10c to $500 Challenge: $66

On paper it seems to be going well. I have made the decision (for the time being) not to move up to $5 games until I have 20 buyins, $100. My ROI for the $2.75 games is a healthy 22% at the moment and I am fearful of unsettling the steady progress.

Things I have learned at $2.75 level:

Stay out of the chat whenever possible - there is NO mileage in responding to the sulky infants that abuse you when you are making statistically decent plays. High blind play (400), with moderate to weak stack (about 4000 I think) I raised from sb on a standard steal against a similarly stacked opponent on the bb and ended up all-in after he raised, I had 10 4 he had 9 6 and my ten paired on the flop. I would do the same again (actually I should probably have pushed rather than ending up committed and calling?), but the key thing is to ignore the abuse in the chat and focus on the next hand. I won that game but had to get lucky again (insta called an all-in from a short stack with A2, he showed AQ, a deuce came on the flop and I shot into the HU with the big stack - nb the blinds were big, 600 or 800).

Do not be troubled by the robots - The 5leepwalkers of the world clogging up the already terrible traffic on betfair may be an irritation for those of us playing for fun, and they are spoiling small stakes games by timing out, slow play and shoving all-in tediously predictably, but ultimately they are probably grinding out little more than they could make flipping burgers in McDonalds, or waiting at tables for tips; they are multi-tabling at $2 stakes because they can't cut it in $20 games. The people that really should be feared are the creative players with 45% ROI such as TRM 08! Even if you are a very weak player like me, the robots are not making much from you, they can have the 3p in every £1, as long as they arent putting you in the red overall. Just play your normal game against them - win or lose you are bound to be having more fun than they are because you probably dont use beating microstakes hobby poker players as a support for a fragile ego!

Taking the Beats and Minimising Losses - You can play well and still lose lose lose, 10 games in a row easily. Getting this into my head and laughing off bad beats is very very important for me and is something I must work on. I need to leave the tables as soon as I am unsettled or angry! But minimising losses is also very important. Example of terrible play by me - 3rd hand in an STT last night I limped with AJ...flop came KJJ. Second to play, with a lot of people in the pot I checked in the hope of reraising...no bets...same stupid strategy on the turn, same result....on the river I reraised the utg player and got called by a bloke slow playing QT who made his straight. I played like a fool, but I didnt go bust on my set of Js and went on to win. There is a place for small-ball even at this level (and even with ultra tight-aggressive robots at the tables!).

Conclusion - play your own game at all times, play for FUN at micro-stakes, take the bad beats on the chin, stay out of slanging matches and dont try to teach the insulting abusers how to play better in the chat or even justify your play (we are allowed to make mistakes anyway). There are few players to fear at this level and how bad would it be to return to the 10c tables anyway.........well actually......tbh....terrible