Solid Session

I put in a pretty profitable session on Sunday netting about $1K after playing just under 4K hands. I was planning on playing longer but decided to call it quits and go to a BBQ with some friends back home. Unfortunately, this now means that I have to earn 20K VPP's in 4 days to once again keep my SNE status. While things won't be quite as hectic as they were last month, I definitely have my work cut out for me before the month expires.

I figured I'd post one of the more interesting hands of the session where I actually had a huge suckout at 400nl. It was kind of a weird spot because the player that overshoves the flop is a huge fish and I have him beat like 95% of the time but the first caller was a nitty reg that could easily be trapping with KK+. At the same time, I think that it's reasonable for the reg to be holding 66-99 and probably even more realistic that they have TT-QQ (which I thought they might actually fold to my shove). The hand also happened fairly early in my session after I had already lost a string of small-medium pots in a row so I guess I took the higher variance line by shoving after already making some big lay downs in the day. Looking back on the hand I guess that I should be folding but I think it's going to be pretty villain dependant.

No-Limit Hold'em, $4.00 BB (9 handed)
UTG+1 ($412)
Hero (MP1) ($400)
MP2 ($400)
MP3 ($415.40)
CO ($434.10)
Button ($217.20)
SB ($206.25)
BB ($128)
UTG ($220.10)

Preflop: Hero is MP1 with 10, 10
2 folds, Hero bets $8, 1 fold, MP3 calls $8, 2 folds, SB calls $6, 1 fold

Flop: ($28) 4, 4, 4 (3 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $18, MP3 calls $18, SB raises $198.25 (All-In), Hero raises $374 (All-In), MP3 calls $374

Turn: ($1010.25) K (3 players, 2 all-in)

River: ($1010.25) 10 (3 players, 2 all-in)

Total pot: $1010.25

Results:
SB didn't show
Hero had 10, 10 (full house, tens over fours).
MP3 didn't show [Ah, Ad ]
SB doesn't show [5c, 5h ]
Outcome: Hero won $1007.25

Anyways, hope I can run well and play decent over the next few days.

gl at the tables.

The Next 15

Well, the next 15K VPP's have gone much better than the first 15 but unfortunately that isn't saying a whole lot! Nonetheless, I think that I've won enough money to be even on the month or up some meaningless amount (aside from rakeback ldo). It feels good to be running better though and I think that I'm still playing solid. The games always seem to slow down in the summer a bit and that ain't making things any easier.

Aside from this Fri/Sat, all that I've been doing everyday for the past 10 days or so is playing poker and working out. It feels nice to have some structure in my life for a change. Usually, I wake up in the afternoon and when I eventually get around to "working" I end up playing until the early hours of the AM. Over the last couple of weeks, however, I've been waking up extremely early (before 8am in most cases) and have gotten the pokah out of the way early enough to have most of the day to relax and keep on top of chores/gym. The main reason why I've been making an effort to get up early is to play during busier hours (now that Euro's comprise the majority of players...well maybe Canadians, not rly sure) and it's been working out pretty well so far.

Oh yeah, I finally got around to opening a new database in HEM also and should now have accurate graphs that aren't missing a ton of hands. This should be a pretty precise graph of the month so far:



After a somewhat stressful work week I was ready to get my drink on this weekend. Friday night involved going over to my friend Dan's place for a going away party as he is leaving in a couple of days for summer employment. I ended up hanging around there for a while and then left to go downtown with Ben and Brandon. We were planning on going to a place called "Library Square" because we knew a few people that were already there but once we arrived there was a massive line-up. One of the girls that we knew there came out to talk to us and showed us her stamp. I suddenly had a stroke of genius and thought that I could replicate the stamp if we could find a sharpy. We hit up a nearby 7-11 and bought a black felt and walked back towards the bar. The three of us drew our best impression of what we thought the stamp looked like on our wrist and I volunteered to go first and try to fool the bouncer. I walked up to the line and took out my phone and pretended that I was talking to someone to make it look like I had just left the club to make a call. The bouncer opened the rope to let someone out and I tried to walk in simultaneously while flashing my wrist to the guy. The conversation went like this:

Bouncer: "Wait a minute, let me see that stamp again."
*I show him again*
"I don't know about that. Bouncer #2, hey Bouncer #2! Come and look at this stamp. Is it real?"
Bouncer #2: "I dunno"
Bouncer: "Ok, well how much is cover tonight?"
*I don't have a fing clue*
Me: "Ten bucks"
Bouncer: "No!"
Me: "Yeah, I paid $10 earlier."
Bouncer: "No, cover is $12."
*I try to convince the bouncer that I paid $10 for cover 2 hours ago but he isn't having any of it so I turn and walk away. Fail.*

After we couldn't get into L.Square we ended up going to a couple of places down granville. I'm pretty sure we went into a strip club at one point but Ben was too cheap to pay $10 cover...I don't ever want to hear that I'm the cheap one again, though I didn't care at all and hate strip clubs to begin with. We spent most of the remainder of the night at an Irish bar and it was relatively uneventful. When we arrived the three of us went up to an empty table and were approached by 3 girls claiming that they already had the table reserved. I told them "no problem" and started to walk away when they said that they were "just joking" and wanted to share it with us. Nothing developed though. Fail #2.

I went out with Brandon again tonight to the Lamplighter where we were meeting a group of about 15 people and I had only previously met 3-5 of them. I like the venue at the Lamplighter, although it is a bit cramped, and I ended up talking to one of the girls in the group for quite a long time. It was a difficult task because it was incredibly loud in there but she was very nice and down to earth...though i wasn't overly attracted to her. Brandon and I spent several hours in the bar before texting our friend Ryan, who was at a nearby club, to see how his night was going. He told us that we should come and meet up with him so we bailed on the L.L. and walked down the street to meet him. He was hanging out with three girls, one of which I've met before and two that I've never seen. It turned out to be a pretty perfect arrangement...I had a great conversation with one of the girls before we all headed to the dance floor and kind of paired off and threw some shapes and got our grind on. I ended up getting the number of the girl that I was talking to so hopefully I see her again soon because I had a great time.

The most impressive accomplishment of the night would have to be me writing this blog right now, while quite boozy, with minimal grammatical and spelling mistakes!

gl at the tables!

Bad Beat Jackpot?

Of course there is no actual bad beat jackpot promotion on PokerStars but if there was I would have been involved in it today (well, depending on the requirements I guess...I've seen some pots qualify for the BBJ if aces full (AA as hole cards) gets cracked but it might be more common to have to have quads get beat)! Regardless, since there is no BBJ, I'm glad I came out on the winning end of the cooler lol.

No-Limit Hold'em, $2.00 BB (8 handed) -
Button ($91.10)
SB ($152)
BB ($213.30)
UTG ($288.25)
UTG+1 ($222.85)
MP1 ($200)
Hero (MP2) ($200)
CO ($200)

Preflop: Hero is MP2 with Q, J
1 fold, UTG+1 bets $6, MP1 calls $6, Hero calls $6, CO calls $6, 3 folds

Flop: ($27) A, K, 10 (4 players)
UTG+1 checks, MP1 checks, Hero bets $16, 1 fold, UTG+1 calls $16, 1 fold

Turn: ($59) 4 (2 players)
UTG+1 checks, Hero bets $36, UTG+1 calls $36

River: ($131) K (2 players)
UTG+1 checks, Hero bets $76, UTG+1 raises $164.85 (All-In), Hero calls $66 (All-In)

Total pot: $415

Results:
UTG+1 had A, A (full house, Aces over Kings).
Hero had Q, J (royal flush).
Outcome: Hero won $412

Always nice to get full value out of the nuts and more importantly get to show down a royal flush! I've heard of people actually checking behind royal flushes to get a badge on ptr but the value of such a badge to me is about $0...so unless I misread the board or misclick expect me to raise the nuts on the river heh!

gl at the tables.

The First 15K

I guess that I've been pretty fortunate up to this point to not really have any sort of downswing at all this year. It seems as though I haven't been running very well all year but I also haven't been running terribly bad either.

That said, the first 15K VPP's have been nothing short of brutal this month. Just standard running bad...losing flips, getting coolered etc. I've also been playing sort of spewy and have been making bad calls in close spots and it seems that I've been wrong most of the time. I currently find myself down about $1700 and considering that I won't be hitting any milestone bonuses this month, it would take nothing short of a miracle to prevent this from being my worst financial month this year (well, not counting January!).

Thinking positively, my deficit can be erased with 1 good day so it's certainly nothing worth panicking about but it's obviously annoying. Oh well, hopefully it doesn't get worse before it gets better!

I was going to post a bunch of bad beat histories for therapeutic reasons but there were too many and the post got ridiculously long. That and no one cares. I'll leave you with one of the more tilting hands of the day...it was only a flip but his play is so bad that it seems like a beat lol. The play was made by a huge winning player as well, so either he made all of his money back in 2006 or I'm doing it wrong...he reps exactly what he has and there's no way he can ever have anything of real strength in this spot so unless he thinks that I'm squeezing with like A2 and is shoving for value the play seems spewy at best. If only I didn't have the bottom of my range here or if only I won the flip!

No-Limit Hold'em, $2.00 BB (8 handed)
Hero (BB) ($200)
UTG ($200.30)
UTG+1 ($419.35)
MP1 ($202)
MP2 ($203)
CO ($188.55)
Button ($200)
SB ($382.45)

Preflop: Hero is BB with A, Q
3 folds, MP2 bets $8, CO calls $8, 1 fold, SB calls $7, Hero raises $34, 2 folds, SB raises $374.45 (All-In), Hero calls $164 (All-In)

Flop: ($416) K, 4, 2 (2 players, 2 all-in)

Turn: ($416) 7 (2 players, 2 all-in)

River: ($416) J (2 players, 2 all-in)

Total pot: $416

Results:
SB had 8, 8 (one pair, eights).
Hero had A, Q (high card, Ace).
Outcome: SB won $595.45

Anywho, hope this month is going more smoothly for the rest of you! Will give another update in 15K VPP's or so.

gl at the tables!

Canucks Go Down In Flames

Well, yesterday was a very disappointing day for the city of Vancouver as the Canucks fell to the Boston Bruins 4-0 in game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final. The Canucks had two chances to seal the deal but after getting blown out in game 6 on the road they ultimately fell short in game 7 as well. I've told many people that the Canucks lacked the heart that was necessary to close the deal but after more post-playoff information has leaked I've got it completely wrong. The Canucks just looked like they were out of gas after game 5 and didn't have the will to win but the fact is that they were a physically broken down team. New injuries have now been revealed that help explain why certain players were underperforming in key situations:

"Alex Edler admitted he played with two broken fingers. Christian Ehrhoff admitted that he had to get a troublesome shoulder shot up and it will need addressing in the offseason. Chris Higgins admitted that his foot was never quite right after blocking a shot in the second-round series with Nashville and will need further attention. And Dan Hamhuis wasn't around to admit that he was probably sidelined in the Stanley Cup final series opener by a torn groin muscle.

Ryan Kesler? He wouldn't admit to anything.

Despite playing on one leg and having his teammates marvel at his resolve to take shots to endure the pain of a suspected groin tear and hip labrum tear, the Vancouver Canucks bit his tongue when he could have leaned on a crutch of convenience following a bitter 4-0 loss to the Boston Bruins in Game 7 at Rogers Arena.

Tambellini walked into a dressing room Wednesday that looked more like a hospital ward.

"There were probably shooting six guys up today," said Tambellini."

-"Canucks played despite brutal injuries" The Province. 2011

After learning about this new information, I think that it's safe to say that the heart of the Vancouver Canucks should not be called into question.


Even more disappointing than the loss were the events that unfolded after the game. I was surprised to hear about the shenanigans that were taking place in the city because I watched the game outside at Canada Place and there was no misbehaviour in the area at the end of the game. Even on the SkyTrain home people were tame. Basically, a riot broke out downtown and cars were tipped over and set on fire, fights broke out against the Vancouver police, store windows were smashed and some places were looted. It's obviously an embarrassment for the city, especially when the idiocy is caused by maybe 1% of the people that were down there to watch the game. Furthermore, the morons causing the damage are obviously not Canucks fans/hockey fans and most of them went down there with pre-meditated motives to cause damage win or lose. The real Vancouver fans are those people that stayed in Roger's Arena or in the streets and gave the team a standing ovation for an outstanding season despite the game 7 loss. The Canucks clearly gave us an all-in effort anyone that says bad things about the team is just a bandwagon-jumping fake.

Poker/Life

June has been a busy month so far, as expected. Aside from all of the hockey going on I also spend a couple of days shooting a video for PokerStars that basically profiles my poker story (basically same idea as "I am Nanonoko") and how I balance poker and life. I had a good time making it and I'm sure it will turn out pretty good. We probably have about 12 hours of film for a 5-10 minute movie so it will be interesting to see the finished product, which will probably come out in a couple of months. Will keep you posted.



My headache from yesterday's hockey game was made a lot worse today due to the fact that I got 2 wisdom teeth yanked from my head a few hours ago. I had a cavity on my top left tooth and instead of filling it I was advised to just get it pulled. I was also advised to get the other one pulled at the same time to avoid complications that will likely be inevitable in the future (I only have 2 in the top, no bottom ones are even in the gums...something about being an evolutionary progression. What can I say, I'm a marvel to modern dentistry). Anyhow, the extraction went well and I just got them pulled after taking some local anesthetic (freezing), despite being quite worried about the whole thing ahead of time.

With regards to poker, I haven't played a heck of a lot this month yet...surprise, surprise. I'm basically starting work for the month tomorrow and need to earn about 47K VPP's before the end of the month to once again retain my SNE status. I don't have very big expectations for this month in terms of money won because I won't be hitting any milestone bonuses but with some run-good I can still hit 5-figures. I've at least got enough days ahead of me that I should be able to comfortably earn around 3K VPP's each day by playing 4-6 hours from here on out. I was originally thinking that I might lose 1 or 2 days due to my dental work but hey, if Kessler can play through the pain then so can I!

gl at the tables.

The Bruins Are In Town

So I went downtown tonight to meet up with my friend Miles, who was in town for just the night as he is heading off tomorrow to work at a fishing lodge for the rest of the summer. I joined him and my other friend Ben at the Empire Landmark hotel and after enjoying the view from the 30 something floor we headed down to the water to have a few drinks and appetizers at Cardero's, an upscale seafood restaurant located right next to a harbour. It was quite warm outside despite being cloudy so we elected to sit on the patio overlooking the ocean and docks, which were occupied with yachts. I was making small talk as the hostess seated us and she admitted to being a Boston fan and pointed out a hotel across the bay and claimed that the Boston Bruins were currently staying there for the hockey game tomorrow. The hostess seated us and asked us how we liked our seats and I replied "perfect, I can even watch over my boat from here." I have used this joke before with good results! but this time it was not well received and I got 0 laughs :( Anyways, sitting 2 tables behind us were some familiar faces and after putting the pieces together we realized that it was none other than James Duthie, Darren Dreger, and one other TSN member that none of us recognized and we assumed that he worked behind the scenes:


We were all thinking that this was pretty cool since the three of us watch SportsCenter all of the time and it was neat to see the guys off camera. I didn't recognize Dreger at first because he was unshaven and Duthie was talking on his cell phone and was wearing a pretty ugly purple T-shirt.

Out waitress was very cute, she kind of looked like Erin from the office only with blone hair. Miles disagreed with me at first but came around the 2nd time he saw her...Ben said "what are you talking about, she's not even brown!" (confusing Erin with Kelly, fail lol). We ordered a pitcher of Sangria because it was on special, as well as some calamari and muscles to share and started tweeting/facebooking how awesome it was to be in the presence of TSN celebrities. It wasn't too long after we got our food that we looked towards the streets and saw three big guys in suits all sporting playoff beards walking towards the restaurant. We immediately assumed that they were Bruins players coming from the hotel and got excited about the fact that they might be eating at Cardero's...not only that, but there was a free table behind us that had room for 4. Sure enough, the staff started to get excited and moments later the three Bruins were seated directly behind us! I recognized Milan Lucic, who is actually from Vancouver I believe, and I did not know who the other 2 players were (no, they obviously weren't Chara/Thomas etc.). Miles, Ben and I didn't really know what to do...do we tell these guys that they suck and to go back to Boston? Drink more and then try and fight them (l o l)? I'm not really sure what the appropriate play is here but we chose to more or less ignore them and not acknowledge their presence. It was interesting to watch everyone's reaction to the players eating in a Vancouver restaurant. They received a ton of stares from everyone but most people were star-struck and seemed to forget where their loyalty should lie. A couple of older people went over to them and shook their hands and said things like "I hate to admit it...but you boys are doing a great job!" An older women went over with her son and even got one of the guy's autographs...for a second there I thought that they were coming up to me for mine. These guys ordered a lot of food, starting with a soup and salad and them mowed down a big burger and fries + a side of asparagus. As we were leaving I contemplated making some kind of last minute remark. I eventually decided that I was going to go up to them and say "good luck tomorrow boys, you're going to need it!" Unfortunately, I pussied out as expected at the last minute and walked on by without saying a word. I ultimately decided against saying anything because A) I would look like a fool B) I was wearing a blue T-shirt and we were drinking Sangria...it might look like I was hitting on them and not insulting them C) These guys are NHL ballers that can bang any girl in the city, they don't care what some homo says to them and D) my whole plan to not acknowledge their presence would be foiled. Alas, I can only hope that the burgers slow these guys down on the ice tomorrow and the Canucks send them packing out of Vancouver with their tails between their legs! Game 5 goes down at 5pm tomorrow and I'll be watching it downtown with about 1 million other people. The series is currently tied at 2-2 so this is obviously a huge game, especially considering that game 6 will be played in Boston. My dad actually has tickets to the game so he'll be watching it front and center! The Canucks lacked a lot of heart on games 3 and 4 so hopefully they find their mojo because they ARE the better team this year. Let's go!!!

Do the D.A.N.C.E. (May Review)

May was a pretty crazy month in terms of a lot of stuff happening. The month seemed to pass by slower than expected, especially after considering that I was having fun on vacation for most of it. I was able to pretty much just drop everything at the end of April and travel over to London and Spain on a whim after having a successful $20K month. I returned home from my trip overseas around the 14th of May and immediately got to work grinding at the poker tables over the next few days for the first time that month.

On the 20th of May, I took yet another small vacation and headed over to Victoria with my good friend Ben to visit my old roommate and frequent blog guest star, Miles. I wanted to do a big write-up from this weekend because it was pretty awesome but it doesn't look like that's going to happen because so much stuff keeps happening in my life right now that I can't even keep up with myself lol! Needless to say, I pretty much knew that it would be impossible to have a bad time over there and I wasn't disappointed. It also helped that I cashed in the VIP quarterly freeroll that Saturday for just under $3k, which meant that I was now buying the drinks that night if I wasn't already ;)

The VIP freeroll was actually quite interesting the way it all panned out. I woke up early on Saturday on the floor of Ben's place extremely hungover. I had actually forgot about the freeroll almost entirely and had plans to go hit some balls at the driving range with the guys that afternoon so I was never even intending on playing it. However, I changed my mind once I saw that registration was only at about $3K players (I think the previous one got 6k-10k players or something) and figured as a poker pro I could not pass up on this value. I had basically not taken into account what the turnout would be like without any American players and as a result 1 in 3 players would be min-cashing for at least $200. My plan was to try and win like 1 hand lol, squeak into the money and pay for the weekend and then jet off to the golf course. Things started to unfold pretty much as I had planned and after a combination of winning a few hands early and then going extremely card-dead near the money I managed to slip past the bubble with a 10bb stack. Miles had joined Ben and I at Ben's place around 1pm and were getting restless so I told them that I would go all-in and try to bust or double up, that way we could all leave right away or they could go without me and meet me later. The very next hand I shoved A5o from UTG and picked up the blinds. I folded my rags in the BB the next hand with a lot of action in front of me but picked up QQ in the SB the next hand and got action from TT against the cut-off and doubled up. Two hands later, I shoved ATs from the CO and got called by the BB with JJ but I spiked an ace and suddenly had like a 40bb stack lol. With that, Miles and Ben headed for the golf course and we arranged to meet back at Ben's place later as I certainly wasn't about to punt off a 40bb stack in the money to go hit some golf balls when first place was $100K! I continued to run well for a while, which always seems to be the case when you feel neutral about the result since I wanted to go to the grocery store and pick up stuff for dinner anyways. I was playing pretty well too though...there was one hand that I remember where I 3-bet AKo in position against a cash game reg that I play with on a daily basis and checked back a KQ9 flop, blank turn, and then fired big on the river and got called by AJ high, lol. I was pretty much among the top 10 chip leaders for the entire tournament until I lost a huge pot with about 50-70 players left for close to the outright chip-lead. I was opening a ton of pots, mostly due to picking up quality hands, and opened TT from MP and got shoved on by one of the other big stacks at the table. Even though he was another big stack, everyone was pretty shallow and we were all playing 15-50bb stacks so I didn't think he'd have to be super tight in that spot (he had also been quite active too). I also thought that if he had the top of his range he would be more likely to 3bet small or even flat call so I pretty much snap-called him and he showed me 55. Unfortunately, he hit a 5 on the flop and I didn't re-suck so I was left with about a 15bb stack. I certainly didn't give up and managed to navigate my short stack to 25th place, when I busted after losing a coin flip with TT to AQ all-in pre-flop and cashed for $2800. Oh yeah, I was also hosting two SCOOP final tables at the same time, which was a bit tricky but worked out just fine!

Aside from having some great plans in place for Saturday night, another thing that helped take the sting off of busting in the final 3 tables was that I was meeting up with a girl later that night who I figured was 99% down to have fun. I had met this girl the last time I was on the island, probably about 6 months ago, and hadn't been in contact with her in any way, shape or form since. While rather intoxicated the night before I had sent her a message telling her that I was in Vic and asked her what her plans were for Saturday night. I told her where we were planning on going and she said that she was going to the same place with her friends...haha, no shit...anyways, it was kinda tough to find her because I barely remembered what she looked like but we eventually met up and I had a great time-she was indeed down to have fun.

So with all of this time away from the tables I left myself in a bad spot for the last week of May. However, after cramming in 40 hours of poker in the last 3 days of the month I am still Supernova Elite and ran well enough/played well enough to order that gold statue of myself that I've always wanted. I literally started to bust out dance moves uncontrollably in the shower after I had finished my grind and am beyond stoked that I didn't lose my mind or my bankroll!

May



$8,638.85 Table winnings
$3,004.33 Tournament winnings
$4,000.00 Cash Bonus
$2,600.00 200K Milestone Bonus
----------------------------------------------
$18,243.18 USD

This graph is wildly inaccurate but hey, it's a graph! I have yet to fix my HEM simply because I find it more relaxing to be unable to check my results while playing. I will fix it eventually...most likely during my next downswing! For now, these are all of the hands that HEM has recorded from last month (and since it's missing tons, it's entirely meaningless and doesn't even resemble the correct shape, oh well!)

So I've been taking some time off this first week in June to get my head back on straight before resuming the grind (which will be tomorrow). I'd like to think that I've learned my lesson about leaving everything to the last minute so I don't anticipate anymore 12 hour poker days this year but I guess that time will tell. It's been crazy around Vancouver right now because the Canucks have taken a 2-0 lead in the Stanley Cup Finals against the Boston Bruins and are potentially two games away from winning it all! I watched the last game outside downtown and had no idea that many people even lived in Vancouver lol. I think that most people want the Canucks to let the Bruins win one game in Boston so that they can come back home and close it out in 5. As I type this game 3 starts in about 1.5 hours and I don't even know where I'm going to watch the game...it will be nearly impossible to get into any establishment as they have all been full about 3-6 hours before puck-drop.

What else has been going on...well, on Friday I had my first patio pops of the year on my balcony because summer is officially here and the weather is awesome. I even hung out at the beach for a while yesterday. I went out on Friday with a group of about 10 people and I ended up meeting a cute half-Brazilian girl that gave me her number. I sent her a message last night around 11pm and she responded by saying that she wanted to call me and chat on the phone in a couple of hours...oh boy, this has stage 5 clinger in the making but hey I'm not going to judge just yet. I didn't get back to her until this morning because I was exhausted and did not want to talk on the phone at 1am lol. I'll take her out to dinner sometime this week and go from there...and then come back and delete this paragraph before it bites me in the ass as this blog has already done over and over ;)

Finally, the same crew that made the short video "I am Nanonoko" are flying into town this weekend to do a similar video for me! I'm pretty excited about it and hope that we have fun making it and that it turns out well. I'll keep you posted with more details about this as it unfolds.

gl at the tables!!!