I have decided to move over to Stars for a while to play there. For some reason, FT just has my number, and I am running badly over there.

it is amazing how great some days this game can be and others, it absolutely kills me. I watched a few interviews today on Pokerroad.com......so that motivated me a little bit.

I am one of those guys who normally deposits $200-$500 and then plays till it's gone and then re-deposits more. Well those days are over.

I'm starting with $100 and that is it. If I blow it....then i will take more time off....read....study....and consider depositing more.

I decided the other day to move all the back down to 50nl and $3-6 SNGs and once I have a decent ROI and I have 100 buyins at 50nl, I will then move up to the next level. I never thought it would come to this because I have been successful at the higher stakes, but lately everything seems to be going very badly for me.

I am reading NLHTAP by Skalansky and Miller and I bought the new Gus Hansen book, so I am trying to get through those as quickly as possible.

I will try and update this as much as possible.....

See you at the tables.

hitman

Well I have read just about every dam poker book on the planet and I don't care people say......you need online training to be good at online poker.

They are two completely different worlds and I have learned this the hard way.

I have played a lot of cash games at the lower stakes....but truth be told, I actually play better at 200nl than I do at 50nl.

I just finished up Collin Moshman's SNG book and it has tremendously improved my SNGs. I have been playing those things wrong for over a year now. And all of this time, I thought people were just getting lucky on me.

I borrowed a buddy's login for PokerXfactor and watched Pearljammed Jon Turner's videos....and that too has been a complete eyeopener in the world on online poker. I have also adapted his "small-ball" TAG style and I am running much deeper now with a few more final tables under my belt.

I'm giving up on FT for a while....I run so bad over there for some reason. I switched to Stars and I LOVE it.....way more fish and much less variance so far.

Laterrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Well, that poker tourney was something else....I spent almost 20 hours at that place.

First off, it was some semi-pro football team hosting it....they called themselves the "National Champions" of Division 1 or something like that. One of the coaches sat at my table...and he was a complete tool box. Of course I think some of the players served food, acted as "floors", sold t-shirts, ect....most of them carried am arrogance or aloofness to them.

$100 bought you 20K in chips...and then of course, you get a rebuy and an ad on for another 15K in chips. if you bought a t-shirt and completed a survey, that was another 3500 in chips....so you start out with 38.5k and 30 minute blind structures. Around 600 signed up to play.

Nothing spectacular happened at my table for around 3 hours....I had solid reads on everyone....so I didn't make any "moves". I had an absolute calling station/donk to my immediate left so that was nice when I got a real hand.

Our table broke after the 2nd break...so I was moved to what seemed like a very loose table. People calling large raises out of position with QJ offsuit and things like that....of course, they had been playing with each all afternoon, so I didn't get too presumptious, I just sat back and watched.

When the blinds were 500/1000 with 100 ante, I woke up to AKs in late position. I had a guy in middle position who had me covered raise to 6k. I reraised to 15K which was around 40% of my stack. He calls. Flop comes K77, he goes all-in, I snap call. He turns over JJ. The turn is nothing, and he rivers a J for a boat.

I look at him and ask him what he thought I had when I re-raised? He coudn't give me a straight answer, and of course everyone was waiting for this genius to answer. So I sat there and waited. AA, KK, QQ, AK? All of those hands beat JJ....so again, what did you think I had when i re-raised you 2.5 times your bet?

Needless to say....he couldn't answer and I got up and left to play cash. Let me tell you, the cash play was worse than the tourney play....it didn't take me long to realize why some of the people were not in the tourney anymore. The type of poker they were laying was atrocious. I'm not a professional by any means....but I have been playing long enough to know what gambling is....and that is all these guys were doing at the 1/2 level. I just remembered why I play 2/5 and 5/10 live now.

So...in a nut shell.....it was a good tourney structure, and some of the people were great. Two members of my crew made it the final table and they decided to chop after the seventh guy got knocked out. The each walked away with $6300 in cash on a six way chop.

I think I should have stayed in bed.

Well, it's been an entire month and I think I have gotten worse at poker. I crush the local cash games but online I seem to be running bad online alot. I wish some of the pros would show videos where the keep getting stacked and sucked out on.....because that shit is happening alot to me.

As for tourneys, I read an article last month where one pro was getting his little brother into it, and he is doing well. He told him to read certain books, and from those books would be everything he needed. Well, I own every poker book ever printed and I have yet to find the one that stands out amongst the others. Anyone out there like one in particular?

I have been wanting to play a lot of poker lately, but mentally I don't know if I should be...if that even makes sense.

I enjoy the videos....I really do....but i don't know if they always help....there's nothing to really reinforce what you are learning....and how can someone possibly recall all of that info without watching the same video over and over?

Truth be told, I have only been seriously playing for a little over a year now....but I have dedicated so much time and money into this...only to read about these kids at 18 making millions playing....what gets me even more is that they don't know if they want to keep playing poker as a job. Well, I know one day in a 9-5 grind will pretty solidify that decision for them.

I'm rambling now....goodnight.

I will wrote more at another time... I just wanted to get the first entry out of the way.