Hi guys, the time has come for me to get back into the coaching game. After much demand in the SSFR forums on 2+2 and even from some regs at the tables, I've decided I need to get started up again after about a year off from coaching. I'm excited to try and help turn things around for those of you who are struggling at 50 and 100 and even 200 and trying to take the next step and become a winner.

So without further ado I will introduce myself to those of you who don't know much about me and describe some of my credentials. I am one of the biggest winners (top 12-15 I believe) according to PTR over the last 3 years at 100nl across all the tracked sites and have a solid winrate at 200nl as well over a pretty decent sample, as you'll see here.



So as you might imagine, I'll largely be focusing on 100nl students but I am more than willing to take on people whose main game is 200.

I'll be coaching 50nl students at $65/hr, 100nl students at $85/hr and 200nl students at $110/hr, and these rates are open to negotiation based on affordability, number of sessions booked, and any other possible reasons we can come up with to negotiate said rates. So please feel free to PM me either here or on 2+2 (same sn) and we shall see what can be done for you.

Duncan

Another year has come and gone, and none too soon. I'll remember 2011 as a year where some fantastic and awful things happened, where I had some of the best moments of my life and some of the worst moments of my life. Considering how big a part of my life poker plays, it's no surprise that the same could be said about poker this past year. We started off playing MSNL and a little bit of HSNL (who are we kidding, it was like 5k hands of 5/10 but if you had told me in 2006 when I was playing 1c/2c that I would be 10-16 tabling 400-1k on both FTP and Stars and not sweating 1k pots, I would have called you crazy), and by the middle of the year I was staked for SSFR. Not what I had planned.

That said, there's hope ahead in 2012. Lots of hope. We've got a fresh start with the spectre of 2011 further behind by the day, and every day is an opportunity to wake up and make good decisions, play good poker, and simply live well. I'm gonna post an obligatory year's end graph (with ev simply because it's my damn blog and I'll whine if I want to), there's nowhere to go but up as you'll see here.





As for 2012, I have a few goals set, mostly things that I think I can control.

1. Play 1.2M hands (avging 100k hands a month)
2. Don't play when I'm not feeling it, don't force sessions. It'll be a challenge to play more this year than any year past while not forcing sessions, but I think that some improved time management skills I should be able to pull this off.
3. Go to the gym three times a week. Up until December I was doing this pretty regularly but I got out of the habit. No excuses, I need to improve this and maintain it.
4. Coaching, coaching, coaching! Yes I plan to begin coaching, possibly by the end of January. PM me and I'll keep you in the loop if you're interested. I plan on doing alot of coaching and keeping a pretty full schedule. Along these same lines:
5. Cardrunners. I've slacked big time on this over the past year and a half that I have been a member of the team here, and that's pretty inexcusable. It's a great way to keep my game sharp (nobody wants to look bad on camera!), it's a good way to help the 50nl and 100nl community and give back a bit. There's no downside, and the opportunities afforded me by CR that I have largely squandered thus far are really not acceptable. So expect a big increase in production from me on this front.

So as you can see, I plan on taking steps to make 2012 the most successful, healthiest and hopefully happiest year of my life. I can't control everything, but I plan to make the most of the things I can.

Good luck at the tables,
Duncan

Hey guys, been awhile since my last update. I've been putting in personal record breaking volume this month trying to finish off my 300k milestone, and as is typical I've lost at the tables almost as much as I would have gained from the milestone itself with about a 28 buyin downer as of this moment. I would have enjoyed December alot more if I had just booked the month on the 3rd or so lol. Ah well, such is December, lots of grinders hate their lives while they try and get that last milestone.

And my favourite part of this post, that one little mistake! During the big Sunday Million this past weekend, a little bit after the money bubble busted, I had about 3x avg as did BLAABAR. I mentioned this in the Stars SSFR regs thread and he offered to swap me 3%. I tend to not accept swaps even though this would have obviously been very +EV since we both had big stacks, a pretty big edge on the field and BLAABAR is pretty damn good. I busted shortly thereafter for $950 or so, BLAABAR busted many hours later for about $800k or so. WHOOPS

Hey guys, just played a few thousand hands and had some pretty good results. I also recorded a video during the day's play so I feel like it's been a pretty succesful day. Here's a graph:



There were remarkably few interesting spots actually and I think the few that were worth talking about were in the video so I won't spoil it by going over spots here but suffice it to say I feel pretty satisfied.

Hey guys! As you can see, I have decided to revive my long dormant blog. A lot has changed since the early days of this blog. Since those days I have gone from being a random dime a dozen microstakes player to being one of the biggest winners in the history of 100nl across all sites (according to that site that shall not be named), being hired as an instructor at Cardrunners, and running off a pretty sweet run at midstakes at the end of last year and beginning of this year.

Im proud of what I've been able to accomplish in my career thus far. I've been able to play a game that I love (maybe 40% of the time lol) for a pretty damn good living, be respected by my peers and basically have a dream come true thanks to Taylor offering me a role on CR. A few years ago working a menial low paying stressful job where I hated every minute of my life, I would never have dreamt I would be given the opportunities to live the life I now lead.

That said, it hasn't all been easy. The past six months or so have been the most challenging of my career and some of the most challenging of my life. I went from having a very comfortable life roll to being nearly IRL busto thanks to having some unexpected real life financial challenges, all the while going through a nearly 300k hand break even stretch with a 40 buyin downswing in the middle for fun. Considering my winrate at 100nl for about 400k bands before that was about 7ptbb/100, you can imagine the shock and disbelief this caused me. I was used to winning all the time.

In May, for example, I lost almost $100/hr. At 100nl. The level I beat like a drum for about 2 million hands. You almost have to try to lose that much, and while there was some tilt mixed in, after exhaustive review I had to conclude I still would have lost a ton even tilt free. Let me be a cautionary tale for those of you making the leap from the real world to playing for a living. If it can happen to me at 100nl, it can happen to anybody.

That said, the turnaround has begun. I'm winning at a solid clip at 100 and 200, my game is sharp and I've never been more confident. I'm looking forward to what the future holds and I've never been more sure that it's a bright future. So in conclusion, I hope to keep this blog at least somewhat active, at the very least sharing some hands with you guys and while I would love for all of you to get a little something out of what I have to say, I feel like I'm mostly going to be writing this thing for my own benefit.

Thanks for reading and good luck at the tables,
Duncan

Hi guys. I'm in the midst of recovering from a downswing at nl50 which occurred shortly after a bad shot at nl100 (man i run bad there lol) so in order to get some confidence back and get into the winning way again I am going to drop back down to nl25 for a bit. I'm still comfortably rolled for nl50 so it's not a bankroll issue, just want to get comfortable again and remember how to win. So if you guys at nl25 see cb4mvp make sure to stack me while you can lol.

Hey guys, I have decided to start blogging again. Since my last entry I have totally crashed and burned from a high of playing nl50 all the way back to being barely rolled for nl10, and then I got myself back together and rebounded and have been playing nl50 since the beginning of this year. Since nobody is actually reading this I will not bother sharing any details of this rebound, but suffice it to say I'm back to playing some winning poker and enjoying the game. So I'll take you through some of the larger hands I won and lost today.

This is a fun hand. Usually my default when I get raised or 3bet on a flop like this is to fold or call and reevaluate in position, but I decided that there are so many awful turns that I would just stick it in vs this guy. I didn't have any real reads at the time other than the fact that he was like 40/20/inf at the time (it leveled out ot 36/33/inf before he left after 20 hands) so I figured I couldn't really be that wrong on a drawy board like that.

http://www.cardrunners.com/members/display_hand.php?session=s%3A5%3A%2240789%22%3B&hand=s%3A7%3A%221793702%22%3B

This guy was 50/2 over 77 hands, but it was like his second or third hand at the table and I am not in the habit of looking for reasons to fold overpairs to unknown players in 3bet pots, especially for less than 100bb.

http://www.cardrunners.com/members/display_hand.php?session=s%3A5%3A%2240790%22%3B&hand=s%3A7%3A%221793703%22%3B

I really am not pleased with the way I played this hand. This guy was like 52/11 over just 17 hands, so I think he could have been calling me down with worse which is why I don't mind my second barrel, but I think probably c/c the river is better than shoving. Any opinions?

http://www.cardrunners.com/members/display_hand.php?session=s%3A5%3A%2240791%22%3B&hand=s%3A7%3A%221793704%22%3B

Readless this probably wasn't the best line I could take but I do like to check/raise or check/shove some turns vs players who I believe could be floating and will call with worse, and I think this is probably a really good board to do this on.

http://www.cardrunners.com/members/display_hand.php?session=s%3A5%3A%2240793%22%3B&hand=s%3A7%3A%221793905%22%3B

I pretty much never take this lin, but vs this guy I really felt like he had exactly AA/KK or nothing. So I stationed him down.

http://www.cardrunners.com/members/display_hand.php?session=s%3A5%3A%2240794%22%3B&hand=s%3A7%3A%221793906%22%3B

This guy had been raising the flop with what appeared to be a very wide range so I figured his range was pretty far behind my hand and I let him try to bluff me on the turn and river.

http://www.cardrunners.com/members/display_hand.php?session=s%3A5%3A%2240795%22%3B&hand=s%3A7%3A%221793907%22%3B

Thanks for reading guys! More soon.

Hey all, back at the tables the last couple days. Played some .05/10 PLO on Full Tilt (even closer to play money than my usual game, I know. sue me) yesterday and did some damage, winning about 5 buy-ins. Now as you go over these hands, please remember that I'm just learning this game and am very novice, so my thought process in some (or all?) spots may be faulty. So bear with me.

Hand 1

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1581263

This might be my favourite hand ever (at these stakes at least). This is pretty much always a fold for me preflop, but with several overcallers and the button, I figured I could at least see a flop. Nice to flop gin, yes? :) I raised the flop because I figured if he had a set, he might be happy to get it in on the flop rather than a turn that doesn't pair the board. And of course if he had a flush he would just stick it in on the flop. When he just called my raise and checked the turn, I thought maybe he had to have a set and I wanted to give him another card to hang himself. Amazingly he still paid me with his A hi flush when the board paired.

Hand 2

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1581278

When I reviewed my session I was surprised that on both the flop and turn, I was less than a 2-1 favourite. That is, until I realized he had a flush draw on the turn, too. I'm dumb.

Also had a short but productive session tonight at .10/25 PLO where I won a bit over two buy-ins. Couple quick hands here:

Hand 1

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1581298

I sucked out pretty bad on the river vs this guy, (85-15 underdog on the turn) but he picked the wrong time to slowplay his hand here. Pretty major cooler in my opinion, too. Anyway, I like my turn play here, just calling his 1/2 pot bet. I don't really know what he hopes to accomplish there unless he's just trying to figure out where his flush is, because I'll likely raise him with hands that beat him, call with hands like I had hoping to fill up, and fold all worse hands. And of course if I don't fill up on the river I don't put in another cent, so basically he played this hand to lose the maximum, I think. Anyway, pretty sweet when somebody check-raises you on the river when you hold the nuts. That hasn't happened too often to me, lol.

Hand 2

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1581308

This is just fun. Nice to flop the nuts and have a redraw with top two pair and then cooler the guy when he fills up on the river. Ship it.

Hey guys. Sorry for the lack of updates, I haven't been playing much lately and most of the poker related time I've had has involved getting money moved over to Full Tilt. I'll be playing more soon, stay tuned.

Hey guys, just had a session in which I lost like $13 or so, which is much better than the normal $100+ the last couple weeks, lol. Gonna take you through some of the bigger hands I played.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1546372

Nothing I could do about this one. When this particular player raised me, I was pretty sure I was up against a higher set but oh well.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1546380

This hand was kind of tricky because we were almost 200bb deep. When he called my flop bet I was a little concerned, but AA was the only hand I was worried about, and this guy's range was much wider than that, so when the best card in the deck came off (other than maybe a black 4, lol) on the turn I was happy to CRAI.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1546384

I don't love the way I played this hand. On the flop when he min C/Red me I had the following thought. If he flopped a flush, he's not folding and I'm gettting my money in as a fairly big dog with no FE. If he has a set, same situation is true. So I decided just to call and try and hit my flush, then proceed from there. On the turn, I decided to just call his bet and make it look like maybe I had a pair and now just picked up a draw. Regardless, he would fold if I raised and I wanted to maximizi my expectation. If the board paired on the river I could just call his value bet and pay off his set, or at least give him the chance to bluff it. The river was obviously a good card for both of us (better for me, lol), and he seemed pretty happy to give me his money there. Anyway, feel free to flame this hand, lol.