It’s been about a month since my last blog. The most important reason I didn’t write an entry, is that I’ve been real busy with the last few assignments for my studies. The weather is also great over here, which is real uncommon this time of the year. Therefore I wanted to spend some time in the park and on the beach with friends and girlfriend.
Studies
At the time I’m working on my final assignment, which is an assignment where I reflect on the progression I’ve made throughout my studies. It’s rather interesting to see my progression in the last few years.
I expect to present this assignment in about two weeks. After that, I’m finished and can do what I want!
Routine
The last few weeks I built a good routine which consists of working out, working on assignments for my studies and doing fun things with my friends and girlfriend in the evening. In order to be more effective, I think it’s important to develop a good routine. When I’m going to start playing poker full time, having a solid schedule will be one of my key goals.
Poker
Because of the SCOOP on PokerStars, I decided to leave my hiatus and start playing some tournaments. I grinded a decent MTT schedule on Monday. There was a SCOOP 6max rebuy, which is a format that I love. I also played lots of small stakes tournaments, all on Stars.
It was great fun to play again. Luckily I was not rusty at all, and ran good. I took down a small $8 tournament for about $800. I also went real deep in the Badugi event in which I got 22nd (out of 2k runners).
It was rather funny that I got deep in the Badugi tournament because I had never played the game. I have played a lot of 2/7 TD Lowball, which has some similarities to Badugi. I also rember listening to a podcast on Deuce Plays, saying you should play tight in Badugi, so I did. After I few hours I really started to understand the game, which made it real fun. In the later stages it got more aggressive and shorter handed, so I got in a few marginal spots and ran bad.
At the end of the session at 06:00(!) I was real excited with the result. I won about $1K in my fist session and only invested $150 tops. I felt like I played near the top of my abilities.
The day I looked forward to: Ante Up!
Yesterday was the day I looked forward to for about a half a year. The coolest SCOOP event took place: Ante Up! I really love this format. Every session I used to play, I HAD to play the daily $5,50 Ante Up tournament. I love the format and the fact that nobody has a proper strategy. I don’t want to brag, but I built a good portion of my roll playing the $5 Ante Up. I think I’ve taken top3 about 15 times.
In Ante Up only the antes go up every level, the blinds don’t. So you have to limp a lot of pots and play all sorts of weird multiway pots.
I sold some action to play the $162 medium SCOOP. I was real excited to play good players and see how they would adjust to the format. I started off slow, but at the middle stages of the tournament it went great. I felt like players weren’t adjusting well to the format and kept folding. Near the bubble everything went sour. I lost rather big pot where I got a real unlucky river in a HU pot where I rivered a set and the villain a backdoor flush. Then a few hands before the bubble, I lost 99% of my chips in a hand where we both flopped trips in a single raised, HU pot on TT5. I think he had no business being in the hand (I iso-raised large from late pos, he limpcalled oop with T8. Stacks were rather shallow).
In the low version I got coolered with AQ – AK in a spot where I had to shove pre because of the dead money.
I got stacks in a lot of other tourneys in which I played. Unfortunately, I couldn’t break though and make a final table.
Although I hadn’t played in such a long time, I felt like I played better than ever. I know that sounds weird, but I think it’s because I listened to a lot of poker podcasts about strategy and posted a lot on the forums during my internship.
What to expect
Next time more about what my exact approach will be in becoming the best poker player I can be. I hope it’s fun to read this blog. I you have any suggestions or comments, please leave a comment! I will update my personal information in the near future as well, so you'll know more about me!
