Yes, one of my New Year's resolutions was to start a new journal and keep it up to date.

After 2+ years of playing online poker (and cashing out almost $3k at one point last year), it's finally time to take this thing seriously. Having a wife and kids a full-time job, I can't put in a gazillion hands like others, but I can definitely get more out of the time I do play. It's too easy to play on auto-pilot while surfing the net between hands - I think it's because I play on my laptop so I only play 1 or 2 tables. I'm going to try to get that up to 4 tables eventually.

February goals
============
1. Play 12,000 hands (had about 9k in January)
2. Go over biggest hands after each session
3. Watch (and study) at least 10 Stoxpoker videos


Starting Bankroll: $2340.65

Since Full Tilt resets their Iron Man clock at midnight EST (9:00 PM local time), I'm going to count this session toward February. I played some $1/$2 LHE just to see how quickly I would accumulate FPP's - played 2 tables for 1.5 hours and earned 109 points in 285 hands. I'm still planning to play the majority of my hands at Cake, while playing enough at FTP to qualify for their Gold level. Strangely enough, it seems like the LHE players are worse than the NLHE players - at least the ones I played last night at $50NL.

Although 285 hands is hardly a large sample size, my stats were just about where I like them - 22.11/15.44/1.9. Attempt to steal was 28.26%, and W$SD was 72.73 (I ran good).


Here's the biggest hand of the night (by a long shot)

1/2 Limit Holdem
5 players
Converted at

Stacks:
UTG ($45.50)
CO ($78.75)
Hero ($95.25)
SB ($86.50)
BB ($76.75)

Pre-flop: (1.5 SB, 5 players) Hero is BTN [As]
UTG calls, 1 fold, Hero raises, SB calls, BB 3-bets, UTG calls, Hero 4-bets, SB calls, BB calls, UTG calls
61.30% (EV = $5.81)
22.00% (EV = -$0.48)
16.70% (EV = -$1.33)

Flop: [8c][4h] (16.0 SB, 4 players)
SB bets, BB raises, UTG calls, Hero 3-bets, SB 4-bets, BB calls, UTG calls, Hero calls
24.50% (EV = $3.84)
67.70% (EV = $17.66)
7.90% (EV = -$1.47)

Turn: (16.0 BB, 4 players)
SB bets, BB raises, UTG calls, Hero calls, SB calls
19.00% (EV = $5.12)
76.20% (EV = $32.58)
4.80% (EV = -$1.70)

River: (24.0 BB, 4 players)
SB checks, BB bets, 1 fold, Hero raises, SB calls, BB calls
100.00% (EV = $56.00)
0.00% (EV = -$4.00)
0.00% (EV = -$4.00)

Final Pot: 30.0 BB
Hero shows: [As]
SB shows: [8h]
BB shows: [Kc]

Hero wins 29.5 BB ( won 21.5 BB )
SB lost 8.0 BB
BB lost 8.0 BB
UTG lost 6.0 BB

That'll teach SB to call raises OOP.

Current bankroll: $2375.65

Long day with not much to show for it.

PT shows 1423 hands (which is a lot for me) - mostly at $1/$2 LHE with some $50NL and $2/$4 LHE thrown in for variety. The $2/$4 session was fun - I found myself down 20BB before I had barely gotten my chips out of the racks. At one point I was almost down 25BB and was about to quit, but the table was still good; so I stuck around and got all but 5BB of it back.

For the second night in a row I hit a third Ace on the river to win a pot where my Aces were outflopped.

Grand total: $9.20
Bonus cleared: $22.50 (clearing the FT bonus first because it expires sooner)
Rakeback from last month: $199.55

Current Bankroll: $2606.90

Spent most of the day with friends, but did play for about 90 minutes tonight. 272 hands; +$64.25 despite having AA cracked twice (once by QT hitting runner-runner tens, and once by 84 flopping trips). Also cleared another $7.50 of the FT bonus - 40% of the way through it now.

Current Bankroll: $2,678.65

I'm not sure what's going on, but Full Tilt seems to like me now. Either that, or I've gotten a lot better at LHE since playing NL for a while - or the other players have gotten worse than I remember from last time. Their $1/$2 LHE games seem like a pretty stress-free way to clear my bonus and rack up points towards their Iron Man medals.

Through my first 2394 hands at $1/$2, I'm running 4.68 BB/100, which is quite good nowadays. My VP$P is a little on the low side (18.88), but I'm discovering that they'll still pay you off even if you wait for bigger than normal hands. AF is 2.34/2.35/1.54, which is just about where I like it. All in all, I can't complain about the way the month's starting out.

And, since I haven't posted any hands in a while, here's my tite calldown of the night. I just couldn't believe that the flop hit his 3-betting range, unless he had an overpair -

1/2 Limit Holdem
5 players
Converted at

Stacks:
UTG ($19.00)
CO ($118.00)
Hero ($81.50)
SB ($79.75)
BB ($77.25)

Pre-flop: (1.5 SB, 5 players) Hero is BTN [Ad]
UTG calls, 1 fold, Hero raises, SB 3-bets, 1 fold, UTG folds, Hero 4-bets, SB calls

Flop: [8c][6s] (10.0 SB, 2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets, SB raises, Hero calls

Turn: (7.0 BB, 2 players)
SB bets, Hero calls

River: (9.0 BB, 2 players)
SB bets, Hero calls

Final Pot: 11.0 BB
Hero shows: [Ad]
SB shows: [Jd]

Hero wins 10.5 BB ( won 5.5 BB )
UTG lost 0.5 BB
SB lost 5.0 BB

Current Bankroll: $2784.40

Today's WTF?!?! hand -

https://cakepoker.com/HandHistory/?Hand ... wsPDw8I%3d

When limit players talk about the pot being too big to fold for 1 bet on the river, this is exactly the kind of hand they're talking about. I came so close to folding, but just couldn't bring myself to make the heroic laydown.

2/4 Limit Holdem
5 players
Converted at

Stacks:
Hero ($241.00)
CO ($101.00)
BTN ($105.00)
SB ($77.00)
BB ($80.00)

Pre-flop: (1.5 SB, 5 players) Hero is UTG [Jh]
Hero raises, 1 fold, BTN calls, 1 fold, BB calls

Flop: [9c][Qc] (6.5 SB, 3 players)
BB bets, Hero raises, BTN calls, BB 3-bets, Hero calls, BTN calls

Turn: (7.8 BB, 3 players)
BB bets, Hero calls, BTN raises, BB calls, Hero calls

River: (13.8 BB, 3 players)
BB checks, Hero checks, BTN bets, BB folds, Hero calls

Final Pot: 15.8 BB
Hero shows: [Jh]
BTN shows: [Kh]

Hero wins 15.0 BB ( won +9.5 BB )
BTN lost 5.5 BB
BB lost 4.5 BB

All good things must come to an end. And so it is with my winning session streak this month. 1,538 hands spread across $1/$2 and $2/$4 LHE on Full Tilt, as well as some $50NL on Cake. All told, I cleared $25 in bonuses, and lost $120.50 at the tables. If not for some moran rivering his two-outter (hand posted in LC) in a 220BB pot, I would have broken even for the day.

Tomorrow's a new day, however.

Current Bankroll: $2,688.90