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.

Mid March, Medium March!

I’m no stranger to the grind, not only poker wise but in life in general, therefore I know for a fact that nothing comes easy unless you fight for it and put to use every single fiber in your body trying to reach your goals.

We’re half way into the month and it hasn’t been the best nor the worst month of poker, I’m slightly down on my ROI% but hopefully things will start taking a better turn the 2^nd half…

I’ve been very deep in a dozen of tourneys recently but no final tables due to unfortunate coolers and bad beats but nevertheless, I’m very excited about the Micro Millions series starting in 2 days, been playing a lot of satellites, mostly hyper-turbos 6 max and I really hope for a good run during the entire series, fingers crossed.

On the other hand, I was quite pumped up to hear about the China Poker Carnival with 1 million RMB GTD (Around $160K USD), but unfortunately, the main event is a an invitation only tourney and I wasn’t able to get my hands on a ticket…well that’s a bummer, I will post during the weekend for an update about how I’m doing in the Micro Millions series, until then, may the poker gods shine on you and I.

It's been more than half year since my last post and here I am again,  near the end of last year, I started coaching a colleague of mine and it got me back playing seriously, reading a lot of poker related stuff and working on my focus which translated in a great 1st month of January 2012 come back taking it from the basics, slowly but surely, the way it should be done.

Here are the stats for my January sessions:

ITM: 33/175
IMT %: 19%
1-3 Finishes: 17
Finished Late: 13%
Prizes: 132$
Average BI: 0.51$
ROI%: 47%
Profit: 42$

Goals for Feb:

1. Move up to 1.5$ 45/90 man
2. Try to get a seat to APPT Seoul
3. Make the top 10 at least once in the weekly Asian Poker League

That's it for now, wish me luck and good luck on the tables!

2011 and the awful swings

It wasn't really the new year's start I was expecting in poker, I've had huge swings, ran bad an awful amount of times but I mean that's poker as we all know, and as long as I stay focused, keep the right state of mind and work hard, I'm confident I can submerse through the cloud and fog that's been around my poker sessions recently.

I've been putting more study and volume into my SNG game, approximately  500 a week, I've also been reading about 6max NL strategy and tactics to improve and finally, I got a prop deal at this new poker room, where I get to play 6max and only that, with a good rakeback deal and softer competition.

Last but not least, the 3rd season of TPT (Taiwan Poker Tournament) started, if you haven't read the older posts from my previous blog, I was the 2nd season champion and got to go to Macau for free with my partner and play live poker everyday which was like heaven! :)

The first tourney had a record field of 71 players, and the new feature of the 3rd season is that it's sponsored by Pokerstars so every week, Pokerstars will give away prizes to the top finishers, early in the tourney I had lost half of my stack with the second nut flush and had nothing going really until I doubled up with Q2 on a 2KQ flop in a limped pot and I'd say the hand of the night was when I open raised utg with AKo, utg+1 snap jammed, the guy next to him flat called and a 4th person moved all in, it was a tough decision for but the blinds were so high and I had to go with my instinct and call, I was against A10o, JJ and KK, the flop came with an Ace which put a fat smile on my face before slapping me with a J on the turn, the set guy screamed out loud before the river gave me a flush amassing an enormous pot, I lost a couple of allins in the final table, btn raise with KQo, I jam from sb with AK, flop comes with 2 queens and so on but managed to finish 2nd and win a Pokerstars Backpack which was awesome, so until my next post, may the poker gods shine on you!