Tourny Woes and Cash Leak continues..

Hey All,

So yesterday, I tried to unregister myself from a $8.80 Pokerstars tourny 2 mins before it started, only to realise that Stars have a rule that you cannot de-register 2 mins before the commencement of a tourny... so before i knew it, the field grew to 2121 in a $40k guaranteed rebuy tourny. I generally don't like to play these huge field tournies. Usually it's such a drag to sit for 6 or 7 hours and bust out in 10 to 20th place, for like $100 dollars profit. I think that's a load of shit. But i think playing a rebuy tourny does bring a bit more value in the final 20, although the real value is definitely final tabling, so i'm not thaaat averse to the odd large field tournament.

First hand, AA. I doubled up in chips. Then about 4 hours later. I counted that i had only won about 15 or 16 hands, of about 200? I was playing super tight, and sitting around the top 100. (At one stage in this tourny i was sitting 14th!!!) Anyhow, there's me thinking clearly through each decision.

I get AQo, I raise preflop. I get re-raised all in. Guy has me covered. I call. He flips over AQo. Split pot! Good call!

Little later, blinds are $1000/$2000. I get AKo on the button. Nobody in the pot before me. I raise to $7000 total (over 3XBB), the big stack on the BB thinks i'm making a steal (although i've been playing super tight and have only taken part in approx 3 of the past 20 hands) and re-raises me all-in. He has me covered. I tank..... and then.... I call. He flips over AJo. I am ahead. FLOP 3K10 rainbow. My opponent will win this hand 13.48% of the time. Turn card, a f#*@ ing QUEEN. Game over. Out in 169th. I took no rebuys. I did take the add-on. I'm not upset with my play. I clearly made the right decision. I clearly played it correctly. I'm so upset that he hit his straight. It's such a disgusting thing to happen. It's not the first time, and the frequency of the occurance really hurts me deeply inside. The first prize was approx $8,600 dollars. I was really keen on that! The other players at the table screamt Noooooo! They were supporting me, because i was making all sorts of chirps about the previous hands in play. One in particular where i told the table i didnt think the initial opener would call another players all-in because the initial player opened to 4999 chips, which i told the table i read as weak because it looked like it tried to appear strong, but was in fact weak. The table like my antics in general.

At the same time I was playing a PLO8 Tourny. I was fighting for survival practically the entire tourny. Managed to make another final table, albeit out first with the first semi-decent hand i got A25J rainbow... board came high only and missed me naturally. So 9th out of 105 there.

Will play some more tournies today when i get home from work.

Currently i've spotted one of my major leaks. That leak is 'cash game', so i'm laying low of cash games for a while. I've gone through a not so nice run lately, coupled with tilt and loss of concentration and making silly mistakes and what not... and i'm slowly losing my discipline on the cash game front (PLO8)... so i've decided to give the cash game thing a rest until i can comfortably build my roll back up playing tournies. If i'm limited for time i will do the SNG thing, but for now, cash game is going to have to take a rest.

I'm also dropping in stakes to give myself a bit more of an edge on the tourny front. Whilst i was keen to play $10 dollars and up tournies... I will now put a max limit on the $33PLO8 tourny only.. otherwise for NLHE tournies i'll have a max limit somewhere in the $Twenties, and anything above $6 will do.

The hardest part of keeping this together is finding the time to play tournies. It means i will probably be cutting down on poker, from 5 days a week to max 3 days a week. And even then... maybe only one or max two of those days will be used for tournaments and the other for SNG's. The limitation of time is real limiting factor, but we'll just have to see how it goes.

That's me for now...
Fin