It is interesting to me how much my game can swing from bad to good from week to week. In a tournament especially in the bar leagues, one mistake can really cost you the tourney. Most of the games we play in are pretty small, maybe 16-30 people sometimes less, just depends on the night.

Lately I am either really focused or completely not focused and go on tilt way too easy. Too much Sugar? Maybe. I will have to do some logging to see if I can find it. It is a pretty big hole in my game. We are playing for free and you have to expect some wild swings in chips and given the structure the luck factor is a bit higher. (I just read a post on cardsquad about luck and tournament structure) That’s not to say there aren’t any good players, there definitely are. More that tight play, at least early on, is the best strategy. Most of these players don’t respect a raise especially early on when the blinds are low and they have plenty of chips. 10X the blind will often be called in the early rounds with Q8,Q7 especially if ‘soooted’. (That extra 3% you know…)

I’m not complaining that is just how it is and I often forget that. It still stings when they catch that 1 outer on the river and I go play video poker of some such thing. I tend to read a lot of blogs and am really trying to improve my game. We were just in Vegas less than month ago and really wanted to play in a tourney out there. We went down town and hit several casinos there but had to wait several hours for a tourney and we really don’t play much limit cash games. We didn’t want to wait as it was pretty late already already but I do have to say there was some intimidation factor being Binions and the size of the buy in. We really wish we has as they were filming an Ultimate Poker Challenge and it would have been a great way to pass the time. We didn’t know anything about it but have started watching it of late. We did play in a tournament the day before we left at the Stratosphere. I liked the poker room and the folks running it. I did ok and made the final table with avg chips only the top 2 were paid so I finished out of the the money but did get some confidence in my play for real money. Still not sure about ow limit no-limit games though. Have to work some online on those.

Getting back to the swings I had a pretty good night on Sat I placed 4th in both games and both games had 24 or so. Not a stellar finish but given that the previous two night I was out early and just couldn’t focus. It does give me hope that I can get deep and with some luck can start taking firsts again.

One of the leagues we play in changed the way they do big tournaments from a Monthly to a weekly and you have to place 1 or 2 to be in the weekly. I am still on the fence about it, mostly because we have to change up our strategy and means it is less likely that both of us will be in the weeklies as we were in the monthlies. Since we only play once or twice a week we have to play really well ,and get lucky to be in. So be it. It also means that there will be a smaller field and I have done well in those.

Not sure what this blog will become but I do intend to update more often, if only for my own edification… Ciao …

Posted: 01|8|07 at 3:36 pm. Filed under: Poker.

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