Time for a change

Since at the end of last week I have been thinking about where my poker career is going. I was comparing that to my goals that I set out when I first started playing poker for a living. If I look at where it is now I would say...content. Its going reasonable well but if I stay on the same path I know there is ceiling to what I can achieve and maybe not achieve all my goals. I think content is dangerous mind set to have if you play poker or even in life in general. Its just shows your happy to go stale and not improve or move forward.

As people who follow my poker career they will know that I play 18man Sng's. I have been playing these for about 10 months now. Even though I haven't achieved everything at the 18's....far from it, I believe I know what is achievable. I think playing the sng poker is the hardest way to make a living in poker and its def a grind. looking at the players at the top of the 18man game, they are the only ones that making a very good living from them but they also make a lot money from coaching and staking other players so even though they have hit the ceiling they are making money from other ways apart from playing.

I have decided that I am now going to move over and play 180man mtt's and play the 18''s alongside. I feel this the right move for me now. I want to start earning better money so that I can open more doors to me(buying into more live events, travelling and online mtt's) that would be harder to do at grinding the $16 18mans. I'm not knocking the 18mans I will always consider myself a 18man player but for what I want out of poker I need to add something to my game. If I learn how to play the 180's then this will help my game adapt better to MTT's for when I travel round europe playing the live circuit. plus it will also help me fund it obv.

long time without an update

I have been so lazy with updating my blog, its been about 3 months..oopps. In the last 3 months a reasonable amount of things have happened. I went to Munich for a couple of tournaments and I have dropped my staker (sponsor for the people who don't know what that is).
Back in May i went to Munich for a couple of days to play 3 tournaments for a seat in World series. To be honest I actually enjoyed the holiday side of things more than poker. The thing is with Poker in Germany is that its still a couple of years behind everyone else. Its actually illegal or very close to play for money in the casino's. With this in mind there isn't chance for people to play. Most of the players over there are really bad and so are the dealers. some of them didn't have a clue what they were doing which made feel very comfortable. With the poor organisation of the 3 tournaments as well i really didn't give a shit(plus we basically trying to win holiday not money). I was an hour late for the second tourney because i was at the football stadium and then the third tourney i was 2 hours late because i wanted an afternoon nap.lol.
Out of all the places i have visited this year I think Munich is my favourite. If you fancy a sight seeing and shopping holiday I recommend Munich. The food over there has been the best as well, closely followed Vienna.
I had dropped my staker a couple of months ago so that I could go it alone and start making more money. which has been a great decision for me as i really feel things are moving quicker now with my online game and the goals that i set at the start of the year seem a lot closer.

I'll leave it there as I have been rambling but I'll update in couple days with more updates about whats been going on.

A month to forget

April I think will be a month to forget. I didn't run well or even average apart from a 4 hour spell. I don't want to bitch and moan on here becuase its not interesting to read for anyone. Compared to last month I had a nightmare, the only money made this month is from rakeback or from the Battle of the planets. This month I have tried so hard and studied my game trying to find out weather its me playing badly or variance. I guess in a good way I found out its variance but its still leaves a bad taste in my mouth this month. When you are running bad and getting staked it makes it feel even worse because you have to split even the smallest profit.

I was discussing the luck factor with someone a couple of days ago and even though there is more skill than luck in poker, it still has a factor. I play against bad regs everyday that have some many leaks in their game but manage to run 6-8% roi which is amazing considering how bad they are. I consider myself to under achieve at online poker but I also an unlucky player online. If it wasn't for live poker the 6months i don't know where i would be.

I should prob play so more today but I feel so shit about my last couple days. I have something like this in Decemeber. So i must take experience from that I keep positive because if I carry on playing the way I am I will make a good money. I have proven it to myself before.

Munich package and maybe WSOP!

I think its been only been a week or so since my last blog but I have a few things to update on. Last Sunday I won a package to go to Munich which has 3 tournaments with 4 seats for side events for the WSOP in each them. Then those 12 players play for the main event seat which is compared to other qualifiers has unbelievable value in all them. I really looking forward to going to Germany as it will be my forth trip abroad this year because of poker. Obv if I win a seat to go to vegas then that would just be amazing.

Online has been a little strange this month. I started playing sets of 20 SNG at a time and was breaking even which felt like a long time but it wasn't. As I wasn't playing as much the period of time felt long than it was. So I have gone back to playing 2 hours sessions where I usually play around 40 SNG's. Since then things have picked up again and I think I have a chance of good month if I play as much as I have planned.

Today I ran pretty hot and I am now sitting top of the leaderboad with a score that should see me win another ticket to monthly final(battle of the planets). I still haven't been able to use the first ticket I won.lol

quality Vs quantity

I haven't played alot this month, trying to get back in the swing of playing online again has been a little hard this month. Just before I went to Emop Portugal I was playing sets of 20 SNG'S instead of playing 2hours sessions which I was doing before. I think this is how I'm going to construct "my working day" previously I was playing as much volume as possible and maybe not being forcused on every SNG 100%. I think playing now playing the sets of 20 SNG I can forcus on each one alot more. My volume is going to suffer a little more but what I lose in volume I hope to improve on in hourly rate by playing better as just be more conscience of whats going on at the tables. I haven't started the month very well but I feel I am more than experience enough now to deal with a downswing at the start of the month.

Last night I was thinking about my next trip abroad.I know I have only just got back but I like to think ahead and set goals. I am confident that I can win a seat for EMOP Italy for the end of the May but I can't really bank on it. I was looking Kiev in the Ukraine as they have some reasonable tournies in May. Dominican Republic have the world poker showdown at the end of May but the flight is expensive. The only other tournies are in italy 2 weeks after EMOP Italy. These tournies I think are ifs, buts and maybe's. If I don't go away for a couple of months its no big deal.

EMOP Lisbon and hanging out with Devilfish

I got back from Lisbon in the early hours of this morning. It took 10 hours to get from portugal to England which is just a joke. I can't really complain about the trip though. I one a package online for 20euros and cashed in the tournament for 2.3k euros, which about $3k. The tournament played pretty soft as expected but on my first day I had a pretty tough table with some online mtt guys and devilfish to my left. I thought I managing to cash was an outstanding effort really as I was card dead for most of the tournament and limited spots to steal. I always managed to do enough to be around the average stack or just below.

I think the most memorable thing about the trip was hanging out with Devilfish. At the table apart from 1 other guy we were the english guys at the table. we spent the best part of day 1 chatting which helped past the hours when i was card dead. he told me so many funny stories about Phil ivey, phil Hellmuth and the mouth who he said is a bit of nit when its comes to nights out. He gave me his phone to show me some jokes and have a look at some pics. One pic was fergie from the blackeyed peas sitting on his lap taking a pic of them together!....i may never was hands after touching the same phone as her.lol. Its was also cool that he wanted to eat dinner with me as well at the break which i thought was really cool.

winning a Battle of planets ticket

Last week I started playing the $16 18mans again. I got off to a really good start and managed to get on the BOD leaderboard. I won $110 for 6th which was a nice added bonus and a chance to win 12k when I the chance to play the BOD tourney. At the moment I mixing the $6 and the $16's when playing my sessions which are obv are bigger swings. I trying to to ignore the bad sessions because this downswings are to be expected. All I can do is play correctly and keep forcused.

Last night I was watching the EPT Berlin robbery which got me thinking about when I visit Lisbon. Obv the money is no where near the same but surely the security is going to be alot tighter now. At poker tournies the security is so soft I wonder how no one has tried it before. When I went to watch the WSOPE in London there £850k on on platform with one unarmed security guard next to it.lol.

Haven't really got much more to say but thought I should try and keep this as update as possible.

learning curve of 2010

For the first time these last 2 week since maybe mid december I am feeling like i'm enjoying playing online poker again and have the burning desire again to play online poker again. I've always wanted to play online poker but I guess now I feel like I have a purpose and remembered why I wanted to play poker professionally. Maybe I was running so bad online,winning money play live poker and I wasn't short of money. Running bad online almost became the norm and getting up early in morning and getting volume lost importance for me.

This year so far I have been travelling alone to poker tournaments in Europe, which has given me plenty of time to be alone with my thoughts and analyse my poker career path.I think in Vienna I realized how playing live poker is easier money and another form of income but not so frequent. In Dublin I remembered the most important thing...grinding online poker. Having these large periods of time alone I learnt so much about myself and how to keep myself disciplined and focused on my career. Its so easy to get lazy or find excuses for doing other things.

At the start of 2010 several people said 2010 was going to be a big year for me.I believed them then and I still believe in myself now. I am sure I have learnt more about myself and what it takes this year than the last 6-months of 2009. I will never let myself lose the importance of getting in volume again even when I am running bad. I will also remember that online is my bread and butter.Playing live and travelling is secondary.

A case of being more professional

Since just before I went to Dublin I have thinking about my online and how I should be disciplined and professional about it. I have always had a problem with the amount of volume I play. I guess I always ran ok and that meant I was always had enough money to survive. Its not until a ran bad I realized that I had picked up some habits and a bad mind set. I always knew volume was key to making a living from poker but I guess I was just being lazy. Its funny that my coach mentioned the amount of volume I play and what I should be playing yesterday,which got thinking in more detail today.

Playing poker for a living is like running a business and the only way to make money is play. I have always known this but now the preacing has to stop and I have to put this words in action more often. I was thinking about my goals that I wanted to achieve when I first started playing the 18mans and how I was going to achieve them. I must remember these goals and carry on pushing towards them. I know from watching other people play and looking over my HH's that I have a good knowledge of the game but I must put this in practise.

Ages since last blog so a lot to say!

Its been a while since I last blogged here due to fact I kept putting it off. 9 days ago I got back Dublin which on Poker terms was a nightmare but to be honest the trip ended up being more of a holiday. The side event I was doing got due to unexpected amounts of entrants in the main event. Which I felt ok with in way because I wasn't feeling to good the first night. The second night a played 300euro event and only lasted a couple of hours.AA cracked by 99's and then hit a set of 4's and I guy hit runner runner straight. The final night I didn't want to play as there weren't enough entrants in the tourney with 3 other events already started. So I ended up spending the weekend doing the tourist things in the City and watching Arsenal lose....again.

Last week I decided I want to play some bigger live tournaments and carry on travelling. So I was keeping an eye on the european poker sites for any worth while satties during the day and found 5euro rebuy step1 with 5 runners into a sunday final(200euros). I decided this was to good to miss and jumped in it, the players being so bad I took it down and made the final. The sunday final had 8 packages with 81 runners which was so soft it was unbelievable. 3 hours later I won a package to go to Lisbon for the European Masters of Poker. The package consisted of 1.1k buy-in 350 spending money and 4 nights accom. With over 90% of the field being qualifiers from 2and 5 euros buy in tournies I know I going to have a big edge over most of the players.

This month online has been some what of a rebuilding job after a poor jan. I so disappointed with my volume from jan that I want to make sure I had a reasonable amount volume in feb. I started the month running ok then i hit a bad patch...thinking oh no not again. After speaking with coach and studying alot more the couple of days have been better and things are looking up!

If anyone is laking inspiration at the moment, Vertek has got some must watch videos on his blog which will def help.

Thats more like it!!!

I think/hope that my bad run online has come to a end. I've been playing the $6 18mans to get some recent results behind me along with confidence. I'm running at $1.5 a game since I took a break from the $16's. I'm not as pleased as I should be, but I guess I feel that I have to get some better results at the $16's before I'm happy about where I'm am in regards to online. The only issue I have had this month is volume. I'm going to struggle to hit 800 games which is pretty shocking for someone who plays full-time. I know that I was in Vienna for a week but I don't want to use that as an excuse. I should of grinded harder to make up for it. I can't complain about running bad when I am turning out that sort of volume.

I'm going to Dublin next week for 3 live tournies which after Vienna, I am feeling very excited and confident about.Its a good feeling knowing that I use these live tournies as a second income with Online being my bread and butter. If things go to plan to Dublin I'm planning to go to Barcelona and Hungary in March. Atm I trying to get into euro masters in Lisbon but I have win a seat for that.

(note to self: don't get distracted by live tournies to much and make sure that my Online volume is my prioty for feb!!)

F/T in Vienna...Bring on Dublin!!

I've been back a couple of days now from Vienna. It was a successful trip with me Final tabling and taking down $2.5k in one of the tournies. I played 3 tournies in the space of about 5 days. The first one I played badly and didn't last to long.In the second I played well,got that bit of luck you need and ended up on the final table. The final table played alot like a super turbo which was weird considering most of the tournament had some play in it. I think really the antes got massive which obv changed the situation(not to mention the blinds). I am generally pleased at coming in 8th out 296 runners and along with 18th out 140 runners in the third tourney which was actually the bubble. I set myself the target before I went out to Vienna that I wanted one FT and make 1.5-3k profit which happened. I knew the tournies were going to soft with 100euro and 200euro buyins but I realized its possible to make a good income from these type tournies. I have recently played 4, ft 2 of them and 18th 1.

I am now all booked up and ready to go to Dublin where I am going to play 3 more tournies at the start of Feb. I can't wait.

I have taken a couple days off from Online due to trying to get my sleep pattern right and also just being busy. I plan to get as much grinding in from Monday as possible until Dublin.

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Digging in deep and being patient

Well 2010 has started off where 2009 left off.... on a downswing. With December being an expensive month as predicted having a downswing couldn't come at a worse time. For 2010 I was hoping for a good start but that hasn't been the case. I have been studying my game alot more lately and discussing my bad run with other people which is really helping me. I find looking at other peoples sharkscope can make me feel better if I have a couple of bad days. Boku87 for example was break even after 22k games so it didn't come to him over night.(now sitting on nearly $200k profit)

I think everyone is different when it comes to studying. Some people like to review and reasure themselves that their game is good. when I review i hate looking at bad beats because i'm just reliving it and thinking about lost money. Atm I getting little frusrated with things because i have put so much hard work and time in poker and i'm not getting the rewards I deserve lately. I'm running bad at $16's atm and actually running worse at $6's...explain that considering their meant to be softer. Comparing games from 3 months ago to now it reasures me it only a matter of short time before i making a killing as I am playing alot better now than I was 3 months ago when I was making reasonable money. I understand that I have to be patient and I things will start clicking at $16's like they did at $6 earlier in 2009. Every successful player has been through the same thing and I am just going through the standard bad run at the start.

I'm going to Vienna on Wednesday for 3 poker tournaments which I am really looking forward to. It's going to be my first Poker trip abroad so its going to be an adventure. I'm pretty confident of having an edge in these tournies and it will be a nice break away from the online grind. IF I get a cash over there I am planning to go to Dublin for Euor deepstack festival in feb. The weather in Vienna is like -15c and worse so i better wrap up warm lol.