The first two matches however went better, even though I was pretty much card dead through both hands, I was patient and my bubble play seemed to help me get into the money. Once I was in the money I was able to take second place in the first match and first place in the second match. If I can keep this up in my next three matches I will start to add a second table and see how it goes.

Wednesday September 24, 2008
SitNGo Wizard Score: 83/100 (Difficulty Average)
Games Played:6 (2/1/0 >3)

I’ve also made a pretty big life change. Saturday was my last day drinking beer. Not for good mind you, but I need to loose some weight. I’ve given myself a goal. Lose 50 pounds. Drink beer again!

You can follow my diet progress here.

Monday September 22, 2008
SitNGo Wizard Score: 75/100 (Difficulty Average)

** Just a small disclaimer, I have a 7 and 1/2 month old son, who I spend a lot of time with. This usually leaves me with 2 hours or so to play poker or study. **

I played 3 tournaments tonight. First of all I don’t multitable. The way I see it I can’t win consistantly on one table, let alone multiple tables. So getting to my goal of 50 tournaments may take some time. I’m in no hurry.

The first game I played I never really got off the ground. The first hand I played was 21 hands in. Blinds were 30/60 (3rd level). I had 10,J offsuit in the cutoff. I figured it might be a good stealing hand. I raised to 300. And the SB calls me. The flop comes A(D) Q(sp) J(sp). I made a 1/2 pot bet. Giving the SB the right odds to call. (There was the defining moment of the first match for me.) Turn and the River were blanks. He shows Q,10 offsuit for the win. That left me with 12 BB and I never really recovered. I got no hands after that. Blinds are 50/100 I have 885 in chips. On the button I am dealt K6 offsuit. It’s folded to me. I push into two pretty loose players. I get called by the SB with AQ of hearts. Incedentally SNGWiz says what I did there was wrong. I would have had to bet all in to a maniac or Johnny McTight for the push to be correct. I guess I could have waited for a better hand. Out in 7th place.

Tourney 2 gave me some better hands. Hand #4 I am dealt AK offsuit in the cutoff. I raise the early limper and the blinds to 100. Early limper calls. Flop comes 7h, Jsp, 3h (all missing me). I make a pot size continuation bet. Which he calls. 8h is the turn. At this point I was thinking what hands could he have…. um no idea. A flush seems like a long shot, but any pair is possible. He raises all-in. I fold. I tighten up until hand 13 where I get smaked in the face with the deck. AKs (win with the flush high T1,260), very next hand AA (win 2 pair A and 5 T1,430), very next hand JJ I win the blinds, very next hand AKo. Ladies and gentlemen we have a new chipleader. The last two hands I played I was still chip leader. 5 players left. I am dealt 8,7o in the BB. It gets limped to me by my almost equal chipstack UTG and I just call. Flop is 10,8,3. I check.  Ah on the turn (3 hearts on the board), I bet 250 (1/2 the pot). UTG raises to 600. I call. River is a blank. He bets 600 and I call (like a donkey I might add). He turns over AQ ftw. Very next hand KJ offsuit in the small blind. I raise to 800. BB calls. 2 10 6 rainbow. I raise 1000. I get reraised to 1000. This guy is an idiot. I push. He calls. I’m left thinking who is the idiot as he turns over 76s. My hand does not improve. He rivers a straight. Bye Mike.

Steaming Pile of Monkey Crap. If my wife and son weren’t sleeping in the next room I would have broke things. I settled down and after reviewing the tourney, I saw that maybe I should have raised more preflop with my KJ. The wiz didn’t seem to have a problem with how I played it. Even adjusting the ranges I seemed to do alright by the wiz. Ah one more wont hurt.

Tourney 3 saw me take a good lead when my pocket jacks held up all-in against 2 players. I secured the chip lead with a straight flush a few hands later. And then I took a major hit. The blinds are 100/200. I have KQo in the SB which is folded to me. I raise to 800. The BB decides to call. The flop is 828. (2 clubs) I continuation bet 1000. BB calls. For some reason I decide to fire the second bullet and put him all in with a bluff. I get called and he turns up 7,8 offsuit. I go ballistic. Looking back I should have been pissed. If he had Ace rag he still would have had me beat. Well it put me on the short stack. And on tilt. I left the table for a sec. Put some water on my face and came back to play. I decided that I would just stay tight at this point and try to finish the game with some dignity. Normally after a beat like that, I’d give up and go all-in with whatever I got next. Well it worked. I ended up coming back and winning the tounrnament.

I’m not sure I deserved to win after that idiotic play, but after that I played a much more conscience game. Also the guy who won that hand became the chip leader and sat out the rest of the game. It kind of calmed me down, and I was able to steal his blinds every time it came around to me.

I wasn’t able to do the quiz though, so today I did 200 questions. Also once I figure out how to convert my hand histories, I’ll post those as well. Titan spits them out as XML files.

Thursday September 18, 2008
SitNGo Wizard Score: 149/200 (Difficulty Average)
Games Played:3 (1/0/0 >2)

My results improved slightly tonight. I found myself making a few mistakes that repeated. So I made some notes/ comments I will share about assessing if shoving is a good idea.

1. Pay attention to your stack size vs the blinds, as well as your opponants. (This was the one mistake I need to improve on the most, while I have all of the time in the world to make my guess on the quiz, you only get like 15 seconds to make a decision online.)
2. Push tighter with a raiser before you. (I found that if I was in the small blind and the dealer made a standard raise, pushing with weaker cards was a mistake)
3. Pay attention to the pot odds (This one also relates to my point #1, it is often correct to call an all-in raise if you have a big stack in the big blind and the shover is raising with only 1 or two blinds with any two cards.)

Keeping in the theme of SitNGo wizard I also watched a video tonight. Colin Moshman’s SitNGo Wizard tutorial video (Video #150). It helped me to understand alot of what the numbers mean. If you have a Stox Poker membership and you have this tool and have not yet watched it you should. It helped me a ton.

I also continued to read my first book. I have few books with regards to sit and go strategy, and I chose to go with How to Beat Sit and Go Tournaments by Neil Timothy first. It is a beginners guide to beating sit and go tournaments.

I want to get back to basics and this book does exactly that. It focuses on solid ABC poker. Tight in the early blinds, loosen up in the middle and even more at the bubble. I’ve gone through the gameplay section of the book and now it is focusing on reading your opponents. This book is what I needed for the back to basics. It doesn’t cover any advanced concepts, but they do make the claim that you will end up in the top 6 over 80% of the time by following this strategy.

I’ll find out tomorrow, because my son willing, I will play some poker. (Finally).

Tuesday, September 17 2008.
SitNGo Wizard Score: 74/100 (Difficulty Average)

I need to start taking responsibility for my actions. I need to start taking the game more seriously. So with that in mind I give you my manifesto.

Above is my current Sharkscope for Titan Poker. My first goal is to get my numbers out of the red. How am I going to do this you ask?

1) I am a member of Stoxpoker video training site. (My goal for September is to try to watch a video every couple of days)
2) My vast collection of books. (My goal for September is to read my first book)
3) Forums. I will post at least two hands that gave me trouble per day of play. I will also try to make a better effort to reply to posts as well.
4) SitNGo Wizard. I will review every session that I play. I will also take the quiz every day to get my score up.
5) Look into the possibility of a poker coach.
6) Lastly I will make a better attempt to play more games.

I intend to post my hand histories, my results. And In general post more to my blog. I believe with dedication and hard work I can become a successful SNG player. I welcome your comments, and invite your criticism.

Tuesday, September 16 2008.
SitNGo Wizard Score: 66/100 (Difficulty Average)