March & Gold Medal Hockey Game

Well February is in the books for me, I know there is one more day left, however the Gold Medal Hockey game between Canada and the USA is Sunday at noon, so I will be watching that and hopefully celebrating after. Canada has a better team and should win but the US has been the most consistent during these Olympics. My prediction, Canada 5 USA 3.

Canada right now as a nation has tied the record for most Gold Medals in a Winter Olympics at 13, tying Russia & Norway, but can set the record with a Gold Medal in Hockey tomorrow.

The Olympics has been great for the city on Vancouver, but I am definitely ready for them to be over. I'm sure the city will be pretty quiet for the next month trying to recoup from the festivities. A lot of great stories have been told and made at these games and has put Vancouver on the map, that's for sure.

Back to poker. Now this being my first month (half month really) of playing full time has been frustrating, but was a great learning experience. I was a Full Tilt player for a long time, normally splitting 70% Tilt and 30% Stars during a night session, but switched over to PokerStars this month exclusively to focus solely on the 180 mans and get those mastered.

Now the 180's didn't turn out how I would have liked, but I am getting better and better everyday. Here are my February results from start date Feb 7 to Feb 26.

Games Played: 1070
Net Won: $1,300.83
Total ROI: 11%
$/ Tournament: $1.22
Days Played: 14
$/ Day: $92.92
Total Hours Put In: 84
Total Hourly Rate: $15.49

Here is a shot of PT3 Graph (Numbers I record slightly differ from the PT numbers) .



As you can see I was break even for just under 1000 games, so for those of you who are complaining about "running bad" after a day or 200 games, Suck it up! Stop complaining and put in more volume, that's the secret!

Now there is some new blood joining our coaching program for March, I have four new students that I picked in a draft system with the other coaches. And I also might have a possible personal contact that I might add depending if he is able to agree to the requirements I lay out.

The first couple months of the training program have been more trial & error, but with the new students there will be more strict rules and goals that need to be achieved to continue with the program. We expect each new student to play at least 1000 games a month, that is our main concern. We want to see commitment and it should help push the current students as well.

I am Extremely happy to announce that two of my students Vertek & Chip210 are going to be taking on a few students themselves this month. They have crushed the $2 180's, and are doing extremely well at the $12's. Vertek is closing in on $10k for the year already and Chip210 has made over $5k as well. They are going to be working together with their students which I think is a great idea and they are going to become great teachers.

The rest of the students are doing great as well.
All but one are winners this month, quick shout out to Ryan whose has tripled his profit from January so far and putting in over 1,200 games, and to Matt, Mark & Ruddy for getting in good volume. It's all about volume and you will not succeed at online poker without putting in a ton of volume. Make it a great last day of the month boys.

Also glad to see Bill ramping up the aggression and Craig for sticking with it, continually learning. Daniel, doing well, just need to put in more volume.

Now March goals for myself.
I am planning on playing 2500+ games in March and maintain a 25%+ ROI. Now that I am playing full time, I feel this is more than realistic and I am not setting a dollar goal as results don't matter and as long as the volume is put in the money will be made.

I am going to end it here as this post has become very long...
See you at the tables.

February Results & Olympic Craziness

Well, February has been a little frustrating so far, however I know I am playing some of the best poker I have ever played. My results don't show it, but results don't matter and it is just about getting the volume in.

I have found myself start seeing more spots I can take advantage of, abusing the bubble, playing people against each other as the chip leader at the final table, robbing the regulars (as I'm pretty sure they don't know who I am yet) and just playing well. I have found a few regulars calling me pretty light, so I make a note and make that adjustment for next time.

It's been a while since I have sat in the winners circle, been runner up/ third a bunch and a ton of final tables, but haven't taken a first in a while, but it's coming and will come in bunches.

I took Saturday & Sunday off last week to go downtown Vancouver to take in the Olympic experience and the city is just nuts! Craziness everywhere, nothing bad, everyone has a great attitude, no shortage of high fives, people with "free hugs" signs, spontaneous singing of the National Anthem and a lot of drinking, lol. The German house ran out of beer! Apparently Vancouver has consumed more alcohol this Olympics than the last two combined, but hey, it's what we know how to do.

Have put in 932 games so far, and will be grinding the rest of the month hard putting in at least 100 180 man games a day. Like a student of mine "Vertek" said, "I'm going to eat variance and shit $$$".

See you at the tables.

PS: Students are doing awesome, keep pushing guys and just get your volume in, don't focus on results. I was heads up for a $12 180 man last week against Vertek, he took it down, well done sir, and had another student "Fried Liver" join me at the final table of a $12 180 as well a couple days ago. It's great to see the progress everyone is making and looking to take it to the next level.

Canada's First Gold Medal on Home Soil!

Here's another Olympic and non poker post, but history was set here at Cypress Mountain in Vancouver today.

34 years and 500 athletes later, Alexandre Bilodeau has won Canada's first Gold Medal on Canadian soil during his run in the Men's Moguls today!

A nice relief for all Canadians as it has happened within the first 48 hours of the games. Jennifer Heil was the favourite to get Canada's first Gold during the Women's Moguls, but came up just short taking the Silver. USA's Hannah Kearney won the Gold and had a spectacular Mogul run.

This no doubtingly will spark the Canadian Athletes and there will be plenty more Gold Medals awarded to Canadians during this Olympics.

You can read about it here if you like Alexandre Bilodeau.

Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics

So the 2010 Winter Olympics are in my hometown, and it is a little crazy here. Just finished watching the opening ceremonies which were pretty good, nothing mind blowing but well put together, and the "Great One" Wayne Gretzky, great hockey player to ever live (in my opinion) lit the torch which made sense as I could only think of a couple others who would deserve that honour, my other candidate, I would have liked to see Michael J. Fox.

I will not be attending any live events, would really only like to see the short track speed skating or any hockey game, but the ticket prices for those are ridiculous, so I will be watching them from home in HD.

Here is what I am looking forward to:

- Ski Jumping
- Speed Skating especially Short Track
- Luge (my condolences go out to the family of Norad Kumaritashvili who died during a training run today)
- Snowboarding
- Skeleton
- Bobsleigh
- Hockey (Obviously)

I'm sure I missed something but these are the main events I am looking forward to.

Vancouver is a beautiful city and I'm glad it gets to be seen on the worlds stage, if you have never been, you should plan a visit.

New Experiences and a One Sided Prop Bet

So I have been playing on my new setup now since Sunday and I finally feel I am getting comfortable with the different software that is running while I play.

Table Ninja for anyone who isn't using it on Stars is CRAZY! I don't know how I was playing without it, one click/ button responses is awesome, no more misclicks while I play and the "on screen BB display" is the NUTS. Table Ninja is highly recommended by Johnnyhilldo.

I also have PokerTracker 3 running at the same time and while some players like to play without it, I actually really enjoy having it available, helps me identify the fish from the sharks, plus other valuable information. I have also downloaded a mod from Raven at TiltBuster that has a very simple design and allows you to see the colour coding that you assign players, really awesome for only $20, you can check it out here Raven-TiltBuster.

So today was a pretty good day, took a 2nd in a $36 180, a first and a second in a $12 180 and some other final table cashes. I feel that I am starting to play my A+ game and solely focusing on the 180's on Stars really helps me focus on one game and really master it. Going to focus on putting in at least 8 hours a day, playing 100 games a day and maintain around a 20% ROI. I feel this is achievable and for March I really want to push myself to get as many games in as possible.

Now for my one sided prop bet I made today, I was talking with Nick Rainey and letting him know that I am coming out of my downswing and his comment back was "don't worry about results until end of month, that's your biggest nemesis, how often do you hear me talking about downswings?"

So I made a proposal to him, if I mention a downswing either in my blog or to him personally, I have to pay him $50, so this will get my head out of my ass and focus on the positive and long term results. (The mentioning of a downswing in this post does not count towards the bet, just for clarification, lol)

Now not to focus on short term results, but here is a snap shot of my day, I think one of my biggest on Stars to date:

See you at the tables!

New Poker Setup

Alright, new setup in place, very excited about this!

Just in the process of downloading all appropriate software that I mentioned in the previous post.

So here is a quick look of what I was working with:



And now here is my new setup:



As you can see this is a drastic change from my MackBook Pro Laptop.

The monitors are two Samsung 24" Widescreen LCD Monitors, Logitech wireless keyboard, mouse and speakers, and the tower was custom made just for my poker needs.

Once all software is downloaded I am ready to grind, don't think I'll be playing tonight, going to be testing out the software with play money first and grind all day tomorrow.

It;s going to be a gooooood month, I can already tell.

No More Day Job!

It hasn't really sunk in yet, but I have just worked my last day at my job.

I am now a full time grinder and I cannot tell you how happy this makes me. I spent most of the day getting all the components for my new setup. I will be picking up my custom made computer (just for poker) as I love my MacBook Pro and will continue to use that for everyday use, but a Windows computer was necessary as most software companies do not create "Mac Friendly" programs and I'll pick up my desk from Ikea tomorrow.

So new custom cpu with Windows 7, two 24" Samsung Monitors, wireless keyboard & mouse... ability to crush the tables at will, priceless!

I will be purchasing TableNinja for Stars, FTP Shortcuts for Tilt, PokerTracker 3 and some mods from Tiltbusters for now. I am an "old school" online poker player manually uploading/closing my tables so it will be nice to have a program doing all this for me and allow me to putting 110% focus on the tables.

Going to be getting a massage tomorrow to get totally relaxed in the afternoon and will get grinding Saturday evening. I am going to focus strictly on the Stars $12-$36 180 mans, and the Tilt $75 45's & $52 90 mans, maybe a MTT here and there but 99% of my games in the next couple months with be MTT SNG's. Also, only playing one site at a time, not playing both together to maintain full focus.

I will put a photo up of my new setup once it is finished, I'll show you what I was working with, and then my new setup.

I am going to be one of the best MTT SNG players online so If you don't know who I am, you will soon, look out for Johnnyhilldo!

January Results & Sunday Variance

Well, I didn't finish January the way I would have hoped, but was still a good month overall..

I played 1299 games, with a profit of $6005.35 between Full Tilt & Stars, not including rakeback. Profit per game across the board was $4.62 with an hourly rate of $52.79 after putting in 114 hours.

All profit was from Tilt as I ran almost exactly break even with the $12 & $36 180 mans on Stars after 671 games. It's not unusual to run break even after even 1000 games, so I'm just focusing on putting in the volume and the results will follow.

Sunday was a frustrating day. When I re raise a guy pre flop with AA and he calls the raise with Q8 suited, you know the games are juicy, however the short term variance can hurt you as they will suck out their fair share. I would book these guys everyday if I could, but sometime you are going to run bad against them, and that's just life, move on.

February should be fun as I will be leaving my full time job as of Feb 5 and will become a full time SNG MTT player. This is very exciting for me as I will be able to immure myself into the poker world and can focus on my game as well as spend more time coaching my students to take them to the next level.

Speaking of students, I'll give you guys a quick update.
9 Students
5 Students played over 1000 games.
Average ROI - 28%
Playing $2 - $12 180 mans on Stars.

All but one had a profitable month, great job guys, February will be even better!

I was talking with Nick Rainey about his coaching program. I told him I feel he has the best system out there as it focuses on working with a student long term to ensure their success, not some weekend bootcamp that you pay a lot of money for and hope you soak in as much as you can.

We definitely have something special here and like I have said before, I am honoured to be a part of his coaching program. There is no better feeling that helping someone succeed!

I also have some exciting news that I will share soon, going to be part of something big.

Ok, put in a 12 hour session, very tired, going to bed...