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 I found I enjoy writing about poker, so I took the time to write this. I am currently in the process of writing Part 2, so more to come! enjoy!

Part 1: Reacting to the isolation raise

When you sit down at a poker table you should try and categorise as many players as possible. It is the players’ tendencies that are going to impact your game play or at least they should be. These tendencies may become more apparent over time but keeping record of players can help you in this area. Having statistics on each player will certainly help you do this, although it is not necessary for everyone. I personally do not use them and the reason is I like to play creatively and take a more feel approach and sometimes statistics can cloud my judgement. This is just my personal preference and I recently took a personality test which showed that I rely on a feel approach in many situations. I believe each poker player should tune their game style to their abilities and their strengths. Although you have a style your game should still be changing as dynamics of the game change.

When I open up a table, I firstly look around to see if there are weak players and try and sit on their left. An interesting table dynamic that can arise is when a weak player open limps. If it is folded around to me I will open up my range to isolate this player by raising. My goal is to see a flop heads up against this player but if he folds I can collect the dead money which is just as good. When I raise in this situation I will raise 1 big blind bigger than my opening raise; this is because I want to discourage others from entering the pot if they have position on me. The reason I want to discourage others from entering the pot is my range is a little wider in this situation and I don’t want to get lots of callers who had a better price. The goal is to play against the weaker player but if I have good players behind me still left to act I will likely have to make my isolation raising range tighter.

If a weaker player limps in and a player to my right raises and I know they are capable of isolating I will 3-bet in this spot more often than I would do if the weaker player had not limped in. This is because I know the player who isolated has a wider range in this situation and if they are doing this regularly I will be more inclined to 3-bet wider. The frequency in which they isolate will have a strong correlation to how wide my 3-bet range is. In this scenario my range will consist of the typical range I normally 3-bet for value with and sometimes I will increase this slightly if I believe I can get value from worse hands. The other part to my range are hands with little value but which have some high card value e.g. K4s which means I can still make top pair or flop a flush draw when called.

Therefore when I know this player is likely to be isolating a weaker player I widen my range for 3-betting. Although I will widen my 3-bet range in this spot, this does not necessarily mean that I am increasing the number of hands that I raise for value. Rather, to ensure my range remains polarised. This means I appear aggressive with a wider range but the range I will be stacking off with is still the typical range of your tight aggressive player. When I 3-bet with K4s I do not lose value from my hand as it is a hand I do not normally open or 3-bet with, I am only playing it because I think I am going to take down the pot enough of the time because of this particular table dynamic. The reason why I prefer to have K4s compared to 62o is firstly K4s makes top pair more often, it is suited which adds some value and it reduces the chance he has AK or KK. If instead I have a hand with good post flop potential i.e. a suited connector or low pocket pair, I likely want to keep the pot small and keep the weaker player in the pot and I will just call the isolation raise and try and make two pair or better or a strong draw. If I have a mid pocket pair e.g. 88 I don’t want to 3-bet as I cannot stand a 4-bet so I will call with these hands. I will be more inclined to call if the regular who isolated will likely 4-bet or fold, when holding a hand that can’t stand a 4-bet but is still good.

When thinking about 3-betting in this situation I will first consider other factors before deciding. If I have players behind who are aggressive and know that I am 3-betting with a wider range then I will have to make sure it is not too wide to the extent that I am easily exploited. Another important factor to consider is my image. When considering my image, it is more feel based than anything; I likely have an overall image and a current image. This could be the case if I play an overall tight aggressive game but have played a looser style for this session. Knowing which one will have a greater impact will help me make better decisions. It is important to indentify the players who will 4-bet you light just because you 3-bet three times in a row against them and the ones that will still wait for a good hand, but widen their range slightly for now. If my image is perceived as tight I will be more inclined to 3-bet a player who is likely isolating.

 Here is my last 5-6 months of play

Long time since I posted an update, no I didn\’t go broke. Just didn\’t feel like blogging. Well I will post a graph probably soonish as I <3 graphs lol. Anyway I have just made a break out a break even stretch of 50,000 hands although its a little early to say that im completely clear. My winrate overall has been positive but thats because of running worse at 200NL a while back. In my last 30,000 hands at 100NL I have had a winrate of 8bb/100. Its been pretty ugly, I have repeatedly had 10 buy in downswings, and I know its due to my laggy style. Anyway the feeling sucks so bad when you run the table over you made like 20BB from being aggro pre flop and on the flop and then you get it all in as a huge favourite and your aggressive image has worked for you, then he sucks out… and its like eurgg…

During this time I have done so much learning and thinking and really got to grips with hands I 3-bet IP and plays for checking as the pre-flop aggressor, to shove over any flop bet. A good spot is you squeeze with AA and get two callers, and flop is like 810K, 2 suits and when you check it normally means your done with the hand. There\’s alot of money in the pot, so this spot is pretty good to shove over the top.

Also I like the concept of smooth calling AK to an UTG raise but 3-betting AJo, as with AJo you will often be getting reversed implied odds so you should just muck this hand but by 3-betting you can get him to fold by overepping your hand and it makes it easier to play than flopping an ace and trying to guess on the turn when he fires again, when u have top pair. Generally I am now 3-betting hands in spots where there\’s a raise and a call, like AJo that play well heads up. But flatting AJs that play well in multiway pots and KQs… Before I was probably 3-betting just because its profitable to 3-bet IP against people but now I am doing it for a more deeper purpose and calling for good reasons. Also while I dont tilt all that much, I get pretty annoyed which leads to a few loose pre flop calls but then I shut back down to playing well. I think I need to try and get into a deeper focus and play less robotic. As there are some games I am unsure what everyone has and others where I feel I am getting very accurate reads and know how to play my hand on each street. This will be my main focus right now, GL HF.

I am feeling good with the discipline I have forced upon myself. Imagine being in my situation you have played 80,000 hands and have made $8000. Then in 3 days you lose 30% of your winnings (losses of $2300-$2500). It may look like I lost too much but in reality I am still bankrolled for $200NL and overolled for $100NL, and I can lose 10-12 buy ins and be ok.

I think I wasn\’t over reacting by trying to quit, its a devasting loss. I shrug it off and spend a few days thinking if I am winner or not. I critize myself loads in my head but yet remain confident to others. I think there is no harm in being negative for a while as long as you aren\’t playing. Once I found some corrections I can make and felt confidence I knew I can beat the game I stepped down a limit and have been grinding. I am pleased I can do this as I was afraid of this situation for a while. In the last week I have been playing good poker and running well. I have turned my $400 deposit into $2300 and have almost recovered my losses at $200NL.

In the end people should realise everyone goes through this and not many deal with it correctly. Playing your cards well is just one factor, you have to be able to cope with losing and despite tilting a little bit I am pleased as I took the right steps to recover.

My plan is to build a bankroll for $200NL out of what I have online currently. This way I dont risk not being able to pay rent as I cashed out my previous roll and will use this for living exspenses. Therefore I am building my roll up again at $100NL, which isn\’t a problem as I realised I have leaks to plug, which will be good to get fixed at $100NL. My winrate is about 8 big blinds per 100 hands and i want to push this up to at least 12 big blinds per 100. Then I should have a better game and a roll for 200NL.

GL all

Well I have moved from parents house to a shared house with my friends. I have lecture\’s starting on monday and have had lots going on. Unfortunately I lost a little over $2000 playing $1/$2 recently. It was run bad and then run bad some more and then I was running bad and playing really bad. I decided I wanted to quit the game, I made an immediate cash out of everything and tried to switch of from the game. Instead after a couple of days I watched some more training videos and did alot more thinking on my game. I have now made some changes, I think I am a winner at $200NL but when you run bad its always a good idea to just take a break and try and improve while you clear your head.

I redopsited on the same site and have been playing NL100 a little bit today and yesterday and so far so good. The goal is to recover my recent losses and I am in no rush and I feel more confident in my game. I have done alot of thinking on suited connectors and when to 3-bet them IP, OOP and when I should be calling with them.

Also some good news is for my final project at university I will be writing a poker tool which will most likely be a poker bot for NL. I will have one of the professors as my superviser and he loves poker. Hopefully I can play him, I shall let you know ^^

GL guys.

Summer is coming to an end and soon I will be studying again. I have a £2000 sponsor and perhaps a little help from my grandparents. Im hoping I can achieve a balance through uni including studying,
playing poker and having fun with friends. It could become stressful when rent is due and I have had a bad downswing. If I can make $1000 a month I think I will be fine. I am hoping I can find an hour a
day to play, which will likely be in the evenings.

My rent is £270 (pounds) a month and my tuition fees will be covered by my sponsor. I have noticed the site I am playing on becoming tougher as it is likely people are no longer on holiday. I know I am
going to have to make bigger folds and sometimes I appear quite spewy but its because I see alot of crazy action but I think that will die down a little. I think I have a good game vs the regulars which is
important. If I can beat the winners on the site I should be fine. Im sure overtime there will be more competent players but I can always grind $100NL which I feel very comfortable playing. $200NL is a
little more challenging but for me the biggest factor is handling bigger losses when things go bad.
 

My goal for october is to make $1000. I believe I will be spending the most that month, from books and partying. The bigger goal is to make my bankroll grow over time, while making withdrawals to pay
for rent and living exspenses.
      

Wish me Luck
 

Graph for 24th May to 7th September (total made including bonuses and FPP is $8500)

Link To Graph

Haven\’t updated in a while mainly because I haven\’t played much. My pc broke so had to order the parts and build a new one. Then i went away for 4 days but in the last 2-3 days I have put in over 10 hours.

When i got back from Holiday I immediately ran super cold, and lost 4 buy ins at $100NL. I just wanted to play $100NL before playing $200NL. I had something to eat then played $200NL not to chase losses as I have a bankroll for $200NL and I thought I was playing ok.

I had the usual annoying beats, KK vs AA, QQ vs KK, AA vs 99 losing them all.. Then 77 on a 7AA board, he has AJ, turn is J sigh.. soon I was down $800-$900. I felt pretty tilted and tired but carried on until i was down only $150.

The next day I repeated the whole thing losing $800 and making most of it back. It just seemed like I was only able to win if they folded, if they called I always lossed. I seen it before ye whatever… it still hurts lol. I just wanted AK to hold against A10 but it never did. I soon became pretty tilted and called off a flush draw with a pair for a shove of about 6x the pot size. I then realised everyone was doing it and picked of two others with considerable better hands but still quite marginal. I then started over betting when I thought they would stack off. I climbed back up with some good plays and used my tilted image to my advantage.

Today I had a $100 PL Omaha table, a $100 NL table and two $200 NL tables. Sometimes when your on a cold streak you just need to suck out once to feel a whole lot better. On the Omaha table I got it in with a underset and sucked out for quads! I then sucked out a short stack on the $200NL table with A10 vs AK. In all It was no more than $200 made but it felt better. It put me up $300 over the 10-11 hours of play so pretty good considering.

I have been playing 100NL and 200NL, and have managed to 4-table 200NL for a few hours now. Ive had a really good run recently. At 100NL i feel comfortable and I can make plays and I wasn\’t sure if I was going to be able to play 100% at 200NL.

But I had a hand where I called a flop bet with a gut-shot and with the intention of raising some good turn cards to make him fold. I thought he would fold mostly and I still had a little equity in the hand. My hand certainely isn\’t strong but with enough fold equity I can play if profitable by raising. In this case I decided to call and raise the turn. I got a fold.

Also I managed to tripple barrel at 200NL as a bluff and that worked out. I also flatted a 3-bet with Kings in a spot I thought he was making a move and raised his c-bet on the flop and took it down. I could have flatted again but I wanted to give him a chance to make a big mistake plus he could have hit the board with a pair.

Its been going well, I have had the odd moment but nothing too annoying. I had KK vs AA and stacked off there, which is very standard, some smaller pots ofc but surely running above expectation. Although played more 100NL than 200NL.

TBH I think im still in shock how good poker is going for me. I will be really pleased when I hit 100,000 hands as this is a good sample size to show if your a winner or a loser. I think im about 30,000 hands short.

Ive made a few changes to my game. Dropping broadway hands and using suited connectors a little more. Im managing about 2-3 hours which maybe is a slight increase from 1.5 – 2 hours.