Poker Week: Day 5 - Took a Shot, Killed the Streak....

I did something a tad reckless yesterday, I took a shot at $25/$50 PLO on Full Tilt. I had $2,800 in my Full Tilt account which I had spun up earlier in the week from $100 and I decided I would take a shot at a limit that I am no where near bankrolled for. The reason why I took this shot was for several reasons, firstly there were three players that I had notes on and considered to be weak players. Three players in a 6-max game is a hell of a lot, in my opinion. Secondly, my main bankroll is on PokerStars, this money on Full Tilt is really there for extra in case I decide to play on there. Finally, a good win at that limit could be several weeks worth at the limits I currently play at.

Unfortunately the gamble didn't pay off this time. I sat at a Shallow table with $2,000 and ended up getting it in with two pair and an up-and-down firing all three streets out of position, only for my opponent (one of the tagged weak players) to call me down with second pair and a nine high flush draw, the flush draw got there on the river when I only had $650 left with over $3,000 in the middle. It was either check-fold, check-call or bet and pray, I elected to bet and pray, he called me with his nine high flush and it was good.

I popped on the final $800 and played it super tight, I managed to get it up to about $1,400 before getting it in with double suited Kings against single suited Aces. Then Aces held, fairly standard.

So that was my attempt at $25/$50, it didn't go well and I ended up losing $2,800. However, my pride wouldn't leave it there and I got on PokerStars and grinded the PLO tables until I finally banked a $65 profit for the day to keep my streak alive of winning every day of my holiday. Pleased with myself for breaking even, I stopped playing, watched some TV. I got out WWE SummerSlam on PPV and started watching it, but then I got the itch.

I couldn't resist trying to turn the break even $65 into a few hundred profit so I can say I've won every day and won a decent amount. I think it was the pride, I ended up losing $800. I stopped there realising that I was too tired to play and was stupid for getting back on there in the first place.

I'm not upset about losing the $2.8K on the shot, I'm more annoyed that its ruined my $1,000 per day minimum streak that I've had since I've been off, but losing is inevitable and I can win back the rest and then some.

With the tournaments I had planned, I played the Sunday Warm-up and Event #34 (NLHE 6-Max KO) on Full Tilt, and ran like shit in both of them. I ran so bad I decided not to play the Millions or the FTOPS Main Event, I'm not really bankrolled to play them and NLHE MTTs isn't my strongest form of poker. The main reason to play the tournaments is the six figure scores for the win, but realistically it's unlikely to be me winning so why waste the money.

I think I'm not going to worry about MTTs for awhile, I should be happy to have found a form of poker that I am very profitable at. I love playing PLO cash games and that's where I should stay, I can make good money there.

I was reading some old blog posts by Ben "Milky Bar Kid" Grundy and he sets himself yearly goals. I think I'm going to set myself some monthly goals, I had a think about it last night while I was in bed and I came up with the following goals:

1. Win at least $10,000 by Aug 31
2. Have a $1,000 stop loss that I should never break
3. Win at least $2,000 at $1/$2 PLO (I'm about break-even at this limit currently)
4. Play at least 10,000 hands at all limits

Those are the four goals I've decided to set myself for the rest of this month. Currently, I have around $7,700 profit for August so point one should be achievable. Point two is more about discipline and to make sure I don't take huge hits to my bankroll, I rarely break this rule as it is, but I want to make it formal. Point three is the big one for me, currently over 4.5K hands I have only $170 profit, this is simply not enough. I can't figure out whether its bad play or running bad, but I need to win here so that's going to be a big one for me. $2,000 may be a bit unachieveable by Aug 31st, but what's the point in making these things easy?!

Daily Bankroll Update: -$803.30
Bankroll Update for the Week: $5,893.45