Epiphany

Well it seems like it is all starting to come together, finally.

I played the MiniFtops #24 on Sunday, busting 946^th of 19196 entries. I played a solid TAG style early on, then eventually transitioned into the “Maven Method” in the later stages. “Maven Method” is the phrase I use when referring to his teachings, so no one is allowed to use that phrase without my express written consent (obv joke). I would have played more, but I felt really great about my deep run and decided to spend the rest of the day sleeping and hanging out with my dogs.

I didn’t play anything on Monday due to the fact that my sleep schedule has been really off lately. Most of the time I am playing is during the later parts of the evening, so I tend to stay up late and sleep during the day which isn’t something I am used to. I decided to start going to bed a little earlier and waking up around 4:45 am to start playing. Full Tilt has a $5k Guarantee for a $10 buy-in that starts at 5:00am, along with various $2-$5 buy-in tourneys running simultaneously. Starting at 6am, the $12K KO starts and an hour later the $14K starts. I have noticed the fields are not as large as they normally are in the evening, which is very appealing. I also feel the play is a little better due to the fact that east coast grinders are waking up to play, coupled with a mix of the euro-donks.

When I first sit down to play, I approach every table the same way. When I get to a table, I make notes on everyone’s stats followed by where they are from. This helps me out tremendously if I end up in a tough spot against them later. I learned this by watching The Maven and Ari. These guys type books on players, and not just in the hands they are in, they type books on every hand. In learning to do this, I play fewer tables so that I can pay closer attention to everything. If you aren’t doing this now, I highly recommend it for the serious player.

Yesterday morning I started my new playing schedule and right away started getting great results. I final- tabled one tourney and went out 18^th in a 1000 person tournament. I endured my usual bad beats in both the $12k and the $14K, bubbling the cash in both of them, but overall I felt good about the session. Afterward I watched two more Ryan “Gutshtallin” Welch videos on Poker X Factor. I enjoy watching these because sometimes as an online player you can become “results oriented.” And when you are making the right plays and still losing, it can start leading to doubt instead of logic. This might in turn cause you to call instead of raising or folding.

I also watched the AJKHoosier1 video from the Super Tuesday win last week, the one where Maven went out 5^th or 6^th. In this video, AJK described the Maven as a LAG (Loose-Aggressive) player. After reading some more forum posts about the Maven, the good, solid regulars think that all he does is shove with garbage, and those guys could not be further from the truth. I will admit, I do not know all of the Maven’s students. The ones I do know (Bob2Bob, Drexxel7, Daisyxoxo, Subiime, Micon and Dyzalot) are all putting up solid numbers right now. Were they putting up solid numbers before? I have no idea, but they aren’t idiots, and they aren’t just “shoving with garbage.”

Well, I need to cut off and get some stuff done. Good luck at the tables everyone!

College Football Saturday

I had an interesting day at the tables again. I ended up running deep in both the $12.5K and the Daily Double A on Full Tilt. I lost a race in the $12.5k in a BB vs. SB battle my AKs vs. QQ and he had me covered by a couple of chips. The Daily A went very well….out of 1350 people, I managed to finish 12th. I lost three key races at the end to bubble the final table. I still made decent cash for a $10 tourney, but I had it in my mind that I was going to win that tournament. I played my usual TAG style until the middle stages when I started using what David taught me and I could not miss. I did not have a real hand until near the end so I had to pay close attention to find the players who were playing too tight or too loose. Do not get me wrong, I held my breath every time I fired at them because I DID NOT want a call most of the time. It is starting to get easier though; I just need more practice.

I am going to sit down and plan out my tournaments for tomorrow. I am seriously considering playing outside of my bankroll for a couple of the $75 tournaments. I think I would rather play fields that are only 300-400 people versus the 1300+ person fields. I know this is wrong, and David will probably say something to me about it, but I want to give it a shot.

Mini-FTOPS event #24 starts in about ten hours, so I am going to try and get some sleep before I play. As of right now the event has 5561 entries with a $100K prize pool. The buy-in is $12; you get $2 for each knockout and 250BBs to start so I am looking forward to playing.

I’m starving, so I am going to cut this short. Make sure you watch the video below! Good night and good luck at the tables!

Coming Together

I think I am going to wait awhile after a session before I blog. My emotions tend to come through the blog and that probably isn’t very enjoyable for the reader.

Well, I spent some time today bouncing things off Ryan, one of David’s assistants. I actually met Ryan at the expo this past summer and actually had spent quite a bit of time talking to him about the poker training. He is one of those people that you know is a good person inside. I think his two most defining characteristics are youth and enthusiasm. He is at the bottom of the totem pole at Ari’s training center and he is doing it for the experience, not money. I say that because David does not pay him and he is not allowed to play online poker, or at least he was not this summer. Crazy, huh?

Anyways, I emailed over some hand histories from a couple of tournaments and we decided to review a $26 buy-in $17K guaranteed tournament on Full Tilt. I have mentioned in an earlier blog that one of the toughest things about tournament poker and learning David’s system is that everything is read-dependent. You must forget about what your hand is and look at the situation first. Of course, when you are losing, the doubt starts creeping in and your confidence can really take a beating. Ryan confirmed for me that I am playing very well, but there are a few more leaks I could plug, mainly blind versus blind situations. For example, I had a situation come up where I had 82o in the BB when I was 17BBs deep with five limpers. Instead of open shoving hoping everyone would fold, I bet half my stack, and got one caller who of course hit a set with his small pocket pair. Had I shoved, I believe he would have folded too and I would have chipped up nicely. 82o? I know. Again, the situation was right for what I was trying to accomplish…I just didn’t execute it correctly.

We also agreed that some of the concepts are simply not applicable at the lower buy-ins. Granted, I can still use most of them, but I need to be more selective when I am making moves, because players at the lower buy-ins just do not fold. I made the adjustments before I played tonight, and right away found my session went much smoother than normal. I decided to play the $12.5K on Full Tilt and made a great run, finishing around 60th where I unfortunately spazzed out and donked off my stack on a draw when I was 8th in chips. Dumbass. Other than that, I played very well, executing well timed bluffs and even winning a couple of races. I am looking forward to playing all weekend.

Tomorrow the team will be playing in the $3500 WPT event. http://networkedblogs.com/p12137608 I wish everyone the best of luck.

Also, I noticed tonight that Daisyxoxo is in the lead again for Bluff Online Player of the Year. Every time I sit down to play a poker session, I swear I see him at a final table or rapidly approaching one.

Well, I am going to go read for a bit and call it a night.

Good luck at the tables!

Situational

I had another losing day.

I spoke with Zac for a bit yesterday. I guess the entire crew is out playing at the Borgata this week and then possibly off to Europe after that. As always I wish everyone the best of luck and safe travel.

Does anyone care to comment on this hand?

Villain’s stats are 39/18 VPIP/PFR and stealing 20% over a 29 hand sample.

http://www.pokerhandreplays.com/view.php/id/828612

My play should be standard but I would like some opinions.

Some of the hands I post on P5’s might seem standard. Believe me, before I attended the training, I had my idea of what I considered “standard,” but all of that has changed now. I am now relying on stats, math, and position more than ever. Hole cards are the LAST thing I look at now when I am making a decision at the poker table. To be quite honest, that is why many people bash The Maven for some of the hands he gets called down with. Does he have AA or J2o when he open shoves on the button? Depending on your stats, position, and how you have been playing, it does not matter. He has a “read” on the situation and is playing based solely on that read.

This part of the training has been the most difficult to grasp. When I play live poker, reads are easy to pick up on. Body language, the way a person bets, whether they’re drinking alcohol, the clothes they wear, their age and so on. Online you do not have the luxury of that physical information so you have to research every player at your table right when it starts so you can get an idea of how they will play. At the lower buy-ins, this is easier due to the fact that we all suck and have negative ROIs. At mid to higher stakes I really try and do my homework. This has resulted in me playing fewer tables and really paying close attention to the action instead of going on auto-pilot.

I started reading Alexander Fitzgerald’s blog on a regular basis now. He always has a story and he is a great writer. My ADD usually prevents me from following anything more than a few paragraphs but this guy is pretty interesting. Once I start winning and traveling more, hopefully my blogs will be more interesting too.

Good luck at the tables!

Any Chance I Could Get a Refund?

I would like to thank everyone for the PMs on P5’s and of course via Facebook. I wanted to wait a week or so after I had put in some volume so my blog post would be a little bit interesting. I sent over some handhistories for Zac (David’s assistant) to review. I guess in a few spots I was calling when I should have been raising….things like that. So I made the adjustments and have decided to share my results.

I’m losing now more than ever.

You know, the funny thing is, I know how to play this game. I have played and studied more online poker in the last month of my life than in any other stretch. I am talking 16+ hour days of playing, Poker X Factor videos, and hand history review. The problem is, I am either running bad or I am making mistakes. I am going to assume the latter because I personally do not believe that people “run bad”. I don’t believe in “luck”…since there has never been anything to prove someone is lucky or unlucky. I stick with the basics - math and statistics.
As I mentioned before, I play the lower stakes. There was a good article posted by a P5’s member (http://www.pocketfives.com/poker-articles/the-curse-of-ax-4668751) who addressed players at the lower buy-ins. I could not agree with him more. While I am happy I paid for and attended the Maven’s training, it really isn’t something you can use at the very low buy-ins. You aren’t running off hands like ace rag and king jack at these levels. I cannot believe how many times my KK has been cracked by ace rag post flop, or how many times I have been up against KJ with 1010, AQs, and lost…..it goes on and on.

I studied Gutshtallin’s video series on Poker X Factor and was really impressed with his line of thinking. He admits when he was wrong and clearly talks out every situation and the reasons for his moves. I have been a Card Runners and PXF guy for a long time and I think out of every MTT video I have ever seen, I like his the most. Hmmm…the “most” might be a little much, but between him and AJKHoosier… it’s close. AJKHoosier’s videos are always very entertaining to watch…and educational.

I finally have some money on Pokerstars now, and I took a shot at some of the $4 180-man tourneys only to bubble the cash in one of them. I never thought I would like to play on PokerStars, but they offer so much more for the low stakes MTT player.

I watched The Maven win the $33K cubed on FT tonight! Congrats! I also saw Daisyxoxo make a nice run in the $1k Monday on FT….congrats to you too buddy! I guess Bryan Micon had a couple of really nice scores this past week too, as well as Rjules. Seems like everyone David trains is killing it....sucks being the red headed step-child. Oh well, maybe things will start turning around soon.

Does anyone know how to export a tourney’s HH from HoldEm Manager? In PokerTracker I have a folder it gets sent to, but HEM is different. I usually just end up asking Full Tilt to send me the tourney histories via email, but that takes a couple of days and I like to start reviewing right after I donk out of a tourney.

Well I think I played a total of 15 low buy-in tourneys today and I did not cash in anything. It is 2:27 a.m. and again, I am beyond frustrated. I paid for the training, I am putting in the volume, and I am being completely honest with myself…so if anyone has any suggestions let me know. While I am not a solid winning player, I was at the very least break-even before the training.

Now I am broke and losing. It does not matter though, I refuse to give up. Sometimes I wish I knew how to quit, but it just is not in me.

Below is a video of how I feel after each poker session lately.....enjoy.

The Losing Continues

I decided when I created this blog that I would be brutally honest with it, good or bad.

Early last week, I arranged for a sweat session with the Maven for Thursday night. I received a call from Zac around 11:00 pm telling me this was going to cost me $150. He explained that I could call around and talk to other students and possibly sweat them via Skype and Teamviewer for a cheaper price if I wanted. Needless to say, I was less than pleased about this and decided against it. It is absolutely unreal that I should have to pay $150 to watch him play….or anyone else for that matter. Do not get me wrong…. I like Zac, he seems to be a good guy from little time I spent with him, so I will not kill the messenger over this. But I think this is total bullshit.

I was told to send over some hand histories from a couple of tourneys I played, so I will be doing that later this evening. I tried exporting them from HEM but no luck so far. I will admit PT3 might been a little easier in this aspect because everything goes to an export folder…so instead I emailed Full Tilt for them and should get them any time now.

The fact is, I am still a losing player at the low stakes. I decided to drop my stakes even more to practice the system and it truly does not work at these stakes. When playing against these truly bad players, you need to play them straight forward with no system other than TAG poker.
I just finished browsing Pocketfives and saw that Kennl took down the 50/50 on Full tilt again. I looked up his recent scores and was blown away. He is absolutely destroying online poker.

My GF emailed him through another poker forum a couple weeks back and he replied that he runs 3-22 inch monitors and nothing else. No tracking software, no Sharkscope, and no short cut programs. He plays 10-12 hours a day in an office on the backside of his home. On any given day, he is playing every tournament available right alongside of every $24 45-man SNG. How is he able to make that many decisions that fast for such a long period of time is truly not human. My guess is that he is just one of those rare human beings. (i.e. Will Hunting)

Troy “Gambler2k4” Gamble is doing some crazy “40K in three months” challenge. I posted a link to it off to the right of my blog. Check it out. He used to have the funniest blog on CardRunners but for some reason he took it down. The guy is funny as hell and a great poker player too. Troy is a regular at the 2/4 level on Stars, so I don’t know what he is doing at .25/.50, other than showing people it can be done… good luck buddy!

Edit:

I am doing my best to remain positive and this is more than likely a tilt edit…..but I am beyond pissed right now at this fucking game. I made a comment to Ari and David both the other day about why they do not play the lower buy-ins. It was explained to me that since they have good ROI, it makes sense to play the high stakes, better returns on their buy-ins. That of course makes perfect sense to me.

I on the other hand would love to play the higher stakes because people who play the higher stakes understand what pot odds are, or that ace two is not a made hand pre-flop, or calling off half of your stack with QJo is a mistake, or better yet, when the action goes raise, re-raise, all-in, the guy with pocket fives 25bb deep who is last to act comes along.

I cannot beat the lower stakes.

First Blog

Whether he likes it or not, a man's character is stripped bare at the poker table; if the other players read him better than he does them, he has only himself to blame. Unless he is both able and prepared to see himself as others do, flaws and all, he will be a loser in cards, as in life. -Anthony Holden

Hey everyone,

I will do my best to maintain this blog with weekly/daily updates; it will depend on my mood. I am a very private person, so I am completely out of my comfort zone typing this. This blog will be about me and how I evolve and adapt to the world of online poker. I have been playing for almost three years (both cash and tournament), and I feel I am a slightly losing player in both forms. I am a losing player because I am failing to make the adjustments needed to accomodate how fast the game is changing. Do not get me wrong, I have won several live tourneys here in Las Vegas along with thousands of dollars in cash games. However, online poker has completely “pwned” me from the beginning. I have been a CardRunners and PokerXFactor member since the beginning and have read just about every poker book ever written, except the one by Chen about math…..I just can’t do it.

About me: I’m middle aged, I played college football, and spent a large portion of my life as a Marine traveling the world. I am not married nor do I have children. I have a girlfriend who plays poker as well, so that is a definite plus, because I do not see how a relationship could work if your significant other did not understand/play poker too.

My set up: AMD Phenom II X3 processor, 4 Gig RAM, dual 19’ monitors.

I will be upgrading to the 30” Dells as soon as I start to become a winning online player, but for now what I have works just fine.

I have hired private coaches, attended WPT and WSOP academies, and while everything has helped me become a better player, I still have not achieved the results I am looking for. After beating my head against the wall several times, blaming my losses on suckouts and poor play by others, and even going so far as to accuse the poker websites of cheating, I have realized the problem lies within me. So I asked myself, "how do I get better? I am already watching poker videos, studying them over and over but yet not getting the same results as the people recording them. It must be luck right? Or maybe I need to pause for a minute before I make a call so that I hit my card because of the RNG (Random Number Generator) the poker site uses." I have literally thought there was no way the problem was with me, it had to be something else. "Online poker is rigged!! How do people keep going runner runner against me? Why do I keep losing 70/30 situations, and even 80/20’s!!!"

So why didn’t I just give up? Well, for a couple of reasons. One of those reasons is that I know some guys that cannot win a local backyard league tournament but yet they crush it online making $5-10K a month part-time. Lucky? Well, maybe at first….but not every single month. Another reason would be the freedom that playing online poker would provide to do whatever I want, whenever I want, from anywhere in the world.

So one afternoon I read an article (http://bit.ly/18M2J7) in Bluff Magazine about some guy they called The Maven. His real name is David Chicotsky and he was the Bluff Online Player of the year for 2008. The article tells of how hard work and determination turned him into a successful online player as well as a person. He worked countless hours and gave up sleep, holidays, and weekends. I also learned recently that it affected a personal relationship he had with someone he really cared about. I made up my mind after reading this article that I wanted to meet him.

I met David this summer during the Ante Up For Africa WSOP event where I volunteered to walk celebrities across the red carpet. It was a great time and I was very fortunate to have had the opportunity to meet the likes of Sarah Silverman, Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Don Cheadle, Kenny Smith, Jennifer Tilly, and several professional poker players. After speaking with David at his booth during the Expo, he invited me over to the training center the next day to take a look around. I accepted and was thoroughly impressed by everything he said and showed me. We discussed his system and the students that are currently using it. Every student, except for a few with personal issues, is crushing it online. I was sold. I also was fortunate enough to meet “Bob2bob” and “Drexxel7,” two up-and-coming online superstars who are David’s students.

Now, my business has all but failed over the past year so financially I couldn't afford it. So I debated over this for almost two months before I broke down and called him again one afternoon while he was playing in an FTOPS event. He personally guaranteed me that he would turn me into a winning player if I would put forth the effort, so we agreed to terms that would have me being coached by him and Ari Engel.

First day: Training with The Maven. David has two assistants, Ryan and Zach. Ryan is the younger, up-and-coming protégé and Zach is the well-groomed, highly intelligent guy who runs everything. Zach has a commanding presence, is well spoken, and seems just as excited teaching as the students are listening.

The material is straightforward and highly progressive. There are tools that MUST be used for it to work. If you do not employ them, you will not be successful. After the material was presented I watched David play several tournaments, eventually final tabling one (going out around 6^th I believe). I went home exhausted but decided to play one tournament before I went to bed…so I chose a Full Tilt $6 NLHE 90 man KO. I won it and it felt effortless. I texted David the results and went to bed.

Second day: Training with Ari Engel, another accomplished online poker player who is actually David’s teacher. I watched Ari play all of the Sunday majors and we discussed several situations that occurred. The main thing I noticed is that David and Ari have different styles of play, but yet the employ the same tools. David likes to play several tournaments at a time, while Ari stays around four, sometimes five. Ari is a great guy and when you get to know him, you will soon realize that he too is a poster boy for dedication and discipline.

During my visit, Joe “Dyzalot” Morneau was killing the FTOPS $2500 buy in event in the next room, so I was able to watch him play for several hours. He is another GREAT player and person to talk to about poker. At 39 years old, he is well traveled and has seen it all before. I think with my age and character, I could relate to him more than anyone else in the house.

After the training, I left town for a couple of weeks and locked myself down to play. Now during this time I ended up only barely making a profit and became even more disheartened than ever. I thought to myself, “Fuck, I’m not even break even, because I just spent several grand on training.” Back to the drawing board. I got back into town and called Ryan, David’s assistant to schedule a sweat session for the next day. During this session, I picked up more than ever, mainly because I watched David plow through a field of 9000 people in the Sunday Million in his bath robe to finish 10^th.

The only people at the training center watching this take place were Ari, Dyzalot, Ryan, and myself. David had this video playing in the background over and over again. I am not exaggerating when I say that he must have played it 50 times or more. He told me he did it because he likes the song, but I’m guessing that the intensity of everything Pantera puts out only added to his aggression. I say this because I saw the hole cards and I watched him absolutely destroy everyone on the way to his 10^th place finish. The bottom line is he plays to win.

I mentioned at the beginning that I have a Marine Corps background, spent eight years around men and women who are dedicated to a cause and have the discipline needed to carry out tough tasks. I demand more of myself than anyone could ever ask. When I lose at something, I just want to die. That is how intense I am when it comes to winning. For the record, it takes a lot to impress me. Just because someone wins a million dollars in poker....well it isn’t enough to garner my respect if they are not what I consider a good person. A lot of idiots make money in poker. My point is, I consider David a good person and whether he chose poker or any other profession, he would be successful.

Okay, now on to the haters. People rag on him and call him names because he charges so much for his training? Some of the idiots talking trash are down more money that he is charging! Here is a guy who takes you into his home, trains you for five days, answers all of your possible questions and teaches you to become successful and people have a problem with it? Unreal. I just learned that Ryan (his assistant) is not allowed to play poker for an undisclosed duration and he is not being paid! You cannot buy that type of loyalty these days. How much would you charge a complete stranger to live with you for a week and to teach him everything you know about poker so he can leave and become your competition?

Believe me when I tell you that paying for the training was one of the toughest decisions I have ever made, because I thought it was overpriced as well. I even went to Bryan Micon via Facebook and asked him about it, and in typical Micon style he gave me some bullshit answer about how it would change my life etc. I started sweating, Subiime, Daisyxoxo, Bob2bob, Dyzalot, and even Micon, who took down a large tourney for 6k online…..so I said to myself, it must be worth it and took the plunge.

I want to state again, that I am not a blogger, so with the exception of this first blog, I will keep things simple, short, and direct.

David and I discussed the idea of my producing a blog for a variety of reasons, because this could help him or it could hurt him. But either way, I will be 100% honest with it.

I welcome comments, suggestions and anything else people have to say. I cannot comment about David’s system because I gave my word, and signed an agreement to privacy.

I think I wrote enough for now. Good luck everyone and see you at the tables.

Qtrain