Weekly Draw Playing
After a successful 2010 my sights are set higher for 2011 and I hope to quadruple my $2,500 or so profit from 2010, in this upcoming year.
I've decided on the spur of the moment to start a weekly blog which i must admit I don't really have any experience of.
the reasons I'm doing this are partly because I feel like it will help keep me motivated each week to keep active at the tables. Also though, I feel it will provide a sort of diary for the year where I can look back at my progress, read back over the ups and downs and remind myself of all the hard work I put in over the course of a year.
i'm not sure how much strategy detail i'll go into or anything but perhaps some entries might even help players to understand 5 card draw a little better if they decided to read through a few entries.
I don't claim to be a high stakes shark that knows all there is to know about 5 card draw, but despite playing low stakes, I have had consistent success through last year so I'd like to think I know a bit about the game.
Even if no one finds the entries particularly useful or interesting, I think it's good to make a record of your progress when you are working towards something over a long time, and I hope it will help me achieve my goals in 2011.
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Week 3 of January 2011:
After a great turnaround in week 2, the following week would have a lot to try and live up to, but from the outset I was determined to come close to matching it.
With the latter part of january upon me, my attention turned to the battle of the planets Mercury leaderboard, and the monthly $50,000 triple shootout. In order to win my ticket for this, I needed a gruelling 60 hour week at the $2 Five Card Draw sit n gos, and a top 10 place on the high or low orbit leaderboard.
The reason I need to be playing such long hours is basically that Ive never been much of a multi tabling player and I find my focus isn't great with multiple tables open. Making a top 10 place on the BOP leaderboards is hard enough as it is, without eroding some of my edge away trying to play two or three tables at once.
After a decent enough first couple of days at this, day 3 was the stuff dreams were made of as I put together a stunning score of 510 in 19 games of a 20 block. The significance of the 20th game was that a 1st or 2nd would put me well into contention for a top ten place on the low orbit leaderboard, guaranteeing me my BOP ticket and extra prize money before id even finished my weekly 100 games.
half an hour later I sat with myself and 2 others left at my table, both having around 2,100 chips to my 4,800. It seemed unthinkable that I could finish 3rd given that neither player was particulrly aggressive. But from the stuff of dreams, came the stuff of nightmares. Twice in quick succession I held mediocre two pairs and raised, my opponents calling, drawing 3 cards, and hitting bigger two pairs. The damage from this left me at around 3,000 but I was not overly concerned as of yet. Just a few hand later though the small blind and myself ended up getting all the chips in, me with KKK and he with 991010. The 9 arrived to send me out in 3rd place, which was particularly painful given the significance of the game. Through the despair of this awful beat, I had to look at the positives though. I had a low orbit score that would net me $20 extra for a 10th -30th place score, and I was well on my way to a good high orbit score.
the remaining few days were a tough battle however, and after 95 games played for the week, my challenge for a top 3 place was all but over. Doing sme quick calculations i realised I needed two 1sts and a 2nd to move into provisional 5th place. This seemed a pretty big ask considering id only managed one 2nd in the previous six, and was on a bad run, but I took a break, came back composed, and got two 1sts immediately. Another scare was to follow though, as i had to wait until the final game to claim another 1st - passing the two players in 6th and 7th on 1,746 points.
Another late player score came in to drop me to 6th place overall but I didn't mind, I was home and dry with the BOP ticket, and with $145 earned over the week and $70 extra prize money for my high and low orbit placings - I had to be happy with +$215 for week 3.
January week 4:
After an excellent previous 2 weeks, i would have been satisfied with another $100 in week 4. My form continued into week 4 and this target was immediately exceeded, picking up another 3rd place out of 242 runners for +$133 on day 1.
The problem with this was that having achieved pretty much what id hoped for the week, and the month as a whole, I didnt have a great deal of enthusiasm and fighting spirit for the rest of the week and I feel into a routine of watching dvds and drinking red wine for much of following few days while I try to bring my sleeping patterns back around to normal hours again.
There were a few sit n go results to speak of but these were mostly negative news, meaning that I ended at around +$118 for the week.
Hopefully a new month will bring fresh perspective and energy, and I can continue with my previous good form in January.
Week 1 and 2 of January 2011:
After christmas and new years the poker treasury was looking a little drained, and so I had high hopes for week 1 of this year.
As it transpired, things didn't go according to plan. I felt as though I was running fairly bad, but perhaps I was a little bit rusty after a few weeks away from the action. I mostly played $2 sit and gos to get back into the swing of things, although a few additional $6 ones were thrown in as part of a grander plan to improve yearly profits.
Despite my best efforts, I ended the week with only +$38 which compared to my hopes, really felt like i'd got the year off to a bad start. Little did I know, that over the next 2 weeks, my January was about to get very interesting indeed.
Week 2 began in a similar fashion to week 1, seemingly for each step forward I was taking, I would have a bad run of results to push me backwards again. My weeks begin on Sunday 5am UK time by the way, because thats when the battle of the planets weekly sit n go leaderboards end, and I will be hoping that they play a part in my progress this year. I hadn't made any sort of decent start to the week this time around and so rather than pursuing any faint hopes of finishing high on leaderboards, i decided I needed to take a shot at something bigger.
As the end of the week loomed closer, I decided it was time to take a shot at the $500 guaranteed. For those who are unfamiliar with this tournament, it runs several times a day on pokerstars and is a 5 card draw MTT that usually attracts between 150 and 240 players depending on the day. One of my goals listed for this year is to win this more than the 3 times I managed last year. That Friday, I came close, with a respectable 3rd place out of 202 runners, and my first real progress for the year - a $115.70 score.
Having rescued my week at the 10th hour and brought my week 2 winnings to $151 total, I felt a lot more relaxed about Saturday, which was the final day of my week. $151 per week all year won't bring me the $10,000 I'm aiming for this year, but it sure felt like progress.
the 11th hour as they say, of my week, was sweeter than the 10th - with another shot at the $500 guaranteed yielding another (comparitively) big score, with 1st place out of 140 runners and $162 prize money to turn week 2 entirely on it's head, ending up +$313.