One month has already gone by since I started my new challenge! I feel determined to play some solid Poker and to use my bankroll wisely but I still need to try to make a particular effort to pick the time of the day that suits me best. There is obviously a few reasons for that.
This, of course, does not mean that I have been spending the month looking for good spots and dining with my girlfriend. There has been quite some playing and there has been some good old swinging too! I initially planned to play at least 10.000 hands of cash game per month during this challenge. I don't know whether I will be able to keep up that pace throughout the whole thing but I think it is a good goal to put together some decent volume and to try to reach something like 100.000 hands at the end of the challenge in June 2015. This first month, I have managed to reach the 11.000 hand milestone, 11.049 to be precise. click on image for full size
The beginning of the challenge has been quite harsh though as I started with losing around 15% of my bankroll over the first 500 hands. Thank you PLO! We love you! Really! :) Since then, all I have been doing for the rest of the month, is grinding my way up again in grand Omaha and NLHE Zoom (or 4-tabling) tradition: up and down and up... and down... Every time I seemed to take off a little bit, a series of weird encounters or silly plays of mine occurred, sending my graph down a couple of buy-ins again. At the end of this first month, I am down €27.67 in cash games. This is the result of 76 sessions played in 20 days at stakes ranging from NL/PLO2 to NL/PLO30. MTTs and SNGs are games I would like to focus a lot on as they tend to be good bankroll boosters if you are lucky and talented enough to make big hits. So far I have played 327 tournaments (turbo MTTs, regular MTTs & hyper SNGs). Buy-ins have been ranging from €1 to €10 playing €1-3 hyper SNGs and €3-10 MTTs. On September 18th, after being stuck around ±0 for 209 tourneys, I managed to finish 5th/230 in a €5 6max tourney and I also almost made a second final table the same day busting 10th/237 in another €3 full ring game. I could have done better in the €5 6max but I came in a bit short at the final table and busted in a very standard way where I min-raise on the button with JJ just short of 15bb (drawing dead preflop actually :p ). I then call an all-in from Mister Second-in-Chips, uAREaDEADlol, who I have no other info about than the 37 hands played together on this final table. He ends up holding A9o. A on the flop. Auf Wiedersehn! click on image for full size
Being up €130 at that point, I decided to take some €10 tournament shots besides the €3-5 games and I played more €2-3 SNGs along with the €1 ones. Today, I am down again from +€130 to +€21 some 120 tournaments later. So back to the grind! I don't believe it's interesting to religiously grind one's way up from limit to limit in online micros as fields are big, swings are huge and skill is not necessarily rewarded if you consider the ridiculous rake you pay in low cash games. My belief is that, below buy-ins of €25-50, it is preferable to move up based on the bankroll rather than considering the win rate only. Based on the surreal rake, I got the feeling that the volume needed to identify the true win rate will make me pay way too much to the Poker room. Even with good rake back promotions, I feel like chances are, I will be playing micros for a veeeery long time before I can move up. I consider that it is worth a (not so wise) shot to move up as fast as I can using kinda aggressive bankroll management. Once I hit the €25-50 buy-in limits, I think it is definitely worth to focus on one's win rate again more seriously before moving up further because I consider those fields hard to master in tournaments. In cash games, I always find myself playing against good regs from NL50/PLO20 on. Below, it is not uncommon to still find plenty of 70/10 artists. click on image for full size
All in all, my starting bankroll of €500 is now €494.56. That's a loss of €5.44 over 11.049 cash game hands, 327 tournaments and more than €1.000 invested. I am really not feeling bad about this result but it is not like I am going to be bragging for days and weeks. 'It's not enough', as my brother loves to claim quoting George Young interpreted by Johnny Depp in one of our favorite movies, Blow. It is indeed not enough to make this solidarity challenge something that can remotely be called 'a success' but my gut feeling is good regarding the quality of my game and of my mindset.
As I know I might not be able to play as much this coming month, I am planning to play more satellites during the next weeks. I will be away from home quite a bit during october, mainly for Poker live coverages of the WPT Brussels, the Winamax Poker Tour launch in Paris and the Namur Oktoberfest. It's always more difficult for me to play some volume while I am not at home (home, sweet home). As a result, I might play less €3-5 MTTs and compensate with some €2-5 SATS potentially giving me access to some €10-50 tournaments with smaller fields and bigger top payouts . I will not buy-in tourneys >€5 though before my bankroll reaches €600 again. Hyper SNGs will still be on the menu of course as they are short games and I am also still planning to reach the 10.000 cash game hand milestone during October trying to take advantage of the periods I will be at home to play longer multi-table and zoom sessions. Looking forward to it! Thanks for your attention if you made until here! Don't hesitate to send me some feedback, some advice, some love... or some money if you care. Actually, if you really were about to send some money, I would rather suggest you to send it to the A.P.E.M.H. Foundation VIA THIS LINK. Take care and run good at the tables! Damian
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The A.P.E.M.H. (Association des Parents d'Enfants Mentalement Handicapés) is a 1967 established association of parents with disabled children. It was amongst the first structures to offer complete day care for disabled persons in Luxembourg and evolves today as the A.P.E.M.H. Foundation with multiple day and night care centres accross the country since 1985. A.P.E.M.H. structures are meant for every person with a minor or severe disability. The aims are to provide good living, education and social integration conditions for the persons with disabilities but also help and consultancy for the families around them. I will start a long bankroll challenge on September 1st, 2014 starting with an initial roll of 500€. The challenge will last until June 2015 when the Centre Nossbierg (Esch/Alzette) will be celbrating their SUMMERFEST (summer party). Terms of the challenge: [-] no min./max. hand volume [-] 30% of net profit will be donated to take part to the financing of the 2015 Centre Nossbierg Summerfest [-] minimum donation: 200€ Archives
February 2015
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