Cash challenge and diary- £100 into £1000- USING BRM!!

DeucesLive

So. The quite excellent thread by Trebor got me to thinking- why haven't I done something about this? When I play well, I'm a decent player. Wouldn't say I'm excellent by any means, but I know what I'm doing, can read plays quite well and am very quick with mathematics. Problem is, when I lose I tilt, REALLY bad. Even though I think I'm controlling it, I'm not- my game gets over wild, I start trying to bluff the muppets that tilt me so bad and get more irate when I can't. Before I know it, that coupled with a total inability to do the logical thing and move down in level has seen my roll I've worked hard to build smashed down to around £50 again, and it's start over time.

No more.

This is something I could do myself, but when you do something yourself- it's a lot easier to lie to yourself, and be less vigilant. By sharing my aim with the community, I share my failure too- and I hate failing. Like, really hate it. I'm really motivated when I set myself a challenge, so here goes.

The plan-

£100 starting roll- play NL4 until doubled. The tedium of playing NL4 and the level of self control needed will, hopefully, go a long way to sorting out my discipline. It's also quite tough to go bust on NL4, but because I can't move down any further, I want a fairly substantial roll to start it off, hence 25 buyins instead of 20. I don't want to reload at any point here.

At £200, play NL10 till £400, then NL20 till £600, NL30 till £800, NL40 until goal. All going according to plan, I'll finish at NL50, which I will try and beat (I know I can beat 20+30 if I play my best)- if it proves too challenging, drop back down and enjoy myself, taking the odd shot.

I'm aiming to average 2 hours a day of solid cash, playing 4 tables. I'll play satellites to vegas/GUKPT/SPT events out of my own money rather than my roll, and allow myself £20 of roll to play Primo satellites on a sunday. All other tournaments will be eliminated, since I don't take them quite seriously enough and end up busting a fairly substantial portion of my bankroll.

My aim is to make 2 buyins per day average at whatever level I'm playing at. If at any point I lose 2 buyins in a single session, I will leave the tables for at least an hour- as I'm playing in the evenings mostly, that'll mean logging off for the night. On weekends, I may reconsider after cooling off for a while. Hopefully this will help eliminate some more tilt and attempts to chase losses.

I'll post the 3 most significant wins and losses from each session, mostly for myself to get a realistic idea of if I'm making my money through good play and betting, or through coolers, and the same for how I'm losing money. Any advice on hands particularly though would be gratefully received.

I know this isn't the first cash diary up here, so if you're totally uninterested in reading it- sorry! Move along! But I'm hoping this will be a good kickstart to fixing my problems on the tables. Got the GUKPT final to look forward to tonight, so I'll be on the tables shortly to get my challenge started! Go easy on me if you see me there

JBuss

Great read and Good luck.

Im hoping to deploy a similar strategy play small stakes DYM

Jonathan

Patching99

Good luck Deuces, you give a lot of well thought out of advice in the clinic so I'm sure you will get no end of help on here.  My tip for 4NL is stay off my tables!

68Trebor

 Good luck. Just a couple of pieces of advice.

 Firstly, don't set targets on how many buy ins to win per session. You can play your absolute A game and still end up losing. It is about doing the right thing and this will eventually get you to your goal.

 I would suggest you need to include your mtt and sng play as without this you will not being giving a true reflection of whether you are winning / losing. This helped me enormously and really highlighted that I am not a very good mtt player, although I still believe I am, lol.

 Key is keep the thread going once you start, look forward to reading your exploits.

MP33

Wd on getting to GUKPT final

I,ve found at NL4 its easier to tilt as your most likely to suffer bad beats than the higher levels as the standard isn,t as good and your more likely to get it in , in front , but if you can not let it get to you as it can be so frustaring at times with fish getting lucky time and again

the thing thats helped me most is BRM and as long as you stick within your limits you should be fine

i only make small amounts of money on here,(not enough to make a living from)  but its  consistent and does  wonders for your confidence. The idea is not to get carried away and to stick within your BR at all times

i know a lot of the big stakes players have moved up through the levels to get where they are today, but I personally like dohhhs strategy. He,s found a level he,s comfortable at and sticks to that level and his results speak for themselves

GL and look  forward to reading your progress on this thread

Paul   

edit : Like trebor , I also don,t set myself targets - The only tarets i set myself is the amount of sessions and time I play for and to try and not go over that, which is harder than you think smetimes 

unknown_username

Should be interesting. Keep it going.

Again, dont set targets per session. Sometimes its just not your day and if you start chasing to try and hit your daily/weekly targets you could end up in trouble.

I found when i first started that looking back at hand history or posting on the clinic really really helped out. Just ensure you are happy with the decisions you made throughout the session, that is the only target you should set yourself, the money will follow. After reading your posts over the last few months on here, you should kill it!! Good luck.

pod1

i would start at nl10, you know you would crush it here ,even with 10bis it would save you sooo much headache  phil

CrazyBen23

In Response to Re: Cash challenge and diary- £100 into £1000- USING BRM!!:

i would start at nl10, you know you would crush it here ,even with 10bis it would save you sooo much headache  phil
Posted by pod1

+1. If your a good player dont waste your time messing around at 4nl cos that will prolly make you tilt quite easy

DeucesLive

Starting Bankroll- £100Total Session Profit- £3.18
Ending Bankroll- £103.18
Session hands played- 524
Total hands played- 524

Cheers for the support all do appreciate it. The reason I'm starting at NL4 specifically is to teach myself the discipline- it's almost like a self punishment. If I can't crush NL4, then I have no business moving up the levels- and it should teach me to tighten my game, be patient and not play stupid hands.

Ended up busting in the GUKPT final, 3 major hands contributed- the first by far the worst;

PlayerActionCardsAmountPotBalance rosjim1 Small blind   15.00 15.00 3955.00 aussie09 Big blind   30.00 45.00 4015.00   Your hole cards Q K       glencoelad Raise   90.00 135.00 3910.00 RUNITSRANN Fold         DeucesLive Call   90.00 225.00 3910.00 HANSON Fold         rosjim1 Fold         aussie09 Fold         Flop     9 5 3       glencoelad Bet   225.00 450.00 3685.00 DeucesLive Call   225.00 675.00 3685.00 Turn     8       glencoelad Bet   337.50 1012.50 3347.50 DeucesLive Raise   840.00 1852.50 2845.00 glencoelad Call   502.50 2355.00 2845.00 River     9       glencoelad Bet   960.00 3315.00 1885.00 DeucesLive Call   960.00 4275.00 1885.00 glencoelad Show 9 9       DeucesLive Muck Q K       glencoelad Win Four 9s 4275.00   6160.00

Thankfully, read the danger signs (it was second hand!) and managed to get away relatively cheaply- tried to trap him on the flop, obviously no idea he was that strong- the bet was quite quick, so I figured it was just a c-bet and wanted another street. The call on the turn from the raise suggested a set, so the board pairup was about as ugly as it got- but no way I could fold in case he was on a busted draw or weaker flush. Don't think I could have got away from this any cheaper.

Was always uphill from there, ended up jamming with 910s, called by AQ and doubled through there- then got KK soon afterwards, and blew half my stack after flopping a set of kings, only for opponent to turn a flush. Thankfully didn't go broke at least. But went out with KQ against JJ final hand, hit the queen too- but J rivered. Such is poker ^^

On the cash tables, I played like a total plonker for the first hour or so, and was feeling my way into how NL4 plays- very peculiar. Was down a couple buyins, and already broke my rule about giving up after losing 2 buyins- but I felt I have to get to grips with the level first. Got the measure and thankfully ended up making a marginal profit- think I've got the right feel for it now. Hands to follow.

AcidMan27

Good luck Deuces.

Hopefully you won't stay around too long at my level 10nl.

; )

DeucesLive

Biggest winning hands;

Player	Action	Cards	Amount	Pot	Balance
ianc	Small blind		£0.02	£0.02	£2.21
alcando	Big blind		£0.04	£0.06	£3.85
eziopot	Big blind		£0.04	£0.10	£3.96
	Your hole cards	Q K
eziopot	Check
oregon	Fold
DeucesLive	Raise		£0.20	£0.30	£6.47
onabluff	Fold
ianc	Call		£0.18	£0.48	£2.03
alcando	Fold
eziopot	Call		£0.16	£0.64	£3.80
Flop
		A K 6
ianc	Bet		£0.20	£0.84	£1.83
eziopot	Call		£0.20	£1.04	£3.60
DeucesLive	Call		£0.20	£1.24	£6.27
Turn
		10
ianc	Check
eziopot	Bet		£0.93	£2.17	£2.67
DeucesLive	Call		£0.93	£3.10	£5.34
ianc	Fold
River
		2
eziopot	Bet		£1.55	£4.65	£1.12
DeucesLive	All-in		£5.34	£9.99	£0.00
eziopot	All-in		£1.12	£11.11	£0.00
DeucesLive	Unmatched bet		£2.67	£8.44	£2.67
eziopot	Show	6 K
DeucesLive	Show	Q K
DeucesLive	Win	Flush to the Ace	£7.80		£10.47

Player	Action	Cards	Amount	Pot	Balance
clowbow	Small blind		£0.02	£0.02	£7.84
sully03	Big blind		£0.04	£0.06	£2.67
	Your hole cards	J 10
DeucesLive	Raise		£0.16	£0.22	£3.82
jr87	Call		£0.16	£0.38	£1.55
huvenhagen	Fold
clowbow	Call		£0.14	£0.52	£7.70
sully03	Call		£0.12	£0.64	£2.55
Flop
		9 8 9
clowbow	Check
sully03	Check
DeucesLive	Bet		£0.52	£1.16	£3.30
jr87	Fold
clowbow	Raise		£1.04	£2.20	£6.66
sully03	Call		£1.04	£3.24	£1.51
DeucesLive	Call		£0.52	£3.76	£2.78
Turn
		7
clowbow	Check
sully03	Check
DeucesLive	Bet		£1.52	£5.28	£1.26
clowbow	Call		£1.52	£6.80	£5.14
sully03	All-in		£1.51	£8.31	£0.00
River
		A
clowbow	Check
DeucesLive	All-in		£1.26	£9.57	£0.00
clowbow	Fold
DeucesLive	Unmatched bet		£1.26	£8.31	£1.26
sully03	Show	5 5
DeucesLive	Show	J 10
DeucesLive	Win	Straight to the Jack	£7.68		£8.94

Player	Action	Cards	Amount	Pot	Balance
EGANRFC	Small blind		£0.02	£0.02	£6.27
DeucesLive	Big blind		£0.04	£0.06	£10.32
	Your hole cards	A A
jackol	Call		£0.04	£0.10	£2.26
oynutter	Fold
Littlesis	Fold
EGANRFC	All-in		£6.27	£6.37	£0.00
DeucesLive	Call		£6.25	£12.62	£4.07
jackol	Fold
EGANRFC	Show	Q Q
DeucesLive	Show	A A
Flop
		4 10 7
Turn
		9
River
		10
DeucesLive	Win	Two Pairs, Aces and 10s	£11.67		£15.74

Biggest losing pots:

Player	Action	Cards	Amount	Pot	Balance
DeucesLive	Small blind		£0.02	£0.02	£15.71
jackol	Big blind		£0.04	£0.06	£2.56
	Your hole cards	Q Q
oynutter	Raise		£0.12	£0.18	£0.80
SilverF1sh	Fold
Littlesis	Call		£0.12	£0.30	£1.18
mickweed23	Call		£0.12	£0.42	£2.96
DeucesLive	Raise		£0.42	£0.84	£15.29
jackol	Fold
oynutter	Fold
Littlesis	Call		£0.32	£1.16	£0.86
mickweed23	Call		£0.32	£1.48	£2.64
Flop
		7 5 8
DeucesLive	Bet		£1.04	£2.52	£14.25
Littlesis	All-in		£0.86	£3.38	£0.00
mickweed23	Call		£1.04	£4.42	£1.60
Turn
		K
DeucesLive	Bet		£2.24	£6.66	£12.01
mickweed23	All-in		£1.60	£8.26	£0.00
DeucesLive	Unmatched bet		£0.64	£7.62	£12.65
DeucesLive	Show	Q Q
Littlesis	Show	10 10
mickweed23	Show	K 9
River
		J
mickweed23	Win	Pair of Kings	£7.04		£7.04

Player	Action	Cards	Amount	Pot	Balance
peachy_c	Small blind		£0.02	£0.02	£2.60
huvenhagen	Big blind		£0.04	£0.06	£3.96
	Your hole cards	J K
clowbow	Call		£0.04	£0.10	£3.07
sully03	Call		£0.04	£0.14	£4.12
DeucesLive	Raise		£0.20	£0.34	£7.03
Ace_Jed	Fold
peachy_c	Fold
huvenhagen	Fold
clowbow	Raise		£0.32	£0.66	£2.75
sully03	Fold
DeucesLive	Call		£0.16	£0.82	£6.87
Flop
		K 8 9
clowbow	Check
DeucesLive	Bet		£0.60	£1.42	£6.27
clowbow	Raise		£1.20	£2.62	£1.55
DeucesLive	Raise		£2.60	£5.22	£3.67
clowbow	All-in		£1.55	£6.77	£0.00
DeucesLive	Unmatched bet		£0.45	£6.32	£4.12
clowbow	Show	A A
DeucesLive	Show	J K
Turn
		6
River
		Q
clowbow	Win	Pair of Aces	£5.84		£5.84

Player	Action	Cards	Amount	Pot	Balance
crimsnking	Small blind		£0.02	£0.02	£0.67
alcando	Big blind		£0.04	£0.06	£4.05
	Your hole cards	K A
hedley07	Call		£0.04	£0.10	£4.34
oregon	Call		£0.04	£0.14	£3.21
DeucesLive	Raise		£0.20	£0.34	£4.53
onabluff	Fold
crimsnking	Call		£0.18	£0.52	£0.49
alcando	Fold
hedley07	Call		£0.16	£0.68	£4.18
oregon	Fold
Flop
		2 5 Q
crimsnking	Check
hedley07	Bet		£0.68	£1.36	£3.50
DeucesLive	Raise		£2.32	£3.68	£2.21
crimsnking	Fold
hedley07	Call		£1.64	£5.32	£1.86
Turn
		8
hedley07	Check
DeucesLive	All-in		£2.21	£7.53	£0.00
hedley07	All-in		£1.86	£9.39	£0.00
DeucesLive	Unmatched bet		£0.35	£9.04	£0.35
hedley07	Show	Q 2
DeucesLive	Show	K A
River
		6
hedley07	Win	Two Pairs, Queens and 2s	£8.36		£8.36

Notes on the hands- AA was an absolute gift, lol. KQ hand I got lucky on of course, but at NL4 I'd play it the same way again, expecting my kings to be good fairly often. The J10 hand is the most interesting- I was going to fold to the first bet, figuring my implied odds weren't good enough, but when the second person came along I decided the odds were good enough to get involved. I've realised that with draws, there's no such thing as fold equity at this level- so I went the conservative route. Lucky turn and no need to make any further decisions.

KJ hand is standard as, had seen the villain do the same thing with 3rd pair so just unlucky they had aces, would do the same. The AK hand I think was spewy, was early in the session (see above re: fold equity+draws), so learnt from that. QQ was just a bit of a cooler, knew my hand was almost definitely good and by the time it wasn't, I think it was too far gone to be folding now. Obviously I was very concerned about the king but no way I can fold now- he can just as easily have any number of random hands I'm crushing.

Not quite the 2 buyin profit I was hoping for, but I'm confident I've got the measure of this now. (by the way, this is intended as an average profit- not something I HAVE to get every session. Some sessions I'll end up down, but hopefully I'll be getting 6/7/8 buyin days too- as long as it evens out to around 2 per session I'll be happy).

Time for bed. Fun times! ^^

LOL_RAISE

shove turn with that JT hand

YOUNG_GUN

Best of luck deuces, look forward to a couple of weeks when your takings buy ins of me

You got a good game so looks pretty easy if you stick to it

TINTIN

a few words from myself as ive been on the NL4 tables quite a lot recently. if you have done ok on higher level tables then certain plays are lost on this level. Its quite astonishing what people play, i wouldnt stay to long at this level with that starting roll as it may bring some bad habits into your game, im talking about all the limp limp limp min bet min bet min bet carry on, it plays on the mind

pryce6

Definitely start at nl4 and stay there until you have doubled your roll. GL.

GaryQQQ

This thread is a great read, good luck.

You sound highly motivated, if you can maintain that discipline and stick rigidly to your BRM rules I'm confident success will be yours.

scotty77

Played with you a bit now and then.  you should def be able to achieve this.  good luck and keep updating the thread!

shaun09

I got £10 from Sky poker for my birthday, Iv not got that into £850 just by playing cash
i got that £10 on the 20th april so it can be done

DeucesLive

Starting Bankroll- £103.18

Total Session Profit- £0
Ending Bankroll- £103.18
Session hands played- 0
Total hands played- 0

... wait. My numbers didn't change?

Unfortunately, had the longest day ever today, so no time for teh pokerz major suckage. But, just to show I'm still alive and not bottled it before day 1's even cold in the ground, I'll post something up at least! Here's something you always wanted- an insight into my exciting life. Yayyyyy ^^

So, my day. I work as a labourer currently, and digging a base for a patio. Great fun, especially when previous owners leave you presents to excavate, such as 4 foot square metal water tanks. REALLY great fun, I kid you not. >.<

I dug for a while. A long while. Then, as I was pulling up some slabs to make some more room, I came across some funny shaped worms. Now, I'm not always the sharpest knife in the drawer but something made me think that worms with arms and legs isn't something you see every day?

Turns out they were baby mice. About a day old. As I looked at them, the mother nipped out, grabbed one and took it back. Straight under the next slab to be lifted- FML. Or, hers rather. So after all of them had been shifted, I lifted the next slab, uncovering her nest. She scarpered, leaving her poor babies behind.

So being not entirely heartless, I took pity and grabbed the nest, babies and all (5 in total) and dumped them in a shoebox. Cut a nice hole in the side and left it where I last saw the mother- she didn't come for them in an hour though. So I took them home, put them inside a nice fleecy hot water bottle cover and put them on top of a hot water bottle (their little tootsies were cold). Turns out they were hungry little things too, so fed them tiny amounts of warmed milk from a syringe. They liked that.

After doing a little research on mouse care, I discovered 2 things. 1- they are hungry. A lot. 2, they have to be kept warm. This doesn't bode well, since the only safe way of keeping them warm I have is hot water bottle, which goes cold after an hour or so. Looks like my alarm's being set on the hour, every hour for tonight- my reward for having a heart.

Dumped the new family members with my sister and her kids, who absolutely loved them (want to look after them overnight? Yea, that's what I thought) and went to the gym to lift heavy things over my head. Well, not so heavy at the moment anyway, I have a niggling shoulder injury that won't go away. Woe is me. So I look like a bit of a wuss down there nursing my little weights whilst everyone throws around hundreds of kg for fun. JUST YOU WAIT TILL I'M FIT AGAIN. >.<

After that fun, I went to play football (labouring+gym+football in one day? Yes, I am quite mad/stupid, delete as applicable). After a close fought battle, we ended up winning 1-0. I scored the decisive goal, having hit the crossbar 3 times. LEARN TO SHOOT STRAIGHT.

That finished about an hour ago, I came home/showered/sat down to eat my lovely nourishing dinner of beef+vegetables. Om nom nom. But, sadly, this has left my poker playing for today at absolutely zero, and there's no chance of me even attempting to play now. So, with any luck, I'll have time to play a little tomorrow- but with work, a comedy night run by one of my mates (actually really really good, had Brendon Burns down last month off th' telly) and a late night gig to stand in for, I may not get much time. But, at least it'll be eventful.

Thanks again for the support- Pryce, I'm glad you agree on the whole NL4 thing, it's kinda horrifying to play but let's be honest- if I can't consistantly beat a level where people happily jam in with 4th pair, then I have zero business moving up. Blaming bad beats+RNG is simply covering up an inability to adjust and be disciplined, and learning solid ABC poker is my ambition from this- I really, really admire Gliterbabe above all the sky regs for his seemingly permanent profit margin- he may not make quite as much per hour as some others (or maybe he does?) but he seems permanently on the up, and just a great role model for anyone trying to play cash. The high risk, high gamble approach is one I love, but I can't handle the swings that come with it- it just ruins my game. 

That's me done for the night, I've waffled on aimlessly for long enough. My micies are crying out for food again.

MAXALLY

WOW....BLOGS FTW! )

I was nearly filling up then, lol.

DOHHHHHHH

You aren't seriously gonna get up all night to warm them up are you????????????????

Surely they're gonna be warmer in ur house than they wudda been under the patio? So they'll b ok??

And do mice have arms as well as legs??? lol!

DannyMcs

These are always fun reads and this has had some unexpected twists already! Gl mate, don't forget to add 5 meeces to your BR total.

pryce6

I started at nl4 playing cash just before xmas - I knew I could beat the games but that wasn't the point, I wanted to build a roll. I think it's important to actually build a base, should you go straight to nl10/20 there's a strong chance you might have to reload, and that would really dampen your enthusiasm for this little challenge.

Actually seeing your balance rise through hard work and knowing your not just 'spinning up' with a few BIs for each level is really rewarding. Celebrate with a drink when you make your milestones!

scotty77

I'm a massive girl when it comes to animals so make sure to update on the mice plz or take them to the RSPCA!

pryce6

In Response to Re: Cash challenge and diary- £100 into £1000- USING BRM!!:

I'm a massive girl.
Posted by scotty77

+1

MP33

LOL at mice story - Have you tried taking them back again to where you found the mother?

You could leave them there again and see if she,s still around and comes back for them

P

DOHHHHHHH

I'd put the oven on low and leave em in there all night.

AcidMan27

Forget the poker, just keep us updated on the mice.

DeucesLive

Starting Bankroll- £103.18Ending Bankroll- £108.55Starting Mouseroll- 5Ending Mouseroll- 3Total Session Profit- +£5.37, -2Session Hands Played- 234Total Hands Played- 758

The stats tell their own story. A very sad one. Two of the micies have passed on to eat from the cheese in the sky.
 Despite our best efforts, one died during the night (there was one looking a little lifeless during the day, though he perked up a bit- was probably him) and then another one in the middle of the day. Must admit I'm a little gutted by it. But, of the three remaining, at least two seem quite lively and, maybe, have a hope of survival. After reading a lot online I'm not optimistic- seems their chances of survival without their mother are very slim. But, I'll give it my best shot. Right now, if I can even keep one alive- that'll be a success in my book.
Needless to say, between this, work, a comedy night (which was really, really excellent- check out Inder Manocha if you can, fantastic comic) and an impromptu gig (playing old Deep Purple numbers I've never heard before- yay me) I didn't have a great deal of time for poker. I managed to fit an hour or two in 3 tabling, and turned a profit- but I wish I hadn't, because I played like a complete tool. I turned a profit, which is a relief, but I didn't deserve too and sucked out way more than I usually do (in cash at this limit I very, very rarely get my money in behind, and when I do- they're generally epic coolers. This was just horrible, fishlike play which got rewarded by hitting. Embarrassed.com.)
Any profit is a good profit though, and hopefully over the next 3 days I'll have more time to really put some hours in. Not really any standout hands this time round (biggest hand won or lost was £2.22 to me) so not posting up hands this time round. Probably make up for it now when I have some real amount of time dished out. 
I really hope I can keep these mice alive another day at least. I would have uploaded pics but they're too large and I dunno how to resize them cos I'm thick.

pomfrittes

  Good thread m8.  Think you should have a mouse naming Comp. thread .

AcidMan27

If you upload the pics to Imageshack you have some options to resize them.

Or PM me if you like and i'll resize them.