SwingSwingSwing's Poker Journey

It's all gone pretty pearshaped. 

I've just had a sequence of ten tournies without a cash. It's wiped out all of my Sharkscope profit which is not very nice. Reviewing the games, a few were bad moves by me but quite a few were bad moves by opponents and a few were just being unlucky.

Oh well.

I'll keep on grinding. 

It totally messes with your game, that's what.

I've been having a bit of a 'mare since my last post. Eight consecutive games without placing wasn't very good. And it wasn't variance, it was bad play. Reviewing the hand histories confirmed that I arsed up in nearly every single one. 

After that reality check, results improved a bit. I'm down to $18 profit at the $6.50 Turbos, an ROI of 5%.

Indeed they are.

My current ROI is 28.2% and I'm up $109 for the year. OK, it's not a lot of actual money but I haven't played that many tourneys. I even managed to win a $5 regular SNG last night that I signed up for by mistake! My Sharkscope winnings are at $68 which I'm pleased with seeing as I only got the figure above zero about 10 days ago.

I've got a new target to replace the "get Sharkscope winnings positive" target and that is to get my Sharkscope "Average ROI" above zero. It's current at -6%. I'm not quite sure what sort of timescale to set for this one so I'll make the end date notionally the end of the year. 

The SNG education is continuing. The live coaching sessions on PokerStrategy have been the most benificial recently. Watching Chenny8888 and Unam handling bad beats with grace has been an invaluable lesson and has made me a much calmer person at the virtual tables. As Chenny8888 says, "Shit happens".  You're always going to have people suck out on you. Accept it and move on the next hand. 

Well, it's only February and I have achieved my solitary concrete poker goal for 2009. As of 6.50pm today Sharkscope has me as being $4 in profit. So I'm hanging up my poker gloves. I've achieved all that I wanted to in poker. Nobody can take that away from me. Best to retire while at the top of one's game.

Only kidding! 

It is quite satisfying though, knowing that you have improved and that this is starting to show through in the results.

Since my last post, I've switched from the $5.50 regular 9 mans to the $6.50 turbos. I probably should have done this a while ago but it I foolishly believed that I had a bigger edge with the regular format. What tosh. With turbos, you get into the push/fold stage faster and this is better for a player like me who has got a reasonably good knowledge of ICM and push/fold strategy. Since the switch my ROI is 13%, although my sample size is exceptionally small. I've even managed to win a few.

I've managing to keep up with my other targets too. Lots of videos are being watched, live coachings are being attended and I've been reviewing my hands and taking quizzes.

Long may this continue.