My First Year Of Online Poker (long)

[spt24 0]

My first year of online poker is complete and I thought it would be nice to write a summary of my experiences throughout the last year. I am a 25 year old Geology student living in Nebraska, playing poker for fun, a little money and hoping to get better in the process.On May 5th(yeah, so I am jumping the gun a bit) I deposited $82 onto Neteller using Instacash because I wanted to play immediately and I didn’t know any better. Well, after 5 days of waiting for them to call me and confirming my bank account info, etc., I finally deposited 50$ onto Ultimate Bet. I was now ready to win all the money (like Marcel Luske said - 'I need allllll the money').Not knowing what game was best for me I decided to sit down at a .10/.25 limit hold’em table. Three hours later and 40$ up I quit for the night. I just knew that I would never have to work again in my life. Poker was easy, I was good at it and most of the other players weren’t. 40$ a day could work out fine and I know that I will get better with time, ah, the easy life. I had read Skylansky and Malmouths advanced limit hold’em guide so I was familiar with selective starting hands, position, etc., but I had not practiced any of it, that is until that night. Two days later I made my first cash out, I took 30$ and left myself with 50$. Throughout the year this would prove to be a normal occurrence for me, I run well – I cash out. I never feel very comfortable with having more than 100$ online. And many times I would build my account to 100$ and then cash out $90 and try to grind the last 10 dollars to something over 25 so I could cash out again. My only bill, while living at home and going to school, was 100$ for a credit card each month. After cashing out things changed. I know that some of you are familiar with the post cash-out syndrome, whereas you cash out some money and then the poker site seems to hate your guts and you go on a big losing streak. I felt this bug more than once, I am not sure if I wholly believe in it, but it seems that way. So limit hold’em was starting to be a bore to me and I wasn’t a big winner at the lower stakes, damn you variance, so I decided to look to another game. I began to hit up the 5$ tournaments, both 10 person and heads up matches. While treading water in the 10 person tournaments at UB, losing a bit, I noticed that I could kill the heads up matches. During my first month of playing I was winning 40% of the total hands, but winning 60+% of the matched I played. I always knew when I was playing someone good and I would just avoid playing them again, the rest of the fishes at this level were easy to beat. Still I was cashing out almost all of my winnings and going broke was a bi-weekly event. I would make 25$, have 50$ in my account, cash out 40$ and lose the last 10$ - overall it is a profit but going bust still sucks. I didn’t know about bankroll management and winrates and all that other good stuff. Around this time I was bored with heads up games and I was itching to play something new. My brother told me about Omaha, I was hooked. For 3 months I was either at the penny tables(when my bankroll was low) or the .10/.25 PLO tables. The penny tables are no joke, I would every week or so take a 1 or 2 dollar buy in to over $20, I see that happen all the time there. The play is so poor and people don’t mind losing a dollar or two at a time. Around this time my bankroll was really building up, I had at one point 250$ in there, from the 25$ original redeposit. I said to myself that I was ready to move-up and play in the bigger PLO games at UB. So what did I do? I had a few beers, well if 10 is a few, and hit the table. I played 1$-2$ PLO and went bust-o in a few hours. PLO has high variance and I played OK but my hands just never held up (top set flopped loses to runner-runner straight). But that happens, especially with big draws, so playing out of my bankroll kicked my as, as it should. I tilted the last 100$ away, putting the last 50$ on a NL HE table and losing a 110$ pot with 9 high versus my 7 high(all in preflop – everyone limped to me on the button and I basically went all in with 75s to pick up the 20 bucks sitting in the pot and 98 was the only hand that called me – lol – it almost worked).But I swore off internet poker for awhile. It was late 2005 and I was up around 300$ at UB, could have been better, could have been worse. I began bonus whoring through PSO and I was by this time reading FCP regularly. I have posted in the past mostly in the PLO and Omaha H/L strat sections. Around the New Year I put some money on Pokerroom. I put on 11$, played 2 sit-n-goes and lost. I repeated that process two more times. But I new I could beat this game so one day I got fed up and put on 50$, this started the Pokerroom run. January through March I played in roughly 350 Sit-n-goes for mainly 5$ a piece(up to the 20$ ones a few times). I made 500$ profit playing these games just by folding and playing extremely tight (but pushing with pairs and AK). Some games I would fold down to 200 chips(yes, I would play 0 hands) and the blinds at 100/200 and there are 5 players remaining. Three double-ups later and I was the chip leader and ready to take the tournament down, that happened at least 3 times. I couldn’t have been playing more than 10% of the hands that I was dealt but I was constantly beating the game. That was a fun time. Since then I have been extremely card dead at Pokerroom, but I am still around 500$ made for 2006, I have no money on there right now, it is in my neteller account until I am in the mood to crank that back up again, I am giving it some time. Recently I took up Omaha H/L. I read a lot about all Omaha games online, and I found out that H/L has lower variance. I haven’t gone much past the penny tables with H/L yet, but so far I have been a big winner at this game. I like to play it heads up and just bet the pot over and over again, you know when you have a good hand and want to take it to a showdown for a 3/4 or a scoop and the times you get the other person to fold half of the pot makes this strategy easily the best way to go, at the low levels the players are just awful. I entered three 1$ Omaha H/L tournaments in the last week, the first one was shut down when UB went down ( I was in 3rd place with 50 people left), the second one I placed 15th(top 20 money) and the last one I won for 32$. So those tourneys seem to be very beatable. Last year I played in the 10$ PLO rebuy tournaments during the day, I played 3 times, invested 30$ each time and bubbled all three times(~90 players entered, top 10 payed, and I would always finish 11th-15th.) The next time I build a bankroll I will try to get back into those because one 500$ win would be a great and I think that I was close turning the corner and placing high.My most memorable hand in the last year was my biggest bad beat I suffered. Playing .10/.25 cent PLO H/L on Fulltilt clearing a PSO bonus I was dealt KK53 ds. The flop was 333 and I was bet into on all the streets by some guy that had 88JT, needless to say the turn and river were 88 and he stacked me, I will never put money on Fulltilt again, I saw too many weird things there. I also refuse to play at Partpoker or Pokerstars, I hate the graphics and I see weird things there too often also. My biggest hand won – NL HE .10/.25 I had doubled up to $50 and I was dealt 22 in MP. I called a raise to $1.25 and 5 people saw the flop. On the 972 flop I bet $7.50, the pre-flop raise guy min reraised me and I pushed, he flipped over TT and I won a 103$ pot. I won another 100$ pot in PLO, but I forgot the details.I have a first and second place in 5$ 30 player tournaments(one on UB and the other on PR). Those scores were for 40-60 bucks or something. I have played in only 6 of them, so I have done fairly well as I bubbled in one of them. Overall I am up 800$ in my first year of playing online poker. Due to playing sporadically and at the low limits that I was playing at I am fairly pleased. I easily tilt when I get bad beats against me and that is something I definitely need to work on. My overall game is solid, I play a Tag style and that seems to work best for me and I am mostly conservative in nature. My favorite game right now is Omaha High/Low but I still like to play Omaha High as well. I haven’t picked up playing limit HE since the first month I played. I know I can make myself into a winning player there, but I don’t want to devote the hard work. My bankroll management is very good – I say this because even thought I have gone broke 20 times or more in the past year, I had already cashed out a profit each time. Had I not cashed out each time I made some money I would never have gone broke all year – but I find that I feel most comfortable doing it that way. That really makes it hard to move up levels, but until I have a good paying job that is the situation that I am going to be in. Goals for year 2. Make money, preferably over $1,000, maybe more. Get comfortable with leaving several hundred bucks on a poker site. Play within my bankroll – keep as much money as I need to play at a level on the site and not move up until I have 300BB, or 30 buy-ins or whatever is required for what I am playing. Work very hard on the emotional side of the game, tilt less, let variance occur without thinking that poker is rigged. Play in some higher money games and get better at MTT’s. Play in 1 $100 tournament, see if I can cut it with the big boys (those deep-stack tournaments are great for me, I just try to play overpairs and sets very fast so I need to see a lot of hands.) I want to bang two chicks on a pool table (yeah, I know, random thought). I need to keep having fun playing and watching every televised poker event that I can. Keep having fun at the two weekly tournaments I play in ( I am up about $100 in live play this year – last 6 months). To all the people that flame this, thanks, you are useful and interesting. I also know that I should TP/MM and my blog is going to start up soon so I can keep you all informed… (ah, the sarcasm). But seriously, I hope that someone has found this interesting and maybe learned a thing or two in the process, it’s a long journey we are all on and it’s nice to spend some time playing a game that is as fun as poker is. If you see me at the tables then say what’s up, I am antedumb at UB and antedumb00 at pokerroom…

[crazyplaya6 0]

sorry, but i have to be the one who does thisit's mandatoryTP/MM

[WhatArunAA 0]

sorry, but i have to be the one who does thisit's mandatoryTP/MM

WOW, you are really cool.

[bombsaway 0]

War and Peace

In between looking at rocks, I recommend learning how to write concise posts, because this was torture. As far as your poker exploits go: good for you?Yikes.To the idiot that responded with TP/MM, YSSCKY. Dear god, where have all the funny people gone. Turd? Ron Mexico??? ANYONE?????

[crazyplaya6 0]

In between looking at rocks, I recommend learning how to write concise posts, because this was torture. As far as your poker exploits go: good for you?Yikes.To the idiot that responded with TP/MM, YSSCKY. Dear god, where have all the funny people gone. Turd? Ron Mexico??? ANYONE?????

i started an edit but lost it, ignore my brain fart post

[HangukMiguk 8]

I can't be funny either.

I'm sorry to hear that.

[pbwl11 0]

Little problem there sparky......UB doesn't have .10/.25 limit tables. They go from .05/.10 to .25/.50What else have you lied about, I wonder........?

[danlux 0]

You sound like a smart enough guy, here's my advice. Deposit more money, and or don't cash out as often and try to build a real bank roll. $800 sounds nice, but that averages out to barely more than $2 a day. Keep something like 200 dollars on a site and play 10 dollar sng's. And play something other that ultimate bet, there's way too many fish on party poker to be ignored. Oh, and stop majoring in geography. That's what people like Reggie Bush major in.

[HangukMiguk 8]

Little problem there sparky......UB doesn't have .10/.25 limit tables. They go from .05/.10 to .25/.50What else have you lied about, I wonder........?

he's clearly talking about the blinds, not the limits.

[SuitedAces21 2,722]

Little problem there sparky......UB doesn't have .10/.25 limit tables. They go from .05/.10 to .25/.50What else have you lied about, I wonder........?

BURN!

[pbwl11 0]

Not knowing what game was best for me I decided to sit down at a .10/.25 limit hold’em table. For 3 months I was either at the penny tables(when my bankroll was low) or the .10/.25 PLO tables.

Don't sound like blinds to me.

[GWCGWC 83]

cliff notes dammit

[vonteego3 0]

get a blog

[Simpleton 0]

sorry, but i have to be the one who does thisit's mandatoryTP/MM

It is getting quite old and actually a little stupid

[llou 0]

I'm not qualified to judge your poker abilities ... but ...As a writer/aspiring blogger, you suck.llou

[SSPadawon4 0]

It is getting quite old and actually a little stupid

U say FT is fixed. UB is the worst site ever. I lost with quads 5 times in a month to runner runner str8 flushes. U r lucky. U play way to high for wat u got in ur account. Just wait until u get a bad streak, a real bad streak where u don't win **** for a month to 6 weeks. Im currently in my third one all time, like u im a small stakes player. The first one i lost 100 dollars. Second one last 70 and this one im down 50 and still in it. My friend who plays a little higher stakes then me has been in a cold streak for almost 3 months losing over $500.But gl this year and maybe u r protected from bad streaks.

[Butcho22 0]

Does anybody else feel like this thread belongs on neverwinpoker?To the OP...i didn't read all that, it's just wayyyyy to longI will probably read it next time i'm at work....

[mikenewz 0]

I just had my first year of online anniversary... While I could have a much longer post than the original guy considering I used about 10 sites and occasionally multitabled and went for higher limits, here's an attempt at a more concise summary:Stage 1:April - June 2005 I'd cal it a learning phase, mostly on Poker Room. When I saw how much fun I could have with such a selection of games, I found most interested by NL 5 person ring games or SNGs. The action was fast. I also learned I should get a deeper understanding than playing by feel, and read some poker books and mags, particularly Super System 2.I occasionally played a $5 tourney, and nabbed 2nd in one with 250 competitors for a nice payday. But like any winning I'd get cocky and play up at a higher level or just try something I didn't have expertise in (like big ring games, or bigger buyin tourneys). I would cash out and cash in on some whims - like $100 at a time so I wouldn't have more than $200 in the account. Looking back, this 3 month stretch was an investment of $1000.Stage 2 July - October 2005I started to really cook with playing more frequently, even taking the risk to goof off at work when I wanted a 'break'. Plus my wife and kid wanted more time with me, so I had to go a bit underground.The adrenaline this gave me would both help and hurt. I started to get really focused on beating people heads up, doing the $10 heads up battles. I figured it would cross over to success in tourneys and SNGs.But at ring games my adrenaline would cause me to push a bit much, so I was getting caught more and more; especialy if I wasn't patient about creating a good table image. So at ring games I would have high variance, getting stoked if my crazy style would draw someone in that I could clobber if I was lucky to get a real hand. I was bubbling out or not making serious enough late in tourneys to apply my abilities at heads up. Heads up I could do well against most opponents by changing gears really often, trying to put the other guy on tilt as much as possible by going all in with 5 - 3 off and showing the cards, or checking down the nuts. My increased play was fun, but cost me another grand.Stage 3October - Dec 2005At this point I was pretty obsesed about poker, which meant I didn't think it was a healthy obsession. My wife agreed. I went to gambler's anonymous and answered yes to about 13 of the 20 questions. I only needed 7, so I diagnosed myself as a compulsive gambler.That made sense. I could easily get in 10-12 hours some days between work and late nights; and any break of a few days was followed by me wanting to make up for lost time. But damn! Give up poker? It had really engaged me for my interest in numbers, strategy, competition, structure. It was also good for my procrastination and denial; and in college I wanted to start a procrastinators club - but kept putting it off.When I did play, plus I was going to GA meetings, I did so on the sly. It didn't hurt my game that much since if I lost it would give me incentive to take a break. But when I won, as I started to do at the ring games and 5-person SNGs, I got too much of a charge to put the game away. I lost about $500 max during this time.Stage 4December 2005 - March 2006Holy crap - the poker compulsion kicked me in the *** when my bosses at work wanted to know what the hell was wrong with my productivity. A quick look at the computer told the story, dumbass that I was I didn't delete stuff on a daily basis. Anyway, I had an 'out' as I was already in a 'program' to get better. The first 30 poker free days sailed by, it was good for my family. I hadn't lost much interest though since occasionally I'd read blogs or watch a program.The stress at work, and my life in general, took me back to find som solace at the tables in Feb/March. By then I'd also found there were some nice opportunities at the Bike, Commerce, and particularly Hollywood Park casinos. I'd lose $100 one day, but then $200 the next, or take $40 to $150 in 1.5 hours at the $40 buyin table. It seemed easy. But I was lying to everyone, my wife, my GA friends, my family. They all saw how happy I was. It's interesting, a compulsion in your brain. I'dnever had a problem with substances before..but man this was really teaching me that my brain cam to rely on the poker action. That's not healthy.And yet, I'd crossed over to making money - particulalry live but I also stemmed the losses online. I profited several hundred at the new FCP site, as well as Full Tilt. (I'm a Mac guy and both sites are Mac friendly)So was this a real problem?Present: April 2006You can bet my wife sees it as a problem. At the end of March she caught me playing online and I told her all the lies I'd done to cover up for the last month. Within days, that was it for her. She told me to get out of our own house.I did, I am taking my life very seriously now. I am playing through what my true desires in life really are: at the end of my days will I have true friends from the gamblers I'd meet along the way (not likely), would I be financially successful (possibly, but that would take years, plus a lot of variance as I move up to a higher level); would my daughter, family workers respect my choices (nope, not even the few who can understand poker is as much or more skill than luck). My desire in life had been to: Be responsible, be a good husband and dad, and to have fun along the way. A life of pleasure with travel, sports, movies, social gatherings, and truly interisting conversations. Well, now is the time to overcompensate and get poker out of my life. I haven't placed a bet in 30+ days. I even went to Las Vegas on business the other day and only went to the convention center and back to the airport. It really sucked seeing those bright lights out of the plane window as I left. But it's the best thing spending time with my daughter, and being truly focused when with her. Well, this entry did get so much longer than originally intended. Thank You all for your best wishes. Most of us don't give a crap what's going on with each other's personal lives. And since I have been personal here, my apologies to anyone that is upset by the entry. Take care and Good Luck!

[cdt002 0]

This reads as a great satire to me. Who made the alternate account to make up the ultimate mundane poker post?? Will the world ever know?

[joshrogo 0]

I feel like i lost part of my life reading that post .. It is not the slightest bit interesting, and I doubt anyone will find it the least bit interesting.

[wsox8 10]

Good luck in year 2.. Interesting but very long post

[acesfull333 0]

I didn't think this totally sucked...Not saying it was a riveting read, but I did find it mildly interesting with enough interesting stuff to get me to the end... but what the heck do I know?!?!?

[spt24 0]

Thanks for your comments all, well, most of you.A few comment, I don't know what to tell you, long means long. I warned you, don't read a long post if you don't want to - that makes you an idiot.It's geology not geography.it was .25/.50 limit, it was a year ago, I don't play limit anymore and I know that I said the wrong thing. Yes, that does make everything I said a lie, obviously.I think its very funny that someone tried to write a concise report and then rambled on just like me, outstanding.I like reading other peoples trip reports or career summaries, so I made my own, it was mostly so I had it written out somewhere.

[Butcho22 0]

Thanks for your comments all, well, most of you.A few comment, I don't know what to tell you, long means long. I warned you, don't read a long post if you don't want to - that makes you an idiot.It's geology not geography .it was .25/.50 limit, it was a year ago, I don't play limit anymore and I know that I said the wrong thing. Yes, that does make everything I said a lie, obviously.I think its very funny that someone tried to write a concise report and then rambled on just like me, outstanding.I like reading other peoples trip reports or career summaries, so I made my own, it was mostly so I had it written out somewhere.

[Tiltinagain 973]

I feel like i lost part of my life reading that post .. It is not the slightest bit interesting, and I doubt anyone will find it the least bit interesting.

I too want a refund on the 10 minutes of my life I lost. You two need to call Oprah, she actually enjoys listening to this kind of weak dribble.