10c - $500 Challenge: $148
Issues
Sharkscope doesnt track all your winnings - some of my results are not shown on the graph although the gist is correct.
I was NOT bankrolled for $5 games despite the optimistic comment on the previous post and nearly went bust, reduced to about $35 at one stage.
Betfair is not a suitable site for this kind of challenge, at least for a modest/weak player like myself. The traffic is ridiculously light....9 handed normal speed STTs can take a long time to fill up, the small number of hard core players, whilst not exactly sharks (!), are competent and include a disproportionate number of nits. Blinds are often up at 600 or higher on the bubble. Few players know how to play a big stack in order to thin the field so chips end up swilling about....and the short stacks hang on with 3 bbs because the big stacks fold to any all-in! Weird.
Learning Outcomes
I really thought I was going busto. I played bad and had bad beats. I think I had begun to loosen up as a result of my decent $2.75 stakes results, and I really couldnt get a gram of luck....instead of dropping back to $2.75 stakes for a couple of weeks, I just boosted myself into a $10 game, got a 2nd, and fought on at $5 games. It has come good and I have £88 with a high point of over £90 but I only just got a grip in time. Bankroll management is key and I made terrible errors, but it is so hard to be disciplined at these micro stakes levels. If I drop below $100 I will go straight back to $2.75 games! Basically I tilted.
My game has leaks: TRM08 is not happy with my bet sizing. He is correct, on the whole, to say I am not maximising winnings and minimizing losses as I should be and I plan to fix this. However, some of the regulars on BF percieve a 2.5 X bb raise as weakness, not strength, and there is a still a place for modest overbets sometimes. Sexyshazza suggested I am getting too aggro too quick when shortstacked at these tiny stakes, and having thought about this have decided this is also mostly true, although it really depends on the table... but.... as I noted above - often the big stack on BF simply does not know how to crush the opposition and perhaps hanging on with 6 bbs now and again may be profitable.
I think my play after the bubble is good just now and that it is important to be prepared to play the player and not the cards. That means not going nitty and waiting for bullets or cowboys - play position! My ratio of first places to third places is decent.
Everything is still ropey just now and I dont plan to move up to $10 games until I have at least $250. It can still all go pear shaped at $5. The stress...the terrible stress....
Comments
Bad Faith doesn't play on Stars 'cos he would be HORSEWHIPPED. 
Just kidding.
In all seriousness, what I said about bet sizing was that for many (possibly even all) players, one of the most difficult skills to master is betting just the right amount to maximise expected value. It's not a Bad Faith specific thing, it's a fundamental poker skill and one that's tough to master for everyone. Even me. 
Generally speaking if you are betting for value, you want to bet the maximum amount you think the opponent will call. On the other hand, if you are bluffing, you want to bet the minimum size of bet you think they will fold to. At the same time these two types of bets must be disguised and balanced so that it is not obvious to your opponent which type of bet is which (ie don't give off bet sizing tells).
Having said all that, at low stakes (or in loose games) you should rarely be bluffing and your opponents often pay little of no attention anyway, therefore bet sizing is actually not that complicated. Simply bet strong hands and bet them hard ie fastplay don't slowplay. Opponents will often call all ins with second pair (vs your sets etc) so often the best play is simply to shove.
I will say Bad Faith is an excellent psychologist and I have gained great benefit from his musings on the psychological side of the game eg stay out of chatboxes and don't lower yourself to opponents petty levels.
Good luck with the challenge, even if Sharkscope is conspiring to track all your losses and none of your wins (a variation on all online poker being rigged at least).
Lastly, Betfair is definitely the right site to choose for this challenge as the opposition is extremely weak compared with FT and Stars and the blind structure on BF favours skilled play due to having 2000 starting chips.
Very interesting indeed Felix - I am embroiled in Moshman's Heads Up book (gifted to me by a nice friend), and trying to think harder about the max wins min losses thing and win more.....the STTs are so formulaic mathematically though that the psychology is at least as important - I have been getting aggro four handed or less and exploiting the NITS, playing position and opponents rather than cards. For a big chunk of any STT now you know that any raise will end up raised or re-raised all-in by some ultra tight short stack Having watched Killer Queen cash in an MTT last night by limping, min raising and folding premium hands until she was down to 2 BBs I think the managing pot size thing is prob more subtle and important in the MTT (or higher stakes games). It isnt unusual to only play 2 hands before the bubble in an STT ....and before you know it it is push or fold! Death to the nits.
I dont think Sharkscope is rigged, I like it, but I am certain that now and again they miss results and if it is a win or a second place that can affect your stats: for the record I am $171 / £102 at the moment. Some of the missing $s is from tiny cashes on Micky Mouse MTTs, some from rakeback, and perhaps $30 from cashes in STTs not recorded by S Scope.
I took your advice and watched Luke 'FullFlush' Schwartz on Channel 4, he does not seem like the kind of man you would want to sit and drink beer with! A wee horror.
congrats on the challenge so far mate. hope u continued success, i do have to say ur bankroll policy is a bit risky although this is from the viewpoint of someone who plays a minimum of 12 tables at a time. 25 buy ins not much though as u said u would move to $10 at $250. i also decided to set myself the challenge of grinding through stakes and have so far turned $5 to $200 ish. at $200 im still playing a mixture of $1.10, $1.75 and $2.20 sngs. thats probably a bit too cautious but i do worry that when u get to higher stakes with better opposition or if u have a real downswing (30 buy ins maybe) that u might go bust. but as i said congrats and continued luck
Really appreciate your thoughts. I am sure what you say is correct! There is severe risk that when I meet better players and the margins go down I take a massive downswing at the $10 level Anyway, very interested in your strategy - I dont think I am good enough to multi-table seriously just now but I am so tempted! Maybe I should avoid $10 tables until I have (if ever) $300. I promise to be honest and report the facts here directly if i do go busto It is only a bit of fun afterall. Good luck to you too - dont fry your brain with all these tables, it sounds exhausting.
In response to Bad faith's comments on the role of mathematics versus psychology, I would say (as you in effect did) the main psychology in STTs is putting your opponents on hand ranges when they push and working out how often they will call your pushes (ie are they of a loose or tight mentality).
However this is also a maths skill as you can do this based on previous statistical behaviour (perhaps using a HUD) and assign a number to them eg 10/2 would be tight passive, 34/25 would be loose aggressive (numbers are vpip/pfr). Therefore, as Annette Oberstad said in one of her training vids "STTs are pure math" (yes she speaks American lingo).
The only three pieces of info required when pushing (or calling) are a) the mathematical probability of someone behind you being dealt a better hand 
the probabilty they will call you (based on their vpip etc) and c) pot odds. If you know these three figures, an STT becomes completely a math exercise (therefore Negreanu argues "boring" and not proper poker").
This is why STTs are often referred to as "a completely solved game" which is an expression you would associate more with maths than psychology (it's what keeps psychologists in work, their work is never done lol).
Maybe the lecturer of psychology is actually a hidden maths genius after all?
Good luck with your challange! And extra luck to you for using my all time favourite author/philosopher in your profile pic! (I use another favourite in my profile by the way...)