Bobby,
At UB, the bigger the game, the quicker you clear the bonus.

That said, I'm not playing in any huge games, but I do play at UB almost everyday. The biggest games I've ever played there are the .50/1.00 limit and $50 buy-in NL games.

I haven't gotten up to current times in my journal yet, but as of now, I've earned about $1,200 in bonuses from UltimateBet. With their more frequent re-load bonuses now, August of 2004 was the last time I played there without a bonus though.

September 2004: Looks like we made it

3rd: I recieved an offer from Paradise Poker offering me $50. I'm going to move part of my bankroll over there and collect that bonus. I'm doing pretty well at the .50/1.00 limit game at Empire Poker though, so I'm planning on jumping back over there once the bonus is compete.

4th: There was a software update waiting for me at Paradise Poker. After playing a couple hundred hands of .50 / 1.00, I noticed they started a lower buy-in no-limit game. It's a .05 / .10 Blind, $10 buy-in game. I've been afraid to make the jump from the .01 / .02 game all the up to the .10 / .25 game, but this intermediate jump doesn't seem that scary. I decided to give it a shot. I played about 400 hands and I'm up almost $20. I made some rookie mistakes (like re-raising the nut-flush on a paired board), but the game seems really soft. It will take me a little longer to work off my bonus, but the game is easier to play and win. I'm going to stick with this for a while.

19th: It took me about 1,500 hands to clear the $50 bonus, but I won an additional $130 in the process. I made a lot of big hands I'll grant you, but I got a lot of action with them too. This game is really good. I've decided that I need to have 2000 times the Big Blind before a start a new level at No-Limit. I need to win about $170 more before moving up to the $25 buy-in tables. Things are going great and my game is feeling very strong.

23rd: I got quite a shock today. When I lost my connection, Paradise Poker didn't 'protect' my hand. I've always been careful to reset my all-in protection, so when I looked into it I found a big suprise. Paradise has stopped using all-in protections. Holy cow! I can't play without them. I have a satellite internet connection, and it can be flaky. Well, I withdrew my money and sent them an e-mail explaining why. I hope this is just a temporary thing. My game cooled off significantly in the last few days as well. Over the next 2,500 hands, I've only won $50. I guess that's still pretty good, but nothing like my starting pace.

24th: I played a few hundred hands at Empire yesterday, and then UltimateBet sent me a reload offer. I'm heading back to UltimateBet to work off the reload bonus.

25th: I crossed over my first milestone since tracking my game in PokerTracker. I made 200 Big Bets at the .25 / .50 game at UltimateBet. It took me a little over 4,000 hands making almost 5 BB / 100. That seems really good. I have my first benchmark completed. I hope I have as much success at the .50 / 1.00 game.

29th: UltimateBet had a software update today and they are now offering a $10 Buy-in NL game. I'm really excited. I was doing very well at that game over at Paradise before they cancelled their disconnect protections. I will be able to clear my UltimateBet bonus playing this game too. I've read that good no-limit games dry up quickly because the bad players lose their money too quickly. I hope that these internet games will last.

30th: I recieved reload offers from Empire and Party poker today. I had to make a couple big deposits but they are worth $200. These reload bonuses are really starting to add up. I also pushed over the $1,600 mark this month. I'm going to withdraw the extra $250 and give it to my wife. I think she is going to be very suprised how much money she's getting. I have a trip Albuquerque in a couple weeks and I'm excited about playing live in the casinos.

Hands: 8,010
VP$IP: 17.9%
PFR%: 4.9%
W$WSF: 25.6%
W$@SD: 58.9%
AF: 1.85
BB/100: 12.6
$/Hour (including Bonuses): $4.21

September Profit: $371
Overall Profit: $1850