pretty exceptional poker in the one tourney I got semi-deep in. My 3-bet bluffs were working, my postflop play was taking pots down, everything felt spot on... but then I took 2 bad beats late with KK and poof I was out in 39th. It was somewhat fitting because some of the newer guys on the vent channel I use to "talk poker" have been bemoaning their luck and whining about bad beats lately. I can't say that I no longer get upset or frustrated when I take bad beats now, but I do feel like I have a much healthier mindset about them now then I ever have before. All I can do is play my best and let the luck work itself out.

I decided to take tonight off because I wanted to watch my Badgers play and I was pleasantly surprised to see them pretty much manhandle U of Miami. Tomorrow I am off to my first pt appointment for my knee but I am hoping to get in a session tomorrow night.

Last workweek of the year

So the family has come and gone. We had a good Christmas even though it was too quick and somewhat of a whirlwind and now it is quickly back into the same old routine. Especially since my routine is heavy on finding reasons not to play. I took today off after waking up early, doing an hour coaching session, and then taking a nap and waking up in time to watch Monday Night football.

I am planning on actually working tomorrow and then I have my first pt appointment for my knee on Wednesday and have to take the car in for its 15k mile maintenance on Thursday.

Other than that I should be getting back into the same old same old of grinding, playing some live games, and just trying to enjoy life as best as I can.

Merry Christmas!

We aren't celebrating until Sunday (so we can do our x-mas shopping for each other tomorrow) but I hope everyone else is having a great day today.

Sounds like we are going to spend the day playing games, watching movies, taking walks, and cooking (well more like I will be cooking, but I like to cook and don't have to clean when I cook for my wife's family) tri-tip, twice baked potatoes, salad, and probably brownies and ice cream for dessert. Good thing the sticking to a diet resolution doesn't have to start until next year.

Blue table time!

I played an afternoon session today that didn't go so well, so when it ended around 4:40 I decided that I would take the dog for a walk, eat some dinner and then crank up a later nightly session (I usually start my nightly session at 5 p.m.).

So I did just that and then played bad/took some bad beats early on so I decided to unregister for the later tourneys that I was going to play and just stick with the two tourneys I was left in. Well 6-7 hours later and I made the money in both tourneys and ended up winning the $30 rebuy on Tilt (when they seat you at the final table on tilt the software puts you at a blue table - hence the title of this post) for just over $7k which brings me back out of the hole for December and should mean my 4th consecutive winning month in a row. It also brings my yearly ROI to 99.4% and brings my bankroll up to the highest I have ever had it, so it definitely was a good way to end the night.

I need to clean the house and yard tomorrow and then I am making a dinner for my wife and her best friend from work tomorrow night and then I have family coming in on Christmas eve, so I will not be playing any poker for the rest of this week. So in case I don't post again, I wish all of my readers (yes all 4 of you) a merry christmas.

Tying up some loose ends

It is rainy and drizzly here so I didn't want to clean the floors only to have them get muddied up again + I might as well wait until right before my family comes on Thursday to start cleaning = all I did clean up wise today was vacuum and clean the dishes.

I did mail off our X-mas cards, put in an evening session and watched the Survivor finale so I did get some stuff done.

I also have been added to the pokercurious list of blogs so I might pick up some more traffic that way. We'll see.

I plan on playing a full session tomorrow and then will be off for a while as my wife's best friend is coming over Wednesday night and I am making dinner and then my wife's family comes for X-mas on Thursday.

Downtime

So my wife finally had a couple of days off and I've just been relaxing and spending time with her. I bought our christmas tree, did some errands, made and addressed x-mas cards, watched our dvr'ed Dexter and Survivor, and even better I still managed to make some money even when I wasn't playing because the guy who I help to stake and my "protege" (the student who I am coaching) both won tons o'cash and I get a percentage of that so yee haw that's a nice bonus too.

While I am talking about my protege, I have to say that he really impresses me. Of the 3 students I chose, only one really took full advantage of what I have to offer and the best part is that he is the youngest student I chose (he's still in college) and was playing the smallest stakes when we began. Not only did he pay attention when we had our 1 on 1 coaching sessions, but he also used and continues to use full advantage of the group of poker guys who I talk with on a ventrilo server. I talk with some great poker minds on a daily basis and not only do we have the ability to talk over poker hands and situations but we also very frequently get into some pretty in depth poker theory. So I just don't see how someone can not improve just sitting and listening to us and joining in on our conversations. He was the only one to do this, and it is no surprise to me that he has increased his average buy-in from $1-2 tourneys to now at probably around $15 and he has increased his nominal bankroll to well over $10k in these last 2 months. So yeah, it feels good to know that I was a part in making that happen.

Full Session No Results

I put in a full session today and basically broke even. I made it to the final two tables of 2 different tourneys but just couldn't get it done. I was (and still am) a little bit upset at myself because I semi-bluffed in one of the tourneys when I had a big stack in a spot that I just didn't need to waste chips and my opponent likely had me crushed. I feel like I rarely make those kinds of mistakes anymore so it was definitely frustrating to do so.

I do feel good that I finally put in a 50+ tourney week so I did get some volume in. Charmian has been working nights the last two weeks and she finally has some time off this weekend so I will play an afternoon session and then take Fri. night and Sat. off and maybe just play the later tourneys this Sunday (if at all).

The WSOP schedule is already out for next June and I am already starting to formulate my plan. I think I am basically just going to do exactly what I did last year and try to get a $30k roll together and play as many of the $1k-$2500 WSOP events as possible as well as mix in some of the side tourneys at the Venetian/Caesars etc. Once I put the ad up on PTP I will link it here for anyone who is interested in investing in me.

Small little score

I played the $109 PLO/8 tourney on stars as a filler tourney and took it down for like $2500. Nice to have a positive day. I also got 2 hours of coaching in which went well I think (I hope). So all in all I call it a good day.

First full day in a long time

I played two sessions today for a full day of probably over 10 hours of playing and just couldn't finish how I wanted to. The best I did was make the final table bubble of one tourney... Always a little frustrating to play that long and play pretty well and not get rewarded. I realize the last couple of months I have gotten a big score early in the month which has made things very easy. This month I have started slowly which means I need to dig myself out of a hole before I can feel better. And at the buy-in levels I am at now it is also pretty easy for that hole to get pretty big, pretty fast, so hopefully things turn around again soon.

I have also picked up a couple of coaching hours through pokerpwnage, so that should be a nice way for me to earn some side money each month.

Back to the Grind

I played my live game on Friday night and won the small tourney that was held and online I have been playing basically one session a day. It has been rainy and dreary here so other than taking Chula for a walk every day I haven't been getting out that much.

Charmian is stuck in the midst of working the night shift and was on call today so I haven't seen much of her. She was actually off yesterday but since she was working nights all last week her sleep schedule was all screwy so she couldn't get to sleep until like 7 in the morning and slept until 3 pm - and then had to wake up for work at 5am today so she basically woke up to go back to bed.

Anyhoo, she is on nights again this week which makes it hard for me to do anything other than hide in the garage during the day while she sleeps so that I don't wake her up.

Year in Review/Goals

This time of year is always a time to review how the year went and refocus on goals.

My goals for this year were to:

1) I want to maintain an ROI of at least 50%
2) I want to profit 100 k playing poker
3) I want to play at least 2500 tourneys (doubling my volume this year - and basically guaranteeing a 100k year if I can get close to a 50% ROI)
4) I want to continue garnering more exposure in the pokerworld which will hopefully lead to more moneymaking opportunities (sponsorships, writing deals, etc.), and
5) I want to get back in shape.

I have close to a 100% ROI for the year, I made close to 100k, I made a WSOP final table and through my pokerpwnage work I feel that I am gaining more exposure so I feel happy with goals 1,2, and 4.

I will end up playing about 1300 tourneys for the year which is just 1/2 of my volume goal so I failed there pretty miserably. And I am in the worst shape of my life so that was likewise a fail.

I also took on a couple of students and I feel like I have helped them make strides in their poker game. All in all I feel like I had a very good year, and feel very fortunate for the success I had. I continue to struggle with the volume/not wanting to make poker a grind balance but I do feel good about the fact that the vast majority of time that I play I am in a good mental place and thus play at a high level and with relatively few mistakes.

My goals for next year will be exactly the same as they were this year - the only difference is that I want to focus on getting back into shape as my primary goal.

Playing some again

I have put in two afternoon sessions the last two days and feel like I am playing well/fine just missing out on the big hands you need to win late in tourneys. So I will continue to play sporadically the rest of this month and continue to play my home cash games as well.

I also went for my follow-up appointment with my knee and it looks like I basically have lost a lot of cartilage in the knee. My options are physical therapy, some weird lubricating shot, and lastly surgery. I have decided to start with the pt and then just go from there. We'll see what happens.

Couple of pics

Thanksgiving was good. I am a family guy and I got to spend time with almost all of my family (one week in L.A. with my dad's side of the family and one week in Santa Barbara with my wife's family) so I am a happy camper.

I didn't take as many pictures as I would like but here are some of us with Chula on a Santa Barbara beach hike.

Home Again

After a two week jaunt visiting family in L.A. and Santa Barbara I am back home and exhausted from the 6+ hr drive today. I will try and post a recap later.