vacation - all I ever wanted... was to play poker.

This week is my week's vacation from work. I have to use the days by the end of the year or lose them. Since we're not going anywhere, my plan is to work on my game.

This morning, I downloaded StoxEV and watched the tutorial videos. It's an amazing program (I think - sooo complex), and I'm sure it will take much time to get used to. Today I modeled the QQ hand I had in my Thursday night game on the 89J rainbow flop. I went back to my blog entry and entered all of my opponent's hand ranges and actions. Based on this model - StoxEV reports that I had 59% equity in the hand after I shoved the flop. Not too bad. If I allow my opponent to call with AJ (something I don't think he does) - my equity goes up even higher.

Then, I played online. First one was a 6 man that got me nowhere except another bubble. I got aggressive at the right time, shoved with 9To, and got called by A4. He hit 2 pair. From an ICM perspective, my shove was great, his call was horrible, but that didn't help much today.

Then I decided to try something else I've been meaning to tackle - multitabling. Full Tilt just introduced a new type of game - matrix tournaments. In these, you play 4 simultaneous sit-n-goes with the same 8 opponents. You get money for finishing in the top 3 at each table, and also points for knockouts and survivals. At the end of the 4 tourneys, the top 3 point-getters split some more of the prize pool.

I tried a $5 tourney just so I wasn't draining my bankroll doing something very new. I was able to follow the action ok - not too overwhelmed with 4 tables going. However, I didn't end up doing very well. I only monied in one tournament - taking second place, which only won me $2.70. I placed 5th, 6th, and 7th in the others. I need to review to see how I played in each - was this poor play a function of my multitabling, or was it just ye-olde variance hitting me in the nuts. Here are some of the hands I remember:

I hit a set of tens and got a call from an unsuited ace who hit a flush on an all-heart board (he had Ah)
I had KK twice and had to lay them down both times with an ace on the flop and betting action before me.
I raised AK, got put all-in by a big stack, called, he had A9 and hit runner-runner-flush.

I also played an aggressive donk like a fiddle and got rewarded by losing a big pot. I had A6 and completed the big blind. He had already limp-reraised me so I was playing conservative. The flop came 6 2 4. He bet the pot, I just called. Turn came an 8, he bet pot again, I just called. River came a 7 - he bet half pot, I called. He had 5 T and hit his one card gutshot straight after betting pot twice. Ouch. Should I reraise preflop again? This guy had already shown he was not capable of folding - do I want to go to war with A6? Do I shove flop with TPTK? This guy is putting his money in with the worst hand the whole way and then sucks out - aren't I playing "correctly" by calling down and letting him hang himself?

Well, that was my afternoon session- more poker to come tonight.

one other note: PokerTracker 3 currently doesn't handle the matrix tourneys correctly. I actually won 2.70 by placing 2nd in one of the tourneys, but this didn't get recorded. PT also smashed all 4 of the tourneys together b/c they have the same full tilt tourney ID. They have promised a patch

Evening session - 2 normal nine man tourneys - one bubble (my first ICM shove of the night with JQ is called by A7 - which is a HORRIBLE play by her and only marginally bad by me (+EV overall but just over 10 Big blinds, no need to shove quite yet). Second tourney I finally break my out-of-the-money streak and take 2nd. That was 7 online tournies in a row out of the money (excluding the matrix tourney).

Lots of poker to play this week - as usual, I need a turnaround late to make it a positive month. I will give myself a pass this month, though, since a) I'll probably be screwing around with the matrix tourneys this week, and b) I won 5 hundy in the live tourney last week. Getting back to positive is certainly a goal but I won't despair if I don't get there.