Tuesday, January 18, 2005

The Vic again......

Went to the Vic again on Sunday. It was my 5th visit this year already and I decided to start off by playing the £100 Pot Limit Holdem cash game as it was the only decent looking game when I arrived about 6pm. I started of with £300 and was up to £320 before the first reasonably sized pot I was involved in happened. I had AA on the big blind and 6 people put in the £3 blind before It gets to the button who raises it to £20. Small blind passes and I call as I think a reraise my scare my opponent off. 3 other players call and it flops a relatively harmless looking 358 rainbow. I check and it is checked round to the original raiser who raises £100. I push all in for another £200 and it passes round to the button who thinks for a couple of minutes before passing and saying that I must have had trips. Soon after I pick up KK in the small blind and there is an early position raiser and two callers back to me so I make it £75 to play. One caller and a flop of 22J which looked very nice. I bet £150 and the other players shows JQ passed and says, “I knew you had AA or KK.” So why exactly did they call if they thought that? Some people! Standard play with AA and KK standing up saw me leave the table after an hour around £300 up.

I had spied the £250 Dealers Choice game was about to start which is why I left the Holdem game and while I have my reservations about playing in it due to recent results I decided to give it another crack as the usual line up of rocks weren’t there. I sat down with £1000 and was regretting my decision to play after the following hand happened. Playing Omaha Hi/Low I held A4JK7 and it flopped 72J with two clubs to give me top two pair, the A flush draw in clubs and the second best low draw. I raised £100 only to get reraised £200. I call and a K comes on the turn. I check and my opponent bets £400. I call and the last card is a 5 which has also brought a back door diamond flush. I call my last £200 and my opponent shows me A2 of diamonds which scoops. I was winning the whole pot till the last card and a low diamond was the only way I could lose the whole pot.

I decided to pull out another £1000. My maximum I will ever lose on a night is £2000 and I have never broken that rule. I was down to about £800 when I called a pre flop raise of £30 with A2588 and it flopped 88K. I had hit quads J. The first player bet the pot of £150 and I am pretty sure that he must have KK in his hand as I know how this player plays. I think that however I play this hand I’ll get doubled up so I call. Next card is a J and he bets £400 and I go all in for £200 more. I think he knew what I had straight away but called and I picked up a pot of £1750. I have had an amazing run with quads of late that even goes back in to last year. Four out of the last five times I have picked them up in Omaha I have been doubled up which is incredible as normally I wouldn’t expect any action at all. In fact I have never lost a huge amount of cash to quads myself shows just how lucky that statistic is. Touchwood….

Soon after on another Omaha Hi/Low I had A3JJK in my hand and raise it £30 to play from the small blind. It flopped a very nice 24J rainbow to give me top trips and the nut low draw. 6 players called my raise pre flop. I bet £75 hoping that someone may reraise and I get two callers. Next card is a 2 and I check as I now have a monster and don’t want to scare my opponents off and the other two players check. Last card is a 7 which brings the low. I bet the pot which was £450 and both players call. I took the high and the low was split three ways. Both of them had a 2 and had made trips so maybe I was a bit unlucky that neither raised on the turn.

I was at a high point of £2400 when I played a hand very badly. In fact I don’t think I could have played it any worse. Playing Pot Limit Omaha I held QQ66 and called a £40 pre flop raise and it flopped Q32 with two spades. I checked and the button raised it to £150 to play. My first mistake was not raising here. I decided to just call and then fire on the turn if it was a blank. Another player also called the bet and the turn was a 4. I know I should now have bet as with 66 in my hand I could represent the straight. However, I checked and the next player bet £300. The button passed and I called. The last card was a 7 and I checked and my opponent went all in for his last £300. Again I made a mistake. I should definitely have called his bet. His bet was £300 into a pot of £1250. If I had thought about it I would have called. I think I was still annoyed at how I had played the hand up till then and I passed and he showed A high and was flushing. Thinking back…. If he had made a straight on the turn he would have bet £600 all in to make players drawing pass their hand. I hated my play on that hand it sucked……

I was down to £1800 and was slightly on tilt as I was thinking about that hand that I played so badly. So what was the next game I would put a serious amount of money into the pot. LOWBALL. I have only ever played about 4 lowball hands in my life before this one which happened to be against Paul Parker. My first three card were 237 of which the 2 and 3 were hidden. Paul had a 6 showing. I called his first bet of £25. My next card was a 5 and Paul got a 3. He checked and I bet £100. He called straight away. My next card was another 5 and Paul got a J. He checked again and I felt that I could get him off his hand with a big bet so I bet £400. Yuck he called straight away again. Now I felt he must have had two cards lower than the 6 hidden which meant he was favorite. The second from last card gave him a Q and me a K. Not good. He bet all in for £450. I had to call as the pot was giving me 2/1 and I still knew he only had a J low at this point. The last card is dealt and he didn’t look pleased. Mine is an A and I make a 7 low to win a pot of about £2000.

I didn’t really get involved much after that and I lost a few pots before I finished with £2600.

Nice to be back in profit in the Dealers Choice game. I got lucky hitting quads and winning so much on a game I hardly know…..

2 comments:

Big Dave D said...

I'm enjoying your winning and your reports. I'm tempted to offer some advice but you are clearly better than i was at that age. Some things tho. You need to get over the tilt thing. I wish I could give advice in how, for me it came with age. Tilt keeps many good players in worse circumstances than their A game deserves. The buyin rule you had for the 250 game is clearly daft. If you are going to play a big stack game then setting an artificial limit on losing is like setting one on winning. If the game is good, you stay. I remember once, in the days I played live, driving back home to get some money the game was that good.

I dont like the hilo play. The hand prolly isnt worth a raise out of position preflop. And you must bet the turn. An agonised 1/2 pot to 3/4 pot bet may get action, or simply drag in other lowcallers. It also builds the pot for a big push when the river comes. And of course it ensures the pot is bigger if you get counterfitted.

anyway, keep firing.

Dave

Milkybarkid said...

Well i hope the winning continues......

Its one of my biggest dilemmas in the 250 games i play in. How much should i sit down with? I like playing with a big stack but don't feel comfortable starting with 3 or 4 grand because losing that much in one hand would seriously damage my bankroll if it happened a few times. I also never know when to stop. As you said i should stay if the game is good. Like the other night i was 5 grand to the good, hitting cards and there were some weak opponents on tilt. I was practically the only winner on the table. I should of stayed but there were some people who had me covered and they were playing very aggressively.

Hmmm i guess my check on the turn in the Hi/Lo game was to try and induce a raise. I had correctly guessed that at least one of my foes had hit trips so assumed they would bet. I was unlucky that the last guy who held trips and the nut low checked. Still the check raise was a bad idea as i don't want to indicate that i held a monster. A £200 and a pot bet on the river would have been the best play.

How bad was my play with those Queens? The tilt thing is my biggest weakness. I lost my head for a while after that hand. I have got better at controlling it especially live but i haven't played much online this year as yet as i had some big losses last year which can mainly be put down to me tilting. Found myself playing high stakes limit stud once as it was the biggest game going.