I am a poker player but I will be in the same boat, party poker have suspended my account with them (I assume). I havelost roughly £700 since december so from gambling point of view it looks bad, it did also include me losing over £100 the odd day. I haven't did that yet on GG but I'll have to keep playing small stakes for it to stay that way.
With lack on updates this month you might think I've been running bad and don't want to mention it. Well the running bad part is true but only towards the end on last month. I did like my overall game play last month and I wanted to update my thread on a couple of occasions but just didn't get round to doing so.
The results of the month have left me break even on sky poker and 800 down on bet 365. I did start very well on sky coming 4th in an 8K summit bounty hunter and sharp shoot bounty hunter. My performance over on bet 365 started poor but a more decent run came about towards the end of the month where I managed to final table in two MTTs.
It does appear as though I do not want to play sky MTTs ATM and need a break, just to give you an idea I was in the sunday major last night and lost interest in playing. You could say it's just a mental problem with bad runs and whilst that could be true the way I exited in the last averenger MTT tells me mistakes are creeping in. I had a really good chip stack in that event but then came a spot where I X/R flop correctly and when called I then blew away the rest of my chips on a turn I should know requires me to give up or just X/C.
I am certainly not making it easy for myself ATM because on the one hand I am trying to fit in as many MTTs as I can but at the same time the ones I play require me to play different ways against different player pools. Fitting in lots of MTTs is only good if you can play correctly and keep mistakes to a minimum, playing low stakes sky MTTs, high stakes sky MTTS as well as low and mid stakes MTTs on bet 365 it's just no good because you are now required to play so many different forms of play.
I do enjoy playing sky and most certainly won't quit but I am gonna be having a break from sky this week and head across to GG poker, I was arguing with them the other month about allowing me to make a deposit greater than affordability check yet I have rarely played any MTTs with them, I also will continue to play MTTs on bet 365. I am running nicely on these full ring MTTS ATM and getting the hand history onto holdem manager is allowing me to revise the hands well. Also I have begun getting a bit of 1 on 1 with a coach I know from BBZ and getting the hand history into holdem manager helps make it easy to review. I still believe my game is really good this 1 on 1 coaching is used to just help me tweak those more difficult spots you get in MTT, spots like ICM, cold calling and bet sizing well preflop and post flop as a short stack, The sutff I rarely I had on the cash tables.
It appears I am now back to square one again because hackers have struck for the 2nd time. I was having a good life over on GG poker not in profit but in getting more MTT volume but these hackers managed to access my account with GG poker having hacked my email address and stole over £690.
The stress of all these issues with other sites could certainly be felt when I reacted really angrily last Saturday, the main cause of this anger was it looked as though bet 365 was gonna close my account with them over gambling issues but when I explained the reason behind my stress they understood it more clearly.
I have now sorted out the hacking and made it so the hackers will no longer be able to hack my email address, the main issue now is trying to get my GG poker and poker stars accounts sorted out because I seem to be having issues receiving emails from GG and they do not offer live chat.
Despite having lots of problems ATM I am still really in the mode to play poker, I've been looking forward to the next UKOPS for a while now and shall be playing 3-4 of them per day.
I'll report my run in each UKOPs on a daily basis and I'm gonna make note when ever I've questioned a hand. Gl to everyone else playing UKOPS
Day one of my UKOPS is over and it feels like a really unlucky one.
I had started off well in UKOPS 1 UKOPS 2 and UKOPs 5. I wasn't get very far in UKOPS 3 or UKOPS6 and UKOPS 4 was a bit swingy.
I should be fairly happy with my overall game in most the UKOPS, their is some debate over some of the stuff I was shoving in UKOPS 4 but given that it was against this really aggressive opponent it's hard to say.
Tomorrow I will be looking to try and go over most the hands I had in UKOPS 2 because I kinda question if I was playing too nitty.
Player
Action
Cards
Amount
Pot
Balance
Armyburger
Sit out
x
Big blind
50.00
50.00
7760.00
Your hole cards
8
9
craigcu12
Raise
150.00
200.00
20010.00
iodio
Fold
Jessieak
Fold
Climwinner
Fold
x
Call
100.00
300.00
7660.00
Flop
Q
7
10
x
Check
craigcu12
Bet
100.00
400.00
19910.00
x
Call
100.00
500.00
7560.00
Turn
7
x
Bet
350.00
850.00
7210.00
craigcu12
Raise
900.00
1750.00
19010.00
x
Call
550.00
2300.00
6660.00
River
J
x
Check
craigcu12
Bet
2200.00
4500.00
16810.00
x
Fold
craigcu12
Muck
craigcu12
Win
2300.00
19110.00
craigcu12
Return
2200.00
0.00
21310.00
this hand was one of interest, I did a river value bet with my straight but having heard 7x folding river my value bet becomes pointless, Do I have any bluffs on this river well that is tough but having looked on GTO+ I should be shoving on this river with my busted flush draws, I should value bet AA if I was to see him fold his trips then J9 or J8 can become a river shove because those combos are blocking 98 and does he have many FH not really because those should be X/R flop.
Knowing this opponent is gonna fold his 7x on this river I could raise question marks over whether this river full house is actually -EV
Player
Action
Cards
Amount
Pot
Balance
5Kind
Small blind
1000.00
1000.00
21566.00
ApolloCree
Big blind
2000.00
3000.00
26823.50
Your hole cards
5
5
Tedson
Fold
Swimmr
Fold
craigcu12
Raise
4400.00
7400.00
63703.00
x
Call
4400.00
11800.00
89640.00
5Kind
Fold
ApolloCree
Fold
Flop
Q
5
9
craigcu12
Bet
7000.00
18800.00
56703.00
x
Call
7000.00
25800.00
82640.00
Turn
K
craigcu12
Bet
18000.00
43800.00
38703.00
x
Call
18000.00
61800.00
64640.00
River
Q
craigcu12
All-in
38703.00
100503.00
0.00
x
All-in
64640.00
165143.00
0.00
x
Unmatched bet
25937.00
139206.00
25937.00
craigcu12
Show
5
5
x
Show
K
Q
x
Win
Full House, Queens and Kings
139206.00
165143.00
When I do shove on this river my main target is gonna be AQ QJ and JT but if my opponent was to fold these Qx combos then my shove with this 55 is -EV for sure because he will have 11 stronger combos of FH to just the 4 weaker combos of straight
My game is in a messy state ATM and having reviewed some of the big lost pots I've had the last couple of days it's no surprise I'm not running well in these UKOPS or most MTTs. I believe one of the causes to all this is the debate over GTO play vs exploitive play on a weak poker site.
Am I player too GTO maybe but if GTO play was really so bad then why is it I'm loving life so much when defending the BB and why is it I really enjoy over betting having been two of the most common spots I've studied in GTO? The key to all this is I have created a pattern from GTO telling me which combos I should X/F X/C and X/R on flop vs cbets, I also have a really good idea which turn cards favour our range and which favour opponents . The reason I'm loving life as a over better is I've looked at a lot of spots in GTO where I node locked my opponents range
GTO was key to helping me win with this hand, before GTO this K5o was a snap fold any hand weaker than a gutshot was snap folded, Post GTO I have discovered combos like T9 J9 JT Q9 K5 and Q5 should all be defending, the stronger their backdoor equity the more we want to X/R and if I node locked my opponent to overfold then I can X/R most of them combos. The turn K comes and was I scared no, I do not see many Kx in his range and some will even over fold Kx on flop if I'm never betting this K5 then all I'm value betting is 2P+.
A craigcu thinking GTO would not have played this hand like he did, for starters he'd have bet big on flop knowing opponent does not have many auto folds, when called he would then overbet turn and when called he gives up on river knowing he has got strong equity with weak showdown value and has opponent node locked with a capped range that will over fold to over bets.
Another leak in me ATM is I'm not thinking about my whole range, when I think about my whole range I see this QJ at the bottom of my value range, I have got plenty of better value hands in my turn range that had raised flop, this QJ is right down at the bottom.
I have got a whole host of bad plays, including some really bad play in highroller take this hand, it was cocked up big style. I have discovered from simple 3way work our SB range is strong than BB and BTN on most boards and have been looking into doing min bets on flop but I'm just button clicking too much with out thought. I know from solver this Q9 wouldn't do much donking on flop and if it did it would be a D/C. The overall plan would be D/C flop then donk a turn flush and barrell again on river, but as played I bleed money big style.
Sky poker is weak and full GTO+ play is bad for sure but no GTO+ play is far worse and so I need to stick to GTO theory and evaluate. They do over fold and they do under bluff in GTO terms that means making the mix hands become pure bluffs and pure folds.
Range play and GTO patterns is what helped me finish so well in those other high rollers.
Another day of UKOPS goes by and I fail to make profit but I am really proud of myself.
The difference between today's session and yesterday's session was I thought far more better about my decisions and the reason for not cashing out in these UKOPS was I failed to win the flips.
The only hand I might have mess up in was this spot but it wasn't an easy spot for sure.
Player
Action
Cards
Amount
Pot
Balance
roddy28
Small blind
250.00
250.00
8045.00
loololollo
Big blind
500.00
750.00
7181.50
Your hole cards
10
Q
SNOOKER72
Fold
x
Raise
1000.00
1750.00
44391.25
Swimmr
Fold
craigcu12
Call
1000.00
2750.00
17135.00
roddy28
Fold
loololollo
Fold
Flop
8
9
Q
x
Bet
2750.00
5500.00
41641.25
craigcu12
Call
2750.00
8250.00
14385.00
Turn
2
x
Bet
1000.00
9250.00
40641.25
craigcu12
Call
1000.00
10250.00
13385.00
River
8
x
Bet
1000.00
11250.00
39641.25
craigcu12
Raise
12000.00
23250.00
1385.00
x
Call
11000.00
34250.00
28641.25
craigcu12
Show
10
Q
x
Show
8
K
x
Win
Three 8s
34250.00
62891.25
First and fore most it was a really weird like took by villian pot size betting flop as weak pair which he then blocker bet on turn and once it gets to river and he does another blocker bet I'm thinking surely he has something weak and whilst I have TP it's a hand I don't see that strong and judging by his small bet size on turn and river I thought surely he's got something weak and will fold.
It's not correct play by me for sure but I'm walking away from this giving him a really aggro tag and shall be raising him more frequently in future punishing him.
Something tells me taking a bike ride helped big style as it got rid of alot of energy which allowed me to play in a much more relaxing manner therefore I thought about every decision
Hope all is good and well with you and Happy Easter.
K5 must have been the hand of the day! Facing a bit over a min raise, calling can't be terrible - you are getting good odds, but it just preforms so poorly post flop.
On the last hand why did you not just call instead of turning your hand into a bluff?
If anything, you might have considered a small raise, not as a bluff, but for value; although the pot-a-roo on the flop is slightly concerning, al be it diminished by the two subsequent min bets. As you identified it's great to know player is donking pot with bottom pair, which you can attack in forthcoming hands.
Good luck tonight and if you are streaming i'll tune it at some point.
Hope all is good and well with you and Happy Easter.
K5 must have been the hand of the day! Facing a bit over a min raise, calling can't be terrible - you are getting good odds, but it just preforms so poorly post flop.
On the last hand why did you not just call instead of turning your hand into a bluff?
If anything, you might have considered a small raise, not as a bluff, but for value; although the pot-a-roo on the flop is slightly concerning, al be it diminished by the two subsequent min bets. As you identified it's great to know player is donking pot with bottom pair, which you can attack in forthcoming hands.
Good luck tonight and if you are streaming i'll tune it at some point.
That K5o would certainly be talked about in a televised game. It is a super close call pre and will be -EV call for most it's +Ev for me because I'm not one of these people who hopes to hit, when I see a board texture like this I X/R for sure, a board like 862 with 2 diamonds I'm gonna X/C small bets with plan to bluff when a 3rd diamond comes and in this specific spot when I see K on turn I'm gonna remain really aggressive get max value from QQ-99 and 8x, the flop x/R means opponent has few Kx combos if he does have a better combo then nice hand.
Looking at that QT the turn could be a spot where I could have R/F, either he is playing a nutted hand really weak or more likely that not he has got some weaker value hand and is afraid of the flush
Today's highroller appeared to go well with a nice double up but that success didn't last long following a barbaric move made by a player I thought was decent and as a result what happened I fealt tilted.
Edit: I apologise about this hand, I myself am looked it up and I was the one who played it ****. I should never have checkback on the flop in the first place
Today's highroller appeared to go well with a nice double up but that success didn't last long following a barbaric move made by a player I thought was decent and as a result what happened I fealt tilted.
When I call and lose this hand I was expecting a really polarized range, My thought process at the time was 9 blocks his sets and Q9s , Every combo of AA KK Qx JJ and TT I check flop are gonna fold this river, This T9 should also be folded too so it was a bad call on my behalf because the 9x combo I should have called was 98s and 97s but losing to the correct combos I would have still continued playing very well and the chances are I'd have made alot of chips back trouble here was sawing this hand left me tilted and I started checking back TP.
When we have a checking range IP as preflop aggressor and don't raise as much strength IP as preflop caller it's because we want to protect our whole range and float more with plan to bluff later streets. Trouble is all opponents even the best do idiotic actions so I'd rather have a raising range IP similar to the range used OOP and cbet 100% of my range IP on most flops since I will be able to realize my equity no problem.
Craig.
I am trying to help you here. So please don't take this the wrong way.
You re-raised pre-flop, and your opponent called you. When he was ahead. You both checked the flop. When he was ahead. He bet the turn, and you flatted. When he was ahead. He shoved the river. I would not have shoved there-but he was ahead.
You called, putting 7.7k into a 12k pot. So logically you must have thought you were winning more than 35% of the time. With 2nd pair and a weak kicker. Against someone you believe to be a good player. You believed he had the world or nothing. Whereas he had a mediocre hand, that was better than yours.
You are criticising the other player. But he was always ahead. And he took control of the hand post-flop.
You chose to reraise a good player pre. With a drawing hand. You did not bet the flop, so you had no idea where you were. You merely flatted the turn. You never did "bluff on later streets". You called a shove for chunks with little more than air.
Either I am playing a different game to you. Or you need a break.
Because I think your game is a lot better than this hand, or your analysis of it.
Today's highroller appeared to go well with a nice double up but that success didn't last long following a barbaric move made by a player I thought was decent and as a result what happened I fealt tilted.
When I call and lose this hand I was expecting a really polarized range, My thought process at the time was 9 blocks his sets and Q9s , Every combo of AA KK Qx JJ and TT I check flop are gonna fold this river, This T9 should also be folded too so it was a bad call on my behalf because the 9x combo I should have called was 98s and 97s but losing to the correct combos I would have still continued playing very well and the chances are I'd have made alot of chips back trouble here was sawing this hand left me tilted and I started checking back TP.
When we have a checking range IP as preflop aggressor and don't raise as much strength IP as preflop caller it's because we want to protect our whole range and float more with plan to bluff later streets. Trouble is all opponents even the best do idiotic actions so I'd rather have a raising range IP similar to the range used OOP and cbet 100% of my range IP on most flops since I will be able to realize my equity no problem.
Craig.
I am trying to help you here. So please don't take this the wrong way.
You re-raised pre-flop, and your opponent called you. When he was ahead. You both checked the flop. When he was ahead. He bet the turn, and you flatted. When he was ahead. He shoved the river. I would not have shoved there-but he was ahead.
You called, putting 7.7k into a 12k pot. So logically you must have thought you were winning more than 35% of the time. With 2nd pair and a weak kicker. Against someone you believe to be a good player. You believed he had the world or nothing. Whereas he had a mediocre hand, that was better than yours.
You are criticising the other player. But he was always ahead. And he took control of the hand post-flop.
You chose to reraise a good player pre. With a drawing hand. You did not bet the flop, so you had no idea where you were. You merely flatted the turn. You never did "bluff on later streets". You called a shove for chunks with little more than air.
Either I am playing a different game to you. Or you need a break.
Because I think your game is a lot better than this hand, or your analysis of it.
I messed it up bigstyle for sure. I ran in throught GTO and it turns out I should have cbet 100% of my range on flop.
My overall game in position is horrible ATM, I don't need a break I should go back to cbetting 100% of my range IP in 3bet pots and begin looking into a checking range once I've ran GTO similators because I appear to be making dozens of mistakes IP ATM.
During that good run last year I was doing far more cbetting that I do ATM and as a result I was always realizing my equity well and knew which combos to over bet turn, bet large bet small and cbet back but now I am getting lost.
I said I don't need a break but I will be having a break for sure because I have no other sites ATM and I'm not gonna start another new only only to see that end up with chaos.
I had to check my hand history with the QJ hand to make sure it wasn't me. I think I got you later in the big one with the old overbet vs 2 pair coup, but hace you a bit of credit for donking that low flop with a wide range GTO stylee, and I'd also just folded an overpair on a low flop the hand before. Hope you come back stronger, I barely played for a couple of weeks last month and definitely gained from the reset.
FWIW I am not convinced many fold QJ there, so think you lose whatever you do there, so don't look too badly on it.
I had to check my hand history with the QJ hand to make sure it wasn't me. I think I got you later in the big one with the old overbet vs 2 pair coup, but hace you a bit of credit for donking that low flop with a wide range GTO stylee, and I'd also just folded an overpair on a low flop the hand before. Hope you come back stronger, I barely played for a couple of weeks last month and definitely gained from the reset.
FWIW I am not convinced many fold QJ there, so think you lose whatever you do there, so don't look too badly on it.
Poker is all about opinions. We all have slightly different ones-that is 1 of the things that makes poker fun.
But please listen to this opinion above. Because I know I play too much, too often.
The only slight places we might differ is that FWIW I am not convinced many good players fold QJ there. Which is all the more reason why IMHO the 3-bet works better v less good players.
And that IF you had c-bet the flop, you had a good chance of losing less chips than you did. But you lose whatever you do there.
I had to check my hand history with the QJ hand to make sure it wasn't me. I think I got you later in the big one with the old overbet vs 2 pair coup, but hace you a bit of credit for donking that low flop with a wide range GTO stylee, and I'd also just folded an overpair on a low flop the hand before. Hope you come back stronger, I barely played for a couple of weeks last month and definitely gained from the reset.
FWIW I am not convinced many fold QJ there, so think you lose whatever you do there, so don't look too badly on it.
Hi I was never shocked QJs didn't fold pre I thought the river over bet was poor at the time of play but the truth is it was perfectly fine. I did say in a different post the value of top pair can vary greatly in different spots and this is one of those spots where TP is a nutted hand so I should not be complain about him over betting it on river.
Having a break will be great for me, I've been working to improve too many spots at once and as a result my overall game has become a mess and made me use advanced moves in the wrong spots so I do need to reset and should return to doing the advanced play in spots I know and doing simple play in spots I'm still studying.
Judging by results over the last few days, a break from poker was clearly what I needed.
My first day back went very well with a final table in the rebuy event. Saturday saw me have my first day back on GG and although I didn't reach final table I did make a number of decent runs in MTTs which have really large fields.My best night of the week well that came on sunday where a combination a great play plus the luck allowed me to reach the final table of both sunday major and the £33 bounty hunter.
I certainly did have some mistakes here and their but nobody is perfect in poker even the best make mistakes, if their was any talking point to be made from this week end it's heavily related to river blocker bets.
Player
Action
Cards
Amount
Pot
Balance
jawzindawz
Small blind
2000.00
2000.00
173023.42
x
Big blind
4000.00
6000.00
110680.04
Your hole cards
9
K
craigcu12
Raise
8800.00
14800.00
258674.24
M10Dembele
Fold
jawzindawz
Fold
x
Call
4800.00
19600.00
105880.04
Flop
4
10
Q
x
Check
craigcu12
Bet
6000.00
25600.00
252674.24
x
Raise
12000.00
37600.00
93880.04
craigcu12
Call
6000.00
43600.00
246674.24
Turn
A
x
Check
craigcu12
Bet
14000.00
57600.00
232674.24
x
Call
14000.00
71600.00
79880.04
River
5
x
Bet
12000.00
83600.00
67880.04
craigcu12
Fold
x
Show
10
10
x
Win
71600.00
139480.04
x
Return
12000.00
0.00
151480.04
My plan in spots like this is to do a shove on river but when my opponent does a blocker bet things become awkward because on the one hand I see him have a weak range however his range lacks the auto folds so a bluff raise can be really risky and Iooking back at the amount of times I've seen players make river bets and went on to raise when called I know now these spots are just took big a risk against a really imbalanced range filled with thin value hands which I cannot guarentee to fold.
What I do now is make more notes on players who do this and what I see from here is if my opponent now checks river then his range is now filled with auto folds allowing me to bluff any two cards and in cased where they bet small with strength then I can start to bluff catch really wide when they bet big because they will lack nutted hands and be filled with bluffs.
It's been a few months since I last made an update on my diary. You might think I was away from sky for alot of that time but you also might think I was having a bad time. The answer itself was a bit of both.
I was dominantly playing on GG poker and poker stars, the only time I've really been playing sky was Sunday. As the weeks went by I was beginning to get myself into a bigger and bigger mess, sometimes I was questioning the EV of micro stakes MTT over nl50 cash, other times I was questioning just stick with sky MTTs and then their were times when I was thinking play zoom poker. I was in a huge mess for sure and the way I was outside the poker tables clearly showed that as well with lack of study work lack of exercise my diet was all messed up I was now eating a pizza which had over 3K calories at least once per week and gained loads of weight.
I opted to take a break from poker for a week and in that time I reorganised my poker schedule itself, put myself on a diet, I also now do more exercise daily and am now going out twice a week volunteering. Judging by my first week back I can say it most certainly has worked well. I have managed to get some decent runs in multiple MTTs on I poker including 1 which I should have took down but instead came 2nd.
Long may this continue, I have now ordered some kettle bells and play to do daily exercise, I have been buying far more fruit now than what I was and now go out volenteering twice per week.
No word of a lie it is becoming a shock at just how much of an improvement this break has done to my game.
This here is my sharkscope for I poker and whilst the sample size is still small it's looking as though I am managing to crush most I poker MTTs ATM. When I first begun playing I poker I was opting to play most of the micro stakes but given how results have been going I am already starting to have shots at 20 euro MTTs and starting this weekend I could be adding the main sweat in.
Sky poker itself has also seen multiple decent results in recent times with my most recent one coming in yesterday's big weekend bounty hunter where I managed to final table another high stakes MTT and again coming 2nd. I certainly can't deny I did get all in with lots of premium hands in that sunday major but that alone didn't help me have that great run. I also was doing alot of bluffing on river in spots I would have normally just give up on in the past Take this hand
When it comes to bluffs alot of the time you think air is what counts as bluff and whilst that it true for most spots their are some spots where you turn weak value hands into bluffs and this is one of those spots. When OOP decides to probe bet on turn he has removed alot of my air, so the weak pairs are gonna become bottom of my range. When opponent decides to bet again on river this is where these hands can be turned into bluff, Qt is my choice of bluff here because the T itself blocks JT, the Q blocks AQ and KQ, therefore opponent has got less snap calls, QT also unblocks 87 98 and 43, those are of course losing to QT but as far as overall ranges go that is just a few combos compared to all the better hands OOP will have.
66 55 and 65 are all still in OOP calling range but when these face a raise they never in happy shape because they all unblock every single better combo QQ KK JT, as far as weaker hands go they don't really block anything therefore they in sick shape.
I have just had one of my best weeks in a long time. It's more or less my 3rd proudest week ever behind that week where I got HU in a highroller vs chrismooreman and final tabling two high rollers the same week.
Some could argue this could in fact be my 2nd greatest achievement why? I was able to achieve back to back final tables in the sunday major and as well as finishing runner up in the big weekend bounty hunter.
When I go on to compare the two what I can see is my overall MTT game is coming on leaps and bound, my standard MTT game itself has improved massively compared to how it was back when I came 2nd in those two highrollers.
I will put alot of this down to GTO+, this tool has helped make it become harder and harder for me to be exploited. When we look back at the sunday major where I came 2nd you cannot argue I was getting all the hands but the GTO+ we say that week mostly came in the form of river bluffs, what I mean is I was pulling a range of bluffs on river with hands I just knew had decent blocker effect, either blocking best hands or unblocking all the auto folds.
The story this week well it wasn't so much about bluffs I did pull some but the big talking points from this week's sunday major was some of the great hero calling I was doing on river with thin value.
One of those hero calls was this 65. If we think in absolute hand strength I would hate it but in relative hand strength, I like this 65 better than J9 or 98 why? The answer to that is combos like K9 J9 and 98 are gonna block K4 K7 JT 87 J8 T8 which are all gonna X turn alot or of the time but will barrell river, 65o blocks all of that Is 65 now an easy call? In theory no it shouldn't be but in theory IP has got alot of thin value combos on the river I however know IP is a player who I don't see thin value bet on river I see him go more polarized, the you could ask yourself is he gonna bet every flush like this the answer here no, I see more flushes bet bigger making this 65 an easy call
Another hero call was this T9, in the past I'd be snap folding every Tx combo on this river but not anymore, now I know some T9 have more relative hand strength that others, At KT T2 T3 these are all hands I'd be folding. JT T9 T7 J8 98 87 96 these are all gonna fall down as cry called, the reason I say this is these combos are all combos which block the major value factor for OOP, J9, 97, Q9-Q6s these are all gonna fall down as value combos which will shove and the combos I said I call all block this, will I call ever combo no I'd fold some, the combo I'd be likely to call most is gonna be a one with 9 knowing this is the best value blocker.
I could go on and on but I can see from just these two hands alone just how well my MTT game is getting.
Comments
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2021/feb/03/talking-horses-dire-warnings-issued-over-affordability-checks-for-punters
I am a poker player but I will be in the same boat, party poker have suspended my account with them (I assume). I havelost roughly £700 since december so from gambling point of view it looks bad, it did also include me losing over £100 the odd day.
I haven't did that yet on GG but I'll have to keep playing small stakes for it to stay that way.
I did like my overall game play last month and I wanted to update my thread on a couple of occasions but just didn't get round to doing so.
The results of the month have left me break even on sky poker and 800 down on bet 365. I did start very well on sky coming 4th in an 8K summit bounty hunter and sharp shoot bounty hunter. My performance over on bet 365 started poor but a more decent run came about towards the end of the month where I managed to final table in two MTTs.
It does appear as though I do not want to play sky MTTs ATM and need a break, just to give you an idea I was in the sunday major last night and lost interest in playing. You could say it's just a mental problem with bad runs and whilst that could be true the way I exited in the last averenger MTT tells me mistakes are creeping in. I had a really good chip stack in that event but then came a spot where I X/R flop correctly and when called I then blew away the rest of my chips on a turn I should know requires me to give up or just X/C.
I am certainly not making it easy for myself ATM because on the one hand I am trying to fit in as many MTTs as I can but at the same time the ones I play require me to play different ways against different player pools. Fitting in lots of MTTs is only good if you can play correctly and keep mistakes to a minimum, playing low stakes sky MTTs, high stakes sky MTTS as well as low and mid stakes MTTs on bet 365 it's just no good because you are now required to play so many different forms of play.
I do enjoy playing sky and most certainly won't quit but I am gonna be having a break from sky this week and head across to GG poker, I was arguing with them the other month about allowing me to make a deposit greater than affordability check yet I have rarely played any MTTs with them, I also will continue to play MTTs on bet 365. I am running nicely on these full ring MTTS ATM and getting the hand history onto holdem manager is allowing me to revise the hands well. Also I have begun getting a bit of 1 on 1 with a coach I know from BBZ and getting the hand history into holdem manager helps make it easy to review. I still believe my game is really good this 1 on 1 coaching is used to just help me tweak those more difficult spots you get in MTT, spots like ICM, cold calling and bet sizing well preflop and post flop as a short stack, The sutff I rarely I had on the cash tables.
The stress of all these issues with other sites could certainly be felt when I reacted really angrily last Saturday, the main cause of this anger was it looked as though bet 365 was gonna close my account with them over gambling issues but when I explained the reason behind my stress they understood it more clearly.
I have now sorted out the hacking and made it so the hackers will no longer be able to hack my email address, the main issue now is trying to get my GG poker and poker stars accounts sorted out because I seem to be having issues receiving emails from GG and they do not offer live chat.
Despite having lots of problems ATM I am still really in the mode to play poker, I've been looking forward to the next UKOPS for a while now and shall be playing 3-4 of them per day.
I'll report my run in each UKOPs on a daily basis and I'm gonna make note when ever I've questioned a hand.
Gl to everyone else playing UKOPS
I had started off well in UKOPS 1 UKOPS 2 and UKOPs 5. I wasn't get very far in UKOPS 3 or UKOPS6 and UKOPS 4 was a bit swingy.
I should be fairly happy with my overall game in most the UKOPS, their is some debate over some of the stuff I was shoving in UKOPS 4 but given that it was against this really aggressive opponent it's hard to say.
Tomorrow I will be looking to try and go over most the hands I had in UKOPS 2 because I kinda question if I was playing too nitty.
Knowing this opponent is gonna fold his 7x on this river I could raise question marks over whether this river full house is actually -EV
Am I player too GTO maybe but if GTO play was really so bad then why is it I'm loving life so much when defending the BB and why is it I really enjoy over betting having been two of the most common spots I've studied in GTO?
The key to all this is I have created a pattern from GTO telling me which combos I should X/F X/C and X/R on flop vs cbets, I also have a really good idea which turn cards favour our range and which favour opponents . The reason I'm loving life as a over better is I've looked at a lot of spots in GTO where I node locked my opponents range
GTO was key to helping me win with this hand, before GTO this K5o was a snap fold any hand weaker than a gutshot was snap folded, Post GTO I have discovered combos like T9 J9 JT Q9 K5 and Q5 should all be defending, the stronger their backdoor equity the more we want to X/R and if I node locked my opponent to overfold then I can X/R most of them combos. The turn K comes and was I scared no, I do not see many Kx in his range and some will even over fold Kx on flop if I'm never betting this K5 then all I'm value betting is 2P+.
A craigcu thinking GTO would not have played this hand like he did, for starters he'd have bet big on flop knowing opponent does not have many auto folds, when called he would then overbet turn and when called he gives up on river knowing he has got strong equity with weak showdown value and has opponent node locked with a capped range that will over fold to over bets.
Another leak in me ATM is I'm not thinking about my whole range, when I think about my whole range I see this QJ at the bottom of my value range, I have got plenty of better value hands in my turn range that had raised flop, this QJ is right down at the bottom.
I have got a whole host of bad plays, including some really bad play in highroller take this hand, it was cocked up big style. I have discovered from simple 3way work our SB range is strong than BB and BTN on most boards and have been looking into doing min bets on flop but I'm just button clicking too much with out thought. I know from solver this Q9 wouldn't do much donking on flop and if it did it would be a D/C. The overall plan would be D/C flop then donk a turn flush and barrell again on river, but as played I bleed money big style.
Sky poker is weak and full GTO+ play is bad for sure but no GTO+ play is far worse and so I need to stick to GTO theory and evaluate. They do over fold and they do under bluff in GTO terms that means making the mix hands become pure bluffs and pure folds.
Range play and GTO patterns is what helped me finish so well in those other high rollers.
The difference between today's session and yesterday's session was I thought far more better about my decisions and the reason for not cashing out in these UKOPS was I failed to win the flips.
The only hand I might have mess up in was this spot but it wasn't an easy spot for sure.
It's not correct play by me for sure but I'm walking away from this giving him a really aggro tag and shall be raising him more frequently in future punishing him.
Something tells me taking a bike ride helped big style as it got rid of alot of energy which allowed me to play in a much more relaxing manner therefore I thought about every decision
Hope all is good and well with you and Happy Easter.
K5 must have been the hand of the day! Facing a bit over a min raise, calling can't be terrible - you are getting good odds, but it just preforms so poorly post flop.
On the last hand why did you not just call instead of turning your hand into a bluff?
If anything, you might have considered a small raise, not as a bluff, but for value; although the pot-a-roo on the flop is slightly concerning, al be it diminished by the two subsequent min bets. As you identified it's great to know player is donking pot with bottom pair, which you can attack in forthcoming hands.
Good luck tonight and if you are streaming i'll tune it at some point.
Looking at that QT the turn could be a spot where I could have R/F, either he is playing a nutted hand really weak or more likely that not he has got some weaker value hand and is afraid of the flush
Edit: I apologise about this hand, I myself am looked it up and I was the one who played it ****. I should never have checkback on the flop in the first place
I am trying to help you here. So please don't take this the wrong way.
You re-raised pre-flop, and your opponent called you. When he was ahead.
You both checked the flop. When he was ahead.
He bet the turn, and you flatted. When he was ahead.
He shoved the river. I would not have shoved there-but he was ahead.
You called, putting 7.7k into a 12k pot. So logically you must have thought you were winning more than 35% of the time. With 2nd pair and a weak kicker. Against someone you believe to be a good player. You believed he had the world or nothing. Whereas he had a mediocre hand, that was better than yours.
You are criticising the other player. But he was always ahead. And he took control of the hand post-flop.
You chose to reraise a good player pre. With a drawing hand.
You did not bet the flop, so you had no idea where you were.
You merely flatted the turn. You never did "bluff on later streets".
You called a shove for chunks with little more than air.
Either I am playing a different game to you. Or you need a break.
Because I think your game is a lot better than this hand, or your analysis of it.
My overall game in position is horrible ATM, I don't need a break I should go back to cbetting 100% of my range IP in 3bet pots and begin looking into a checking range once I've ran GTO similators because I appear to be making dozens of mistakes IP ATM.
During that good run last year I was doing far more cbetting that I do ATM and as a result I was always realizing my equity well and knew which combos to over bet turn, bet large bet small and cbet back but now I am getting lost.
I said I don't need a break but I will be having a break for sure because I have no other sites ATM and I'm not gonna start another new only only to see that end up with chaos.
FWIW I am not convinced many fold QJ there, so think you lose whatever you do there, so don't look too badly on it.
But please listen to this opinion above. Because I know I play too much, too often.
The only slight places we might differ is that FWIW I am not convinced many good players fold QJ there. Which is all the more reason why IMHO the 3-bet works better v less good players.
And that IF you had c-bet the flop, you had a good chance of losing less chips than you did. But you lose whatever you do there.
Having a break will be great for me, I've been working to improve too many spots at once and as a result my overall game has become a mess and made me use advanced moves in the wrong spots so I do need to reset and should return to doing the advanced play in spots I know and doing simple play in spots I'm still studying.
My first day back went very well with a final table in the rebuy event. Saturday saw me have my first day back on GG and although I didn't reach final table I did make a number of decent runs in MTTs which have really large fields.My best night of the week well that came on sunday where a combination a great play plus the luck allowed me to reach the final table of both sunday major and the £33 bounty hunter.
I certainly did have some mistakes here and their but nobody is perfect in poker even the best make mistakes, if their was any talking point to be made from this week end it's heavily related to river blocker bets.
What I do now is make more notes on players who do this and what I see from here is if my opponent now checks river then his range is now filled with auto folds allowing me to bluff any two cards and in cased where they bet small with strength then I can start to bluff catch really wide when they bet big because they will lack nutted hands and be filled with bluffs.
I was dominantly playing on GG poker and poker stars, the only time I've really been playing sky was Sunday. As the weeks went by I was beginning to get myself into a bigger and bigger mess, sometimes I was questioning the EV of micro stakes MTT over nl50 cash, other times I was questioning just stick with sky MTTs and then their were times when I was thinking play zoom poker. I was in a huge mess for sure and the way I was outside the poker tables clearly showed that as well with lack of study work lack of exercise my diet was all messed up I was now eating a pizza which had over 3K calories at least once per week and gained loads of weight.
I opted to take a break from poker for a week and in that time I reorganised my poker schedule itself, put myself on a diet, I also now do more exercise daily and am now going out twice a week volunteering. Judging by my first week back I can say it most certainly has worked well. I have managed to get some decent runs in multiple MTTs on I poker including 1 which I should have took down but instead came 2nd.
Long may this continue, I have now ordered some kettle bells and play to do daily exercise, I have been buying far more fruit now than what I was and now go out volenteering twice per week.
This here is my sharkscope for I poker and whilst the sample size is still small it's looking as though I am managing to crush most I poker MTTs ATM. When I first begun playing I poker I was opting to play most of the micro stakes but given how results have been going I am already starting to have shots at 20 euro MTTs and starting this weekend I could be adding the main sweat in.
Sky poker itself has also seen multiple decent results in recent times with my most recent one coming in yesterday's big weekend bounty hunter where I managed to final table another high stakes MTT and again coming 2nd.
I certainly can't deny I did get all in with lots of premium hands in that sunday major but that alone didn't help me have that great run. I also was doing alot of bluffing on river in spots I would have normally just give up on in the past
Take this hand
When it comes to bluffs alot of the time you think air is what counts as bluff and whilst that it true for most spots their are some spots where you turn weak value hands into bluffs and this is one of those spots.
When OOP decides to probe bet on turn he has removed alot of my air, so the weak pairs are gonna become bottom of my range.
When opponent decides to bet again on river this is where these hands can be turned into bluff, Qt is my choice of bluff here because the T itself blocks JT, the Q blocks AQ and KQ, therefore opponent has got less snap calls, QT also unblocks 87 98 and 43, those are of course losing to QT but as far as overall ranges go that is just a few combos compared to all the better hands OOP will have.
66 55 and 65 are all still in OOP calling range but when these face a raise they never in happy shape because they all unblock every single better combo QQ KK JT, as far as weaker hands go they don't really block anything therefore they in sick shape.
Some could argue this could in fact be my 2nd greatest achievement why?
I was able to achieve back to back final tables in the sunday major and as well as finishing runner up in the big weekend bounty hunter.
When I go on to compare the two what I can see is my overall MTT game is coming on leaps and bound, my standard MTT game itself has improved massively compared to how it was back when I came 2nd in those two highrollers.
I will put alot of this down to GTO+, this tool has helped make it become harder and harder for me to be exploited.
When we look back at the sunday major where I came 2nd you cannot argue I was getting all the hands but the GTO+ we say that week mostly came in the form of river bluffs, what I mean is I was pulling a range of bluffs on river with hands I just knew had decent blocker effect, either blocking best hands or unblocking all the auto folds.
The story this week well it wasn't so much about bluffs I did pull some but the big talking points from this week's sunday major was some of the great hero calling I was doing on river with thin value.
One of those hero calls was this 65. If we think in absolute hand strength I would hate it but in relative hand strength, I like this 65 better than J9 or 98 why?
The answer to that is combos like K9 J9 and 98 are gonna block K4 K7 JT 87 J8 T8 which are all gonna X turn alot or of the time but will barrell river, 65o blocks all of that
Is 65 now an easy call?
In theory no it shouldn't be but in theory IP has got alot of thin value combos on the river I however know IP is a player who I don't see thin value bet on river I see him go more polarized, the you could ask yourself is he gonna bet every flush like this the answer here no, I see more flushes bet bigger making this 65 an easy call
Another hero call was this T9, in the past I'd be snap folding every Tx combo on this river but not anymore, now I know some T9 have more relative hand strength that others, At KT T2 T3 these are all hands I'd be folding. JT T9 T7 J8 98 87 96 these are all gonna fall down as cry called, the reason I say this is these combos are all combos which block the major value factor for OOP, J9, 97, Q9-Q6s these are all gonna fall down as value combos which will shove and the combos I said I call all block this, will I call ever combo no I'd fold some, the combo I'd be likely to call most is gonna be a one with 9 knowing this is the best value blocker.
I could go on and on but I can see from just these two hands alone just how well my MTT game is getting.