Hang in there RR, i'm just coming out of a terrible bad streak myself and all I can say is it will end and it will feel GREAT when it does, your hands will hit, your monsters will get paid off, all will be well again. But to get to that point, you have to lose those set under sets, you have to find your KK running into AA everytime you get all in preflop, you have to take the beats. It's all a part of a poker players life. There was a post over at 2+2 which spoke of variance in poker, one great quote (which Xaston had/has in his sig actually) says something along the lines of "Every poker player will inevitably run worse than they ever thought possible. The difference between a winner and a loser is that the latter thinks they don't deserve it."

You'll be at NL50 in no time, just keep your head up Glad to hear of the positive results in your tournament play too.

SUNDAY, APRIL 23, 2006

Lost another $10.32 tonight. The frustration continues. Lost the first few hands to rag 2 pairs and gutshots that had no business being in raised pots. Made a couple of asaine calls with my subconsious telling me "no way you're losing AGAIN". Basically, I just suck. That brings the streak to over 3 buy ins, and yes, I know, that's small compared to others here, but I'm dreading hitting my 5 buy-in rule and having to do pennance down at $10 NL. I at least wanted to move up to $200 before I was forced back down. Jesus H. Christ.

Sets 0-4
AA: 0
KK: 1
QQ: 2


Tables played: 3 full ring
Time played: .8 hours (I find it very hard to tolerate my poor play for very long before I pull myself away, so maybe it's a good thing that I stopped early tonight)

Loss for day: $10.32
Bankroll as of 4/23/06: $732.25

Countdown to $50 NL: $267.75 (yea right)

WEEK ENDING APRIL 23, 2006

Well this was a joke of a week. Hardly played any ring this week, actually, and thank goodness. Sometimes I ask myself "why bother?". Sure, maybe I'll get up to $50 or $100 eventually, but the poker market is already over-populated with players both younger and better than I am apparently, and I'm sure they aren't going to get any worse - I really am not seeing the potential right now for this to be profitable enough for the time I put into it.

It's funny because I give out advice here at BTP to tell other people to keep at it and stay strong, yet, I have a tremendously tough time taking my own advice. I don't know if that makes me a hypocrite or undesirable - I just don't know. I hope everyone that reads this journal gets something out of it, I really do.

On a positive note, I have been cleaning up the SNG scene over at Party this week - ITM well over 50%...so something to report that's not bad news, at least. But I'm sure that will eventaully turn around too.

Hope I didn't alienate any readers - I really don't believe anything I wrote above and do believe that there's enough bad play and people out there to make this worthwhile, but writing things like this in my jounal is one way I let out stress. The other is to throw things - my apartment has been a circus over the last few nights.

3 tables
2 days play

Net LOSS for week: $37.48

Bankroll as of 4/23/06: $732.25

Emoticon of the Week:

RR-

Thanks for sharing your poker experiences with us. Your journal has provided me with a motivation to rise up through the limits as you are doing. I'm at the $2 NL game and if I don't go busto in my session I consider it a win even if I do finish down. I will learn the ropes and slowly get the hang of this game.

It took me a few days to read all 7 pages of your journal and I enjoyed all of it. Thanks for the help with my game.

MONDAY, APRIL 24, 2006

Won $31.80 today and tonight. Happy to see that I'm still able to win. . Actually, it was quite a volatle session - was up more than $50 at one point and down more than $30 as well shortly thereafter - had AA cracked by BB calling K7o PF raise and hitting ragged two pair. Oh well. Played a little loose on and off (see the hand I posted in the NL forum - results will be posted tomorrow). I actually think the recent SNG's I've been playing may have something to do with it. I think I'm going to focus 100% on ring again - I found that my SNG results were far better than ever, thanks to my time in the ring games. I'm sure next time I go back to tourney play, it will be even better. Back in action!

Thanks everyone for your encouragement - I'm trying to work on taking downswings in stride - it's a part of my overall game that I'm still very much wet behind the ears at.

Sets 6-41
AA: 7
KK: 2
QQ: 2


Tables played: 3 full ring
Time played: 3.3 hours

Profit for day: $31.80
Bankroll as of 4/24/06: $764.05

Countdown to $50 NL: $235.95

TUESDAY, APRIL 25, 2006

Won $32.94 tonight. A pretty straightforward and rewarding session - hit a few nice hands early and got paid off. After that, my stacks flucuated up a down a bit, but steadily rose as the session went on. Made a couple of nice laydowns - QQ preflop and some smaller overpairs (villains were nice enough in both cases to show me thier cards to validate my correct thinking). KK ran into an ace on flop twice tonight - from now on, whenver I say I have a pair of kings, I will be saying I have a pair of "ace magnets".

Sets 3-24
AA: 6
KK: 3
QQ: 3


Tables played: 3 full ring
Time played: 2 hours

Profit for day: $32.94
Bankroll as of 4/25/06: $796.99

Countdown to $50 NL: $203.01

Hey SNGfan-

Thanks for the kind words and for reading.

Yes, I do have an ongoing bonus that I'm working off as I play. UB on occassion offers a bonus based on table hours and raked hands played - it's not very fast, but if you're cognizant about checking the website and use Netteller (who they run promotional bonuses with), you shoudl always have a bounus to be working on. I play 3 $25 tables and it clears at about $5 an hour. Not great, but better than no bonus at all.

Regarding the Fox & Harker book, I picked it up at a Barnes & Noble since it said "cash games" - it's pretty good, but advocates a more aggressive style that doesn't suit us at our lower levels and it also assumes live play, where the stacks aren't as deep (i.e. only 50xBB or so). I woudl still reccomend you read it - the hand quizzes are particulary good. And I'll be getting the Sklansky/Miller book that's due out soon as well.

Good luck at the tables dude, and keep at it.

Congrats on the winning sessions RR! Looks like our little slumps are finally over (I made $72+ today myself in less than two hours). Now lets try and enjoy it until the next time we hit the wall.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 26, 2006

Won $44.65 tonight. Well I'm glad to report my little slump is now officially over - I'm ahead of where I was bankroll wise before it began. My hope is that with each slump, I'm able to take it a little better than the last time. Eye on the milestone - $1,000. Actually, I should have won about $60 - I acted on a read which turned out to be false (either that or the fish was just very lucky to have AA) - I reraised PF with AK with position on him, he called, flop came K high, I pushed - normally know better than to do this, but he had called an all-in with Q2 on a Qxx flop a few hands earlier and was chatting it up like a typical donkey. Live and learn.

Sets 5-27
AA: 3
Ace Magnets: 2 (held true both times again tonight guys!)
QQ: 2


Tables played: 3 full ring
Time played: 3.2 hours

Profit for day: $44.65
Bankroll as of 4/26/06: $841.64

Countdown to $50 NL: $158.36

THRUSDAY, APRIL 27, 2006

I've made a couple of wholesale changes that started tonight/will be starting tonight. Firstly, I will no longer use "won" or "lost" in my opening summary. IMO, these words are too results oriented - they will be replaced with "finished up" or "finished down". Also, I emaied UB and they authorized my account to add a fourth table. And so I did. I will also be keeping track of # of hands played so that I may calculate a rolling PTBB/100 for myself every 5,000 hands - I will not be reporting this information until my goal of $1,000 is complete.

Finished down $9.35 tonight. Most of this was my fault - I overplayed AA and lost to a turned straight, problem being the flop was very coordinated. I needed to put the brakes on after my flop bet was called. Ran into some trouble with another pair of aces, but was able to get away. Won some good pots with AK type hands, and otherwise grinded back to a modest finish tonight.

I had no trouble with the fourth table - I felt right at home after 15 minutes or so.

Sets 3-31
AA: 8
Ace Magnets: 3
QQ: 3


Tables played: 4 full ring
Time played: 3 hours

Finish for day: ($9.35)
Bankroll as of 4/27/06: $832.29

Countdown to $50 NL: $167.71