Rolling along...

Last nights pokery fun began with a rather unspectacular 10/16 finish in the first Raisetheriver league game.Congrats to Yorkiepud for taking it down.I didn't catch many hands and eventually ran my AK into a pair and didn't improve.

Next up was Interpokers $11 headhunter tourney and although I didn't make the money ( 53rd) I did take a few bounties and managed to cover the cost of my buy-in.Well done to Dudley for winning £144 in the ££ game later on.

The cash tables were calling and I settled down at a Laddies $100 nl full ring table which was more than a little loose.I lost my $100 buy-in when I slow played 55 on a 10 5 A flop,checking after another Ace on the turn and hoping I was letting someone catch up a little.An innocent looking 6 on the river gave Mr 66 the better full house and I couldn't get away from his all in raise.

The good news is that I didn't gulp at losing $100 ( seems to feel just like losing a $50 buy-in does).I hit a couple of 6 max tables and pulled back $20 before I spotted a very juicy looking $200nl full ring table and decided to get invloved.I won my first pot with a semi-bluff flush draw which boosted my confidence, before I won one a $422 pot ( $230 profit) with the mighty J10.

This is how it went down...

** Game ID 803075995 starting - 2007-08-04 03:39:25
** The Strand [Hold 'em] (1.00|2.00 No Limit - Cash Game) Real Money

- staffy-king sitting in seat 1 with $40.90
- nofhopec sitting in seat 2 with $225.88 [Dealer]
- Acornman sitting in seat 3 with $197.00
- swapper sitting in seat 4 with $189.60 :Only played 5 hands but had seen every flop and already looks like he may be tilty.

- sparksride sitting in seat 5 with $114.96
- tigerlily sitting in seat 6 with $80.00
- kenn213 sitting in seat 7 with $257.46
- Salvadanaro sitting in seat 8 with $246.85
- vika sitting in seat 9 with $94.00
- darlolalex sitting in seat 10 with $286.31

Acornman posted the small blind - $1.00
swapper posted the big blind - $2.00
** Dealing card to Acornman: Jack of Spades, 10 of Hearts
sparksride raised - $4.00
tigerlily called - $4.00
kenn213 folded
Salvadanaro called - $4.00
vika folded
darlolalex folded
staffy-king folded
nofhopec called - $4.00

Acornman called - $4.00 : J10 is not a hand to go to war with preflop but a $3 call into a $19 pot here is almost automatic.

swapper raised - $6.00
sparksride called - $6.00
tigerlily called - $6.00
Salvadanaro called - $6.00
nofhopec called - $6.00
Acornman called - $6.00: Not keen on the reraise from swapper but not folding for another $2 in a million years.

** Dealing the flop: Jack of Diamonds, 7 of Clubs, 9 of Clubs

Acornman checked :Perhaps this was a weak check and I should have bet to find out where I was, but the average pot was $69 and I didn't want to have to fold to a reraise here.

swapper bet - $18.00
sparksride called - $18.00
tigerlily folded
Salvadanaro folded
nofhopec folded
Acornman called - $18.00:pot is a good size and though I'm not sure I'm ahead, sparksride has already called an all in preflop with j2h ( and won)and his call here doesn't worry me too much.swappers bet didn't seem too strong either.( 1/2 pot)

** Dealing the turn: King of Spades

Acornman bet - $24.00:I was trying to take control of the pot here and slow down the villains because I really didn't want to have to call a bet much bigger than this from them with only my J10.

swapper called - $24.00: This backed up my feeling that he wasn't too strong.

sparksride folded: Glad he dropped out.

** Dealing the river: 3 of Spades

Acornman bet - $69.00 : went with my gut feeling and bet out as I felt swapper was weak.

swapper went all-in - $143.60

Acornman called - $143.60 : Very close call indeed.I did think he was weak but now? Hmmm.I went into the tank and looked back over the betting so far.Surely he would have reraised more preflop with QQ/KK/AA, and although he made a post flop bet continuation bet, it was only half the pot which smelled weak.His call on the turn when I bet out after the scary King fell also seemed weak.Calling another $70 into a pot of $347 seemed like decent value.

swapper shows: 10 of Clubs, 10 of Spades
Acornman shows: Jack of Spades, 10 of Hearts
Acornman wins $422.20 from the main pot : Ship it!

I won a $97 pot with AJ v KJ on a 10 J J 3 5 board not long afterwards after limping with my AJ.I was pleased with my play in that hand too, because a villain who had limped too preflop bet out $15,another went all in for $35 and I reraised to $120 ,forcing out the first villain.The first guy wouldn't bet out like that if he had J10 or 1010 and therefore I had to conclude I had him beaten ( QK maybe?) and I was spot on with my read on the all in guy.( KJ /QJ or A10/K10 type hand).

My table broke up and I headed over to Bet365 to have a last blast there before bed.I had two tables going there, when either the site lag or laptop slowed right down, and I timed out with trip Queens on a ragged board with the villain betting into me.Why is it the moment my hand was folded by the software, the "I'm back" button suddenly appeared and activated right away despite me frantically spending the previous two minutes pounding the reraise and even the "all in" button?!

That tilted me slightly and it went tits up for a while as I lost my 365 cash table winnings from Thursday night due to a couple of poorly played $10 turbos and some cash table donkery.

I took a wee break,sorted my head out and took a shot at a $200 nl 6 max table at 365.Pocket tens have been lucky for me this week and were again as I called a preflop raise with them and hit trip tens on the flop.After my checking down disaster with the 55 earlier I didn't mess about and reraised the villains continuation bet on a J 10 6 board.He reraised and we ended up all in on that flop.The turn was a K, the river an Ace and I half expected the villain to show a Queen and scoop the pot, but his cards hit the virtual muck and I'd doubled my $200 starting stack.

I did go to bed not long after that ( 5am!) and was feeling very happy indeed with my nights work.The main positives were losing the $100 early on and not being too bothered,my big hands holding up and actually acting upon my reads and instincts most of the time.

Ok, I'm far too tired to write anymore just now.Don't forget to register for tomorrow nights Bloggerment game...

Juicy Pots

Ok, so I've registered at pokerhand.org and I'll try posting hands in that format from now on, as looks a lot neater and I can't do anything daft like forget to post what I was dealt in the hand.I've resisted before because I was able to view blogs from work but unable to follow the links to pokerhand.I've also upgraded my blogger account so if anyone notices anything stranger than usual around these parts then give me a shout.

I ended up having a fine night at the tables last night ,not getting to bed until just before 6am due to how soft my final cash table at Laddys was.I began my night with a 4th place in an 18 player $15 turbo at 'Stars before donking out of a $2.20 Sunday Million triple shoot-out sat.

Miami Mark headed off so I played one more 18 plyr $15 turbo and took it down fairly quickly after the bubble finally burst.After a few 4th place finishes ( top 4 get paid ) it was nice to take one down and I felt I'd played well and done all my bobbing and weaving at the right times.

I lost about $10 at a FT cash table before returning to Ladbrokes for some late night 6 max action and I'm glad I did.I began by playing a very tight game as usual and made my first wee steal from position with this hand...http://www.pokerhand.org/?813035 .

My vpip % for the 141 hands played was 29% and my preflop raise % was 12% which is higher than my average 7%.Since watching IStrongs 6 max vid's I've tried to be more aggressive preflop.I need to be careful as I've always been a winning player ( 8-9bb per 100 over 22k hands at $50 nl Laddys) and I don't want to change too much about my game.I realise though that to win at tougher tables and higher stakes I need to up my pf aggression.I'm wary also of missing set ( hitting 3 of a kind on the flop) opportunities by taking pots preflop with hands like 88 instead of taking advantange of the massive implied odds that sets offer at micro-levels.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?812984 was the hand that really set me on my way for the night.Sundman was multi-tabling and had a big stack at most of his tables but I felt that given time I had an edge over him and could make it pay.The villian from the two later hands I'll post was also multi-tabling and I took advantage by opening their tables and stealing their blinds when they were already involved in big hands.In this hand Sundman( 50% vpip 25% preflop raise) made the 4bb raise and I put him to the test by reraising to $8.I didn't put him on a 10 or KK/AA and reckoned I was good so I got my money in on the flop.Thankfully it held up.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?812970 was my next biggy and I only called the preflop raise with my KK because I reckoned I could make more postflop if the flop was good or I could easily get away if an Ace fell.The villian was the other multi-tabler I mentioned and had a tendency to over-value hands when he did get involved.I didn't even need the King on the turn to win and that hand probably led to his call of my all in bet a couple of minutes later.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?812980 was that hand and my only regret was forgetting to type "Dem's quad beetches" into the chat.It was a big blind special and my reasons for the all in were two-fold.Firstly it was only 2 mins since I had taken the villians last stack and he may have been slightly tilty/out for revenge, and secondly I hoped my read of him being on the flush draw and hitting on the turn or on a pocket pair ( giving him a full house) was correct and that he would pay me off.

All in all a good nights poker.I played quite a lot of 3-4 handed at that table too as it was generally me,Sundman and Cuno with others arriving,donating and leaving.My time spent playing sng's has helped my game too especially as I now have a lot more experience in very shorthanded situations.

All that and Rangers won 3-1 today with Boyd scoring a hat-trick.

I'm not sure why new blogger wants me to label posts ( for search engines maybe?) but I'll give it a go.

Enjoy what's left of the weekend.....