Rising from deep within...(Part 1)

As what I was thinking what to name this post, a scene came to my mind, which brought the word "Rising" to the picture...

Rising as in the sun that enlightens my apartment and wakes me up, more often than not, in a refreshed and pumped mood, rising as in my poker abilities and the way I perceive the game that I love and  am so passionate about, rising  as in the obstacles facing me in the challenges that I set up for myself  in the short term and long term but let us focus on the short term side.

September was what I'm sure a countless number of people playing poker for a living would just like to erase from their memories, a brutal month in every definition of the word, I spent the 1st week with my gf in Bali which was nice, fun and relaxing then once I was back, I ran so bad it was disgusting, from the Punta Cana main event satellite where I got knocked out with set over set on the flop to the cruel set versus my Aces to send me to the rail out of the Sunday 100K 34th out 661....

It took a while for me to adjust back to my normal game but the thing is, I wasn't satisfied with it anymore, I want to be better, more skillful at extracting the maximum value, making the correct folds and/or adjustments, get better at hand reading, situation exploiting and all this while keeping an extremely focused and zen like mind.

Poker gods turning their backs...

I'm sure there are tons of poker players who will relate to this post but I'm so blown away by how bad I'm running, I'm sort of speechless and experience some creative numbness and brain freeze but not the fun kind of way so I will get back to this a little later...

I'm back and still trying to put the words together, maybe some hands will speak better:

This hand happened in a $.55 tourney that had ~!260 entrants and we were down to the last 19..

And so the grind keep on..

February...What a month, didn't realize it was over until it actually was. I managed to complete 1 out of 3 for my January goals but that's more like 1 out of 2 since one wasn't available anymore so it's as follows:

Goals for Feb:

• Move up to 1.5$ 45/90 man

I moved up and ran at 20% Roi over 300 games, which is like 80~90% increase from January in volume, they were mostly $1 Turbo 90man and  $1.5 Turbo 45 man with 16% ITM finish% and 21 1st~3rd places finish which I'm not overly excited by, I'm pretty sure I could've done better but I also ran like crap for like 10 days total, I will keep playing these until I feel I have a secure BR for the next level and will move up accordingly, I've crushed the $3.5 level before and did pretty well at the $6.5 as well so it's no unfamiliar territory, just wanting to it right this time, bankroll management wise.

• Try to get a seat to APPT Seoul

TPT season 3 recap

It's been almost 4 months since the 3rd season of Taiwan Poker tour has started, and hundreds of people turned every week to fight for the points leading to the final game (Top 20), and closing on the end of April, with two weeks left in the regular season games, I was ranked 25th and knew had to push myself more in the remaining games if I would ever make it to the top 20, and pushing myself I did, as of the first week of April, I final tabled the online tourney busting 4th following by a win in tourney 20 which I felt, put me back on the right track to go on and make 2 more final tables within the 3 tourneys left, busting 3rd (99vsA10 852210) and 6th and with that, climbed up the ladder all the way to 3rd in the final standings with about 7900 points which will convert in chips for the final game.

The final game was held on Sunday 15th and the cards flew at 2pm with about 23 players competing for 3 top prizes (Trip to Macau for 2+accommodation+3K hk$ event entry/2nd Ipad 32g/3rd netbook) and I managed to steal pots, turn up the aggression and grind my stack to about 20K taking the chip lead as well, about 4 hours later we were down to the final 9 and the blinds were starting to get really high and right after the 9th player busted, I raised with A9s and the Big blind jammed on top, given the odds, I couldn't fold there and was hoping I was against some Kx or Qx, instead he had 10s and the flop came with a 9, turn giving me a bunch more outs with a diamond and I bricked on the river doubling him up and having my stack shrunk to about 10bbs with the blinds at 800/1600 and not too long after that, I went for Jam steal from the blinds but ran into the AJo from the big blind and that was that, I was certainly disappointed but as I'm someone who's always on the move, I quickly kicked away the bad vibes and started contemplating the online tourneys I had scheduled as well as the Macau poker cup starting May 27th which I look forward to!

Rollercoaster week

Great start in December, during the first 5 days or so, wasn't running bad and was doing some great play, final tabled a lot of $3.25 45 man, final tabled a $4.40 Mtt field was 1298 and was the first one out in 9th place with my AJs brutalized by a set on the flop, the next day, went pretty deep in a $4.40 180 man, once in the many I switched gears and built up a big stack and then....and then this donk came in my way, I doubled him up with my A9 against his A7 allin preflop, he flops 977, I reraise him all in later on with my 66s, he snaps with K9o and strikes a 9 on the river and my last hand would be AQs on the btn 6 handed (We were 12 left), I raise 2.5x and he calls, flop 356 with 2 hearts, he donkbet into me, here I'm putting him on a draw, either a flush or a straight, so I go on an call, turn is 10, a blank, so I go ahead and shove the rest of my stack, he calls with K4 and hit a 4 on the river....I was amazed on how lucky that donk is but anyways, yesterday and today, the variance hit me in the $3.25 and I barely cashed, whenever I'm dealt KK, I lose to some Ax and when I'm dealt AK/AQ some dude wakes with AA/KK...pretty disgusting.

Today though, I went deep in a $2.20 4K guaranteed, 2572 people entered raising the prizepool to 5kish, had a steady climb in chips before the bubble as well as in the money, then I had a crazy rollercoaster, where I was 2nd in chiplead with like 175 people left, then my stack got brutalized going from 216K down to 20K then grinded it back up to 230Kish with around 90 people left, lost a coinflip worth 100K and comes the golden hand, got dealt KKs in early position and what will follow is a 3bet then a 4bet by villain who was on a heater already (I should've known better) and finally a 5bet allin by me and he snaps with the rockets, good bye me in 72nd place....

What a week!

That might be just enough to describe it, I've been putting a lot of time into studying and analyzing my game and it's a feeling like no other when you can see some of the fruits of your hard work, translation, I had a great week grinding the $3.25/$6.50 45 man, I went deep in a couple of Mtts including a 4th finish out of 2285 in a $4.40 regular with a prizepool of 9K and a 9th place finish in a $2.20 turbo on stars as well, the field was huge, 9365 entrants forming a total prizepool of almost 19K, although I was a bit disappointed with the way I finished since with the 3rd biggest stack in the final table, I certainly could've looked for a better spot to jam all of my stack and have a better finish/cash but that's ok, It's by learning from your mistakes that you improve and that's the golden rule in life as well as in Poker.

October Fresh!

After breaking out even in September and reaching the Silver star status for the 1st time on Pokerstars, October comes with new perspectives and goals in mind, I have a couple of bonuses to clear up, with my new SS Vip level, I'm entitled to play in the 30K guaranteed tourney on each Sunday of the month for a buy in of 100fpp which I look forward to, my first day of October was alright I guess, right after coming back from a short trip and a live event in Macau, I immediatelly jumped in the action with 24 tables, managed to make 3 FT at the $3.25/45 man, one which I bubbled, a 6th and a 2nd finish, also managed to go deep in a $2.20 180 man, unfortunately couldn't make it to the FT after my A10o got outdrawn by AKo and finally played a $5.50 Mtt with 12k guaranteed, which went up to ~16k, 3181 entrants and 15 mins blind levels, I managed to build a relatively nice stack in the first hour, after the 2nd break and about 2 and a half hours in, I jam over the top with AJs from the btn on a J89 with 2 spades after UTG+1 3bet me on the flop, hoping he has KJ/QJ but he flips AQs for a flush draw and does hit it on the river, I go down from 8.9K to 2K in a flash, later on I got moved to a new table and the hand that will put me back on track was 108s in the BB after 4 people limped into my BB, I checked, the flop came with an Ace and 2 spades, the 1st limper bet, the 2 other limpers flats and I shove on top, get called by 3 of them and I hit a spade to not only doulbe up, triple up but quadruple up hehe, it felt very nice, got moved to another table once again, where with 8K I'll get in a confrontation with a supernova and my value bet on the river with A9s payed off, managed to grind my stack to 22K and lost 12K on a bad read, in the money, managed to go on with a read of mine and call a guys Jam with A10 from the big blind, and was right he had A2o, I hit a great flop 1066 and he makes runner runner for a flush with his 2 of diamonds for to hit the rail in 308th place, oh well...