Steamrolling 6max

I haven't regretted my switch from full ring to 6max yet as I'm runnning hot as hell at the moment: up $42 in only 1500 hands for a 72 bb/100! Obviously not sustainable, but a welcome boost in terms of results and confidence.
Even better, I'm having great fun playing poker again, still only playing 1 or 2 tables. Nice bonus: I made a king high straight flush that got payed in full :)
I'll probably play some more 4NL first and if my results keep up, I'll add a few 10NL session again to see if I'll do better this time (have a $44 hole to fill there).

Yesterday, I ended up playing HU at one table and even though I normally would switch tables then, I decided to sit down a little longer. We were both sitting with a full stack and after playing pretty conservative for a while, I felt I had a decent feel for my opponent's game. He was limping and checking quite often pre-flop and made minbets or small bets when he didn't have a hand. He also wouldn't lay down his hand often if he had hit the flop. Great spot for me: I started raising a lot of hands and tried to apply as much pressure as possible. After ten minutes or so (could have been five) he called bets on every street with his flopped top pair against my two pair and he lost half his stack.

By now some more players join the table again, and a little later I felt the HU guy and another player. Always feels nice :) How people can 4-table or 6-table HU is beyond me though: I had trouble keeping up playing 1 table 6max and 1 table HU.

Generally 6max seems pretty straight forward: play very aggressive, raise with a wide range of hands and add a (very) few tricky plays (like a check on the flop or a flatcall PF with a big pair). When facing real strength, let it go if you're likely behind. A lot of players will fold too often and the few aggro's are trappable.

I'm still not very comfortable playing pots OOP and I tend to play a lot more conservative when I'm called PF and/or on the flop. I'm aware this is a leak so any suggestions on how to deal with that kind of situations (PF raise, villain call IP, flop cbet, villain call/raise and I have missed) would be appreciated.

On a side note: in episode 9 of this season's High Stakes Poker, Tom Dwan plays an interesting pot with Howard Lederer: Lederer raises, Dwan reraises in position, Lederer 4bets and now Dwan raises yet again! I won't spoil the rest of the hand and the holecards, so head over to youtube to check it out yourself.

In another cool hand Phil Laak and Patrick Antonius go at it and here Antonius makes a great read. Excellent stuff to think about (it would be even better to hear Antonius explain his thinking there).

This episode also includes a nice degen story: at one point Antonio Esfandiari claims his stack is 50k short (as in $50,000!). Since he keeps saying he's 100% sure, it's a pretty bad situation. Turns out there are still 2 25k chips in his paper bag. I would have checked my bag 5 times to make sure it's empty, but I guess these guys handle money a bit differently.

Have a good time at the tables!

Astafas

It's been a while

Not much poker this month, as I've been on nice vacation in France for a week.

Even though last month, I was heading for a record result, it all went south in the last couple of session: a - $28 session on the 4NL tables and the next day a - $18 session on the 10NL tables and my awesome high of $55 up was mostly gone.

I did clear my reload bonus on Party Poker, but lost just as much chasing the partypoints/playing too many tables.

I have been playing 10NL this month (a little down for now) and I am kinda surprised about the difference between 10NL and 4NL: people are a lot more tight (table VPIP is often around 10-15) and there's a lot less action. There are many nits and even more shortstackers, which is an absolute pain, because then there is not much money to be made. Still, I'm not too worried yet, being down less than 1 buyin and I'm also running below expectation (AA loosing against JJ, KK against AA, QQ against KK etc.) Nevertheless, I have cut back on the multitabling and now stick to 4 tables or less.

In case you haven't watched season 5 of High Stakes Poker, check out youtube now, coz it is awesome, especially the first group of players with Greenstein, Dwan, Elezra, Eastgate etc. are spectacular and show some world class poker, not to mention the biggest televised cash game pot in history. The only problem: they should post a "don't try this at home" message at the start of each episode: for Tom Dwan's aggressive style to work, you need to play high stakes and ... be Tom Dwan ;)

When I raise on the flop with my open-ended straight draw + backdoor flush draw and then bet again on the flop after picking up the flush draw, people just call me with a pair of queens and I miss my many outs (bye bye $10).

May your opponents never draw out!

Astafas

Exit Titan Poker

I have decided to withdraw my bankroll on Titan Poker and I'll probably even cash out as well. I haven't really played a lot there, mainly because the player base is a lot less than what I'm used to at Party Poker and I don't like the software that much. Especially when multi-tabling it's a pain, because you switch to mini-view, which is too small for me.

I'll have to leave my no-deposit bonus though, as I'm nowhere near the 1500 tp's I need to be able to withdraw that. So, the plan is to cash out everything except the bonus (about $50). Because I was going to take a shot at 10NL, I'll play some 10NL session with that bonus.

Apparantly, it will take 2-5 days before the cash is in my moneybookers account and some players have been requested to email id shots when trying to cash out. I can understand sites want to secure these kind of transactions, but I find it curious that kind of stuff isn't required when you deposit.

I just hope it won't be too much of a hassle and I can get my money fast.

Because I should be rolled for 10NL by March/April, I'm thinking about where to play. Should I go for another first-deposit bonus on a new site? Or should I return to Everest (lots of bad players I read) or just stick to Party Poker?
I didn't really like the Everest software (slow network and poor software for multi-tabling), but 10NL is the smallest stake there, so the competition might be weaker compared to other sites.

Any suggestions on that part are appreciated.

Currently I'm running 7BB/100 over 27k hands at 4NL, even at 30BB/100 over 9k hands since October 2008 (when I made some major adjustments to my game). My goal is to try and push that up to 10BB/100 over 40k hands and than take a decent shot at 10NL.
I really don't know what to expect in terms of stronger competition: is there a substantial difference? Is it the same level of play, but just for a little more money?

Again, any input on that is welcome.


PS: My favorite poker show 'High Stakes Poker' is currently running season 5, so I'll be checking out Youtube. I'm sure most poker players know that show, but if you don't, go check it out!!


Untill next time!