Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Nice cash after a long slump!

After my huge payout for the Milestone hand, things haven't exactly gone my way. I have been getting it in with the best hand, but my stack has been so small that players will call. I needed to amend some for middle tourney play, and l finally got a nice payout last night. Swedestar and I decided to chop it up, we contacted the moderator and the host sorted it out for us, $330 each!

Anyway, here is the HH (permalink);
8/180 Turbo

I'm interested in comments on my play/hands closing in on the bubble. I was chipleader with about 50 players remaining and lost the lead with approx 30 left. From there I remained in top 6-7, but was anxious to get to FT and not mincash placing 18 to 10th. Nevermind the HU, I got it in with JJ vs his KQ, but the hands only reflect that we are discussing and autofolding a lot while the host sorts out the chop.

WBCOOP 2012 Event 18: PLO Turbo

I played in the PLO turbo event last night. There were about 180 entries. You know I am pretty clueless when it comes to Omaha. So don't expect any brilliant play in this one, but I did get deep! Here we pick up the action on the final table bubble - 10 players remaining:

EDIT: problems with the replayer right now. here is the link until I get it fixed- sorry!

Event 18 FT replay

I took 3rd place, won a SCOOP $55 ticket, a WBCOOP Main Event ticket, and had plenty of fun!

Roland GTX

Monday, February 27, 2012

Vote Now!

EDIT 29 Feb: I think the voting is over now. We didn't make the cut, but thanks for the support nonetheless. There is an interesting post on the Pokerstars blog if you are interested:
WBCOOP Best Blogger Award special announcement

If you want Roland's Room and yours truly to be in the running for the Best Blog competition, then please follow this link to PokerNews and vote for our blog:
http://blogs.pokernews.com/WBCOOP_en/wbcoop-2012-taking-a-shot-at-the-dream.htm

Thanks guys!

Roland GTX

PS: Feel free to spread the word:)

Red Spade, WBCOOP and other things

Hi guys,

Red Spade
I got back to the tables last night after a few days break for winter vacation. Yesterday's big event was the $55 Red Spade Tourney which both MrSmith and myself played. I believe Klokkhammer was railbirding, too.

I was in it for four hours, but was pretty much card dead the whole time making for a lot of folding. Very early on I picked up AQo in the bb and called a standard preflop raise from early/mid position. I gave him credit as being a solid player just based on the fact that he was also playing the Sunday Million and assumed that he had a medium pocket pair. I flopped top pair, top kicker with Q high flop. I bet out on the flop and got flatted. Next street was a blank and the villain made a small raise. I wasn't sure if he was making a blocking bet or value bet so i called hoping to keep the pot small. The river was a repeat with another low card and another small bet. Now I was pretty sure I was behind but was priced in to call. He had flopped a set and got nearly half my stack on the hand. I'm not sure how I could have gotten away from this hand.

I recovered but a bit later I picked up QQ and got all in against a short stack with K9 and lost. I recovered again, but never got above the average stack size the rest of the tourney. Later I made a desperation reraise shove with JJ. A big stack misclicked (he had 1010 on another table and thought he was playing that one...) and moved all in over the top. He was holding J3o - LOL! For once JJ held up and I survived a bit longer.

I managed to creep into the money mincashing for 134 bucks and 2274th place out of 25K players. I lasted about 300 hands out of which I only had one AK, no AAs and very few playable situations. I like the concept of this tourney with all the pros, but none landed on my table. Plus, I agree with MrSmith that 180 minute late reg is too long. We were almost itm then...

WBCOOP
The WBCOOP has also started up. I would ask you to vote for our blog, but haven't figured out the voting system LOL! I got 10 tickets to use on a bunch of different tourneys and have regged for a mix of NLHE and Omaha. My first tourney will be the 28th, but most that I'm playing are running March 1st to 3rd. You can win anything from $215 to $5 SCOOP tickets in these plus bounties on the pros. The payout structures make it fairly easy to mincash, but I think I'll be trying to get deep.

Live Home Game 
Don't forget our live game on Wed March 7th! I hope we can show the Danes a good time while taking their money...

Roland GTX

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Milestone Hand # 74988000000

Boys!

We have all dreamt about participating in one of those mouthwatering milestone hands over at Stars. I came home from a party slightly intoxicated last friday and fired up 2 cash tables at $0,05/0,10. After a couple of hours the table freezed and host Jarred announced that we were about to be dealt into milestone hand #74988000000.



I held 22 in BB and shoved my last $16+. 1 guy folded (never understand why people fold in milestone hands) and another dude didn't post, so he never got in on the hand. Anyway, minimum payout is $20, then you get an additional $60 for every VPP you have collected in the last 50 hands.......needless to say, I had been playing extremely LAG contrary to my usual TAG, thus racking up loads of VPP's. The winner collected $684. I was quite anxious when I checked my bankroll, hoping for at least $100, my LAG donk style had gotten me...................

670522373
04/02/2012 @ 05.37
HANDAWARD PURCHASE
$620,00 USD

.....................for my drunk efforts. Poker IS, and should always be played for fun!

Monday, February 13, 2012

WBCOOP 2012: Taking a Shot at the Dream


Winning the Pokerstar’s Best Blogger prize would fulfill one dream and pave the way for another!

Roland GTX
The World Blogger Championship of Online Poker (WBCOOP) is back once again! I’ve been actively blogging about poker for three years, and have been playing for even longer. Being recognized as Pokerstar’s Best Blogger would definitely fulfill a longstanding dream as a writer and poker enthusiast. It would do wonders for my blog, Roland’s Room, as well! The honor of winning would be a huge milestone on its own merits. Yet, the $5000 prize it carries would pave the way toward fulfilling yet another dream – making the final table of a major tournament!

The Sunday Million
I play poker because it is fun! Of course, I want to win, but what is the point of chasing that big payday if you aren’t enjoying the journey? Strict bankroll management, aka - responsible fun, normally keeps me at the micro buyin levels. The allure, however, has always been the Sunday Million and the EPT live tournaments. Winning $ 5000 would be my biggest cash to date and would allow me to take a direct shot at my final table dream! I would allot $1075 of the Best Blogger prize money toward five Sunday Million Tickets. At worst, I would finish outside the money in all five, but will have had fun along the way. Perhaps I’ll cash in one or two padding my bankroll even further; thus, allowing for more Sunday Million entries. And maybe, just maybe, I will parley one of those tickets into a final table appearance!

The EPT
You can find me most days of the week multi-tabling micro and low stakes tourneys. I’m profitable in the $2.50/180s where I’m a regular, but my profits tend to get spent playing higher buyin MTTs like the Sunday Storm or on EPT Steps tickets. I have gotten close several times, but that final table or EPT package keeps eluding me. To help me along this line, $2000 of the Best Blogger prize money would be used to pad my bankroll. This would let me comfortably, and responsibly, move up a level from the $2.50/180s to the $8/180 man turbos. This move would hopefully result in an increase in profit from my bread and butter games that can then be invested in a more sustained effort to win on these two other fronts. These profits could be used to play more low and medium stakes MTTs and could also be used to make a serious EPT Steps run. Trying to win some pots, to win some respect, and to outlast Daniel Negreanu and the other Pokerstars pros would definitely make for a memorable poker experience!

Upgrading my Rig
To make chasing these dreams a bit more comfortable I would also put my decrepit 11” laptop to rest. Running more than eight tables on this old friend isn’t optimal. Therefore, $900 of the prize money would be invested in a new 17" gaming laptop. The larger screen would allow me to squeeze in a few more tables. More tables equal more fun! More tables also mean less time (not games) between ITMs, and this helps me keep tilt at bay.

Keeping my Priorities Straight
Finally, $1000 of the Best Blogger prize money would go to my family. I have fun playing poker regardless of the result (as long as I made the right move that is...). But if I’m successful, then my family deserves to reap the benefits as much as I do!

Good Luck and Have Fun at the tables!

Roland GTX

Follow me: TWITTER  -----  PSO -----  BLOGSPOT

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Plenty going on at Pokerstars

Hey guys!

If you haven't been playing much lately, there is some good stuff going on at Pokerstars.

The current 100 Billion Hand promo makes cash tabling a bit more exciting. Also, Pstars is changing the rake system again, this time for the better it seems...

There are a ton of great videos available at the Poker School Online (PSO) too. I watched the "Spacegravy" SnG series and was surprized by his early position hand range! These are free if you want to watch. I also took part in a Live Training session last night. The trainer was talking us through his thought process while playing a 0.01/0.02 cash table, and we could ask questions - good stuff!

I'm still working on my February Challenge to play 100 2.2/180s and 100 3.5/45s - profitably. After 120 games I am way up on the 180s, still down a bit on the 45, but showing a $200 at the moment :)

Snakkes
Roland GTX