Chipstar1

The house my girlfriend and I are buying looks like it’s going to be completed 3 weeks early and I’m going to have to end my challenge to concentrate on sorting everything out and moving in. We expected things to get finalised early in January which gave me time complete my challenge and she took a week off work but the searches were finished within 3-4 weeks instead of the 6-7 we expected, now all there is to do is sign a few things, transfer the deposit and clear the mortgage funds, shouldn’t take too long now. Unfortunately my girlfriends in new york for a week on a trip with work friends so that might hold up things but as things stand it seems like it’ll all be finalised in a couple of weeks which coincides with my team online contract ending, I’m then going to take three weeks off for Christmas and time to get moved in before starting on my own in the new year.

I’m really looking forward to next year, pokerstars have given me the go ahead to change my name which I really wanted done because of the negative impact my contract had on my game I felt I needed a fresh start where no one recognised me, it isn’t a decision pokerstars takes lightly and isn’t the norm but given my circumstances they made an exception. I asked for the name change because even though I might not be a member of team online I felt there was still a chance that people at the tables would recognise me and still mess me around, I just want to blend back into society.

My Internet has been really bad for the past 3-4 weeks and it’s put be behind with the number of hands I wanted to play before the end of the year, as of now I just want to try and get in 10k hands a day for the remainder of my contract and try and get my bankroll above $1000 so I can move up to $10NL-$25NL next year.

I’m not sure what I’ll be doing with my blog next year, I kind of just want to go under the radar without all the self promotion. I’ll be making atleast one more blog post with my final graph since I moved back down to $2nl to regrind, it’ll probably be close to 250k hands.

Hey guys, my pokerstars contract runs out in a month and I won’t be signing another. Upon speaking with pokerstars we agreed that it’ll be beneficial for me to go it alone next year and I’m relieved to be doing so.

I’ve had quite a few conversations with my girlfriend over the past few months about leaving the team and I’m now relieved to be doing so. I enjoyed my time with team online but it became apparent to me that it just wasn’t for me.

Here’s my last email to pokerstars

It’s been a great experience being a member of team online. I realise I’ve struggled with putting in the volume I’d have wanted and it’s mainly due to the lack of motivation due to my results. Being a target at the tables has made it really difficult to progress the way I’d have wanted and if I’m honest if I had the chance to go back two years I’d probably have chosen another path.

It pains me to think how I’ve suffered from peoples attitude towards me at the tables and upon reviewing my results I can point to the exact point where my status had a negative impact on my game, it coincides with pokerstars changing my avatar and showing every table I was sitting at in red in the lobby, this was early April last year and if you check my results on ptr you can see the before and after. Hopefully next year I can start putting in more volume and get to where I want to be in poker to prove to myself that I can achieve the goals I set myself.

Since withdrawing my bankroll down to $200 I’ve been grinding $2nl to rebuild and have felt the pressure lift off, I’ve been happier grinding $2nl over the past few weeks than I’ve been in a long time, I have a challenge to play 600k hands by the end of the year and have another 500k to play. By the time I complete it I hope I’ve built enough bankroll to enable me to move back upto $25nl and have proven to myself I can put in the volume when I don’t feel presured.

I’m quite relieved to be going it alone next year, I’m in the process of buying a house and most of my bankroll has gone on the deposit, I felt it would be worth to sacrifice my bankroll for my future. Buying a home for the first time feels like a fresh start for me and having the freedom to go it alone next year will only add to that.

I know I’ve let pokerstars down in terms of the volume I’ve played at the tables but hope I’ve done a good job with my manner towards fellow players, my video’s and my hosting duties.

It’s been a pleasure working with you xxxxx and I hope things go well for you in the future.

Takecare

Time for another update guys…

Well it’s been 10 days since my last update and this is mainly due to not getting the volume in, I wanted to update at 100k hands but figured I’d do one earlier as my volume has only been 5k hands/day.  I’ve got 49 days to go and need to get in another 520k hands to complete my challenge, I think it’s around 10.5k hands a day from now on, a tough task but my hands getting better every day and last night I managed to get in my first 10k hand day.

I’ve been running pretty badly this month, although my ev looks the be close to the same as my last graph I’ve mainly ran bad in situations where I’ve getten 80% of my oppnents stack in by the turn and them hitting their two outter of draw. I used to be able to beat 2nl for 22bb/100 but I guess the games are tougher these days and with the rake increase I’m probably looking at something along the lines of 14bb.

Here’s my latest graph, hopefully my next update will be at 150k hands.

So far I’ve played just under 30k hands for my 600k challenge at 1c/2c, I hoped to have played 50k by the end of October but I came down with a virus and didn’t feel like playing much, my hand was aching pretty bad too which didn’t help.

My girlfriend and I are in the process of buying a house at the moment and as a result I’ve had to withdraw pretty much all my bankroll to pay for the deposit, it’ll be worth it in the end but right now $2NL is pretty all I can really play anyway.

I’m not sure what my plans are next year, It’s been so hard for me moving up past $25NL being a team pokerstars player that It might be beneficial for me to go it alone next year without having the target on my back, it’s been a struggle trying to work on my game and move up to higher limits when people are constantly 3betting me and never folding to my steals and cbets, I did so much pre team online that I think the my best option is to go it alone next year and see how things go, if things don’t go well then I’ll probably look for a change of career and play poker part time.

Here’s my graph so far anyway, I’ll be looking to play 8-10k hands a day from here on out, hopefully I can make $1000 I November, that’s my goal, although it’ll be a lot tougher now that when I used to play a couple of years ago due to the rake increase, I think it’s around 6-7bb/100 difference, so in theory if my win rate was around 22bb/100 before it’d be around 15-16bb/100 now. It’s around that at the moment but I have ran below ev so far and have been dealt fewer premiums than I should on average, hopefully I can maintain 18-20bb over the course of the challenge.