Online

Well i have been trying to claw back what was a horrific start to the year online. I had five £10000+ losses in consecutive sessions at the start of the year which wasn't exactly how i was planning my 2006.

I have been putting in a huge number of hours since to try and turn it around with reasonable success. The amount i lost has been just over halved. When i had a bad run in November, i didn't think it could happen again so bad, but this one was just much much worse. I kicked off the first session playing £10/£20 Holdem and lost £8000 in 30 mins on one table. Set over set three times in that period which is something like an 94/1 shot each time. That was going to set the tone for the next week or so. Grim.

Some of the hands i have lost just were unbelievable. Here are a couple of the very worst.

£10/£20 NL Holdem - 6 handed. I have £8000 in front of me. Early guy who has me covered makes it £60... 3 callers and i call in the BB with 5c6c. Flop 2c3c8d. I bet out £160 and original raiser makes it £500. Everyone folds to me and i call. The turn is the beautiful 4h which gives me the nuts and he can't put me on my hand either. I check and he bets £1000. I minimum raise it to £2000 and he pushes me in for about another £5500. He has a set of eights and the last eight gives him quads on the river.

£10/£20 NL Holdem - 3 handed. I have £9000. Both other players have £5000. I get dealt TT. I make it £60 on the button. SB calls. BB makes it £180. I call and the SB calls. Flop T33. SB checks. BB bets £250. I call. SB makes it £500. BB calls. I call. Turn 9h. SB bets £700. BB goes all in. I call as does the SB. SB has A3, BB has AA. River was of course the case Ace.

I could write about another eight similar, but those were the biggest two with a combined total of over £30000.

During the run i was even tilting too badly considering... only 10% of what i lost was probably tilt losses. The other difference between November and January is that when i was running bad at PL Omaha, i was winning at NL Holdem. This time i couldn't win a big pot at any game. I did resist the temptation to play the big limit game to try and win it back quick.

For some reason i found this amusing in a sick kind of way. I installed poker tracker towards the start of December and when i returned to playing in January i was happily sitting pretty as the biggest winner on my poker tracker Holdem and Omaha. The way Crypto hand histories work, it only includes sessions when i am at the table, so if i am winning its always going to be the case that i appear as the biggest winner. I looked after loading in my hand histories for January...

161st out of 161 at NL Holdem
78th out of 78 at PL Omaha

My next tournament is in a couple of weeks in Deauville for an EPT event... then on to Monte Carlo for the EPT final.