Guess Complaining Works . . .

The session started off looking like it was going to be more of the same.  Cold decks and suckouts galore.  Eventually things turned around, particularly when the game got short handed which is my specialty.  But first things first.

I played a very interesting hand against Armor32, that I posted about here.  I opened with AQo in fairly early position and then David T cold called me in the cutoff and then Armor called in the big blind.  The flop came 66T two diamonds and Armor donked.  This is an extremely peculiar bet, and is both out of tempo and out of character for Armor.  If he did indeed have a big hand, I think it's still better to check/raise and he gets the cutoff trapped in for at least one bet, but by betting if I raise, he loses the cutoff from the hand.  So in my mind his range is very polarized to weak T's, big combo draws 87dd, 98dd, 97dd,  or a made monster 76s, 65s, 64s, or 66.  So I call, David T calls in the cutoff and we see a turn, which is an off suit queen.  Armor bets again. 

Now, I have a real decision to make here.  I can raise and try and blow David T out of the hand, but I am going to get 3-bet here a lot in my opinion by both made hands that I beat, made hands that crush me, and huge draws of Armor.  Given the combined range of hands that beat me plus hands that have huge draws, I'd rather just call and let Armor barrel through.  I should be ahead of David T here, as he doesn't have many sixes in his pre flop range other than 66 exactly, and shouldn't really have a ten here either with the flop action.  He could easily have a queen, but if he does, it's going to be KQ or QJ here every time, which I am clearly crushing.  The one hand that I am a little worried about is KQdd, which would give David T, top pair good kicker and second nut flush draw, and with me just calling both flop and turn, my hand is clearly under represented.

So I call, then the hand gets interesting.  David T now springs in a raise.  As soon as that happens I narrow David T's hand to almost exactly KQdd.  I was planning on 3-betting David T if Armor called or folded.  However Armor now 3-bets, and I have to fold.  David T calls, the river comes a black ace, Armor bets, and David T folds.  I have a sneaking suspicion that Armor had QT, that I have beat on the river, but can't handle the pressure on the turn.  If I raise the turn, unless it somehow gets capped backed to me, I am going to see the river and a showdown.  Now if Armor actually did have 66, he misplayed the turn, as he only get 4 big bets on the turn and river combined.  If he just calls the raise, I am going to call too, and then he can donk the river again, and get at least 5 or 6 or more big bets on the river.  Plus I'm sure Armor's range analysis of both David T's and my hand at game time speed is fairly accurate, and I did agonize over the turn fold, but eventually made it.

Later on Helen continues to run like a god against me.  Just a small smattering of hands.  I cap 99, when she light 3-bet with KTo.  Don't worry flop comes 9QJ with a flush draw, that doesn't get there and I don't fill up.  She played it perfectly post flop and got 5 big bets out of me on the turn and river.  Then I 3-bet her late position open with 77, while she has 87s.  Flop comes A45, and she check calls.  Turn is a 6 and she check raises me.  River is an A, just to insure that I pay off, since now I can beat a counterfeited two pair of 54, 65, and 64.

After this hand, I have to buy more chips and then I am finally allowed to start winning.  As the table got shorter, I kept applying more and more pressure both pre flop and post flop, and kept winning hand after hand. 

I finally got to be on the good side of a cold deck.  I opened with QQ and got called by the big blind with Q5s.  Flop comes QT8 rainbow.  I got check/raised and 3-bet the flop.  Turn comes a 5, I get check/raised-4bet and I just called and J9 is certainly in the big blind's range.  River comes another 5, and I get to raise/4bet and drag a monster.

Bout time, variance runs the other way in my opinion.

And Knowing Is Half the Battle!

In my last approximately 30 hours of play, I am up 76.975 bets, but still down real dollars.  Huh?  Sometimes, it REALLY does matter the stakes you are playing and which games you run well in, and which games you don't.

In the 8/16 and the 20/40 when it goes, I have been running like a god.  But in the 40/80 I have been getting my teeth kicked in.  Now of course there is a difference in the player pools and the caliber of play, particularly when you go from 8/16 to 20/40.  However, the 40/80 player pool and the 20/40 player pool are essentially the same at Oceans-11, with a few extra people who show up to play 40/80, but nobody I can't handle.  I just can't seem to catch a break in the 40 game.

In my last ten 20/40 sessions, I am up 148.325 bets in 28 hours of play.  In my last ten 8/16 sessions, I am up 213.9375 bets in 35.5 hours of play.  In my last ten 40/80 sessions, I am down an obscene number of bets in only 127 hours of play.  Part of the issue with the 40/80 is that it only goes once a week, and so it is difficult to keep any positive momentum or energy flowing easily from session to session, and makes it hard to turn it around, since I have to wait another week before I get a chance to play at that level again.  Possibly, since I have been playing a lot more 8/16 this year bad habits from playing that game are creeping over and causing me to make mistakes that get magnified and punished in the 40/80 game that the 8/16 players are not capable of doing.  So I am going to be much more aware of that this week when I play.

I got out for a rare Tuesday session last night.  The 20 game got fired up around 5:30 starting 4 handed.  The game eventually filled up and we had a ramming jamming chip flinging affair.  At some point in the evening, overs buttons got passed around and everyone at the table took one.  So we were basically playing 40/80 with mini blinds and $20 preflop wagers.  It was a very fun game, and I simply got to run over it to the tune of 92.5 bets ($40 bets).  Not sure exactly how to book this game in my stats, since it was technically a 20/40 game, and I don't remember what time the overs came into play.  Hmmm, I'll figure something out here eventually.

Unbelievable!

Another losing 40/80 session.  Lately seems like I have been having a ton of these and it's really starting to suck.  Last night was no exception, with me never getting more than 800 winner and really for most of the night hovering around even, until I lose two pots, one in the most absurd ludicrous fashion.

I open AQo in early position, Ramzi cold-calls, and then Helen 3-bets with Q8dd the rest clear out, and both Ramzi and I call.  Flop comes AQx 2 diamonds.  Checked to Helen, I c/r, Ramzi calls two cold, Helen 3-bets, I cap, Ramzi calls again.  Turn is a rag diamond.  I bet, Ramzi calls, Helen raises, I 3-bet.  Ramzi calls again, Helen caps, we both call.  River is an off suit king, and I pay off in the massive pot to see Helen's flush.  I actually think I misplayed this hand.  I am not second guessing the turn 3-bet, but the river payoff.  As I thought Helen's range prior to her capping was heavy in large pocket pairs with a diamond, KdKx, AxKd, AxQd, AxJd, etc.  So with me not filling up on the river, and the river being a king, I am now behind a huge portion of her range and can really only beat a bluff which should never be present at this point, so I really need to just be disciplined and check/fold.  I mean really, if she can cap the turn and bet the king river into two players really what can I beat?

Then later in the evening the biggest most passive mega fish ever sits in the game.  I have played with this guy before, and everyone was salivating when he sat in the game and it quickly became obvious that no one was leaving as long as this guy was in the game.  He came over from a short handed no limit game and bought in short into the game for like 600.  Don't worry he proceeds to win like the first 5 pots with powerhouse hands like Q5o, T7s, A2o, 33, and some other cheese.

Then the following atrocity happens.  I post in the cutoff.  Helen opens the pot, mega fish does as mega fish is supposed to do and cold-calls.  Folded to me and I call with pocket 3's.  Button and small blind fold and Ramzi calls in the big blind.  So 4-way to the flop for 9 small bets.  Flop comes 973 all hearts.  Ramzi donks, Helen calls, mega fish calls, I raise, Ramzi calls, Helen now 3-bets, mega fish eats two, I cap, Ramzi eats two, Helen calls, mega fish calls again.  25 small bets going into the turn.

Turn 9.  Ramzi donks again!  Helen smooth calls again!  Mega fish does as mega fish is supposed to do and calls.  I raise, Ramzi calls, Helen now 3-bets again.  Mega fish as he is cutting out chips asks how much do I owe?  How much to cap?  And finally just calls.  I of course cap, and everyone calls again.  28.5 big bets going into the river.

And the dealer burns and turns and brings what?  The ace of spades.  Normally the most beautiful card in the deck, although in this case it is the ugliest card for me.  Checked to the mega fish, who fires right in.  I throw up, wet my pants, cry call and I am prepared to see my destiny.  Ramzi calls and Helen calls for a final pot size of 32.5 big bets minus the $4 drop for a total pot size of  $2596.  Mega fish rolls the A9o for the win of course.  Ramzi had 98 and Helen had the ace high flush of course.  I am told later by the gentleman in the 1 seat that he folded an ace pre flop, so I need to dodge 3 sevens, 3 eights, and 1 ace to scoop the ginormous pot in which I had over 82% equity going into the river.  Our friend the mega fish literally had one out for the scoop and 3 outs for a chop with Ramzi, which ironically also will allow me to save $80 on the river as with a double paired board, my hand will now be trash.  Ramzi has the clean 3 outer with an 8.  But just imagine what happens if the river is 3!  It will be capped again and I will collect an extra 8 big bets on the river.  I am certain Helen will fold the river if the board pairs again with either a 7 or a 3.  I can easily fold to a river 7 as well.

Thanks to this giant pot the mega fish has now run his $600 buy in into well over 3 racks of chips.  He sticks around continues to play the worst possible poker ever, wins in the most absurd fashion, and finally decides to quit, with most of his win intact.  I am disappointed in both myself and my table mates in that we allowed him to leave the table with any chips at all.  Fortunately for him, he realized that he was the chum in the water and that the longer that he stuck around that he eventually was going to lose it all back.  It was inevitable.  I mean he open-limps the button with 52o!  He literally played 90% of his hands preflop, and never raised preflop and rarely post flop unless he had the actual nuts or the stone cold virtual nuts.  Like he didn't even raise pre flop with pocket kings, AK, or AQ which were at least 3 of his actual good hands that I saw him win with.

It was a sight to behold and unfortunately Ramzi and I got destroyed by the mega fish.  I probably should have just quit after he quit around 3 am, but I didn't and it didn't get any better for me.  I think I need a break from playing the 40/80 or something.  It's really starting to bug me and that's not a good recipe for success.

Freaky Friday

Sometimes there are players who just seem to run super good against you.  Andy W, ran super good against me in the 40 game.  Plus there was a surprise visit from the spaceship again, and Armor32 superbly outplayed me on the seat change list, and we had a surprise visit from Persian LAG master Alex, and CC is still running well, too.

Let's start at the beginning.  I went into the office to take care of some work things along with meetings I had, so I wasn't able to get up to Oceans-11 until around 4pm.  Traffic sucked at that time of course and what is normally a 30 minute commute, doubled into one hour.  By the time I arrived I was like 5th up for the 40 game, but got an open seat in the 20 game.  I ran well in the 20 game, when the spaceship arrived.  Here's where the table change games begin.  The spaceship and the 20 game in general was better than the 40, so I decided to roll my name for the 40 when it was called.  Well it turns out, the seat opened because Armor32 was vacating it to get into the 20 game.  So he arranged for his name to put on the 40 game before leaving it, thus when I rolled he would be above me.  Since the spaceship was also on the 40 board, that meant when the spaceship left the 20 for the 40, he would be able to bum hunt him sooner than me.  Seems dirty, but what are you going to do?  Next time, I will need to pay more attention to who left the 40 game and why, and whether or not he relisted himself for the game he is exiting.

In any case, I ran well at 20, the players were generally weak and I won little more than a rack in about 4 hours while waiting for the 40 game.  Eventually I get called over for the 40, but the spaceship has busted.  He eventually comes back, but busts again in short order.  In the 40 game, I actually am getting reasonable hands and flops, but Andy W is again in god mode against me and letting me have it.  Let's see K6 vs A7 where I posted in the cut-off for my first hand.  I opened, he 3-bet, I got to check raise a king high flop, and he proceeds to double bink an ace on the turn and river, just to guarantee that I pay him off. 

Then he beats my KK with QQ that binks a set on the turn.  Then KK versus his AQs, that flops a flush draw and binks an ace on the river.  Then there was AK vs A7, that rivered a pair of 7's against me.  Oh well, what are you going to do?  It happens, and I'm used to it.  I ended up with a little more than a 3 rack loss, so nothing I can't handle, but it gets frustrating that's for sure. 

Oh and Persian LAG master Alex got me with 8d7d on a 763 two diamond board where I held 54 for the flopped nuts.  I got to six-bet him on the flop too.  Don't worry diamond peels off on the river.

I am used to Andy running well against me.  He had a stretch earlier this year where he could do no wrong against me.  When he was behind he caught up, when he was making a move it worked or he caught what he needed, when I was ahead the perfect card for him to fold would show up and he wouldn't pay off, when he would've flopped a monster he folded preflop when I had the bigger monster.  In general he ran good in all the ways one can run good, winning with the hands he should, winning with the hands he shouldn't, and not losing with hands he could've played, etc.  Fortunately, that eventually turned around and I had a good one month stretch where the tables were turned and I ran very good against him.  So maybe there is something to the yin-yang of a poker table and its players.

Rounders

Recognize the player seated to Johnny Chan's right?  Funny isn't it.  The first time I saw this movie, I had no idea that someday I would be playing with that gentleman on a semi-regular basis.

Silly

I didn't get to play the 40/80 at Oceans on Friday, since I spent the day up in Los Angeles with the family getting photos taken.  So apparently I missed the biggest spaceship of all time.  Oh well.

Then on Saturday after mass and taking the kids to the church festival I get informed that the 40/80 has gone over the weekend again and is still full here on Saturday at around 7pm.  I eventually finished up with the family and the kids and get up to Oceans a little after 9pm.  The game breaks down fairly quickly and is 3-handed for a while with me, Helen, and Andy W.  Eventually Helen quits, I am stuck like a rack, and then Andy and I play heads up for a while.  I get unstuck and eventually $892 winner before Andy needs to bail.  He brought his wife with him and he's on a short lease when she says it's time to go home.

I had a couple of beers and want to wait it off, so I sit around for a bit and eventually get into a full 8/16 kill that I proceed to crush.  I lost exactly 2 showdowns in 80 minutes of play.  One with A9, that I really probably should have folded the river and lost to pocket tens.  Then another with AJs against KJo on a QT9xA board.  I 3-bet preflop, but got c/r on the flop and called down, spiked an ace and felt compelled to call, just in case the preflop raiser had KQ or QJ.

I did get to 5-bet the turn with 55 on a TT52 board in which I raised preflop got 2 cold-callers, then the button 3-button, the big blind came along, and everyone else called for a 5-way pot for 3 bets each.  Flop came T52, 2 clubs.  I donked right in, call, call, raise, fold, I 3-bet, call, call, call.  Turn was another T.  I bet, first cold-caller raised, folded back around to me, I 3-bet, he 4-bet, I 5-bet, he called.  Turn was the 7 of clubs.  I bet, he called.  I announced pocket deuces no good sir, and opened my hand.  He of course had ducks, while the button exclaimed he folded pocket sevens on the turn.

Then I played an interesting hand right near the end of my session where I was getting ready to go.  Preflop limper who's a weak player in middle position.  I raise A9o on the button, big blind and limper called.  Big blind has been playing fairly tight and has a fold button post flop as well.  Flop comes A86 rainbow.  Big blind donks,  Danger Will Robinson! Limper calls, I call.  Turn is a 9 still rainbow.  Big blind bets again, limper raises, I tank for a few seconds and 3-bet.  Both call.  River is a jack, for a final board of A869J rainbow.  Both check to me, I tank for a good 10 seconds.  I finally bet, big blind calls, limper folds, and I take the pot.  I think the big blind either had AT, AQ, A8, A6, 86, while the limper had 87s or 67s.  He would have called the river had he made two pair, so he's most likely hand is a suited connector with a pair and a draw on the turn.  I'm not exactly sure what the big blind had, but the jack was definitely a scare card for me, as she easily could have had AJ.  The only possible straights were 75, T7, and QT, none of which were likely given the action on the turn.

At the end of the night, I booked a $768 win in 80 minutes.  I wish I would've run like a god in the 40 game as opposed to the 8 game.  Oh well.

Kick it Up!

What an interesting night this last Saturday evening.  My Saturday was filled with mundane life things.  I got home from my Friday night session around 4am and go to sleep and wake up around 10:30 am.  Wife does her workout with her trainer and I need to drop my car off at the dealership for some maintenance and recall issues to get fixed.  After lunch with the family get home and nap a little while the baby naps and the wife spends some time with the middle daughter bonding.

Dealership service guy is supposed to call me at 4pm to let me know status of my car.  Instead I get roused by my wife around 4:45pm and I realize that the service adviser never called me.  I am of course slightly annoyed and call him instead to find out the status of my car.  Fortunately, my car was done and I was still able to get over there before the place closed.

After picking up my car, the wife and I decide to go to Saturday evening vigil service at our church.  I like going to Saturday evening mass.  It makes Sundays a bit easier to deal with, but my favorite mass is actually Sunday evening, since that's when they have the best music.  But it's tough with the kids, since they have school the next day and it makes dinner unusually late and gets them in bed later than normal.

In any case, I get a text from Andy during mass that the 40/80 game has gone overnight from Friday night well until Saturday!  CC the poker playing animal played well over a 36 hour session and simply cleaned up.  Turns out the game played through Friday evening into Saturday morning until lawyer David showed up and started playing the 40 game with Cecil and I believe it was JA.  As it turns out they kicked it up to 80/160!

Now I don't normally play Saturday evenings anymore since there is usually no game on Saturdays, but after getting this message from my bird, I sweet talked my wife into letting me go.

I did ok in the the 80/160 portion of my night.  I won 1k, was up more, but gave some back after David rage tilt felted quit, playing 3 handed with CC and Andy.  I did get to 5-bet David with the nuts holding QT on a J893 two diamond board on the turn.  He had a set of eights and the river was a the ten of diamonds and he check/called my river bet and then went super tilted and started mumbling to himself.

Eventually he quit, after he short bought for $100 so he could play his button.  He folded and then his under the gun hand, he went all in and I tried to 3-bet the AT but since he didn't have enough for a "complete" raise, I only got to complete the bet, which meant that CC was going to able to come in.  Not to worry I flopped top pair and a gutshot draw on a AKJ rainbow board.  David quit, and the three of us continued to play, as it is bad etiquette to break the game as soon as the fish quits.  Plus David has been known to "quit" and come back within 20 minutes plenty of times.  Playing 3 handed I lose 2 racks of my 3 rack profit to break the game up only 1k.

Cecil eventually succumbed to the bodily need for sleep and went home looking much worse for the wear.  Not sure how that guy can repeatedly do that to himself.  It's really not good for your health and its really hard on your body, particularly your heart.

After Cecil quit, Andy and I kicked the stakes down back to 40/80 and played heads up for about 3 hours.  I won a little over 2k before Andy needed to go home since he had an early am flight this morning.  Was an interesting heads up session, and I ran well and won the first meaningful hand where he raised the button with QQ, and I defended with KJs, and proceeded to flop top pair.  I check/raised the flop and bet turn and bet river.  There were some hands where Andy played a bit unconventionally that I don't necessarily agree with.  Andy for sure defends his big blind a lot more than I do (he got me with 32o on a 764 board when I had 65s, and he check/raised the flop!), and opens his button relentlessly. 

Summer Wrap Up

Well summer is over and I am back in to the swing of things with kids and school.  Plus I have started my new project at work and am busy with that.  I got to play a lot of poker from Memorial Day through Labor Day due to the many visitors we had, plus a scheduled vacation, and the family going to Minnesota.  Now that the family is back into its school routine, my poker hours are going to see a significant reduction.  I will be back to my semi regular schedule of pretty much just playing Friday late afternoons/evenings.

I am a little worried about the state of the limit holdem games at Oceans-11.  With the new management, and the policy of no longer giving a drop reduction when the game gets short, has really had an impact on the number of players willing to play, especially at the 20/40 level.  We used to be able to keep a 5 or 6, or even as short as 4 players game going pretty consistently, but a number of players that used to be willing to play short aren't willing to do it, plus some of the more marginal regulars (either break-even or slightly losing players) are no longer even willing to sit in the game unless it's super good.  The regulars need to realize that if they aren't willing to keep a game going, that pretty soon there won't be any game, as the occasional recreational players aren't going to even bother to show up if they can't get a game.  Not sure what's going to happen with the prop players either.  If there is no 20/40 game for them to prop, there is really no reason anymore to employ them, which is not good for their future prospects.

Here's a summary of my major gambling activities over the summer:

Game	Result	Hours
Blackjack	-37.8k	29
8/16 kill	3.8k	53.75
20/40	23k	286.75
40/80	9.5k	122.25
2/3 no limit	-0.25k	0.5
5/5 no limit	-3.35k	27.25
totals	-5.1k	519.5

 So excluding my blackjack results which is mainly due to my implosion at Aria over my weekend Vegas jaunt, I basically crushed it at poker winning 32.7k over 490.5 hours for an hourly rate of $66.67 per hour, while getting crushed at blackjack.  The blackjack is obviously not a large enough sample size to do it justice, but you can see the variance in blackjack is just huge.  I can easily make that up in a single good session of blackjack.  I have won over 20k in blackjack in a single session over 15 times in the last year alone, and over 40k in 7 sessions.  It just goes to show that blackjack has a huge variance, and you really need to put the hours in before it all starts balancing out.  Advantage blackjack play is all about getting the hands in, particularly when the count is good and you have the edge.

Don't know when I'll get a chance to play some more serious blackjack.  Barona is being very strict with me.  I went out there with a buddy a little while ago, and I was sitting at the table with him watching him play, when I topped off one of his bets with some of his chips when the count was good, and within 30 seconds I got a tap on the shoulder and was told that I was not allowed to sit with my friend while he was playing, nor touch his chips or his wager.  Sheesh.

Barona is still sending me promotional offers in the mail. The August promotional offer was good for $250 in cash, which I made sure that I went in to get.  However, the September mailer was only good for $30, so I'm not sure if they are trying to send me a subliminal message or what.  I'm guessing that their offers are determined by some formula based on the amount of action you have given them in the past 90 days, and since I haven't been playing there much my offers have gone down significantly.  When I get the October mailer, I'll be curious to see how much it is worth.

Well that's about it for this update.  I'll try and post more often, but with my increasingly busy schedule, not sure how many interesting gambling stories I will have to tell.  On a personal note, my 8-year daughter went out on her first "date" with a boy.  We ended up getting our two families together for dinner at a local Korean BBQ restaurant, because my daughter and the other family's son wanted to have dinner together.  It was cute, and every time I ask my daughter about her boyfriend she gets embarrassed.  It's funny.

Rolling!

Crush Club

1st rule of crush club:  You do not talk about Crush Club.

Yep, I jinxed myself of course and got absolutely destroyed in the 40/80 on Friday night.  Must remember the rules of Crush Club, otherwise I am going to get expelled.

On a side note, I may need to inaugurate a new member of Crush Club.  CC (his initials), seemed to have a very good night, and if he broke the 100 big bet barrier in under a 24 hour session, is welcome to join.

Admission Criteria to Crush Club:

• Must win 100 big bets in 24 hours or less, from buy-in to cash-out.
• Can't be prick or someone I don't like.  
• Doesn't count if you double or triple dip, or if the game breaks and then restarts later and your combined win exceeds 100 bets.  

Them's the rules.  You don't like it, make your own damn club.

Year to Date

Looking only at the limit games I play, I am simply destroying the game this year, particularly here in the last couple of months.  It's starting to get a little ridiculous, I must say even for myself.  Everyone says that I am running good, and while that's probably true to some extent, the way I like to think about it, is I give myself every opportunity to win, and am unafraid to push small edges, particularly in the 20 and the 40 games.  The 8/16 I play much differently, since the aggression level is much less, and the number of multi-way pots is much greater.

In any case here's the year to date stats:

8/16 Kill 231 bets in 42 hours
20/40 460.875 bets in 345.5 hours
40/80 262.7 bets in 92 hours

By any stretch of the imagination, I don't think this level of winning is sustainable, but heck you never know.  I do know that I have been playing very well lately, and seem to make that extra value bet when I should, and make the correct folds when I should as well.

Hope, I just didn't jinx myself for the rest of the year.

Learning to Ride

I've played limit holdem for a very long time.  I'd like to think that I'm pretty good at it.  I have been a consistent winner for many years, and consider myself an excellent short handed and heads up limit player.  However, I would like to make myself a well rounded player, and have started to delve into no limit a bit.  I've mainly played the 5/5 no limit at Oceans-11, and I usually buy in for 200 big blinds, although occasionally I will buy in full for 300 big blinds. 

However, this creates a dilemma for me.  Since I am still learning this game, I am for sure not a winning player yet, unless the game is full of droolers, which is usually not the case.  So I am giving up both real dollars and opportunity cost by sitting in this game instead of a limit game when one is running.  So I need to consider, what is the overall cost, and what is the future expected value I can expect by eventually becoming competent, and a winning player in that game.  Can I expect to win more than $60/hr consistently in that game?  I don't know.  I'm not sure what a reasonable win rate is to be expected in that game for a competent winning player.

So I have been back from Vegas for a little over a week, and got in a quite a bit of poker play since then.  I am still in between projects at work, and my work load has been considerably lighter than normal.  I start my new project in earnest next week.

Here's a list of the sessions I put in last week:

8/16 Kill +20 15 minutes
5/5 NL -5000 8 hours 20 minutes
20/40 +1920 3 hours 24 minutes
5/5 NL +63 10 minutes
8/16 Kill +376 14 hours
5/5 NL +735 2 hours 10 minutes
20/40 +3385 7 hours 10 minutes
5/5 NL -145 20 minutes
8/16 Kill +314 25 minutes
20/40 +455 8 hours
40/80 -800 7 hours 30 minutes

And thus the dilemma is revealed.  In the limit games I played, I won $5,670 in 40 hours and 44 minutes of play for an hourly rate of $139.20.  However, in the no limit games I played, I lost $4,347 in 11 hours of play for an hourly loss of $395.18.  Now granted I had a huge loss of $5,000 in an absolutely horrific 8 hour session, but unfortunately, sessions like this are going to happen, and in terms of real dollars, they count.

I read a poem recently by William Ernest Henley, that I think is particularly inspiring, and I think also is apropos for me with regards to my poker playing, and I think can also be applied to virtually any part of your life.

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll.
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

I like this poem so much, I am thinking of getting a framed copy of it so I can put it up in my office to read each morning when I come into work.

 

 

Burned!

You play with fire, sometimes you get burned.  My Las Vegas trip was a complete debacle gambling wise.  I did have the opportunity to hang out with friends and enjoyed many good meals in good company.

I arrived on Thursday around 11:30 am at McCarran airport, and the limo was waiting for my arrival.  I checked into the hotel, met my host, got my massage at the spa all arranged, and got my bearings all situated in the hotel room.  I stopped by Julian Serrano's for lunch at the bar by myself.  Had a shrimp tapas and the seared tuna salad with sherry vinaigrette.  I've had this salad before, and forgot about how briny the olives were.  The addition of the olives completely unbalances the flavor profile and I of course had to pick them off.

After lunch, I shuttled over to the craps table, and proceeded to go on a massive heater and picked up a nice package.  Then it was off to the spa for my massage.  Massage was nice and relaxing and I was feeling very good about this time.  I went back up to my hotel room changed and hit the blackjack tables in the high limit room.

I played for about 4 hours, picked up a small little package, and by this time two of my buddies had shown up, and I made dinner reservations at Jean Georges Steakhouse.  We had an excellent meal here.  We ordered the chilled seafood platter and hamachi sashimi for appetizers for the table.  After that, I started my meal with the cream of tomato soup, and for my entree I had 8oz filet along with grilled asparagus. Everything was excellent with the exception of the asparagus.

After dinner we headed out to the petting zoo. A good time was had by all, and by this time another buddy finally made it in from San Diego after driving through the night.  We left there, and at the hotel, my buddy and I played the IGT heads-up limit poker machines.  I beat it, while my buddy kept losing to it.  No wonder, I always beat him whenever we play heads up.

I finally hit the bed at around 6am in the morning, and as usual, I can't sleep in strange hotel beds and I am up by 10:30 am or so.  I shower, change, and head down to the craps table.  I met a girl I know from Oceans-11 at the craps table, and we proceed to blow through a bunch of cash.  Eventually I end up having lunch at Lemongrass with two of my buddies.  We proceed to order a buffet of food, although I think the best thing was the soup that I ordered.

After lunch, I decide to play some more craps, and I ended up about even, although I did hit a 1k eleven, that paid me back 15 dimes!

At this point, I am extremely tired, so I decide to head off to the room for a nap, prior to going to the 2+2 Vegas meetup, like I had planned.  I never made it there unfortunately.

After tossing and turning for 15 minutes, I decide that I can't fall asleep and will go kill some time playing blackjack.  Little did I know what was in store for me.

I kept swinging like a yo-yo, getting massively stuck, then even, then up a little, then massively stuck again.  Eventually I quit with a mid 5 figure loss.  The rest of my crew picked up another hitchhiker and we had a nice meal at Blossom.  Best bite I had in Vegas was the Peking Duck in the steamed bun.  I was so focused on playing blackjack that I told my buddies to order without me and let me know when the food showed up.  Fortunately, or unfortunately, my getting felted at the blackjack table coincided with the food being delivered for the most part.

After dinner, I played the heads up machine a little more, and then crashed early at about 2:30 am in the morning and finally get a reasonable amount of sleep, and I am up around 11 am.  I put some more time in the blackjack tables and only get stuck further.

Eventually we have lunch at Julian Serrano's again, and I notice that the menu in the main restaurant versus at the bar is completely different!  This again was an excellent meal, with probably the 2nd best bite of food I had this trip being the traditional Spanish chicken croquetas.  They were simply awesome, and I will be sure to order these again next time I am in Vegas.

After lunch, I put in a last ditch effort to salvage something from the trip, and ended up winning back 5k of my losses to put a small dent into the ditch that I dug for myself.

In all, I had a fun trip.  Wish I would have quit the second blackjack session after I had gotten myself even, but in the world of advantage play, there is really no reason ever to quit playing, unless you are making mistakes, which I was not.  It seemed like every time there was a good positive count and I was firing out large bets, the blackjacks ended up on the wrong side of the table.  I'm sure that the Aria would love to have me back, and have me pegged for the biggest blackjack fish ever.  I am now on a mission to get all of my money back plus some from Aria.  I give myself two years to pull this off.  I may be going to Vegas every free chance I get now in order to accomplish this, but I will do it, unless they wise up and back me off prior to that.

Very Sexy!

I wonder what it must feel like to hug all that money!

Grinding!

So I went and played some blackjack at a different local casino on the recommendation of a friend last night and ended up staying well into the early morning.  I showed up at Harrah's Rincon casino a little after 9pm.  A little after 6am this morning, I finally cashed out a 4k winner and came home to crash.  Fortunately, I am on vacation all this week, and my sister-in-law and her two kids are visiting.

The casino is quite a drive from my house, almost an hour.  The rules for the double deck blackjack there are the same as Barona, hit soft 17, double any two, double after split, late surrender, re-split aces.  However, there are some other significant differences, which I am not sure if I will go back there again or not.  The penetration is very good.  They hand cut the stub, as opposed to Barona which uses a notch in its discard rack to get a pretty consistent cut off of about 35 to 40 cards.  Some of the dealers at Rincon were cutting down to 20 cards or so.  So that's great, but here are the things I dislike about it.  The high-limit room is rather small, doesn't have a convenient restroom near it, the night I was there the table max was 3000, I couldn't find any 9/6 full pay jacks or better video poker, they change cards every two hours, and the floor person informed me he couldn't allow the dealer to drop the deck any time I felt like it.  The biggest annoyances to me are of course the constant deck changes every 2 hours, and the small table max.  Last night I was spreading from 100 to 1600, which is fairly conservative for me.  At Barona I was spreading from 500 to 4000, with the occasional table max bet of 10,000.  At Rincon, I don't think I can play that big, which limits its attractiveness to me.

In reality I actually only won $2900 on the night total.  I won 4k playing blackjack, but had to pay the wife tax of 500.  Then I lost 500 on video poker, before I realized that I was getting short paid and was actually playing 8/5 jacks or better instead of 9/6 jacks or better.  8/5 JoB returns 97.29%, while 9/6 JoB returns 99.54%.  That's a big difference in return!  Then while waiting for the card change to finish, I put 100 on banker in baccarat.  First hand I pulled a natural 9, but tied with the player.  Next hand, I pulled a natural 8, and lost to a player natural 9!

Lastly, I noticed that one of the floor persons working the early am shift, was some guy I went to high school with.  Not sure if he recognized me or my name, but I remembered him.

Growing the Mountain

Ooops, I got more haters.  Booked exactly a 100 big bet win in the 40/80 yesterday after a long 15 hour session.  Here's a series of pictures that I took.

No Consideration for others

Taxicab Dave is killing me!  Not from a poker perspective, but from a sleep deprivation perspective.  I played on Monday night til around 1:20 am or so in a very short game until the spot went busto, and then I decided to play heads up with my friend, hoping cabbie Dave would show up.  I told my opponent that I would play until 2:30 am or so, at the latest waiting for cabbie.  2:30am rolls around, cabbie is nowhere to be found, and my opponent is massively stuck.  I feel bad, and don't want to quit him, so I continue to play.  I have him almost felted twice, (actually he rebought twice, once for 200, and then a full reload if I recall correctly), and then he makes a raging comeback, and in the end I think I won $200 off of him heads up, when lo and behold at 4:30am in the morning, cabbie Dave comes strolling in.  I can't take it, and I leave shortly after 5am.

Then on Thursday, Dave is in the game early in the afternoon and ends up playing until like 5 am.  Don't worry I get the magic text and of course I have to show up and get in a ramming jamming affair, in which I can never leave until Dave does, which is exactly what happens.

Then comes Saturday.  Cabbie puts his name on the board at 3:52 am, and comes sauntering down the aisle at 6 am.  Too many people drink on Saturday nights I guess and need rides home.  Once again, I can't handle it, given particularly that I have plans today, and needed to be up at a reasonable hour.  Cabbie, please have some consideration for others, and throw your chip parties at a time conducive to my beauty sleep.  Thank you.

Haters going to hate!

Been a while since I booked over a 100 big bet win.  Did it last night with flying colors.  I won $8810 in a little over 9 hours of play last night in the 40/80 game at Oceans.  I simply cleaned up and owned the table.  I pulled off awesome bluffs, value bet thin, and rarely payed off losers.  In short, I made almost 100% correct decisions every time I was put to a tough decision point.  Plus I won $648 in about one hour of play in the 20/40 while I was waiting to get into the 40 game, for a total take of $9458 on the night.

Of course, when you are simply crushing the game, everyone else is miserable since you are the only one winning.  Everyone hated me last night.  Oh well, I can get used to the hate.

Crushing!

Crushed the game last night for 5+ racks.  My win looked more impressive than it really was, since I was actually in 5 racks, so when I took my 10+ racks to the cage, only 5 of them were actual profit.

As usual, when you have a big win there has to be a confluence of events or circumstances that contribute mightily to your win.  Last night, in the beginning, the table was not very good, with very few soft spots, but as the night wore on, the table kept getting fishier and fishier, and I kept cleaning up.  Also, I had to make a seat change.  I normally don't seat change, but when certain players are on my left, and I am not running that well, well then I need to make a change.  So I had to do that last night and move out of my favorite seat in the 9, and I moved over to the 3 seat to get position on the player in 1.  Then I got the miracles of miracles as new players starting coming in, the bad players inserted themselves into seats 9 and 2.  In other words, I somehow ended up with the Jesus seat, and had position on the 3 worst players at the table in seats 9, 1, and 2.

Of course, I got lucky, but I was relentlessly isolating these 3 players and for the most part got away with it most of the night.

Rinse and Repeat

Won another 4 racks last night in the 20/40.  2231 to be exact.  Mostly a short-handed game for the latter part of the evening, although when the game was full, there was what I call cold-call alley.  Sye in 4, Guy in 5, and Kumar in 6.  It would often go raise someplace, and a cold call by Sye, followed by overcalls by seats 5 and 6.  Wicked game, with some tremendous bad beats.

I was disappointed in myself last night, in that I berated a bad player, after he sucked out on me 2 out of 3 hands in row, with bullshit hands.  I lost my cool, and I know it.  I eventually apologized to him, more for my own peace of mind, than his.  It was a sincere apology, and I hope he accepted it, but you never know.

I did play a hand atrociously due to this self-induced tight.  Luckily it only lasted the one hand, and I won it by the grace of the poker gods.  Wayne raises, Danny 3-bets, and I cap TsJs in the SB.  Flop comes 8 high, 1 spade, and I somehow lose my mind, and bet/3-bet Danny's raise.  Wayne called both times.  Turn was an ace, and I inexplicably check, and it checks around.  River is jack, and I have an opportunity to bet and make sure that my opponents don't see how bad I massacred my hand, but my dumb brain checks it again, and it checks around.  I roll the winner, and Wayne and Danny both groan.  Wayne claims pocket tens, and Danny claims pocket nines, and I have no reason to disbelieve either one of them.

4 Racker!

Won 2170 last night.  There was a woman who was a complete train wreck last night.  She got very drunk and very belligerent and kept demanding to know why she was cut off.  It was a very poor sight to see.  She also kept demanding to that the floor man call Haig Kelegian, saying that Haig would never treat her like that.  She claimed that she drove 3 hours to drink and gamble.  She also claimed to have 3 addictions, sex, gambling, and booze.  And I kind of believe her.  Very sad.

I played well and ran well last night.  I played two hands exceptionally well in my opinion.  I raised pocket queens UTG and get cold-called in middle position by the resident prop and the big blind.  Flop comes all babies, I bet and get called in both spots.  Turn is another baby putting a wheel draw out for anyone who held an ace.  I bet, prop calls, big blind folds.  River is a jack.  Now, I know exactly what the prop has here.  He has to have exactly AJ offsuit, with a small outside chance of AT suited.  AQ AK AJs 3-bet preflop, pocket pairs between 7-T, likely 3-bet preflop or at least raise the flop, and all big pocket pairs JJ+ 3-bet preflop as well.  Smaller pairs muck preflop.  So I check, since I will only get called by AJ, and everything else will muck, but AJ will bet.  He dutifully bets, and I spring a check-raise in, and he dutifully pays me off, and shows me AJo, just like I thought.

Other hand against the drunk lady, I defend red deuces in the big blind, with like a 4-way pot.  Flop comes AJx all spades.  Checked around.  Turn is a blank, I bet, she raises, everyone else clears out, and I call.  River is a low spade, and I donk.  She hems and haws and then eventually folds.  I pick up my cards to admire my play, and my neighbor gets a glimpse of my cards, and she demands to see it.  I show and she gets extremely agitated.

After this hand, she was gunning for me, and tried to beat me out of so many pots by bluff raising the turn numerous times.  Every time I had it, unfortunately and she just got more and more frustrated.  She eventually went busto a little after 1am, and the game broke almost immediately after she left.

Riding the Train

Since my debacle last Thursday, I have been an on extreme heater winning close to 8.5k in about 30 hours of play in the 20/40 game.  Lately, I have been playing poker very much in a zen mode.  Just taking the cards and the flow of the game as it comes.  Even when I take a beat, it doesn't bother me, and when I make a mistake and play a hand bad, instead of getting upset about it, I replay the hand, decide what I did wrong and why, and then immediately stop thinking about it before the next hand gets started.

Sometimes when I am playing poker, I just know what my opponents have, exactly what they are going to do with it, and exactly how I should respond/act to maximize my expected value.

Days Like This

Some days at the poker table remind me of this Van Morrison song.

Thursday's session was absolutely horrid in the beginning.  I got to the poker room around 5pm, and by 9:30pm or so I was in 10 racks.  By the time I quit, I finished off with a little less than a 4 rack loss.  For the first 4 hours or so, I just lost and lost and lost, mostly to absurd hands, but some I played badly too.

I guess if the first two hands I played were any indication of the type of day I was going to have, I should have just got up and quit.  First hand I played, a local business man, who shows up on occasion and always makes for a good game, cold-called my early position raise with jack-ten offsuit.  I happened to have ace-king offsuit.  I bet flop, turn, and river, on a 4246T rainbow board.  He just called on the river and was relieved to see that I just had ace-high.  This is a very thin value bet by me, as I know he will call me with ace-high as well and sometimes even king-high.  Plus I am always value betting thin, and check-calling this river or check-folding makes it too easy to play against me.

Second hand I played this day a few hands later, same gentleman opens in MP, gets 3-bet by Laurie, button cold-calls, and I call with 22 in the SB.  Pot goes off 4-handed, and I flop the world 2JJ.  I check, opener bets, Laurie raises, button folds, I 3-bet, opener caps, Laurie calls.  Turn is a 6, I check, opener bets, Laurie calls, I raise, both call.  River is a Q.  I bet, he calls, Laurie now raises, I hate life and call, and get overcalled as well.  Laurie has QQ for the nut boat, and the opener had AJ.  Very sick cooler, that if we had a 5-bet cap, will play differently, or if I had just lead the turn, I'm fairly sure that AJ will raise and then Laurie would fold, and I would win the pot.  However, in the long run, getting 5 bets out of 2 players is better than getting 4-bets out of 1 player, and I have Laurie drawing super slim, while AJ still has like 17% equity in the pot, so getting it heads up with him is actually not super desirable.  An expert probably bet/folds that particularly river, but I don't like shrimp cocktail.  Plus, I am not as expert as I seem.

Then as the night progresses, the opposite seems to happen, and I simply can't lose a hand.  The local pro in the game is winning as well, and the wanna-be-pro is simply fading fast and can't seem to win a hand before he goes busto and the game breaks not too soon thereafter.  I did play this hand, and lost to Andy's 93o.  As I go through the hand again, I am not sure if I played it badly or not, but does make me think about what my range needs to be in this particular spot, where I just call the flop and then c/r the turn.

Fast forward to Saturday night, and it's simply a continuation of my last session in which I can do no wrong.  The lineup is simply awesome, with angry Sean in 1, Rajan the king in 2, Andy in 3, Jed for part of the time in 4 and then Asya for a little bit, Helen in 5 and then she moved into 8, Jon in 6, Amir in 7, and an unknown from Los Angeles in 8 until he busted.  Andy had the Jesus seat, and I like to make my office in the 9 seat.  I generally don't seat change unless the wheels are falling off the bus, and I just hunker down in seat 9 and adjust to the players at the table as necessary.

And I just won and won and won.  When I finally quit, I had to grab a rolling table to escort my 9 racks of chips to the cage.

Vegas!

Have my summer Vegas trip planned.  I will be staying at the Aria from July 5 through July 7.  My sister-in-law will be visiting from the mid-west, or mid-east depending on how you want to look at it, with her husband and kids, and the wives have said that the husbands can go have some fun!

Suited Connectors

I won a 30 big bet pot (that's 1200 dollars), in the 20/40 game at Oceans.  Action went off 6 ways capped preflop, with me being the capper preflop with 9hTh on the button.

Flop came KQ8 two diamonds.  I was donked into, just called, then all hell broke loose and it was 3-bet back to me, so I capped it.  Turn was an interesting card the 6 diamonds.  I now have a double gutter in a 24 big bet pot, and once again I get donked into.  I of course called, two players dropped out, so going into the river we have a 28 big bet pot.  The river is an offsuit jack, and now everyone checks to me.  I contemplate, slam out a bet, and get called by very likely top-set or middle set, and scoop a ginourmous pot!

Who's more famous?

Weird pattern lately.  I have been playing full ring games, losing early, then getting even or winner, the games then have gotten short with massive action players and then the wheels fall off the roller coaster.  Most of the players are losers or maybe break even players in full ring games, and are definitely dogs in short handed games, but for whatever reason, I seem to be running horrid against them here lately.

Taxicab Dave was in the game last night, and proceeded to lose a ton early and then go on a massive heater where he couldn't lose a hand.  Whatever he needed he got on the river.  8d2d, limp on the button, ok here have running diamonds.  Very silly.

Have played quite a bit with Gavin Griffin here lately.  I have played with him in the 20/40 mainly.  He plays good, but I will say I think he gets a bit over emotional when he takes a beat.  For the most part he's an upstart guy, well mannered, speaks intelligently, and seems like a good guy.  However for a professional, I would think that he would be used to taking a beat by now, particularly in limit holdem.  I think he is more bothered, by when he thinks a good/reasonable player beats him, rather than a poor player.  Either way, it's part of the game, muck your hand graciously and move on to the next hand.

Last night we had a discussion as to who was the more famous person at our table as there is a local celebrity playing as well, plus another individual with a famous name.

So from Google:
Gavin Griffin : About 10,300,000 results
Local Celeb: About 411,000 results
Famous Name: About 2,250,000 results

My real life name: 132,000,000 results
My pseudonym: About 5,110 results

However, my real life name is pretty common and I think there is a famous jazz musician with the same name, but it's pretty funny that I have the largest number of google hits.

So I guess I win.

Wrap-up

Well my blackjack career has officially come to a close, given my backing off at Barona.  I was expecting this at some point.  I have always played blackjack casually in the past, and that's how I started off at Barona.  But after a little bit, I got pretty serious at it, and started really studying the game.  I knew that blackjack could be beaten mathematically, and that it was only a matter of time, discipline, and having a large enough bankroll to overcome variance, as well as the stomach to be able to book large losses along with large wins.

There are other casinos in the area, that also have beatable blackjack games, but I am not interested in playing anymore.  I think I was doing it more for the challenge to see if I could beat the casino at its own game, and I did it.  I made a 6 figure score, over the course of 600+ hours in the span of one calendar year.  Plus all of the other casinos in the area are a fairly long commute for me, and I am not interested in spending an extra 90 minutes on the road just to play.

I have gotten back out and started playing poker again.  I was out on vacation from my real job since April 5th.  I took the family to Disneyland for little less than a week.  My girls loved it.  I got out one night to play at Commerce casino.  My streak continues there.  Have yet to book a win at Commerce, or at least I can't seem to remember ever booking a win there.  Excluding my Commerce excursion, at my home base of Oceans-11, I have won a modest $1,200 in about 50 hours of play this month.  So nothing great, but I will admit that the swings are tremendously less than they were at blackjack, and I don't think I will ever complain about the variance of limit holdem anymore, after having played blackjack for as long as I did.

I will stay play blackjack whenever I get out to Vegas.  But I don't think I can play it casually anymore, with my new found blackjack knowledge, but I certainly don't want to wear out my welcome there, so I will tone it way back, since I like going to Vegas and having the casinos pay for everything, and as long as I can come away break even or slightly positive, I will be happy.  Looking to book a trip to Vegas this summer, sometime around the 4th of July holiday, which happens to coincide with the start of the main event.  And no I won't be playing the main event this year.  But possibly in about 3 years or so, as a 40 year old birthday gift to myself.

It was due

Well Barona finally wised up and backed me off the game there. I am no longer welcome to play any form of blackjack there. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted, and I won quite a bit from them.

Guess, I'll be back playing at Oceans 11 regularly. Since the beginning of the year, I have only put in 30 hours of poker, for a profit of 6.5k. I'm sure all the regulars at Oceans-11 won't be glad to see me back in their games regularly. But at least I know, I won't get backed off there.

Barrier Smashed!

Broke the 100k barrier last session. In fact I pummeled it. Had my biggest win in terms of both gross and net. Won 236 units in a little over 6 hours. Ship it baby!

I haven't really asked for much in the way of comps, either. I'm sure that my comp balance has ballooned to quite a large number. Any suggestions on what I should ask for?

Yuck!

Back to back horrid sessions.

100k Barrier!

I've played poker for a long time. I started back in 2002 playing limit holdem, and that's what I cut my teeth on. I now feel comfortable playing limit holdem up to the 100/200 level. One of the monuments of a limit holdem player is when they break the 100 big bet win in a session. In a 4/8 chip structured game 100 big bets is winning 8 racks of chips.

I almost broke the 100k barrier last night playing blackjack. Last hand of the night for me, since I had already decided to go home. Deck is positive, count is good, and I have my max bet out there.

I pick up two sevens, against a dealer upcard of a 5. I split, pick up a 3, double, get a 7, resplit, get an ace, double, 7, resplit, ace, double, 10. So 4 active hands, 3 with doubles, so basically 7 times my max bet. If I win this hand it's going to be a huge win.

Dealer opens, has a 3 under, binks an ace for 19, and all of my doubles blank off.

Sick Hand!

Count was extremely positive with a strong ace count, late in the shoe. I had my max bet out there, playing two hands.

First hand, I get two aces and split. Get another ace, split again, get a 4th ace and split again. Hands come out paint, paint, ace, paint. Can't resplit to more than 4 hands, so I have 21, 12, 21, 21 in that order.

Other hand I have ace-8. Dealer upcard is a 2. Dealer opens, has a total of 12 and binks a 9 for a 21!

Radio Check

Just curious, if I still have an audience out there. I know that I don't post too frequently, maybe couple times of month, but I am wondering if I am just wasting my time or if there are others out there who actually read this stuff.

So, if you are a regular reader, or just an occasional visitor, leave a comment indicating what part of the world, you are reading from.

Based on responses, I may decide to retire from this.

So Sexy!

Mr. Toad's Wild Ride

Man, it's been a brutal stretch here the first couple of months playing blackjack at Barona. I started off on a fairy large hot streak, ran sort of even for a little white, and then recently went on a massive downswing. Then just killed it last night. I had my largest ever win last night in terms of gross and net. I cashed out gross 63k. I cleared the rack of yellow (1k) chips and black. I forgot to take a picture though.

However, I made the most spectacular comeback ever last night. I was down to my last 1k, before I started winning, and never looked back before I quit and cashed out. During that streak, and I had about 5 or 6 amazing shoes. In one shoe, near the end, I had my max bet out there for 5 consecutive hands. I won 4 of them and lost one. Of the 4 hands I won, one was a double, and I hit two blackjacks as well. It is an amazing feeling, putting out a large bet, knowing that you have the advantage, and getting paid. Before I went on my amazing run, I had other big swings last night as well too. Easily, had 25k plus/minus swings in the manner of 30 minutes or less. Mr. Toad's wild ride indeed.

In other news, I got back from the Bay area, late Friday night. Got an opportunity to play some pokers at the Bay 101 on Thursday night and Friday evening before my flight home. Man, I am a huge (relatively speaking) lifetime loser at the Bay 101, so far. I am obviously not a regular there, as I only get up to the Bay area, once a month or so. But so far, in calendar year 2011 and the first part of this year, I am down over a cumulative 7K over 28 hours. I'm currently on a losing pace of 250/hr!

Ridiculous, and I am not sure why that is yet. Not sure if it's because I haven't adjusted to the players at the Bay 101, or they don't know me or what. In 10 sessions, I have booked just 2 wins, and 8 losses.

And away they go!

Good start to the new year. I played the 40/80 on Friday night and picked up 4.5k in a about 7 hours of play. Then played the 20/40 on Saturday night and won 500 in about 7 hours of play. On Saturday, I got buried early and ended up losing 3+ racks before I bought another 2 racks, putting myself 5 racks into the game, before I made a raging comeback, and then in the last 30 minutes or so pulling ahead before calling it quits early in the am hours.

I played a couple of interesting hands, this one being the most interesting. Helen, the semi-regular Chinese player, who got killed in the 40 on Friday night, was playing again on Saturday night. She was losing again, and on massive tilt. Helen is a massive LAG, but when not on tilt, plays a decent game. Lisa a very nice caucasian woman, is like the polar opposite of Helen. Very tight pre-flop, and very cautious post-flop, and will only raise the nuts post-flop, and does other things to lose value post-flop.

In any case, early Sunday morning, we are playing 4-handed, when this hand came up. Helen opened, I 3-bet 9s9h on the button, Lisa capped the small blind, Freddy folded his big-blind, Helen and I both called. Flop comes 2s 4s 6h. Lisa bet, Helen called, and I called. Turn was the 7d. Lisa bet, Helen raised, and I folded. River was the 9d, and the river checked through. Lisa rolls As6s and Helen had pocket eights to win the pot.

Later that night, I either played this hand like an expert or a massive fish, not sure which yet. Down to 3-handed, and Helen and I both have overs, so we're playing 40/80 when it gets heads-up between us. Freddy folded his button, Helen raised the small blind, and I called with 65o in the big blind. Flop comes Js 5s 2d. Helen bet, I called. Turn comes Jh. Helen bet, and I called. River comes 7c. Helen now checks, I bet, Helen check-raises, and I tank for a good minute or so, before finally calling. Helen rolls As4s for the massive draw that blanked off, and tried an elaborate check-raise river bluff, that I snapped off. Had Helen, just bet the river, I think there's a very good chance I fold on the river. I originally value-bet the river, expected to get called by good ace-highs, some king-highs, and possibly pocket 3's or 4's. Also, I was trying to fold out better 5s if possible. When she check-raised me, her line at that point made no sense to me, and I was trying to figure out what she thought my hand was, and if she actually thought she had a value check-raise, or was trying a river check-raise bluff. Her being on tilt and losing, also certainly played a factor in my deciding to call. She even insulted me after the hand, telling me that I am such a calling station. :-)

Happy New Year!

Hit a another royal flush on New Year's Eve for 20k. That's my second royal flush this year, so I think I am way ahead on expectation for hitting royals playing Jacks or Better video poker.

Haven't played any poker since the new year started. Will probably get my first session in tonight.

Got to play at Canterbury Park while out in Minnesota for the holidays. Played 3 sessions while I was out there. Won 374 in the 15/30 one night, had a big score of 5330 in the 30/60 followed up by a big loss of 3991 in the 30/60 a couple of days later. Overall ended up 1713 after leaving Minnesota, so wasn't a bad trip in the end. Mostly paid for the 4 plane tickets I had to buy for the family to get out there.

Going over the black jack results for last year, turned out kind of meh. I finished up, but not by a ton, relatively speaking. As I was going through the results, I noticed that if I had stuck to a 10k session loss limit, I would have ended up with a 65k positive swing. Not that it matters, as that is just looking into the past and data mining with a bias, which doesn't account for much.

In any case I have been on a mini-rush of late gambling wise. From poker since December I have picked up $1967, and in blackjack 27.5k, in video poker 20k, and in craps another 11k, or so for a total of 60.5k to finish off the year. Not too shabby.