Coaching - 1st impressions
Date: Thu, Jan 24, 2008
Tonight was my first 1-on-1 coaching session with Messiah from DeucesCracked. As much as I'd like to I'm not going to go into any of the strategy discussed as that's between me and the coach. However I do feel happy to give my overview of my first impressions of coaching...
I've always been dubious about whether coaching is worth the money. I mean my CR subscription costs $50 per month, and DC costs $25 per month... however my monthly 1-on-1 coaching bill will come to $600. This is currently 10% of my bankroll! Quite a big outlay! Financially bankrollwise next month will be very interesting, as I'm going to be taking a lot of shots at education, cash, and tourneys... I'll post on that later, back on topic...
Railing
The coaching session went a lot better than I expected it to go. It was really really beneficial. Messiah seems like a fantastic coach, and there's a lot more included in the coaching package than I expected. To start off I 4-tabled and commentated on my own play, and Dave made comments. Here's how I ran.
I didn't expect to have any real "light bulb" moments, more just to have what I already knew re-enforced, but I was way wrong. In just this session alone Dave fixed a few massive leaks in my game, and got some what I think was pretty incredible advice on plays I would never have thought of making. In one spot I said "I'd never re-raise here, just call.", and Dave was like "For starters I'd rather fold than call, but I'd re-raise here every time, in fact I'd re-raise any 2 cards". There was literally no way I'd have made the play there, but now I think about the situation in a completely different way, and realise I was leaking so much money. Amazing.
PT Analysis
Some of the other stuff I was impressed with was the PT analysis. I'm now used to being able to look at 25nl or 50nl players PT stats and tell them how to improve their game pretty easily. In the same way, Dave was able to look at my 100nl stats - stats that I hadn't even used before - and point out big flaws in my game. This I thought was hugely beneficial. But here's the main reason I think coaching is so beneficial to me...
Changing the learning model
Reading books and watching videos are great, however I can't gain instant access to exact information I want in order to fix my game. I have to watch the whole video and the chances are that video won't cover the exact problems I'm having in my game. So I could try asking the questions on the CR forum or on my blog, however the responces I get are likely be mixed, not from great players and I won't have confidence to apply them. So fixing my game up is pretty tough, I'm often shooting around in the dark trying to make adjustments and I'm honestly not sure if they're right or not.
Coaching changes this purely because I can ask any question I want, and instantly get back a correct answer. This to me is why coaching is so valuable. It cuts out all of the uncertainty and just gets you straight up correct answers. And get this... In addition to receiving correct answers to my questions, my coach will answer valuable questions that I didn't even know to ask. He'll look at the way I'm playing, and fix things that I'd have no way of knowing needed fixed.
So the whole learning model has been changed, and I have to say it is awesome. I have complete faith that my coach is telling me the right things, so I suck up all of his information and apply it without hesitation.
In addition to this after playing sessions through the week, I can ship 4 or 5 of my toughest hands to Messiah and ask questions on them. No need to forum post or blog post, etc and just get the odd solid answer. I get straight up answers of how to play the hand right then.
I can think of a ton more benefits of coaching, but I've already pimped it too much ;) Anyways, next month I'm going to take coaching every week for the full month while beasting 200nl for 20k hands and I'm sure I'm gonna see a big improvement in my game. I'm really looking forward to it!
Off to Stockholm, Sweden tomorrow morning with a bunch of mates. It's 3am now and I still have to pack lol.
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh femalesuperrace/10
Oh aye I almost forgot... Had quite a lot of emails about the iPoker deal, I'll get back to those when I'm back in Edinburgh. I'm not ignoring u guys!
Another strong session
Date: Wed, Jan 23, 2008
Coaching lesson got put off 'til tomorrow night so I decided to do some grinding across 6 tables. I'd rewatched Verneer's 6 tabling 100nl video through the day today, so was in a good mindset to get a bit more TAG. I feel like a caught a good run of cards tonight and played really well. It was one of those sessions that just clicked and most things went right. It's amazing what new goals and focus does for my play.
As you can see I've tightened up my stats a lot, I think this is about my optimum multi-tabling grinding game. Maybe a little tighter. Played 21.5/18, basically playing TAG but isolating a lot from the CO, and loosening up a lot from the BTN. One thing to note is that my aggression factors were pretty insane, I think this shows that I was value betting hands a lot, probably because I caught a lot of cards.
One of the things I think I did best tonight was mixing up my betting when players figured out I was playing so aggressively postflop. As soon as they started adjusting to my constant c-bet pounding I'd start check-raising them on the flop, or letting them float me and check raising them on the turn occasionally in good spots to mix it up. I also put a good amount of delayed c-bets in. I think it's really important to mix things up against good players when they start adjusting to your position raising and cbetting game.
Cheers for everyone submitting votes in weaktight on what to do on some of the hands in my last post. Feedback is always appreciated.
Rivered trips, bad spot for thin value
This is the hand of the night for sure.
Standard button open with JTo, called by a tight SB (12/10). Obv bet, same as I would a cbet, and he calls. At this point I'd give his range J9+, a mid PP or like maybe 56, or a set. Any other hands I'd only give about 10% of his range to here as I really don't think he's floating me OOP here.
Turn is a K and I check behind for pot control, again pretty standard.
River makes me trips, and he bets $17 into a $20 pot. Without any hand-reading I'd be raising here, but taking into account his range based on previous streets and his PT stats I think this is almost certainly a fold. I really don't beat much, I don't think it's that likely he had nothing on the flop, or that he caught the K. I think I beat only like 25% of his river range here (J9/56/middle pair/bluff). I think he has it about 75% of the time, either with a better J or a set. Does anyone else lay this down on the river?
Anyway, I ran my time bank down trying to talk myself into flat calling. But ended up trying to get some thin value and raising up about 2.3x his bet. He just called with 33.
Overpair fold in 3-bet pot
Pretty easy fold, no way calling here is +EV in my opinion. Despite Verneers recent advice on always felting overpairs in 3bet pots I think this is definately somewhere I can get away.
Another biggish fold - AQ on A-high flop
If we have full stacks I re-raise the flop for value/info. But in this spot I think a flop re-raise will commit me, so just flat call. 6 on the river and he over-bet ships it. Eugh, this is close I think. This is the first time he's cold called so I doubt he can have a straight. I was figuring him for 2pr or a set. I'm beating A9/AT/AJ which match his line, hmm. I guess he could have like 99-QQ or something here too, but these don't match his line as well. Meh, I think this is tight. Could prob call or fold here. Will pokerstove this tomorrow.
Most of the hands where I won big pots tonight I played pretty well, pretty standard. Here are a few of the more interesting winners...
Getting value with a turned set
Got nice value here from a loose player who calls too much.
Shipping AK ** (TM) DodgyKen
God knows what this fish is doing. :)
Post-oaking a reg
This guy likes to make hero calls on the river. So I make the river bet look like I'm trying to steal the pot on the river.
C/Ring an aggressive players float
My cbetting image was out of line at this table at this point. I liked C/Ring the turn here and letting him float me.
And another float C/R here
Looks like that flop would have missed me and I was cbetting. But no! That's right fish, hammertime!
Snapping off a river bluff
Loose player, pretty easy river bluff call, most likely middle pair of missed draw.
So I've been running pretty hot since I've moved to the new iPoker skin. I've got a special reverse luckswitch activated account, which is nice. Give me a shout if you'd like a luckbox account and I'll hook you up. :)
A solid session
Date: Tue, Jan 22, 2008
First up, cheers to everyone that left comments on my previous post. I'm pumped to get started the hard work. I'm gonna try to blog even more too, if I'm gonna blog more I need to blog faster, so more bad english and typos coming up!
Did some railing sessions with Graham over the past couple of nights, cheers for that mate. He railed me last night in a completely insane 300 hand session with some HUGE hands. I've sent these to Messiah to help analyse. Anyway it was cool having someone railing while I was playing, kept me thinking about the hands more, but it was difficult to play more than 3 tables while trying to talk and commentate on my thoughts too. So when railing using mikogo/skype from now on I'll try to just play 3 tables and concentrate on improving my reads/play rather than grinding for high volume.
Then I railed Graham for about an hour tonight while he played some $50nl on iPoker. Was good to sit back and watch and chat about some of the tougher hands. At the end of the session we went over some of biggest losing hands in PT which I think was pretty useful also. Graham played real well and crushed the session for like 20bb/100 which was pretty sweet too :)
Got 500 in tonight 4-6 tabling before spending the rest of the evening railing/studying. Over the past couple of weeks I'd basically loosened my game up to about 23/20, and I've been finding it really tough to play postflop with my loose image and in some of the marginal spots I've been in. So tonight I decided to pull it back a bit and grind. I played 19.5/16.5, TAG with tricks and ground out a $60 profit, 11BB/100 (not PTBB anymore). My buddy Jamie (who plays much higher stakes) railed me on MSN for some of it which was fun too, got some great advice from him, cheers man.
Here are some hands from tonight as always, thoughts welcome.
AA with lots of action
lol, sitting with AA and watching everyone dump money in the pot pre was pretty sweet. Flop is, err, dangerous. But there's $66 in the pot and we've got effective stacks of $80 (but MP only has $60). I can't check with what's likely the best hand, and any bet commits me, so I raise the anchor and ship the chips. :>
They've only really flopped a flush with AQ, maybe QJ/JT at a push. I'm screwed if they've flopped a set but I because of the pot size we just felt AA every time here. I think I get called by a good amount of hands I have beat like pocket pairs with a club, or AcX, and I'm gonna take the pot down a lot.
LOL you = my profit
:)
This hand was sick
Villain is 50/12 over 30 hands. His minraise preflop doesn't mean strength, he's done it twice before with weak aces/low PPs. Easy value raise in pos with AK.
On the flop his bet is weak, I put him on A6/A3 , some FD, 45, a mid pair, or something like J9/JT/JQ. Because he's such a fish I have to give him quite a wide range here.
Turn card completes the FD and 55, he checks it to me. I love having position here on the turn. He could have made that flush, so I can check and see what he does on the river. If he has the flush, he's going to bet.
On the river he checks, which seems really strange to me. So I feel that I can rule out a flush and middle set now, or else he's betting that river. So a lot of his range is made up with marginal hands... the weak Js, and small pairs with a A or maybe K kicker. There's $60 in the pot and he has like $43 behind. Can I make him fold 40%+ of the time here is the question. It's not a play I like making at $100nl against these sorts of fish, as I wouldn't be surprised if he calls with his A6. But I think I can fold him enough to make profit by shoving the river here.
He runs down his entire time balance and times out. I breathe out.
3-bet AQ on baby board
Villain is a 22/16, seems like a decent player. He opens UTG which makes me a bit wary, but I think I get value here 3-betting and take control in position.
Flop comes paired all small cards. Ugh. I fucking hate these spots. Am I meant to check behind here? Am I meant to c-bet? I cbet $21 and he insta-ships. Obv he has an overpair, easy fold. I just really hate playing AK/AQ in a 3-bet pot when it's likely villain has an overpair. Maybe I make enough profit from cbetting decent boards and making hands to make 3-betting here profitable, but I hate these hands. Something I'm going to work on with Messiah.
Double-barrell OOP with NFD
Villain is 22/6 here. I think I make a mistake by double-barrelling here. I think he's floating me on the flop maybe like 20% of the time. I don't think I'm folding out much on the turn he's called me with on the river. Probably best checking the turn I guess. He raises my turn bet big and I'm gone.
lol I love this hand
Villain is a MASSIVE donk. Over the past 30mins he's just jizzed his chips all over the table. When he calls the flop I'm not too happy, but obv I'm getting it in every time. :)
Can I call here in pos to draw?
Obv I'm mucking it without the cold caller. But can I call in position now with the bigger pot and implied odds? Or is this still a fold?
I've got my first session with Messiah tomorrow night, really looking forward to that one... seeing as people are pretty interested in the coaching thing I'll try to blog a bit about it too. Upon his request I've supplied my last 15k stats from PT, including positional stats, and a bunch of hands with reads and analysis that I think I'm having the most problems with. It's clear that postflop - mainly in raised pots, handreading, and LAG play are the areas I really want to improve in... and it seems like he's happy to tailor the sessions around this. I won't be done the session 'til 2am tomorrow night, but I'll try to get a short report in the following day.
Upping the Ante
Date: Mon, Jan 21, 2008
I can feel a lot of changes coming on, I just know now is the time...
Over the Christmas break and this month I've realised that there are fantastic opportunities available to me within the poker world and if I put the work in I'll get a HUGE amount out it. Aside from that I love this game, and it's something I really want to conquer. I've become really motivated to take my game to higher levels, and beat poker for a much higher winrate. I feel that this is the right time to step things up and dedicate a much bigger portion of my life to poker. Playing a lot more, studying a lot more, and analysing a lot more. I'm incredibly determined to get to the higher levels, and fast. I'm not after a quick fix or an easy way to get there, I'll be using proper bankroll management and crushing everything, playing high volumes of hands.
People talk about the games getting harder, but the fact is that there's so much fantastic material out there now that if you put the time in you'll become a top player. I'm fully ready commit to studying and playing the game HARD for the next 6 months. I've decided to give myself much higher goals. I want to put double the hands in each month, and spend a lot more time on strategy and study. I'll need to reschedule things a bit, but I'm going to make it happen.
More hands
There's no way to get better without putting in a lot of hands. This is pretty evident from reading top players blogs, like CTS's. I'm going to up the number of hands played each month to at least 20,000.
I think I should use my studying time a lot more effectively. I also believe that it's worthwhile to invest a lot more money into study, as it'll pay off. Videos are a much faster way to get better than books, so I'll be focussing a lot less on books now. Although CardRunners is fantastic and offers a wide range of material not all of it is useful to me, probably only 1 or 2 of the videos per week are ideal study material. I'm really impressed with the DeucesCracked coaching site, I'm going to signup there in addition to CR, which will increase the amount of videos I've got access to.
At the moment I definately don't use the most effective ways to get feedback on my game. I usually post on forums, or discuss things with players at the same level as me. I can often receive more poor advice than good advice, and it can be difficult to seperate the two. Verneer made me realise that paying for coaching is the way forward. Having a great coach eliminates poor advice, gives me the benefit of his experience, and confidence in my play.
I recently applied for a few different coaches, and came to the decision to start working with Messiah from DC. I'll be having my first session with him this week, and will do weekly or fortnightly 1.5hour sessions. In addition to this he'll be available through the week on IM or email to talk through hands or concerns. The cost isn't cheap at $150 per session, but I strongly believe it'll be worth it in the long run. He seems like a great guy, and the service he provides looks fantastic. What better way to learn than directly from someone who's crushed the levels I'm playing at.
Coaching is very flexible too, so in the future when my game moves up to 2/4 I can hire a new coach to guide me up to the higher stakes. The idea of being mentored by a top player like Brian Rue or Vanessa Selbst is pretty awesome.
I still feel it's really important to be part of a group of poker players, and have a lot of friends within the game. I think a group gives me the drive and motivation to push towards my goals, mainly because there are other players doing the same thing. A group can also provide a great amount of support, especially through tough times like downswings. Aside from that I think that online poker is a pretty lonely game, you need people to chat with or discuss hands with during long sessions, and players to connect with who understand the situations you're in on - and off of - the table.
I won't succeed in making these new goals in poker without having balance in the rest of my life. I will be reprioritising things within my life to make more time for poker and balancing poker with the other things that are important to me... my job, spending time with friends/family, and my wellbeing (eating well, fitness, personal development). I'm confident I can make this work, and that having a fit, healthy, balanced life will make me a better poker player.
On to my updated goals, on where I want to be by the summer...
My play will primarily be at cash games, here are the cash game goals:
I'd like to play some of the softer touraments available this year. I really enjoy live tourneys, and they're a good break from playing cash and a nice opportunity to travel. Here's what I'd like to play this year:
I think that's about it for now... lots more to come.
iPoker $$$ loyalty deal
Date: Sun, Jan 20, 2008
As you guys know I'm pretty picky about where I play online. I never play on a site unless the tables are soft and I'm getting a high amount of $$$ back each month. I've recently shipped all of my bankroll across from my old iPoker skin to a new one and have been playing there all month. The service is fantastic and the loyalty deal is the best I've seen on the net for iPoker.
I've set up an affiliate account with the owner of the skin, and I can now offer you guys exactly the same loyalties that I'm receiving. Here's some reasons why I play at the site...
Why do I play on iPoker?
- It's soft. Clearly the most important thing to consider when playing at any site, there are loads of fishies.
- Great traffic. I think it's the 3rd biggest poker site around, at current time of posting there are 30,000 players on the the site.
- Miniview tables rock. They're great for playing on a laptop and I can fit 9 on my desktop screen with no overlay!
- Software is easily customisable. I use custom betpot/auto-reload scripts which I'd happily share with whoever wants them, and I use table customisation software that lets you change the card graphics, table background, etc. You can setup the tables to look exactly the way you want them.
- I'll have your account instantly upgaded (and locked in) to the top 6-star "titanium" VIP level. This is very $$$ profitable. For a breakdown on exactly how profitable it is just fire me an email.
- We're UK based, and offer a VIP points system that allows you to use points to buy in to live events in the UK, and soon bigger EPT events.
- We offer top online customer service. Also, if you have any problems/suggestions you can email me and I'll bring it up directly with the owner of the skin.
- We offer superfast cashouts, if you need to get some money out in a hurry with no messing around.
If you're interested in signing up for an account to give it a go, or would like more info or a more in detail breakdown of the loyalty deal, just drop me an email.
Blogs to read in 2008
Date: Sat, Jan 19, 2008
In no particular order...
One of my fav blogs, Amatay has just gone professional poker fish. Looking forward to reading about his rise to the top, with added SNGays. He's even posting hands now, wtf. Stop browsing the internet and get your ass at the tarbles Jones!
This blog was real inspiration to me and others in the study group when Ken bagged a huge $$ month in December. Working his way up from the low stakes (now playing $1000nl) and using study groups and loads of analysis Ken's blog is always a great read for motivation. Check out some of his free videos, they're great. Loads of awesome hand analysis too, will need to post more replies to hands.
Professional SNG/Omaha/NL/MTT/horseys player from Edinburgh, qualified for EPT Dortmund, GL sir! Loads of MTT trip reports, omaha/nl hands, and interesting sports betting action.
Probably the funniest poker blog around, Daut's humor rocks. Loads of MSPaints, big MTT trip reports, and now doing NL videos for Cardrunners. Currently 20-tabling :o $200nl.
Probably the best poker blog around. Verneer (of CR) puts an incredible amount analysis and thinking into poker. Loads of legendary posts giving different angles to the game. Prediction: Utter crushing of mid-stakes this year, crushing of high stakes next year. Verneer has also done some fantastic free videos, the $100nl 4 and 6-tabling ones in particular are better than most of the low limit videos on CR.
This is the blog CTS started when he was building his roll in $100nl. It's pretty amazing to read his rise from small stakes to nosebleed stakes. His hand and opponent range analysis is pretty amazing, one of the best blogs I've ever read for sure and it's currently changing the way I think about ranges/hands.
Sneaky update
Date: Tue, Jan 15, 2008
Been pretty busy so not had any big updates, lots of stuff I've got planned to post though.
Anyways, on to some news...
It's a pretty cruical time in the office at the moment. My highest priority is to make sure my work is polished up and looking good, this means I'm currently spending quite a lot of time in work. This should slacken up a lot in a few weeks though. Been playing a bunch of 5-a-side footy and squash, this combined with 12 hour working days usually means I'm too tired when to play in the evenings. Not really finding much time at the weekends to play either as I've been out a lot, playing a lot live though!
Friday night game
Speaking of live, played in Andy's weekly home game on Friday night. Think we got about 10 for the STT, which I bust out of pretty early. Then played some low limit NL cash while the tourney finished up, and built up a decent stack of £££s... which I promptly donated to Ed at Omaha Hi/Lo. Fairly standard!
Played a bunch of mixed games inc Razz, 7 card stud Hi, 2-7 triple draw, etc. It's fun to losing $$$ at/learning new games. After this was probably the loosest most mental NL cash game I've ever played in, with at one point the blinds being straddled/re-straddled right the way around to the button lol. Which begs the question, can you straddle from the small blind?!
Officepoker
Gonna try to play in as many OfficePoker tourneys as possible this year, they're great live practise as the play is pretty good. Got sat next to Jas on the first table which was fun, until he got 3 outered, doh! Anyways, I wondered if I've be able to play my A game after the previous higher buy-in tourney. But as Jas pointed out it's not about the buy-ins, it's about improving, and sure enough I think I played my absolute A game on Saturday. I found myself reading players exact hole cards in a few spots, and really felt like I had great reads on all of the tables I was at.
Anyways, I FT'd (55ish runners I think). Had an average stack on the FT, but because the bubble went on so long my stack was only 12BBs. MP opens for standard raise, I ship JJ from the BTN, she calls with AQ, flops an A and I bust in 10th. Weh. Great tourney as usual, people there are always really nice, much better play and atmosphere than regular casino tourneys. Cheers again Neil.
Played an 600 hand session shortly after my downswing post, and absolutely crushed playing 25/22 and finishing up a buy-in. 2,500 hands played this month so far. Need to get a lot in, I'm sure the opportunities will come up to blitz some soon.
My blog traffic seems to be increasing, which is cool as it means more people are interested in whatever I'm posting (or are waiting to see me go busto?) ;). Thanks to everyone reading and especially leaving comments, it's great to get advice/feedback/ideas/whatever. Cheers dudes.
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