Hey Guys,

I am now in Australia and plan to travel from Sydney all the way up the east coast to Cairns (my namesake town!!!). It is nice to be in the developed world again, although I will say my experience in India was a life changing one. It will invariably help my life and consequently my poker game. I have a few goals I have set for myself to help me be more accountable in poker when I get back which I will let you know about, but first I'll tell you about my experience at the casino in Sydney playing 5/5 NL.

I forget the name of the casino but it had probably 40 or so tables running playing mostly NL cash, but also a tourney was running and I think they had some PLO. I didn't pay much attention as I knew I was going to play 5/5 cash. Anyway, my table was very soft (the Aussie's are still very new to poker and play quite passively), but nonetheless I played terrible. I really haven't played much live cash and I know I have a lot to learn (with that said the games are generally so soft that I still am a winning player in live cash). Either way, I am a person who hates to fail and hates to lose so when I fuck up no matter what I can't stand it. Overall, I got on the passive train and just didn't play my normal aggressive game. I think this is in part due to the fact that I essentially never play 9-handed cash, but also because for some reason I just didn't amp up the aggression. In live cash (especially in areas that are newer to poker) people tend to limp far more often. Having a 7-8 way pot preflop is not uncommon at all. My generally strategy in these situations is to limp behind limpers but for some reason in this session I was doing way too much open limping. This resulted in me calling raises rather than being the aggressor (the most vital aspect to success in nl hold em) and consequently spewing my money. One particular hand really pissed me off. I had lost like 200 of my 500 buy in and for some reason did not add back on to 500 (something that I always do online I guess in part because its much easier to reload) when the following hand came up. I limped UTG with 2c4c (EWWWW right!) which was then followed by 2-3 more limpers (forgive me, the details will not be fully accurate but I can still get the point across), followed by a guy who made it 25 to go on the cut off or button. I called knowing that the other limpers would call as well. We went to the flop something like 5 handed so about $125-30 was in the pot. The flop came 4x3x9c. So I flopped second pair with a back door flush draw. I checked a very weak opponent bet out for 25 into like 130 which was then called by 2 other players (one of whom was the inital raiser preflop) so I called as well figuring if I hit a 4 2 or catch a club on the turn I can maybe do something to win this pot. I think the call on the flop is fine but what I do on the turn is terrible (ultimately after diliberating I determined that the whole hand was a TILT HAND! and in reality didn't need much assessment other than that I should have folded pre - but for the sake of talking it out I'll continue). The turn came 10c, I checked the intial better checked, the caller then checked, and then the initial preflop raiser made it $50 into about $250-60. Knowing how weak my opponents behind were I should have called knowing I'd get at least one more caller making the pot odds quite juicy. If I think I have 11 clean outs (i.e. 2 fours and 9 clubs) I have roughly 22% to win but its probably closer to 20% making my call about neutral because 50 into 250 is about 5/1, also knowing one of the other two guys will call makes it even better. Instead what I decided to do was shove for like 120 more over the 50 bet which is retarded. I have zero fold equity and I know I'm getting called by at least the initial better on 4th street. Either way I made a tilt play and shoved. The other two folded and my opponent who bet called me with 44 for a set. I needed a club to win and didn't get there :(. I spent the whole walk home going over the various aspects of this hand and I determined my flop call was fine and also determined that a call on the turn would have been about neutral. The huge mistake I made was shoving. After thinking all this out I realized that the answer was simple. IF I WAS ON MY GAME I WOULD HAVE JUST FOLDED PREFLOP BECAUSE OPEN LIMPING IS ABSOLUTELY TERRIBLE! Even though I lost some money I learned a valuable lesson about poker. It's a lot like life. Sometimes you can stew over decisions you've made looking for reasons to justify your actions. The fact is if you are objective and honest with yourself the answers to even some of the gouhest questions (both in life and poker) are very simple. In the case the simple answer was FOLD PREFLOP YOU RETARD! Everyone is prone to tilt and this is a situation where I did.

Overall, things haven't been too bad though. I've barely played any poker (just some casual 1/2 online when I've had some spare time on my travels) and I'm up around 1k. When I get home I intend to make some changes and here they are:

-only play poker 4 days a week (Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Sunday - these are the action days for tourneys)
-establish exactly what tourneys I will be playing and what my buy ins will be for the week
-make sure to excercise before each day I play - I also am going to look into meditation as someone introduced me to it in India and I think its incredibly useful for poker
-set goals for how much I want to make in my first month - 6 months into 2010 and and for the close of 2010 (this is up in the air right now as I need to give it more thought)
-make $1 million by the time I'm 25
-break into the live arena
-diversify my hobbies to offset the craziness of poker
-spend more time with my family and friends
-the list goes on

Anyway, these are some of my goals if any of you are interested post or pm me we can talk more about them.

I hope all is well with you guys. Gl in your games and remember there is more to life than poker.

David "muckducks" Cairns

Hey guys,

So right now I am taking some time off from poker and backpacking around the world. So far I have spent 10 days in Europe where I hit Prague, Amsterdam (killer weed! Sucks that I'm quitting the stuff forever now - I've realized it to be too big a crutch in enhancing my success in all aspects of my life), and London for a couple of days. My friend and I then moved on to India and let me tel you it has been one of the most eye-opening experiences I have ever had. It makes me so grateful that I can sit in the comforts of my own home and take bad beats for a living! We've seen some amazing sites, the best of which has been a trip to the Taj Mahal, this is no surprise I guess considering it is the #1 Wonder of the World! Aside from that more of what I have gained from my experience in India is how to deal with adversity and plan ahead so as to make life as easy and fun as possible! This is an extremely important concept to understand in regards to poker as preparation is 9/10ths of the success you will experience at the tables.

For those of you who might be in a funk right now, perhaps running bad I'd like to encourage you to take a step back and realize how incredibly lucky you are to play online poker whether it be as a hobby or as a profession. A servant of a friend I stayed with for a couple of days makes 1500 rupees a month which is equivalent to about $40 Canadian! As I drove by a slum I saw a man defecating on the street because he has no ability to use a washroom! The next time you take a bad beat think about that! Also, what this experience has taught me is that when I come home and start playing poker again I am going to be more diligent and methodical about succeeding than ever before because I know how most of the world lives and I want to capitalize as much as possible on the opportunities that have been presented to me!

I will be gone until early december, but keep your eyes peeled for some live content "a la" muckducks in about a month or so. Hopefully you guys enjoy it. And when I get home I am going to crush poker so there is no doubt in my mind the videos are going to be off the hook in 2010 so watch out muckducks is going to be a force to be reckoned with on the tournament scene!

In the meantime good luck to all of you and remember there is more to life than poker!

All the best,

David "muckducks" Cairns

Hey guys,

I am interested in doing a leakfinder video. If anyone would like to have one of their HH's showcased on Cardrunners please get in contact with me by e-mail. I will take a look at all the ones that are sent in and look for one I feel has the most educational merit. It would be great if you guys could send in some HH's where you go deep, so I can discuss some of the tougher end game spots.

david.cairns@mail.mcgill.ca

Best,

Muckducks

Hey guys,

So I just came 21st out of 5717 players in FTOPS #1, I was almost able to defend my title! :( Anyway, I noticed that a bunch of the CR members were stating in the observer chat that they'd like to see a series on this deep run. Considering that I did not make the final table I wanted to see how much actual interest there is in me doing a series on this tournament. For those of you that are interested please post underneath this blog. If there is a decent amount of support I'll go ahead with it.

Good luck to all of you who are playing today and all the best in your real lives! (don't forget there is much more to life than poker!)

Hey Guys,

Sorry for the delay in getting part 5 to you, unforeseen computer related issues arose. Anyway, it will be up next Saturday! Hope you guys enjoy.

David "muckducks" Cairns

So I'm sitting at my chalet with my dad waiting for a few of my friends to come up north to hang out and I asked him if he'd like to learn a thing or two about poker. Ever since I've become more successful with poker my dad has been very intrigued about the game as he obviously started to realize there is more skill than apparently meets the eye! So we sat down and played a couple of heads-up matches. I was very excited to do this because I know that I will encounter many inexperienced players such as my dad at the wsop this summer.

We started with 3100 chips each with blinds being 25/50 (aka 62 BB's) and it was a winner take-all no rebuy format for no money (YAY!). Immediately I picked up on the inexperience of my opponent which is obvious to be the case. But determining how to best approach this inexperience was a whole other story! Much like the inexperienced players I find online, I found myself at a loss for how to best stack him and how to avoid being stacked! I ended up winning the first match when I called a standard 3x raise out of position with KsQs, the flop came k44 rainbow and I checked, my dad bet 200 into 350 and I just called, hoping for no ace on the turn with the intentions of then checking again to hope to extract some value. The turn came an off suit 5 and I checked, my dad checked behind, not the result I wanted but it at least gave me the impression that i was good. The river came an off suit 7 and at this point I put out a bet of 450 for value hoping my donk father would pay me off! Instead he put out an ill-timed stone cold bluff with a5 and I tanked for a bit trying to get a little bit of info from him to confirm that my hand was good...I didn't really get that added confidence, but knew my hand was good far too often to ever justify a fold. I called and my dad got all upset that his bluff did not work. THIS SCENARIO IS THE EXACT TYPE OF SCENARIO YOU WANT TO FIND YOURSELF IN AT THE WSOP AGAINST AN INEXPERIENCED OPPONENT! You want to give them the rope to hang themselves. Also, its not so bad to sort of build up a rivalry with these types of players, as (if you are paying proper attention) it will inevitably lend itself in your favour, getting your opponents to make egotistical plays like my father did.

In our second match my dad sort of grinded me down a bit just showing up with the best hand a few times I would c-bet, until the following hand came up. My dad raised me 3x the blind and I called with k3 out of position sitting with about 40+ bb's. The flop came k58 rainbow. I checked with the intentions of this time getting in a check-raise in on the flop as the board texture lent itself to some more drawing possibilities. My dad followed up with a bet of 250 into 300, exactly what I wanted! I then raised him an additional 600, at which point he called. Now this is an interesting scenario that you will undoubtedly encounter with an inexperienced player at the WSOP. The question now is, what does he have??? The fact is the range is so wide its really hard to tell. The only thing you can know is that your top pair (even with such a crappy kicker is probably good - **it is important to note that this situation is not exactly the same because we are playing heads-up for fun and at the wsop you will be 6-9 handed and playing for big cash!**) is good! The turn came an ace of spades, at which point I went all-in. Unfortunately to my surprise my dad said call and turned over a2 off suit! Now, what is important here is not the outcome of the hand, what is important is understanding what wave-length these types of opponents are thinking on. Given the fact that my dad called me with only 3 clean outs - and the off chance that his ace is good - it is clear that his thought process essentially ends at the fact that he is only concerned with not being bullied out of the pot by his favourite son! Knowing that this is the likely scenario I actually should have checked and then called two more streets of betting (if that turned out to be the case) conceding that I may occasionally be beat by his donk ace-high call, but more to let him hang himself perhaps with a much worse single pair hand or to put a bunch more money in on a draw. Either way, understanding the wave-lengths that your DONK opponents will be thinking on will be vital to your success at the wsop. The only way to do this is to be keenly observant and pay extremely close attention to any hand that the donk turns face-up, whether you are in the hand or not! It might provide the vital piece of information you need to stack them.

Anyway, going 1-1 against the donk isn't such a bad result, because if he keeps playing the way he did I will invariably own his soul. The key is to remain patient as FUCK against these types of players and just wait for them to make the catastrophic blow-ups that we saw my dad make in match one.

Again, I hope this relates to those of you who are going to the wsop this summer. And again, play with fire and play to win!

David "muckducks" Cairns

So I just watched the Mike Tyson documentary and I realized that there are a whole host of parallels between Mike Tyson's success as a pro boxer and the attitude necessary for success in tournament poker (or poker in general). The parallel Mike Tyson has with a successful tournament poker player is ferocious competitiveness and confidence, but at the same time a fear of failure! I think this is the key to real success, confidence, but with that lurking presence of fear of failure in the back of your mind. Whatever this fear is it will be different for all of you. For me I always have the fear of building up a big stack, putting myself in a great position to win and then "mucking" it. I fear this because this used to be the biggest leek in my MTT game and something that I still battle with to this day. I also fear being ridiculed by others if I mess up in a big hand, as I don't want my image as a player to be tarnished by some vacuum situation where I'm either just not playing well, or its the combination of a bunch of factors. But behind this fear, lies great confidence. I am absolutely fearless when putting all my chips on the line if I think its the right time, I will run a stone cold bluff in your face and not even think twice about it if I know its going to work. These qualities are the qualities of a champion and certainly qualities you must possess in order to win. You have to be willing to truly live to be willing to die. THIS IS WHAT TOURNAMENT POKER IS! Mike Tyson certainly brings all of the qualities of a champion to the forefront. But he also has many weaknesses, weaknesses that come back to bite him in the ass and on several occasions (including his inevitable final exit from boxing) cause him a great deal of heartache. Whether it was some external factor like a relationship with his long time coach who died, or a women, or simply a loss of motivation they all come back to bite him when he is not fully alert and on his game.

The struggle to be a champion is not an easy one, and in essence it is a personal struggle. The reason I am bringing light to this movie is because I am using it as part of my motivational strategy to get ready for the WSOP. I want to make sure I go in there feeling supremely confident so I can go out there and cut some throats (not literally speaking of course!). But, I want to be ferociously competitive and ferociously confident. The only way I think you can do this in a pure and calming way is to have a little bit of fear in the back of your mind, of your opponents, but also yourself and what you might be capable of. Because I know with me I'm capable of doing some pretty crazy things at the poker table and without something to check that superego at the door it is entirely possible that I will see a lot of early exists. But a balance between the brink of insanity at the tables and complete control is what wins poker tournaments and in the case of Mike Tyson is what won him so many boxing championships.

Anyway, this is pretty much just a rant, but I hope it inspires you guys. For those of you who are going to the WSOP go in there with guns blazing and PLAY TO WIN!

David "muckducks" Cairns

Getting it in with 5s2s on a 559 rainbow board against a9 and losing to a 9 on the river for top 10 in chips with 2000 left in FTOPS ME are the kinds of things you have to love to play mtts!

muckducks :)

Hey guys,

I just wanted to extend a genuine thank you to those who checked out my video! Overall, the consensus seemed to be quite good and I have enjoyed engaging with you guys in the forums. The videos to come are going to show a lot of cool hands, but also and more importantly it will show you how to stay alive when going card dead. It will also show you what I feel are the best ways to extract maximum value from your big hands when deep in a tournament (this is a vital part of success in MTT poker because it allows you to avoid taking coin flips, or puts you in a better position to take them when they come about!). I look forward to getting some feedback on the next one guys so stay tuned!

On a side note:

I thought I'd take the opportunity to discuss what's been going on with me in poker since I took down such a huge life changing score. Basically, I had been chasing a win in a major tournament for several years, always coming up short on the deep runs that I would have. When I won this tournament, my initial gut reaction was "Yes!" A confirmation of all the hard work and dedication I have put into the game (you get that "fist pump Tiger Woods sensation" go through your body because you know you earned it). I did of course finally run very well, holding up in all of my 75-90% situations and winning most key coin flips and sucking out a few crucual times heads-up; but winning uncontested pots to stay alive was what got me there. Anyway, from the standpoint of the money, its obviously nice to have padded my BR by a substantial margin :) But in reality it is not what is important to me, the success of my hard work is really what I care about. The point I am trying to make here is that I want to encourage you guys to chase success, because money in poker, is the bi-product of dedication and hard work. I'm sure there are many of you out there also trying to chase that big tourney win, I encourage you to go for it! Just know, that an academic approach to the game and fierce competitiveness are the only ways you will get there. If any of you would like to discuss more about what its like to get that big score, how to handle it, or have any life, or poker related questions feel free to comment on my blog, I'd be happy to discuss with those who are interested.

Take care guys,

And once again thanks a lot for checking out my videos.

Dave

Hey Guys,

My first video posted today, hopefully all of you will get a chance to check it out! I am new to this whole process and would really appreciate all the constructive criticisms I can get. My goal is to make all of you better players, but you guys can also make me a better player as well! I look forward to your comments and stay tuned for some pretty cool sutff.

Best,

Dave