Climbing The Limit Ladder

MTT Win on Full Tilt

2006-04-04T10:44:00.000-04:00

On March 26th, I completed one of my major poker goals this year. I won a MTT tournament.
Although it was a $5, it still represents what I have known all along, that I am good enough winn a MTT. This was only the 3rd MTT I have played this year, mainky because I have been trying to play more limit and the fact I now am on my internship for college. Just thought I would give a quick update, I will update my Limit adventure shortly...lets just say it is going very well :)

Click on the picture a few times to make it clear...I'm stupid and dont understand how to get it to work.

Progress report

2006-03-08T21:22:00.000-05:00

I have now moved to 1/2 limit full time when playing. I have a sufficent bankroll to be able to take just about any swing. I have been spending most of my recent time playing on betsson, in order to clear there initail $600 sign-up bonus. Its a good site, although the rake is the highest I have seen online. I'm down a little over $100 while clearing 30% of the bonus so far. The bonus there is all or nothing, so I have to complete the requirements before any bonus is given to me. I should finish this up by the end of March in the limited time I play now. Working 7 days a week for the next 3 months is going to suck.

Chart of my progress

2006-02-28T15:54:00.000-05:00

Ok, I have been on a good streak recently. Since I started tracking my winnings since Mid-January, I have been on fire. Here is a chart of what I have won since I traced my bankroll back to an original starting point. My 1st deposit on UB.
This total includes all sites, all bonuses, and rakeback. My looking through my Pokertracker stats, just under 1/2 of this total is from poker winnings. That means that over $800 of this is from bonus and rakeback. This is a huge sum of money for a 1/2 and under limit player. I suggest to all those layers out there with limited bankrolls to take advantage of the bonuses that poker sites offer you. Don't play at one particular site just because it is your favorite. You may just find out the grass is greener elsewhere.

Why I haven't been updating

2006-02-22T15:37:00.000-05:00

I have been very busy the past week. I have been searching for an internship for the Spring 06 semester since December. It looks as if I have found one finally. I will update later this week about my poker doings, but there are priorities in life, and poker has fallen down a few notches latley.
I have still played some, and I will update that next time.

Turning Stone Trip Report

2006-02-15T20:09:00.000-05:00

So, after going over to college early this morning and finding out im fucked as it relates to internships at the moment, I decided I needed to relax a little. So I headed to Turning Stone(20 min drive), to play some $100 max 1/2 NL.

I get there about 1pm, hand over my diamond card to earn points while playing and buy in for $100.

30 minutes later Im down $300.

First $100 goes in about 5 minutes, I hold KQs in MP and raise to $10, I get one caller. Flop comes 10 J 4. I have an open-ended str8 draw and a flush draw. I bet $20 and am re-raised all in. I then say "Jack huh?", and he says so politely, "Yup". So I call and he flips up AJ, which holds up. No big deal....RE_BUY.

A few hands later I get the button and pocket 3's. Its raised ahead of me to $10 so I call. Flop comes 3 9 Q rainbow (Couldn't ask for a better flop). Initial raiser bets $10 and MP calls. I don't want to scare anyone so I just call. Turn brings a 6 with a flush draw. Initial raiser bets $20 and MP calls. I jam the pot with the $80 or so I have left. Initial raiser insta-calls and MP calls after thinking for a minute. Im greeted by AA and a flush draw. The flush draw rivers his flush so wham...down $200..No big deal....RE_BUY...

A few meaningless hands later I get AA UTG and pop it to 12. I get 3 callers and the the BB goes all in for well over $200. I call obviously and so do 2 others....Yikes.

Long Story Short, 2 people hit sets and one hits a straight (Pot was over $500) , so Im out $300. In about 45 minutes.

I almost just left, but I brought $400 with me and decided to re-buy 1 last time.

THANK GOD!!!!!

I get dwindled down to about $70 when I have the button and AK. A few limpers, so I bump to $15, BB then goes all in for about $80. I think for a few seconds and call, and he flips over AJs and my AK holds. Now im up to about $160.

Card dead for about an hour when I get 99 in MP. 1 limper so I raise to $12....It seems like the whole table called. Flop came 679 with a flush draw. EP bets $15 and I jam all my money(over $140) in with being happy to take it down right now. Player to my left calls and everyone folds. He flips up AA and I take down a $300 pot.

Hours go by, nothing hits so I have about $200 in front of me. Pick up AQ on the button and re-raise to $35 UTG+1's bet of $12. UTG+1 calls. Flop comes J86....Yuck. UTG+1 checks and i bet $30, which he calls almost instantly. Turn is an A.

I think for about 2 minutes here what to do. The whole table is mad at me, yelling to hurry up.....I think of what he could have, how he has played for the last hour since he sat down, what he thinks I could have(maybe this was giving him to much respect). I decide to trap....I check, to which he instantly goes all in for his remaining $80. With his bet there is $250 in the pot here...Im not to sure where I am in the hand. I call and am relieved to see 89, and my AQ holds.
As Im about to end my session with about $475 in front of me for a $75 profit, this occurs.
UTG raises, MP re-raises and I look down and see 6's. Easy fold as MP is super-tight and is screaming AA or KK. UTG calls. (Both of these players have about $400 in front of them.) Flop comes 686. ( I would have flopped quads). UTG checks and MP goes all in only to be instacalled by UTG who has 88 against AA. (This would have been a $1200 pot if I played). Looking back I believe I made the right choice to fold as I was %100 sure I was beat and was facing a $40 bet pre-flop, but damn I wish I had called.

So in all I played for 6 hours, made $75 and had a good time, while clearing my mind.

I feel as though my continues online play has made me a MUCH better live player. After seeing so many hands online, it becomes very easy to read an opponents hand. Also the fact that there is much more interaction at a live game, leads to being able to pick up "tells" on your opponents as well. I think that throughout the day, I was able to make pretty good plays. (I misplayed 2 hands that cost me about $40). Next time I will give a discussion of these two hands and explain why they cost me.

Tracking my bankroll/ winnings

2006-02-12T16:00:00.000-05:00

Between Saturday night and a few minutes Sunday afternoon, I created a very basic bankroll managment program in Excel. I wanted keep track of my winnings and losses this year on a site by site basis, as well as on an overall basis.

My data started in mid-January, and I input all data on all sites I currently have an interest in.
I plan to update my spreadsheet on a weekly basis every sunday. This will allow me to see the flow of money on a week by week basis for my bankroll (Something I have been lazy about for the last few years).
This was a great step forward for me, as I know I have been a winning player for a while, but now I will be able to track it much more carefully.

A little side business

2006-02-11T21:12:00.000-05:00

So, for the past few days I have taken a break from playing limit, to start bonuswhoring. I signed up at empire and got a first time bonus of 20% up to $100. Cleared that quick. Had a friend refer me on Noble Poker. $25 for me $50 for him. We will split the total for $37.50 each. Played a little Limit on UB during the last few days also. Ive cleared my first deposit bonus there, so I will probably re-load with their current V-day offer.

Current Limit Bankroll: $466

My take on the differences of play at different times of the week

2006-02-06T12:02:00.000-05:00

After playing over 10,000 hands of Limit in the last 3 weeks, I have made a few observations as to the quality of opponents at different levels, and at different points in the day.

First off, I will talk about the difference between .25/5 players and .5/1 players. In the .25/.5 games the average view flop % is somewhere around the 35-45% range sometimes creeping over the 50% range. This means that between 35-45% of the table is seeing the flop on average each hand. Using GT+ and add-on to Pokertracker, I have set up the icons to alert me as to when there is a player with a VPIP of over 40% playing at my table. (Set up in blue as to label them as a fish). In the .25/.5 game I will find anywhere from 2-4 of these type of players at my table. If possible I try to position myself directly to their left so I can punish them when I hit a big hand. These types of players are gold mines in the Low limit tables, sure you will get sucked out on a few times, but those times when you hold the nuts and 2 of these players are in the hand, you will often take in a huge pot.

In the .5/1 games I have played, I notice the view flop % is around the 32-40% range on average. This indicates that fewer players are seeing the flop each and, and is sometimes indicative of better players. I have also noticed that there are much fewer players with a VPIP of over 40%. (that's voluntarily Put Money In The Pot). If I find a table with 2 of these players I am lucky. Most of the time there is only one or none of these types of players. The average player is better than the .25/.5 player, so you must look at the tables carefully before sitting down.

Now I will contrast daytime play vs. Nighttime play. I find that the tables at night seem to have a bump in the view flop% of about 3-5%. This means that players are seeing the flop more often at night than during the day. I think this comes about with the different type of players that play at night. There is probably a more younger, possibly less experienced crowd at night, which can lead to a higher profitability for a good player.

The same increase is also there when you look at the weekday player vs. the weekend player. From my days of playing NL on Fulltilt, I can assure you play is much more erratic on the weekend. You see the largest number of players online during the weekend, which usually brings down the overall quality of the players at any one time.

As a final conclusion, using what I have observed, it seems to me that the lightest competition would be on a weekend night. I have no strong facts on this, just my observations from the last 2 years of playing online, and from my attempt to climb the limit ladder.

Easiest $300 I've ever made

2006-02-03T10:30:00.000-05:00

So I get home this morning and check out my PSO account. YESSSSS!!!!, my UB FFP points have been posted. Time to cash out a $300 Party Poker Gift Certificate. Anyone not using places like pokersourceonline.com just isnt getting the full value available when playing online poker. Although I'm not a big fan of Party Poker, I'll play just enough hands to be able to withdraw my $300 and hopefully make a few bucks off of the fonk's there (Fish+Donk=Fonk)

1st dabble into .5/1 Limit

2006-02-01T18:38:00.000-05:00

This is within my first 20 or so hands as I started a new table to take advantage of UB's 25% increase in UB points by being one of the 1st 2 people to sit at a new table.

Using GT+ with Pokertracker I noticed this guy had seen every flop of the 15 hands he had been in, and raised pre-flop over 50% of the time. I really didn't know what he had, but I think he overplayed his hand a wee bit much.

Hand #11534717-20 at Madrid ($.50/$1 Hold'em)
Powered by UltimateBet
Started at 01/Feb/06 18:30:03

Aviater is at seat 0 with $9.45.
atrox2u is at seat 3 with $54.80.
Bloodknot is at seat 4 with $51.60.
britdevine is at seat 5 with $53.30.
XHYPERX is at seat 6 with $15.10.
The button is at seat 6.

Aviater posts the small blind of $.25.
atrox2u posts the big blind of $.50.

Aviater: -- --
atrox2u: -- --
Bloodknot: -- --
britdevine: Qd Jd
XHYPERX: -- --

Pre-flop:

Bloodknot folds. britdevine raises to $1. XHYPERX
re-raises to $1.50. Aviater calls. atrox2u folds.
britdevine calls.

Flop (board: 4s Td 8s):

Aviater checks. britdevine checks. XHYPERX bets
$.50. Aviater calls. britdevine calls. (At first I didnt think I had the correct odds to call, but now after looking at it I actually did. 50 cents to win $5.50 with hughe implied odds).

Turn (board: 4s Td 8s 9d): (BINGO!!!!!!!!!!)

Aviater checks. britdevine checks. XHYPERX bets $1.
Aviater calls. britdevine raises to $2. XHYPERX
re-raises to $3. Aviater folds. britdevine
re-raises to $4. XHYPERX calls.

River (board: 4s Td 8s 9d 2d):

britdevine bets $1. XHYPERX raises to $2.
britdevine re-raises to $3. XHYPERX re-raises to $4.
britdevine calls. ( I think I could of kept re-raising if it was allowed and taken everything)

Showdown:

XHYPERX shows Ad Ah.
XHYPERX has Ad Ah Td 8s 9d: a pair of aces.
britdevine shows Qd Jd.
britdevine has Qd Jd Td 9d 2d: flush, queen high.

Hand #11534717-20 Summary:

$.50 is raked from a pot of $23.50.
britdevine wins $23 with flush, queen high.
----------------------------------------------------------------

A little about me and what I am doing

2006-02-01T16:41:00.000-05:00

Hello all, my name is Brit. I am 25 and currently a senior in college here in NY. I have played online poker now for about 3 years. Almost exclusively playing NL games ranging from $5-200 buy in.

I have played on Full Tilt almost exclusively for the last year or so. I haven't played much since November of 2005, and decided that I want to start learning, playing and dominating small stakes limit Hold Em.

What I am doing now is starting on a limit adventure, Starting with a bankroll of $200, and starting at .25/.5 limit on Ultimate Bet, I will share with you my adventures claiming the limit ladder.

I am very conservative with my bankroll, and will not move up a limit until I double my bankroll. This will allow me to start each new limit with 400 BB's (Big Bets). My goal is to be playing at least 3/6 with a $2400 bankroll by the end of this year. I believe this to be a somewhat modest and attainable goal. Honestly I hope to be playing 5/10 by end of 2006.

I decided to start this blog to chronicle my adventures so I can remember where I started from and so hopefully others can follow my footsteps and success.

I started playing limit in the middle of January 2006, and have already doubled my bankroll to $400 and have finished with the first level of .25/.5

From here on out you will hear about what goes down in my .5/1 sessions as I will begin playing those shortly after I finish analyzing my own data from .25/.5 (8000+ hands).

Current Bankroll: $406