2010 Last Sit & Go [Knockout]

Played my last sit & go [knockout] yesterday. not that i want to brag my winning, juz that im very happy. I won first this time, although i did lost my buy-in on cash game before this short tourney. I can say they were not the most aggressive opponents (last 2) I have encountered, I played with a lot of focus. Below are the last 7 hands of the tournament which changed the tide for me.

Enjoy and happy new year 2011!!

Black.

Drawing Outs on the River

Played about short 100 hands tonight and that was it. First table, I cleared my stack. So I moved on to another table fresh, where every one was playing tight. Until my opponent below came. He was pretty loose and aggressive. He called on every flop. Basically whoever one of us is playing the hand, it will be against him. He had cleared a few stack before this.

One of my encounter with him below. I didnt expect him two have two pairs on flop (due to his past aggressiveness), but probably wan to chase me away with a huge bluff, or made two pairs on river.

With his All-in on the Turn, give me a hard but straightforward decision. I was on both open-ended straight and flush draw. In total, I had about 9 (spades) + 6 (8s and kings excluding spades) + 3 (aces) = 18 outs? Right? 15 of them for the nuts. Although I seem passively calling, but I think I made a pretty good call here when the fifth spade came. And so that was it for me.



Black.

Just A Short One Today

Played only a few hands today and I left after I meet my target. Thanks to L&W who shared with me a site so that I can post visual of the hands I played instead of tons of words like the matrix movie. I will be exploring SharkScope.com. Really appreciate the things you guys shared.

I won this pot below and left. I wanted to get him out of the pot at turn but he had a flush draw (I didnt read, I thought he had two pairs). river queen made us a pair and I scoop the pot with an ace kicker.



Maybe I left quickly because I dont want my winnings taken away as usual so that I can finally say "hey I won tonight"!

Happenings

Many miracle happened tonight, but thats poker. AA lost to TT when the board shows four clubs in the TT's favour. TT won QQ when the board shows 789 A 6. I won a sick hand myself too.

Table 'Cottrell II' 6-max Seat #3 is the button

Seat 1: KILHOFFER ($5.45 in chips)

Seat 2: QProQuo ($2 in chips)

Seat 3: Nmbee10 ($10.87 in chips)

Seat 4: e3fkaa ($5 in chips)

Seat 5: issaru07 ($13.59 in chips)

Seat 6: hxh147 ($4.05 in chips) <-- me

e3fkaa: posts small blind $0.05

issaru07: posts big blind $0.10

*** HOLE CARDS ***

Dealt to hxh147 [Qs Ah]

hxh147: raises $0.10 to $0.20

KILHOFFER: raises $0.40 to $0.60

QProQuo: raises $1.40 to $2 and is all-in

Nmbee10: folds

e3fkaa: folds

issaru07: folds

hxh147: raises $1.40 to $3.40

KILHOFFER: raises $1.40 to $4.80

hxh147: calls $0.65 and is all-in

Uncalled bet ($0.75) returned to KILHOFFER

*** FLOP *** [7s 5s 6s]

*** TURN *** [7s 5s 6s] [3c]

*** RIVER *** [7s 5s 6s 3c] [Ts]

*** SHOW DOWN ***

hxh147: shows [Qs Ah] (a flush, Queen high)

KILHOFFER: shows [8c 8s] (a flush, Ten high)

hxh147 collected $3.89 from side pot

QProQuo: shows [Qh Qc] (a pair of Queens)

hxh147 collected $5.85 from main pot

Four spade on the board, and I held the most beautiful queen of the hand.

Won My First Sit & Go!

I have been playing Double or Nothing. But tonight halfway mugging my books I felt like playing one tourney so I went into micro-stakes of Sit & Go - my very first try. I wasn't expecting I would win, I mean I hoped I did but my target was just top 3. Wasn't leading at all. TruckerAA was leading all the way. I had folded most of my cards only managed to grab 1 or 2 pots once in a while until a major turn of tide came below:

Was KK vs JJ all-in. You can imagine how I felt when the flop came. I was just numbed, didnt react. So the turn K came and saved my night. You can imagine how screw he felt but that's poker. Was at top 3 later and I eliminated number 3 with 99 vs JQ. TruckerAA still in the lead.

I was heads-up with him for quite awhile. We were on par until he was leading 10K chips vs 2K chips. Managed to play tight, I think it was because of my tight table image so he folded most of my raises and thats how I grew my stacks for a comeback. I was too happy so didn't managed to print my last hand but I requested so here you go:

*********** # 1 **************
PokerStars Game #52370081862: Tournament #329411649, $1.00+$0.20 USD Hold'em No Limit - Level VIII (200/400) - 2010/11/08 10:33:45 ET
Table '329411649 1' 9-max Seat #9 is the button
Seat 2: hxh147 (7445 in chips)
Seat 9: TruckerAA (6055 in chips)
hxh147: posts the ante 25
TruckerAA: posts the ante 25
TruckerAA: posts small blind 200
hxh147: posts big blind 400
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hxh147 [8c As]
TruckerAA: raises 800 to 1200
hxh147: raises 800 to 2000
TruckerAA: raises 4030 to 6030 and is all-in
hxh147: calls 4030
*** FLOP *** [4h 2d Th] <<--- I felt pretty fucked here from his three of a kind Deuces..
*** TURN *** [4h 2d Th] [5h]
*** RIVER *** [4h 2d Th 5h] [3d]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
hxh147: shows [8c As] (a straight, Ace to Five)
TruckerAA: shows [2c 2s] (three of a kind, Deuces)
hxh147 collected 12110 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 12110 | Rake 0
Board [4h 2d Th 5h 3d]
Seat 2: hxh147 (big blind) showed [8c As] and won (12110) with a straight, Ace to Five
Seat 9: TruckerAA (button) (small blind) showed [2c 2s] and lost with three of a kind, Deuces

Very lucky night. I was happy.

Lost Shares & Poker

BACK!! For a while.. I have been pretty busy with school assignments, basically for the past one month plus every weekend. Exams will be on mid-november after which I will have a short getaway for about a week.

I haven't been trading at all since. But.. I was into shares, for like the second time in my life. I was listening to others, hearing rumors. There was a new IPO REITs offering which came out two weeks back.

the IPO was bought at 0.96, I contra-ed with my frens for a very high number of lots, we thought we could sell it for just a few clicks up. On the day we entered, it was at 1.15, it went up 5 clicks to about 1.2 on the same day, and went all the way down to range between 1.06 to 1.08 for the next few days.

I learned a heavy lesson here. In less than a week, an equivalent of two forex account was busted for this trade. Damn foolish. There is no absolute shit in th

is world.

Im taking a break tonight before I continue mugging tomorrow onwards for my upcoming exams. Double or Nothing tourney earlier. I was having the worst hands all the way, and my only wins were bluff. I dont remember how many 7-2 I picked up. But nevermind I still lost at 8th place.

There was a funny incident inside though. BB and two callers checked when flopped A 3 3. They checked all the way thru' river and the floor was finally A 3 3 3 3 - quads. Obviously the players in the hand have a confirmed share of their winnings for that game. One player went ALL-IN and the BB folded LOL.

Someone in the chat said sth like that:

only1Pro: lol nice fold

only1Pro: 1000% split and he folds :)

only1Pro: was afraid of the 5th 3?

Black.

Amazing Hand in WSOPE

Poker: Double or Nothing

Just want a short break away from my assignment. My head is busting from it. So I fired up my PokerStars and looked for a double or nothing game. Increased to "Low" games from "Micro". I was playing pretty tight from the start. And hands I went through to showdown I had all the pots early in the game.

I was number 2 in the stacks throughout basically. At one point, I was down till about number 5 out of 8 players left in the game of 10. The blinds were high. I

called with an A 6. Opponent shoved all-in post-flop when the flop came A J 5. I called.

A 6 vs A T. I thought I was fucked (mathematically I was).

Very quickly, turn came a 6. I sat up from my bed and yell "FUCKYAAA!!!!". I grabbed the pot and returned to number two, throughout the rest of the game. I was happy because this is my first game on slightly higher buy-in.

I miss about two flushes during the game by foldin

g pre-flop. Below is one of the screenshot I missed my full house, because two of them went all-in pre-flop. I had no reason to call against such aggressiveness although I had what I find a

moderate-strong card.

Result: +$4.60

Black.

Poker: 20 Sep - Lost Focus

Firstly, I called an all-in with JJ against 88 pre-flop. Flop came an 8 and that was it for me right from the start. Never mind. I grind my way back up. Was on the profit side. I was on too much attention with other stuff online. There was obvious full-house on the table. I had a K high flush and without second thought and look I called all-in and lost everything there.

Losing focus is something that shouldnt be in poker (obviously). I wanted to curb this thats why I played one table instead of two and I play 0.01/0.02 stake instead. But still happens.

I wasn't that upset that such thing (losing) happened but more upset to the fact of how it happened. If you can't keep your focus, don't trade, don't poker. That is why I haven't trade since NFP and play poker for more than a week. Because I knew I had my job and classes to worry. Until finally today I had the mood to get in and it happens again.

This is getting emotional. I suppose even writing blog may go on tilt. Lol, till then.

Poker: 10 Sep - Randoms

Short 100 hands today. Last weekend was terrible, after the previous NFP big draw-down, I was followed by loses in poker over the weekend. This is at a point of time where I was lost and felt I need more time to pick up. Earlier this week I was only doing my school assignments. Got to play a bit of hands today.

Today is a public holiday, our fellow Muslim counterpart's festival call the Hari Raya Puasa. If you don't know, they went through one month of "fasting" before celebrating this special day. Long weekend for everybody.

I need to remind myself of becoming calmer during my trades/poker even during losses. Recently, I let myself go easily, I tilt easily. The more I'm afraid to lose, the worst I become when loses come infront of me. It's simple concept every beginner learn till they are masters, but it is some thing that takes a life-time to master. I was thinking if I relate my capital to my real-life monetary too much. Because if you take it too hard, like losing a few dollars to hundreds of dollars, you might go into thoughts like 'oh my I lost these amount I coulda bought something or something'. But then again, these are still real money. But I think the key to curb this might be changing my mentality about it. Isn't it strange why we always do so well in the demo than our real money?

Have a good weekend people!

Result: +$1.20

Black.

Poker: 30 August

Not a very good day today again. I was slowly grinding my way up. But my 2nd table lost all-in flush to a full house. I didn't expected a full house.

Second big pot lost was when I hold Ace of hearts. The table has 4 hearts. I went all-in.

Ace-high flush losing to STRAIGHT FLUSH.

"Your goal is to win one big bet an hour, that's it." - Mike McDermott in Rounders Movie (1998)

On the contrary, I played two hours. I lost 2 big pot. That's it.

Result: -$6.28

This is so no good!!!

Black.

We Wish..

Couldn't help laughing when my friend sent me this screenshot that night. He told me "sometimes I really wish the hands were swapped.."

We have been squeezing time for about 100 hands a day now. Rushing school assignments. Due tomorrow midnight. Will keep ya updated. Short updates will be through our twitter.

Thanks for keeping up here.

Black.

Poker: 23 Aug

Just a short update today. I have recently up my Stakes from $0.01/$0.02 to $0.02/$0.05. I know it seems crazy for an amateur like me. I decide to focus on cash games instead of hoping around Double or Nothing.

I will be playing about 100 hands per day, whenever I can. And trading will probably be slowing down quite a bit, sorry for my fx readers. But because my school is catching up once again. In fact, I was barely home from school 1 hour (now time is 11:35pm) after work.

I have school assignment due this weekend, otherwise I would want to join my family on a Saturday outing to Marina Bay Sands, the newest casino in Singapore, or rather newer (between the two). Well, good thing about not going is the fact that Singaporeans ourselves have to pay a levy of SGD100 just to enter the casino. Well, I cannot imagine trying to recoup initial 100 loses when what I play are simply micro.

Another thing I found out about local casinos is that we do not have any Texas Hold'em poker here. I don't know the reason. I suppose Macau casinos have it. This poker game only began to grow popularity recent few years when Zynga created Texas Hold'em in Facebook. I learned my poker there too. But then again, just like trading, fake money is seriously different from real money. You find everyone go all-in with anything anytime.

I had good poker earlier (obviously because I won). I was pretty loose on the very first hand and got smash right from the start. That table I managed to recoup back and break-even at the end. At the other table, my good friend joined me. No we didn't cheat or anything. Instead, we went heads up against one another fiercer than against anyone else.

He raised aggressively against me. I had nothing on the table except a pair of Qs myself. I almost folded but I called and win the pot. Next up, I had suited A T. He raised pre-flop. I called, with 2 other opponents. He raises aggressively once again. I didn't call, in fact I re-raises him when the flop came A A K. I had three aces, I would do anything in that hand already.

Then turn came T again, that makes me full house Aces with Ts. He Turn a set too - Straight, holding pocket J Q, on the table A A K T. He all-in, and so did I. Pretty lucky for me - because he know my weakness well and it is a challenge to go heads up against him. It is good because we often point out each other's weakness and try to work on it. He's more a natural in this area. For me I often find myself brain-fucked in probabilities. Still working on it. :)

Result: +$5.03

Black.

Poker: 19 Aug - Beats Beats Beats!!

I'm kinda on tilt after tonight's lost. But I try to take a deep breath and move on to grab some profits back.

These 2 days of losses were more or less result of recklessness. I didn't lose 'em by being "grinded" slowly. I lost 'em thru' all-ins.

Two nights back, as posted in my Twitter. I went all-in pre-flop with a big slick (A K). I lost to a pair of A J when J appeared on the river. Followed by all-in with a pair of A J and losing high card to big slick. *SPIT*!

Earlier, I was doing fine until I did the all-in shit again. One guy raises high pre-flop, I held big slick again. Because I see he was loose and all-in a few times previous hands. So I went all-in. And he did without hesitation.

Big Slick VS Q 9.

9 appeared in Turn. I got busted. The other table I was holding a 6 A. The floor was 6 2 2 3 6. I raised before showdown, thinking I made a full-house. He went all-in. I called. He held a 6 3. 6 full house of deuces loses to 6 full house of 3s. For a moment I felt like throwing the mouse out of the window.

My last big loss tonight, I didn't really know what he held. I was holding Big Slick again (the bigger the card, the greater your lost, or maybe I'm not good enough). The flop came A K Q.

Wow! Who's better than me now? Everyone checks and I raises high and then one of them (out of two) remaining calls. The turn came J. This time that fellow went all-in. I didn't know what to do. I kinda feel that he had turn a set. Obviously a straight if you ask me. I folded and let go of my pair of big slicks.

Result: -$3.89

Black.

Poker: 12 Aug

No trade this week. But I could still took notice of prices this week, and noticed Eur/Usd has fallen -400pips since last week's NFP.

Two matches, Double or Nothing tonight. Both won. First table with the highest chips left. Second table 3 (out of 6) of us All-In. I had pocket Js. One had big slick (A K). Then one K 8. Flop an ace. I thought that was it. But luckily, the big slick guy wins the pot and the remaining five wins the "double" prize, otherwise I would have left with very small stake.

Tomorrow I will be out with colleagues for drinks, so will not be poker/trading. For those of you who does, good luck!!

Result: +$1.70

Black.

Poker: 31 July

Had a few poker hands this afternoon. Trading was slow. Will blog on the Oanda platform training we went some time next week.

Ups & down in the session. I had two tables at once. Both NL Hold'em 9 players normal ring games. It went well earlier on. I noted down some bad beats (not pretty bad) though but some mistakes which I think I have to train on and watch out for in future.

Firstly, i was pretty silly. I had a pair of Js in hole. I raise on pre-flop. Only one person followed. Flop turn out to be K K 9. Opponent checks. Thats where I got it. I all-in (left about sixty cents there) thinking K has got nothing to do with him. He calls. Thats it.

Second mistake was, I had a pocket A J. I hit ace pair on flop. I didnt raise that much, I raised slowly, slowly than should be. J came out at the turn. I still raise but not very much. Opponent calls and hit a straight on river. I should have nailed him out earlier.

Some players play pretty tight in REAL money. But some play very loose. I encountered a player who buy-in double my from what I had, and finishes much earlier than me. He seems to call on every round, to the point that as though he does not have a 'Fold' button installed.

I only remembered one big win from the session. I had suited K 8 (hearts). I hit flush on flop. I raise. One of them (left) called. The turn, turn out to have another Heart. He raised. I hesitated and re-raised him. The only card he could win me is if he had an Aces heart. He calls and I grabbed the pot.

(Flushed, not royal nor straight though)

I lost overall (win in first table but lost in the second table - that all in thing). But I found myself improving, not being intimidated that much by real money, although it is micro. By the way, I was looking for a Poker Tracker (track your statistics) over the net but couldn't find any. Some are way too expensive. Blackberry mobile does not have it either. (BB Poker Life Lite doesn't track micro lots) Wonder if anyone who has any sort of tracker to recommend?

Result: -$1.12

Black.

Daniel Negreanu

I watched a few of his videos over the weekend, interesting the way he analyse people's card based on people's action. Amazing.

Here is one of them.

Anyway, this video has 1.4 million views. I'm not surprise you are already one of 'em.

Just Words

Thanks Jules for the comment on my recent tilt. Reply comments thru' post, something I learned from you. And I welcome you and "Scooby" on your first comments in my blog, thank you guys for the encouragement. Ironically, I wrote tons of trading posts and only got L&W his first comment here in this blog with a poker post.

I watched the movie Rounders (1998) on Texas Hold'em recently, after gettin' quite interested into poker. Very nice show with a lot of quotes. One of them he mentioned I find it quite true. He experienced a bad beat at the start of the show (lost his $30,000 bankroll with a full house of nines over aces to Teddy KGB's hidden aces over nines), and had never touch poker for the next nine months.

Before he sat down in his first poker table after such long break he said to himself (narrative): " In Confessions of a Winning Poker Player, Jack King said, "Few players recall big pots they have won -- strange as it seems -- but every player can remember with remarkable accuracy the outstanding tough beats of his career." Seems true to me, 'cause walking in here I can hardly remember how I built my bankroll, but I can't stop thinking how I lost it."

How true that is, even in trading sense, as it's exactly how I felt about myself. Thanks for sharing with me your experiences too Jules. Learning poker/trading rules are definitely easy, but mastering ourselves is another story. But that is what I want to do, I hope to see myself succeed some day.

I had LIVE poker for the first time with my family over last weekend for fun, and we really enjoyed ourselves. My brother-in-law went fanatic and went to buy a set of poker chips the next day and we're looking forward to another round of battle this weekend.

Taking it easy tonight. I'm playing fake money poker online for some leisure time.

+$1 million (well, fake money)

Black.

Poker: 14 July

Same tourneys today. I wanted to play ring games but I think I need more seat-down time if I want to play them, but I don't. Quite consistent for both rounds. At the edge of losing but good card gave me the chance to fight back.

I feel that in tourney, when ur stakes are running low, you have to push forward as long as you have great cards eg. AA, AK, KK, KQ, or suites pictures - at least for me. Otherwise, the blinds will eat you up alive.

Result: +$1.80

Poker: 28 Jun - Finally.

Won two tourneys today. Sound impressive. But not really. What I played was "Double or Nothing". There are 10 players in this table, and as long as you make it to the top 5, you win a fifth of the pool. First one was easy. I almost got knocked out in the second table. This tournament has high winning ratio, but of course, the prize is not as attractive.

Just like risk:reward ratio in trading. You can win a lot of the time, small amount by small amount, and for that, high probability, becuz what you might be doing is close your trade whenever you're up +5 +5 +5, but let ur lose run. In a high risk:reward ratio, you might be doing things like -5 -5 -5 but when winning strikes it can cover or overcome the small loses you've been thru. A lot of stress/emotional tolerance is needed for the latter.

Another good news about is MY EXAMS PASSED!! Finally, I can look forward and embark my final year of part-time studies. This is truly a blessing.

No trades today.
Results: +$1.75

Black.

Poker: 25 Jun - Not Again.

Played tourneys today. Both seat and go. I won the first table third. Finally cashing back. Second table we played and the prolonged match between four of us. Top 3 will have prize. I really expecting myself to post some winning poker. But unfortunately, I got knocked out at last.

More stakes are in placed when trading compared to the micro buy-ins of hold'em. But u won't believe the adrenaline rushing when I was playing, especially within pocket cards like Aces or AK or even AQ. I played very tightly. Way too tight. I was pretty predictable and won few hands with very high cards. To the point people barely call against my raises. More to learn. But I see myself improving and I'm happy.

Results: -$0.50

Black.

Poker: 19 Jun - Red For Third Time

Obviously, i played very poorly. Even in "play money" games i played badly, and i shouldnt have proceeded to playing "real money" when i am having such down form. One of the big loss tonight was having a pocket K pairs losing to two pairs. i could have taken the pot early but probably the raise i gave wasn't intimidating enough making him afford to go all the way to the river where it give him the second pair.

Now im wondering if i would have a winning night in this arena.

Result: -$1.76

Black.

Poker: 8 Jun

I thought i was writing this post on victory halfway when after prolong game not a single playable cards appear. Until my minnor wins got eaten up by blinds and break-even with some bluffs at late game.

Result: b/e.

Black.

Poker: 7 Jun

Kinda frustrating watching myself playing texas hold'em LIVE for the firstime. I tried playing 2 table at once, kind of ambitious for firstimer. Seriously i wonder how ppl like ANON can play 12 tables at once. Players are completely different level from playing fake money.

Will be posting net result for each day, whenever i play.

Result: -$6.34

Poker Stars

Funded my first poker account with pokerstars.com

I know its a bit rush, but im starting micro and still getting used to the system first with demo. New Label: Poker for this blog.

Wish me luck.

Black.